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A Review of Nintendo Power #1
Via Joystiq, a review on the site X-Entertainment of the very first issue of Nintendo Power. Amusing if only for the sake of nostalgia. From the article: "There's the table of contents. The big games at the time were The Legend of Zelda and the just-released Super Mario Bros. 2. To their credit, Nintendo covered a lot of the older games kids were still into playing, mixing the stuff people wanted to see with the stuff they wanted you to see. It wasn't just one big commercial in print. While they weren't really going to come down on any of the games for their own system, all of the articles were approached honestly enough. They usually steered away from romanticizing crap - if the game sucked, they didn't say it sucked, but they didn't spend a whole lot of time talking about it."
but at that time, what did they have to worry about competing with?
i still have this issue, in decent shape. i will admit that the reviews were fair (in retrospect) but it still has more to do with the fact that what could possibly compare?
maybe i missed a few months, but one game which was truly great for the NES (life force) i never saw much about.
007-373-5963
For some reason this code has been burned into my mind since I was 6, at the time this issue came out. I don't remember if this code to skip straight to Tyson was actually in the magazine or not, but it is still relevant. Sadly, this wasn't quite as known as the Konami code.
It helped me beat the 2nd quest of Zelda because it contained a full walkthrough for it. At that time I probably could not have done it without their help(no gamefaqs.com back then :P)
Ah memories.
Monstar L
Still was one of the best gaming mags out there because despite being only about Nintendo, they wherent afraid to trash games for their system that sucked. I can remember more than a fer 2-3 pointt scored in that mag.
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These and some of the other comics that appeared in the magazine were always fun to read. http://hn.iodized.net/main.htm
I had the original first issue once (it was given away to Fun Club subscribers after all). A lot of the artwork in NP in those days was taken from a Japanese Nintendo publication, I believe. The issue is notable for containing some interesting character art for Mario 2, including a two-page spread that was basically just an excuse to show the characters and various enemies competing in track-and-field events. The art isn't bad mind you, but it just goes to show how random Nintendo Power could be in those days.
justin bailey
______ ______
, anyone?
(I tried to put the code in caps, but the filter caught it.)
Even after I stopped playing console games, I still subscribed to NP. I don't really know why. There's a bunch of issues of it next to my right foot that I don't think I've ever even seen, let alone read.
For some reason, I feel compelled to go look for the old Final Fantasy strategy guide and read about Warmech. Again, I really, really don't know why. I didn't even get past the Elf Kingdom in Final Fantasy. I'm more of an FFIX guy myself.
Ahhh that takes me back, Life Force the first game that I actually bought with my own money (I seem to remember it was about £30 which was a lot of money for a 9 year old). Cracking two player shoot-em-up action that I played over and over again. They tried remaking it on ther GBA but it just wasn't the same.
To err is human. To forgive is not company policy.
To their credit, Nintendo covered a lot of the older games kids were still into playing, mixing the stuff people wanted to see with the stuff they wanted you to see. It wasn't just one big commercial in print.
Pushing their older games in addition to their newer games makes it even more of a commercial, imho.
This guy's the limit!
Issue 1 started the tradition of "The new Zelda: comign soon! Really!"
I'm still amused that Zelda II was covered in the Official Nintendo Player's Guide even though the game was years away at that point. The box art they put in the book was even hand drawn.
I found it digging through some old stuff of mine stored in my parent's attic. It was pretty beat up though.
That magazine used to be great. The 1st issue was probably the best one published by Nintendo. It had the most info about upcoming games, the most tips, tricks, and strategies. However, with each issue after that one, there was less and less of that kind of content. Nowadays, I think its more ads than anything.
What also made that issue great was the fact that it was free. If you were a member of the Nintendo Fun Club (which was also free), you recieved the first issue free. However, creating Nintendo Power was Nintendo's way of saying that they wanted you to pay for those tips, tricks, etc. Before Nintendo Power, you could just join the Nintnedo Fun Club for free and get a monthly newsletter with this sort of information. I wish I still had some of those newsletters, they'd probably be worth something in the collector's market.
Oh well...
DEAD DEAD DEAD DELETE ME
anyone else remember calling this #? It rocked, they'd send you printed stratagy guides for free. I had a full walkthrough for Phantasy Star with maps. Too bad i couldn't afford $100 for the game :).
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I remember subscribing to Nintendo Power since the beginning but I didn't have that first issue. I think the first one I got had a clay version of Mega Man on the front.
I subscribed (or rather mom did) to NP for 3 years, which got me the "gold lapel pin" with the NP logo... which I still have on my desk to this day. I also have the satin NP "members only" jacket... I don't wear this even though I want to. At 30, the pin says cool retro gamer guy, the jacket says lives with his mother.
My favorite issue was the SMB3 special issue.
That magazine used to be top-notch, partially because Nintendo basically was the console-game industry. More than that, though, it used to not be the propaganda machine it is today, as the blurb points out. I dunno exactly what the state of the book is now, but I stopped reading around the time they hyped up the execrable Donkey Kong Country because it had awesome graphics (and, of course, because it was a Nintendo first-party). Before that, NP really was as honest as it could be about the quality of the games, and it also had a lot of other great stuff like Counselor's Corner and the big maps for selected games. There were also a lot of great feature articles. I remember one in particular about interesting games that didn't make it to America; one of them was Mother, before Earthbound made that franchise popular over here.
For the record, I was also one of those people that got a subscription as a Christmas (or maybe birthday?) gift because it came with Dragon Warrior, though I'd been reading the mag occasionally when I could beg my mom to buy it off of the newsstand. I'd read it religiously from that point up to the time I mentioned up there, which I think covered at least 40 issues or so, and I didn't completely give up on it and allow my subscription to lapse until the end of 1996. It's one of only two video-game magazines I miss, the other being VideoGames & Computer Entertainment.
Rob
and Nester who grew up to be every griefer/forum troll that plays video games today.
The second issue had the dressed up Belmont guy holding Drac's head, which was shooting lazer beams from it. I remember this because they had to re-issue that issue with a changed cover.
That Black Covered Player's Guide was even more interesting...its maps of Metroid made me get an NES, I knew that nothing quite like it was going to be coming out for the C=64, even if the latter was a more powerful system.
Actually that map may have helped make me the gaming wuss I am today. It seems like that game with all its hidden stuff would be almost impossible to get through without some kind of outside support...
SO YOU'RE GOING TO DIE: The Comic for Dealing with Death