Super Nintendo Classic Edition Announced! Retrogamers Prepare to Stand In Line, Again
When Nintendo announced the Nintendo NES Classic Mini they threw their hat into the uncharted, for them, territory of Plug and Play consoles. For years Nintendo was known for nickel and diming fans on the Virtual Console yet here was a new piece of hardware from them that featured several games for a much lower price than the VC one. The case containing the hardware was quite cute too - definitely pulled on the nostalgia strings. Today, Nintendo announced there is to be a successor to the NES Classic Mini - the Super Nintendo Classic Edition.
What does it come with
21 games will be installed, there is no information yet if this one will be as easy to mod as the previous release (probably a new security method is in use just to keep it interesting). The games included are:
Contra III: The Alien Wars
Donkey Kong Country
Earthbound (probably won't include scratch and sniff stickers)
F-Zero
Final Fantasy III
Kirby Super Star (8 games in one)
Kirby's Dream Course
Legend of Zelda III: A Link to the Past
Mega Man X
Secret of Mana
Star Fox
Super Castlevania IV (devs loved adding "super" to titles on this console)
Super Ghouls 'n Ghosts
Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars
Super Mario World
Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island
Super Mario Kart
Super Metroid
Super Punch-Out
Super Street FIghter II Turbo
That is only 20 games
Yes, the best I saved for last. For the first time ever, gamers will get to play Star Fox 2! Nintendo is finally releasing the sequel to their flagship Super FX chip game. Considering what the illegal cart makers charge for Star Fox 2 to run on your SNES, this bundle is a steal. It is like buying Star Fox 2 and getting everything else for free.
What else will be in the box
Two wired classic Super Nintendo style controllers, the SNES Classic Mini, and cords to hook it up.
I can't wait to play my collection again in HD
Hold on there sport, this will be like the NES Classic Mini, there is not going to be a cartridge slot t o play your games (or that Everdrive cart) on the SNES Classic Mini. Sorry. This is a closed playground and Nintendo controls what plays on it.
When will it be available?
September 29th, 2017. So go ahead and plan on getting in line on August 20th or something if the NES Classic Mini popularity is anything to be considered. Scalpers will be out in force on this one, again. The price will be $79.99, though scalpers will, of course, reserve right to bend you over and take your wallet and whatever else they deem necessary as fair trade here.
What are my chances of getting one at retail price
Odds are not in your favor. This is based on how the NES Classic Mini went over. I live in Arkansas and the NES Classic Mini was still sold out in minutes, if stores that were supposed to have it even put it out (managers and other employees usually have first pick of stuff like this).
After years and years of dealing with scalpers, getting this product email newsletter in my gmail today is what finally made me filter Nintendo emails straight to the archive. It will be exactly like the NES one, over-priced already and insulting even at MSRP, but scalped like crazy. How many times over do we have to buy the same games?
Yes, I'm still salty from the MM N3DS situation. Never again.
September 29th, 2017 - Cool! I'll set up my alarm clock for Aug 20. Thank you!
Upvote for you that got me to laugh.
Haha :)
Seconded! LOL. :)
What no mario kart..aww
Super Mario Kart is on the list.
Even though I already own most of the original cartridges I am still very tempted to just get this regardless! Haven't read it yet but I was wondering how they will handle the screen resolution since we all have widescreens now...
I have not heard anything about this either. Probably the same way they did the NES Classic Mini.
cool, old scool rocks
I still have the super nintendo, only one cable has broken.. I hope its fixable.
Check your local mom and pop game store. They often have third party, newer, cables (audio/video and power supplies) and even third party (sometimes first party, but expensive) controllers too.
Cool, figures they would make one for the SNES seen how well the NES mini did ^^ I actually could order it pretty easely online (in Europe) just a few days before it came out last time.
May I ask why you didn't pre-order the last one? Not a fan of the included games?
I did, just very late :P. Whasn't sure if I was gonna get it at first
Why do I have the feeling my son will want one for Christmas?!
There are worse things he could want. Like a Red Ryder Carbine Action 200-shot Range Model air rifle with a compass in the stock.
The lack of Super Mario Allstars and Turtles in Time makes me sad. I'm still getting it, though.
Mega Man X and Super Castlevania in particular please me. I've beaten both games on so many occasions.
I can understand why Turtles in Time is not on here because of the confusing licensing that Ubi Soft had to jump through to make the update a few years ago for one (and it didn't even make it to PC).
Super Mario All-Stars though, that is a confusing omission indeed.
What other games would you have liked to see on this thing?
I would have enjoyed seeing some scrolling shooters like UN Squadron and Darius, R-Type, etc myself. Even though I suck at them now, I still enjoy blowing stuff up.
Also, no wrestling games whatsoever. Weird again, considering how popular WWE is. Though this might have required some editing of the ROMs for graphics and even possibly music in certain cases.
Ah, I was not aware of the licensing issue. A shame.
I guess I would have liked to have Mega Man X 2 and 3, but I can understand why they're not included. They weren't as popular as X, and too many X games would have been too much, I guess.
As for WWE, is WWE that popular, though? I think the recent RAW ratings say differently. They've been hitting all time lows, or close to that lately.
I think there's a fanbase for wrestling, per se, as shown by the rise in independent wrestling, but I think the WWE is currently failing to deliver content that the wrestling audience wants.
What do you think?
Tried this response at work but the browser timed out and I lost a REALLY long response. I am going to do my best to rewrite it from memory.
The licensing issue is one that comes up a lot in #retrogaming, unfortunately. I work with a few gaming companies that try to bring back some classics but they constantly run into problems with the licensing. Sometimes it is that no one knows who owns the license for the characters and related things, sometimes it is a case of no one knowing who owns the game code itself. Other times it is a situation where many people claim ownership, yet have no proof other than a hungry lawyer. We see this a lot on Kickstarter, for instance while Interplay released Boogerman on PC and Sega Genesis, there are two guys that claim they own the rights to that game and even tried a #Kickstarter for a remake of it.
Apparently each company did things differently back 20+ years ago - I was not aware that the programmer of the game, under contract and paid for services, retained rights to the game. Or that the artists retained rights to graphics they provided, again under fully paid contract. Yet that is some of what I have heard of popping up when companies have tried to revive a classic. It is a mess. Capcom went through this with Ghosts 'n Goblins, that is why the PS2 games were initially called Maximo instead of an iteration of the popular naming system for that franchise.
A situation like this almost stopped the Ubi Soft remake of the arcade game of TMNT on Xbox 360 and PS3.
WWE is an enigma. People tune in, they pay attention to social media and interviews with wreestlers and then claim "it is dying" or "they are not as big as they seem". Of course they are not. They have no competition, they bought everyone out. They will never reach the levels of the Monday Night Wars ratings because there is nothing for them to go against that would force them to try harder.
I wish they would have spun WCW off as a separate company like intended. They didn't do it because the parent company of USA Network was enforcing a little clause in the contract that restricted Titan Sports to only airing wrestling related shows to that particular family of channels and only USA Network was interested in running a wrestling show. Can't "compete" against another show if that show airs before or after yours.
Now, had WWE done like I thought they would back in the day, spin WCW off under ownership of Shane McMahon, then they could have gotten around that contractual clause. Of course I am sure that would have required Shane to absolve his portfolio of his shares of Titan Sports for legal reasons and this probably was not an option anyone was interested in (a ton of stock being sold could cause a severe drop in value for one).
Anhow, just imagine had they done that. Imagine if Shane, rather than building a PPV style set of fight channels in the Asian market, ran WCW. Would it still be around today? Who nows. I think had he done that we would not be looking at TNA or ROH right now which were created to fill the void of "anything but WWE" that WCW left.
Wrestling games though, getting back on track here, would be a tough sell. I admit that. Other than Undertaker's appearances in those games back then, who else would be the poster child for the games? I am sure editing the ROMS and getting new wrestlers and theme music put in would have been over the budget that Nintendo has for these Classic Mini consoles (though that would be freaking awesome - and the inclusion of Star Fox 2 gives me hope that these will eventually not just be "cash runs").
I would have loved to see some games translated that never got released here in the USA on the NES Classic Mini such as Sweet Home. That would have helped push the plug and play even higher in collectible status.
I am a little dumbfounded as to why they stopped at 21 games. Why not 30? Why not more 3rd party titles or more first party? Where is Killer Instinct (is Microsoft holding that one hostage since they own Rare now?).
Chrono Trigger and Mortal Kombat are missing from the list. Of course the turtles are gone because of licensing. Sad when a little paper work gets in the way really.
Sadly, I think licensing is holding back a ton of potential games for this plug and play. Killer Instinct is one (Microsoft). Rock n Roll Racing is another (music licenses).
Yeah its pretty sad. Just glad to see the system coming out though really.
Eh, cool. Hardcore gamers will snag this up. I'll take the RetroPie option por favor!
By Nintendo keeping these things extremely limited is just forcing fans to non-official options like the RetroPie.
All the mainstream gaming companies failed to adapt to the new tech. nintendo and microsoft are probably the most resiliant i guess. nintendo should capitalize or AR but they're stalling.
Nintendo has a strong history of being last to the party. They let tech mature before using it.
Found this if you are still in the market for a Raspberry Pi solution - https://www.amazon.com/CanaKit-Raspberry-Complete-Starter-Kit/dp/B01C6Q2GSY/ Complete with case and everything (not nearly as cool as the SNES Mini case though).
Good looks. I'm bound to get into the Raspberry Pi scene at some point.