Before Xbox vs Playstation there was SNES vs Megadrive – the console war that defined a generation.
The original Nintendo Super Entertainment System was released in 1990 in Japan and South Korea, 1991 in North America, 1992 in Europe and Australasia (Oceania), and 1993 in South America.
Now more than 25 years later we have a new version loaded with classic games an HDMI compatibility.
Watch the trailer for the SNES Mini here:
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Fans of the original will know that it is almost impossible to connect the 90s to a modern television.
The original used a Coaxial cable, which almost no television has anymore. You could however take the cable from a Nintendo GameCube and use that on a SNES, which allowed you to play games over Scart.
But now even the hardy scart socket is being phased out of modern televisions making SNES consoles increasingly complicated to keep alive.
The lovely grey of the 90s consoles has also turned a weird shade of yellow on most consoles.
So this re-release is actually perfectly timed to rescue a hugely influential set of games from being lost to us forever – or reserved exclusively for PC emulation people (which is against the law in most cases and countries).
And what a set of games they are, the console comes with 20 preloaded games (slightly different for the Europe, US and Japanese versions) and one previous unreleased game Star Fox 2.
The European SNES Mini comes with these games:
Contra III: The Alien Wars™Donkey Kong Country
EarthBound
Final Fantasy III
F-ZERO
Kirby Super Star
Kirby’s Dream Course
The Legend of Zelda™: A Link to the Past
Mega Man X
Secret of Mana
Star Fox
Star Fox 2
Street Fighter II Turbo: Hyper Fighting
Super Castlevania IV™Super Ghouls ’n Ghosts
Super Mario Kart
Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars
Super Mario World
Super Metroid™
Super Punch-Out!!
Yoshi’s Island
Some incredibly iconic titles from gaming history. Genre-defining, genre-spawning in some cases.
I have to give a special shout out to one of my all-time favourites, Street Fighter II. I’ve probably put more hours into that game through the years than most World of Warcraft addicts.
It has been a central part of every house-share I’ve lived in for almost a decade ending many fights over the dishes with digital KOs.
Also worth mentioning is Kirby’s Dream Course, an underappreciated gem that made use of the SNES’s innovative 3D chip.
It’s basically a golf game where you are the ball. Its two player mode has to be played to be fully understood.
One of my favourite gaming memories of all time is me and my mate Beavis having a nail-biting 10-hour competition where we completed the game in vs-mode in a single night.
Of course, back in the day you had to complete games in a single night as most of them wouldn’t allow you to save, Kirby’s Dream Course actually being an exception to be fair.
However, Nintendo have addressed that too in the SNES Mini by adding save slots and rewind feature to the pre-loaded games.
Hardcore fans might baulk at those modern features in classic games, but it allows you to enjoy games in the way that we live now. You can always not use those features if they offend you.
Royal Mail have just texted me and my SNES Mini was just delivered to my house while I’m sat at work writing about it.
