The NES Reincarnated

[agentgray]

IGN has a review of the Generation NEX (http://gear.ign.com/articles/677/677770p1.html), "a NES/Famicom re-release dressed up with some of the technological niceties our great society has developed over the past 20 years." They give it a 9.5.The Generation NEX is unmistakably a NES, straight down to its simple grey and black color scheme. Fortunately, 20 years of technological progress has allowed the package to shrink a little, and the NEX is a thin 1.5" tall. Messiah also managed to expand upon the original NES design even while shrinking it down, and added support for Famicom cartridges, 2.4 GHz wireless controllers, and dual-mono sound.http://www.playmessiah.com/product/images/Buy_image/Buy_NEX.jpg
Image courtesy of Messiah's website.

I've got some old cart's lying around. I may have to give this a try. Anyone else considering picking it up?

[Suicidal ShiZuru]

Flippin sweet, Ill be getting one soon.

[bapenguin]

dual mono sound? Isnt' that called stereo? :)

Looks sweet, I want one....wish I still had my NES. I hung onto a Genesis thank god.

[Vandenh]

Look around on the net guys, it got some bad reviews on other sites. Compatibility is a prob.

[fushi]

Generation NEX is Not Good (http://www.evilavatar.com/forums/showthread.php?t=6810).

[PantherModern]

I've still got a fully functioning toploader, so it really wouldn't be worth it. The controllers are cool though.

[TheEpicOfTyler]

I was about to say, I remembered something a few months back that said the thing was shit.

[see colon]

dual mono sound? Isnt' that called stereo? :)
dual mono =/= stereo

[Jukey]

Wouldn't buy it if it worked perfectly. I prefer not to revisit "old" games and platforms as it is always disappointing. My memories of playing are better than playing again. :)

[Syl]

I also remember hearing that this thing had horrendous issues. It's a shame, as i love the idea.

[Lodin]

Other than this IGN review I've only heard bad things. Think I'll rather just keep playing emulators til the Revo comes around.

[AniAko]

Lot's of companies are doing it. Personally, I'd rather search the earth for an original NES, and relive the memories of BLOWING BLOWING BLOWING the carts, and the half-wedge load ;). I was a master at "half-wedge loads" as well as the "active dis-lodge resets". I'd rather have the real deal. Although an alternative is always appreciated, just never ventured for me.

[*Legion*]

Just buy a new connector and fix your old NES. $10 and a screwdriver, and you're up and running again. Most dead NESs have absolutely nothing wrong with them except a worn-out connector. The nice gold-plated ones you can buy online are better than the connectors that came with the system.

[WastelandDan]

DO NOT BUY THIS. Aside from the numerous reviews I've read about it saying that it's complete shit, I know someone who got one and said the thing is a piece of crap. It has emulation issues with a number of games, including the stellar River City Ransom, and overall is a piece of shit in pretty packaging. Let the buyer beware!

[Orz]

Cheap plastic. Horrible controller. Flawed sound emultation in every game. Other emulation issues in every game, ranging from missing sprites to total non-functionality.

[EternalGamer]

Baps, you might have been making a semantic based joke, but just incase the difference between "dual mono" and "stereo" is this: dual mono means you would get the exact same sounds coming from two different source speakers. Stereo would mean that each speaker broadcasts its own sound channel.

Dan

[AniAko]

Cheap plastic. Horrible controller. Flawed sound emultation in every game. Other emulation issues in every game, ranging from missing sprites to total non-functionality.

Give me Nesticle (http://bloodlust.zophar.net/NESticle/nes.html) baby. That freakin program even supported IP/IPX connections for LAN play WAY back in the 95 DOS days :p

[hideouslywrinkled]

Just buy a new connector and fix your old NES. $10 and a screwdriver, and you're up and running again. Most dead NESs have absolutely nothing wrong with them except a worn-out connector. The nice gold-plated ones you can buy online are better than the connectors that came with the system.

Hey Legion, have you replaced your connector?

I've thought about it, but have never gotten around to it. And where can you find the new connector (and perhaps a good online how-to guide)?

[Roc Ingersol]

nice idea. too bad its shit =/

[Chimpbot]

Cheap plastic. Horrible controller. Flawed sound emultation in every game. Other emulation issues in every game, ranging from missing sprites to total non-functionality.

That's funny, because every game I have one and I haven't run into any of these problems, at all. Ever.
I tried it out with every single NES cart I own, and they all work. Rather well, actually...even River City Ransom.
To be honest, I haven't noticed any of the problems being attributed to this thing.
Oh well. Mine works. I suppose that's good enough for me!

[momusak]

ah the days of contra and side scrollers, I wish that XBOX Live would bring back Contra :), that would be sweet :)

[MrMeatshake]

Generation NEX is Not Good (http://www.evilavatar.com/forums/showthread.php?t=6810).
i love this forum.

[MaiXu]

So you need old carts to play on this thing? As much as I like to collect old games, wouldn't an emulator be a helluva lot cheaper and easier?

[frederec]

So you need old carts to play on this thing? As much as I like to collect old games, wouldn't an emulator be a helluva lot cheaper and easier?

To me this thing seems more to let people play the carts they already have lying around. I've got a number of NES carts, and if I didn't have a working console this would be pretty tempting. But I have a toploader, and so I just bust that out if I want to get some goodness.

[EGO]

So, let me get this straight, everybody else has a differing opinion from the ALL MIGHTY PILLAR OF INTEGRITY IGN!?! :rolleyes:

[Selar]

Hey Legion, have you replaced your connector?

I've thought about it, but have never gotten around to it. And where can you find the new connector (and perhaps a good online how-to guide)?

I've replaced my connector in my NES. It's very simple, and the connector I bought came with pretty good instructions on how to do it. Once you get your system open, it's pretty obvious. There's not a whole lot of guts inside an NES.

You can find a ton of them on eBay (where I got mine). System works like a charm.

[miah]

I've replaced my connector in my NES. It's very simple, and the connector I bought came with pretty good instructions on how to do it. Once you get your system open, it's pretty obvious. There's not a whole lot of guts inside an NES.

You can find a ton of them on eBay (where I got mine). System works like a charm.

I think I got my connector for $5 with like $1 or $2 shipping from one of the random sellers on ebay.. It took less than 10 minutes to swap the connectors and makes a huge improvement on gameplay.

[AversionFX]

this is old news. the console sucks, btw.

[MajSheppard]

uhhh, how is this not illegal?

[Roc Ingersol]

because it's reverse engineered hardware, and Nintendo wasn't forward looking-enough to include all-encompassing EULAs to forbid the legally protected right to reverse engineer.

[Heretic Machine]

Just buy a new connector and fix your old NES. $10 and a screwdriver, and you're up and running again. Most dead NESs have absolutely nothing wrong with them except a worn-out connector.

That and the fact that they were NES's, and had inherent design flaws. Side-loading was a bad idea.

[Peen]

So you need old carts to play on this thing? As much as I like to collect old games, wouldn't an emulator be a helluva lot cheaper and easier?

To be perfectly honest, I doubt that this console package was ever intended to be sold to people who have to ask this question.

It is more for people like me who enjoy getting and playing the old carts for whatever reason.

That being said, I don't own the console itself, but I did buy a pair of their wireless controllers a few months back and have thoroughly enjoyed them.

[Speed_D]

Don't know why they'd put wireless controllers on the 2.4ghz spectrum. Like it isn't crowded enough already. Make them IR or something geez.

[Chimpbot]

Honestly, the console isn't nearly as bad as everyone seems to think. I have one and I've tried literally every single cart I own...and it works perfectly.
I picked this up because it was pretty cheap, plus I didn't feel like attempting to repair or modify my old NES and risk permanently damaging it. It's still in working order...but it is close to 20 years old, now.

My opinion, which is one that was formed from actually using the NEX, is that it's a decent replacement for the old hardware. I haven't witnessed any sound, picture or general emulation problems. At all.

[Pumped'Up]

This thing looks like complete crap. Bulky and absolutely nothing special about it. Wow, what a waste.

Until a compact NES small as a TV remote shows up, long live the original NES.

[eth3rton]

Thats what the Revolution should have looked like IMO......Classic All the way !!

[Spigot]

I've got at least one old NES lying around and I seem to come across them cheap whenever I go out to garage sales in the summer.

I'm just curious as to whether you'd have to perform the ol' NES Blow Job on this new product or not.

[Chimpbot]

This thing looks like complete crap. Bulky and absolutely nothing special about it. Wow, what a waste.

Until a compact NES small as a TV remote shows up, long live the original NES.

The NEX is barely thicker than a cartridge, and not much longer. How small do you want?

[TKO]

uhhh, how is this not illegal?
I believe Nintendo's patents on the old NES hardware have expired, making this a perfectly legal thing to produce now. ..That's probably why this thing doesn't do SNES stuff (which would, no doubt, pull in a few more customers.)

But me, I'm thinking: hell, I might as well wait for the Revolution and have a funky wireless controller and some next-gen stuff to boot. (But I'm probably not the kind of person this is aimed at. I never had any NES carts, and I want minimal hardware clutter with my retrogaming.)

[emperordahc]

Good luck playing Castlevania III on this thing.

BTW, I fixed tons of old NESes for friends. You don't even need new ZIF connectors for them. Just pull the system open, clean the connectors off w/ some baking soda and water, and then carefully push each pin back up (top of the system direction) w/ a screwdriver about 1/4", and you're all done. Works like a charm.

(BTW, I just use my official Nintendo toploading NES. :D )

[Bydo_Empire]

I've replaced my connector in my NES. It's very simple, and the connector I bought came with pretty good instructions on how to do it. Once you get your system open, it's pretty obvious. There's not a whole lot of guts inside an NES.

You can find a ton of them on eBay (where I got mine). System works like a charm.

I replaced my connector earlier this year. It was a snap to do, and my NES works perfectly now. I got my 72-pin at Game Traders for ~$10, but I see them all the time on eBay and other online stores. I found a great how-to website, and while I don't seem to have it bookmarked, just google "replace 72-pin NES" or something, I'm sure you'll find a bunch. It was very easy.

[ninja_in_pajamas]

Something tells me they were paid a lot to talk up the NEX system. The reason I think this is because I have read many independant reviews, and all of them say it sucks. There are alot of games that don't work on the system, and many of the ones that do have color issues. I've also heard reports of the sound being messed up on many titles. If you want to play old nes games, just go to a flea market or something and buy one. At least all the games will work then.

[Nessus]

I really want to replace the 72-pin connector on my NES.