Hacker News Reader

Hacker News

Comment by joeblau | Hacker News Reader

Full thread

joeblau

It seems to be missing some critical features of the original.

- Can't start a game and have the game loading screen distorted until the 7-8th attempt.

- Can't blow in the cartridge until it whistles before playing

- Can't stick 2 games in on top of each other

Getting the game to work was half of the fun.

View on HN

Towards the end of its life, my NES wouldn't work if I pushed the cartridge all the way in. I had to push it just the right depth in, such that the top of the cartridge (the part facing you when you inserted it) would lightly scrape the edge of the slot as I pushed it down into the machine. It was an art. Fun times!

Can't stick my Game Genie in it, either...

Game Genie is why a lot of the older consoles have trouble connecting to cartridges; they built it with a slightly thicker interface, presumably to give it mechanical 'preference' over the game cart on removal, but it can permanently spread the console's pins.

you do realize blowing on the cartridge works just as good as not walking under the ladder and avoiding black cats? As a matter of a fact it contributes to connector oxidation (moisture in your breath).

The blowing on the cartridge myth was always funny. People still think they have to do it.

The actual trick is to stick the game in, and after you push it down, you then slide it with your finger to the left or right about a half-centimeter to align the pins correctly, hit reset, and it's good.

I was under the impression that blowing into it caused some moisture to get there and improve the .. conduction?

It improves surface contact. That it works isn't a myth at all. Many people mistakenly put the blame on dust, thinking that blowing on it remove the dust which made it work.

It's not great for it in the long term, though, but hardly as damaging as much of the smug internet would want people to believe.

Nope. The problem was that the pins weren't seated properly. The solution to that is to take the cartridge out and put it back it.

Guess what happens as a side effect of blowing in the cartridge?

the ironic thing is that tidbits like this are a great way to teach young kids about science. instead we just had to hear about how video games made you stupid and ruin our cartridges by blowing into them or snapping them into place.

I did it as a kid, felt silly after I discovered that it didn't work as an adult, then more recently discovered that it DID actually work. Or at least, it's been sufficiently successful for me (repeatedly putting in cartridges in NES/SNES/N64 without successful start, blow in them once, immediately starts working).

Agreed, till it didn't :(

That's for the Special Edition. The console will be wind powered.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com