Mr. Gimmick (AKA Gimmick!), Sunsoft’s last 8-bit title, is a little-known cult-classic for the Famicom and NES that only saw release in Japan and Scandanavia. Though it didn’t sell well, it’s still praised by game fans for its eye-popping graphics, grievous difficulty, and high-quality music.
In this interview, a prequel to The Making of Mr. Gimmick, composer Masashi Kageyama looks back at his time working on the game. His answers touch on the following subjects:
• What the Mr. Gimmick soundtrack means to him
• The variety of unusual musical influences present in the game’s BGM
• His struggles composing within the hardware limitations of the Famicom
• His current activities, 20 years after the game’s release
Read the full interview here!
Take a blast to the past with a look at gaming history! In this newly-translated 2003 retrospective, the creator of Pacman reveals:
• Pacman powering up by eating power pellets was influenced by how Popeye powered up after eating spinach
• The game was conceptualized as a response to violent games like Space Invaders that would appeal to girls and couples
• Pacman and the ghosts originally moved at half the speed they do today
• Iwatani initially hoped to expand on the character of Pacman, much like Sanrio was doing with Hello Kitty
All this and more in The Development of Pacman!
The Legend of Zelda Manga:
A comic based on the original Zelda game for the NES? Yes! This beautiful manga following the original Legend of Zelda – Hyrule Fantasy storyline was drawn and written by Yuu Mishouzaki and published in 1989.
Read it in English here!
You may be a Nintendo fan, but I bet you didn’t know about the Famicom Modem released in 1987. This accessory for the Nintendo Entertainment System allowed Japanese users to connect their NES to the telephone lines and:
• Look up stock prices
• Bet on horse races
• Play network games
Read all about it in The Development of the Famicom Modem!
You may be a Nintendo fan, but are you familiar with the following piece of Nintendo’s history? In the newly translated article, The Short-Lived Famicom Disk System, we discuss:
• Why Nintendo, for a short time, offered its games on floppy disks
• Why the company reverted to cartridges for later systems like the SNES
Early Nintendo character size comparison chart (official art).
Taken from one of the A Link to the Past concept art pages in Hyrule Historia.
In December of 2011, Nintendo released an official Zelda artbook called Hyrule Historia! In addition to revealing the official timeline for the Zelda games, the book also contains never-before-released concept art!
Take a look at these newly-translated concept art pages from Adventure of Link, Link’s Awakening, and A Link to the Past!:
Page 142
Page 143
Page 144
Or click here to check out the entire book!
Hyrule Historia: LoZ Concept Art Pages
In December of 2011, Nintendo released an official Zelda artbook called Hyrule Historia! In addition to revealing the official timeline for the Zelda games, the book also contains never-before-released concept art!
Check out concept art from the original Legend of Zelda:
Page 138
Page 139
Page 140
Page 141
Or click here to check out the entire book!
