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Homebrew Games
The NES was released back in 1985 and saw a very long lifespan, despite the SNES being released in 1991 games were still being made and released for the NES all the way to 1995! 1995! The year Nintendo released the 32 bit Virtual Boy and SEGA released their 32 bit console the SEGA Saturn! Games were officially being released for the NES a decade after released despite a new system being released 4 years prior! Want even more games for your NES? Games released in 2015? Here's your solution!
A Homebrew game is split into two categories: hacks and mods. There exists some debate between what counts as a hack or a mod but in the end it doesn't really make a difference whatever you decide is a hack or a mod. The NES is ripe for homebrew games with titles still being made to this day! One such game is Mario's Adventure, this game is built from the same game engine as Super Mario Bros. 3 with the same sprites and graphics. However, this game is extremely difficult, much more difficult than Super Mario Bros. 3 but does feature infinite lives, you will need these if you're ever going to attempt to play through this game. The difficulty isn't the only thing that's different here though, the game has changing weather, blocks and enemies done professionally. Even elements from the SNES's Super Mario World appears in this game with changing the power up you have during the level. This was absent in Super Mario Bros. 3 (much like Yoshi but we'll save his rather surprising history for another time) but this, if nothing else, just shows that by allowing the community to create their own games the limits of a console can really be pushed to it's limits. However, this also is down to integrated circuits in the NES cartridge to expand the capacity of the game and override the lock out chip but still, it's quite impressive.
Another notable NES homebrew is The Legend of Zelda: Outlands which is a much harder version of the original Legend of Zelda. This game was not only harder but housed a whopping 18 new dungeons and unfamiliar terrain! The traps and enemies in the game are very different than in Legend of Zelda and makes for an entirely different game and experience. But the NES is not the only console to have Homebrew games, the PSP, SNES, Mega Drive, Nintendo Wii and many, many more! The Magnavox Odyssey was the game console to have the longest game drought from 1972 until 2009! The Nintendo Wii even had the Homebrew Channel! Although you did have to download this channel on the internet.
The Homebrew market is, in effect, resurrecting consoles that would otherwise be collecting dust. Companies have formed with the sole intention to create Homebrew games. The NES is not old news anymore, it's still relevant to this day with games still being released 30 years on! The rumoured (and far from confirmed) console RetroVGS was formed by a group of indie developers who were making SNES homebrews! As this console may never come to light it would have been the first cartridge based console since the N64, mainly due to the developers knowledge of SNES Homebrews but as Nintendo's NX is set to have cartridges too it seems cartridges are back! But really, they never left. Mario's Adventure, Legend of Zelda: Outlands and even Halo on the Atari 2600 show that just because these consoles are old it doesn't mean that people are past caring about them!
