Life as a Retro Video Gamer - Nintendo NES.

[Atariboy2600]

On Nov 23rd 1985 at age 13 I saved up to buy my very first gaming console with my own. At NYC in 1985 where me and my mother gone to 14th street and that same block where I got the NES Deluxe unit at the Woolworth store then the store closed in 97. The NES Deluxe Set was test market in NYC in Oct of 85 and one month later on my birthday on a Saturday afternoon. The same day I got the NES Deluxe Set for my birthday me and my mother gone and ate at Blimpies on northwest corner of 14th Street and 1st Avenue NYC (think of Subway before it was a thing) and I open one of the games and it was Super Mario Bros. Sadly Blimpies is no longer there.
 

 

[Atariboy2600]

In 1988 4 years after I gotten the NES Deluxe Set in 85 one of my mother's friend got a box NES Action Set but later wanted to get ride of it for a Sega Genesis and ask if I wanted to take it for keeps and I said yeah why not and took it home. I been using the Deluxe set so much I had not been playing the Action Set so little I still have it's plastic baggies and twist ties in the box but it's safe to have a spear in case the first one brakes down. 

[Atariboy2600]

Got each of these games one by one when they first released in the US for the NES. And by far my all time favorite NES games ever made. Super Mario Bros 3 was my very first PRE-ORDER video game I ever paid at Toy's r Us in 1990.

 

1985 - Super Mario Bros.
1988 - Super Mario Bros 2.
1990 - Super Mario Bros 3.

[Atariboy2600]

Super Mario Bros. 3 came out in the US today in 1990. Back in 1990 My VERY first pre-order video game I ever paid was NES Super Mario Bros. 3 at Toys 'r' Us and I still have it later second version with the Right Bros. on the box, label and manual.

 

 

[Atariboy2600]

I also posted my Atari collection as well - 

 

 

[Atariboy2600]

My back story on the Famicom I lived in NYC and we mostly get many Japanese imports and sold at downtown China Town stores and if any gaming systems released in Japan we also get them on the same day and in 87 as I walked on Canal Street and got my self a box Famicom and games.

 

   

[Atariboy2600]

I got the Famicom AV (aka Top Loader) from a friend who was visiting in Japan and wanted to mail me a Box console with some games for some art trade and so I drew some pictures and hope to hear from her again in the future.

 

   

[Atariboy2600]

Like I said early on my back story on my take on Nintendo Famicom but this one also I found in NYC in 1988 I got this Famicom  add on and a bunch of Disk games many from the origanl games from Nintendo but others are just hard 3rd party Disk Copy with off the shelf bootleg disks with some download games but ti this day I can still play them on my working.

 

   

[Atariboy2600]

I'm ready to get any Japanese imports as I got a Up/Down power converter so I could play any console safe here in the US. Even got the box Sega SG-1000 and some games and hope to fine more Sega games. My dream is to fine a box Atari 2800 (Japanese 2600) console

 

   

[Atariboy2600]

In 1990 after I pre-order my first video game Super Mario Bros. 3 My late mom took me to the 14th street McDonald and she got me all the Super Mario Bros 3 Happy Meal toys and it was the last thing she brought me. To this day SMB3 is still my favorite game.

[Tanooki]

I feel someone needs to step in and say something unless this is meant to just be your personal log about history.

 

I can relate to this entire thread, dates and all.  Despite the misinformation online there was a sliver of a release of the pre Deluxe Set in the test launch that was done in Los Angeles CA, the county area back in 1985 too.  Being one county over, and I have no idea what caused it as it wasn't something I would have known or asked for I don't think being 8 years old at the time, but I ended up with that system, Hogan's Alley, and Super Mario Bros for Christmas that year.  Nothing of that remains sadly anymore except one thing, I still have my original Super Mario Bros cart, manual and sleeve for it ...it'll die with me.  It took some time, years because I really didn't try, but I finally on the relatively cheap cobbled a working rob back together and finally got to put it to good use when I got a color monitor that would allow it to work again.

 

Of the around 40 or so games my brother and I got back in the day I still have most of them.  Eventually he had his own NES, then went traitor(remember the era) and the kool-aid made him feel it was a kids out of date toy and dumped it for the Genesis, despite knowing a SNES was coming (I had NP magazine) which allowed me to give him a few dollars a piece for a number of his games he wanted gone to get Sonic and stuff.   The few I don't were average at best or I don't have the tolerance for the BS mechanics that aged poorly he had like Roger Rabbit.  In most cases the manuals survived, the games and sleeves definitely did and they're here next to me.

 

With where I lived at the time, the community there, I was able to get into via an americanized multicart of Famicom goodies got in early in the later 90s/early 00s into enjoying FC games we didn't get.  This was on the physical side, I was part of the early era (95-00) emulation and rom release community, my document still sits on gamefaqs for the NES header documentation, and as such I had access to a LOT of Japanese titles, famiclones too, via dumps, some(enough) dumped my friend made and I put the header on that still float in use today.  Because of that I've had a care and interest longer than most westerners with the stuff Nintendo wouldn't' allow us around that 5-6/yr allowance policy they had.  15+ years ago I got a honeybee and started getting some (largely Konami) FC gems to enjoy and I have those still and added a number in the last couple of years.  Finally upping my game to owning a top loader(decade + now) with the hi def nes kit installed, and then an AV Famicom, and just this past July-Sept I put togther a working Famicom Disk System too.  The FDS I'm using an original power supply for, but the FC while I have one, it came with a TRIAD power supply so I've been using that instead.

 

Most of what is up there, same here, some parallels and not in the trajectory of when and how, but it happened.  Even the McDonald's toys, had them all, lost them all, but recovered the things over a decade ago and even in some old papers of mine in a box I found one of the inserts for the troopa that came in the bag with the toy and I kept it, so it's with that on a shelf here too near me.  I still feel, Mario fan or not, they were one of the best toys they ever released for quality, durability, and just overall design.

[Atariboy2600]

Laser Bear Saved Nintendo. In order for Nintendo to sell there NES in the US that had partner with World Of Wonder to distribute in toys stores and if any store wanted to sell Hot toys of 1985/86 Teddy Ruxpin & Laser Tag they also had to order and sell Nintendo's NES as well.