Original NES and SNES controllers

[CZroe]

Hah! Sorry about that. So, this guy had a mint package of VB with Wario land/etc. I didn't know how "rare" wario land was, but I told him I'd like just the console and Mario Tennis. So he split the package. VB itself is not TOO expensive on ebay, but this guy's stuff is mint so I paid $100 for it.

I'll search to see if he still has Wario Land available.

I'm not sure if I could ever get into Mario Tennis. I really loved the original Mario Golf, I think no rendition after that was good. I think it first came out on N64?

I also loved Virtua Tennis on Dreamcast. I have Super Tennis on SNES now but the lines burn-in on my plasma after every point (when it scrolls down) and that's actually annoying enough to not play, lol.

This guy also modified another one of his VBs to use a headstrap. Seems interesting. There weren't a ton of VB games, right? The console lasted under a year I think. Japan it released and discontinued in 1995.

EDIT: He has Wario Land (JAPANESE version). I wonder if the VB is region free? Was there a US version of Wario Land?

Yes, I bought Warioland in the US at a department store (or Blockbuster or a toy store, I can't recall). I thought it would be one of the easier games to get because I never looked into it without having another VB to start with. It might be worth looking into a flash cart if it's too expensive. There aren't very many VB games. I probably already listed half of them!

I know I didn't mention:
Waterworld
Buster Bros or whatever the puzzle game was called
Tetris 3D
Nester's Funky Bowling

I played Mario Golf early by loading the Japanese version on a Bung Doctor V64. I bought the US version at launch and was stunned to see that they didn't do anything to localize the confusing intro sequence that made no sense. Obviously liked it enough to buy it even though I could play for free.

I think the music to VB Mario's Tennis was catchy and there weren't alternative Mario Tennis games at the time so it got a lot more chances than most would give it today. He bouncing ball coming at you is definitely a good way to show off the 3D effect.

 

[Sonikku]

I'm not sure you can play the Rogue Leader missions solo in RS3. If you don't have any friends, it might be an issue.

 

[007ELmO]

Thank you for the tip! I'll probably buy both then, they are reasonably priced.

While cleaning the basement to prepare it for Home Theater construction, I found something I had a coworker oil-paint for me 15 years ago (2x3 ft).

 

[CZroe]

Thank you for the tip! I'll probably buy both then, they are reasonably priced.

While cleaning the basement to prepare it for Home Theater construction, I found something I had a coworker oil-paint for me 15 years ago (2x3 ft).

Does he do photoshop? I would like to commission him for a custom motorcycle helmet skin if his prices are reasonable.

 

[007ELmO]

I think he just paints, and I never contacted him again after this since I changed jobs - I remember his wife saying "Why are you painting that for him? You aren't even charging that much." Hah!

I just gave him an image of what I wanted and he oil painted it. I'd say Vivi is a little too tall but still, came out pretty cool.

 

[007ELmO]

So I jut got a large order of games from an ebay seller (sealed/new, most of them). They all REEK of cigarette smoke. I emailed the guy saying I'm disappointed in that. I cleaned the boxes with clorox (since they're sealed) and I've stuffed them in a box with dryer sheets for now.

Have you guys experienced this before? How do you deal with it/clean them? I emailed the guy with my disappointment, who would buy them reeking this bad? Of course he wouldn't have listed "smoke free home" but this practically calls for "from a smoker's home" - it's that bad.

 

[CZroe]

Sorry to hear that.

16 years ago my used Super Famicom and carrying case came directly from Japan and absolutely reeked of cigarette smoke when I got it. You could even feel it sticking to your skin when you handled it! I don't recall doing anything in particular to clean it up any of the times I took it apart but it's pretty clean now and I don't smell anything at all. I'd say it's one of the nicer-looking used SFCs.

Lint-free cloth slightly damp with alcohol, perhaps?

Curious: did you order sealed games intending to open them? If so, some collectors would have a hissy-fit! I've seen others who can't stand seeing games stay sealed so I guess it runs both ways, but the value of sealed retro games is no much higher these days that it makes sense to leave them sealed and get a flash cart or something.

 

[007ELmO]

So I just asked to return everything. If you google 3rd hand smoke, that's not good. basically whenever I get near the box, my throat starts to burn and I get an immediate headache. How effing hilarious is that? I never knew cigarette smell (concentrated?) could cause that immediate reaction.

Yes, I ordered sealed games to have new ones. Atari games are really old. I may change my decision soon. Definitely I will be asking if there's any smoke contact to their knowledge, or it has to be singl eowner non smoke. I still have a headache hours later, this is messed up.

Tokyo is cigarette city. I visited there 10 years ago and out on the streets you've got enclosed casinos and you look inside and see nothing but fog. Everyone smoking it up indoors.

 

[007ELmO]

The guy fat fingered his return address. I asked him which one is the correct address, the one in his FROM or the one he gave me to return to. We laughed it off (actually, mine was a fake laugh), because he insisted on shipping insurance.

Wonder if he wanted the package lost in transit, and file insurance for a lost package, lol. It was only 9 digits away, maybe he knows that person. I wonder how the USPS delivers packages when the name doesn't match the number of the person's house. Guessing they deliver to the address not the name, but unknown. Ebay sellers are filthy in more ways than one, apparently.

 

[exdeath]

Cigarette smoke is so nasty I try to limit myself to listings explicitly stating smoke free or verify with the seller first.

The two times I ever received something that smelled like cigarettes were fortunately CD games so I only had to deal with the paper inserts and manuals. The plastic cases and disc itself are easy to clean without damage. I'm not sure I could handle it with a SNES or NES box.

For the manuals I'm pretty meticulous. I cut small sections of dryer sheets and layer them between two squares of toilet paper then layer these in between each sheet all the way back into the spine and I do this for every single page. Leave it setting for a couple weeks in an open area and there will be no trace of prior smell.

The toilet paper acts like a buffering media and protects the pages from any oils and stuff from the dryer sheet from direct contact with the pages, keeps it from transferring the fragrance of the sheets too strongly, and helps act as absorption media to "suck up" and wick the cigarette smoke smell which is mostly tar in the paper from what I understand.

The two games were Mario Kart Double Dash w/ bonus disc and Suikoden II both CIB and both of which have no trace of smells or yellowing to this day and are actually pretty mint. I ended up snagging both of them in open auctions for about 1/3 of typical prices so worth it in the end I guess.

 

[007ELmO]

Very interesting advice, thanks! Now I feel like I should do that with anything, I didn't bother trying to smell my manuals. Now they're enclosed in cases with the games, woops.

I was more worried about the cancerous affects of 3rd hand smoke after reading about it, wasn't sure if dryer sheets would just mask the smell and not particularly clean them. It was horrendous. He individually wrapped each game in a plastic bag to boot, probably to mask the smell - but that wouldn't last long, right? lol.

Funny that sellers are not responding now when I ask if they have verification if it's from a smoke free home (even if it's new). I think I'll have to go with loose cartridges and clean them if necessary. The boxes are probably too hard to fully clean anyway.

 

[CZroe]

California has to have signs in every laundromat warning you of this just because smokers may have used the washing machine/dryer before you did.

I don't smoke and have no interest in defending smokers, but second and "third-hand" smoke dangers/risks are GROSSLY inflated. They get away with these claims because it's popular and somehow noble to attack smoking in any way possible, but I prefer using the truth.

The truth is, inhaling just about any inert particles into your lungs just as frequently would be almost equally damaging... and cancerous. The main difference is that there is no addictive nicotine or whatever to compel you to deliberately inhale dust again and again and again. You heard right: it's not even particularly more cancerous. Anything that promotes cellular regeneration is "cancerous" in the long term, including exercise! Whether that's by choking cells with tar/dust or increasing metabolism, you are forcing them to regenerate.

I wouldn't put much more credence into a Google search for 3rd-hand smoke than I would a Google search for vaccines and autism circa 2001. It's a witch hunt. There are enough legitimate health concerns with smoking and the disgusting residue is bad enough just because it stinks and is disgusting. We don't need to pretend that it's any worse than a thick layer of generic smelly grime.

Yes, I'd be upset if my merchandise came to me with a thick layer of smelly grime too. No need for it to be a made-up health concern too.

 

[CZroe]

Very interesting advice, thanks! Now I feel like I should do that with anything, I didn't bother trying to smell my manuals. Now they're enclosed in cases with the games, woops.

I was more worried about the cancerous affects of 3rd hand smoke after reading about it, wasn't sure if dryer sheets would just mask the smell and not particularly clean them. It was horrendous. He individually wrapped each game in a plastic bag to boot, probably to mask the smell - but that wouldn't last long, right? lol.

Funny that sellers are not responding now when I ask if they have verification if it's from a smoke free home (even if it's new). I think I'll have to go with loose cartridges and clean them if necessary. The boxes are probably too hard to fully clean anyway.

I've been in situations where I was asked and didn't have an answer because it had only recently come into my possession. Some sellers might not respond while they try to find out from their source.

Best answer in that situation for a seller who doesn't know because it doesn't smell or look like it is "I can't know that it has always been in a smoke-free home but mine is smoke-free and I don't see/smell any indication that it was around smokers." Unfortunately, smokers can't usually smell it, but they'd be lying anyway if they tried to claim otherwise.

No waiting. It might be better to ask it that way: "does it look or smell like it is from a smoke-free home?"

 

[007ELmO]

yes, I'll ask that question instead. I think cancer is regenerating cells where they shouldn't be (uncontrolled growth) - "the disease caused by an uncontrolled division of abnormal cells in a part of the body". I don't know, I'm not the biomedical engineer my sisters are - I don't take it lightly though. I've seen people go through cancer and die because of it, I really want to die in my sleep someday instead. I really don't think it's a made up health concern.

When your body doesn't like something, it lets you know by various senses. I don't understand the reasons why people smoke, I do get they're addicted, but they do so while knowing the confirmed side affects? It's really a crime that people are allowed to make that choice, but it has a side affect on others ... gray area.

When something stinks and is disgusting, it's your brain's way of telling you to stay away from it. That's why cooked food tastes better. The caveman who for some reason lit his food on fire before eating it (maybe out of accident), was healthier and lived longer than those that ate food raw. So evolution will pass that "tastier/healthier" trait down.

Why does a baby's cry sound so annoying? Because that exact tone actually vibrates a part of our brain that used to be in the upper spine. It actually resonates that portion of the spine. The spine is part of the brain and actually reacts faster than other processing. Since we've evolved to move that brain activity from the spine into the actual brain as we know it, but the baby's cry has not changed yet. There are things preprogrammed that the body reacts to that we don't care to have knowledge of until it tells us there is a problem that it can't solve on its own.

Then it's interesting to note how evolution reprograms DNA for offspring (learned behavior vs. being born with it).

 

[CZroe]

Yes. If a learned behavior contributes to survival then traits that reinforce that learned behavior will also improve survivability and persist.

Smoke from a fire or a cloud of dust from mowing over an ant hill are typically just as bad, but they don't form an addiction that forces people to expose themselves and those around them to it multiple times a day.

Yes: cancer is out-of-control cellular replication that is often because of a mutation within a cell that propagates when it divides (sometimes it's an environmental trigger). Killing cells and forcing them to regenerate is basically increasing the odds for a mutation like that, whether by smoking or by metabolism. It's a big reason why severe calorie restriction increases life span and reduces risk of cancer.

The gunk and funk aren't particularly more dangerous to bystanders than any other gunk and funk, but that doesn't mean I want people gunking and gunking up my merchandise to feed their silly addiction.

The thing that gets me is that every single one of them knew it was addictive before they started and yet they made a conscious decision to start. If I could I would use smoking to screen applicants for any decision-making position before I scrutinize further. Not saying they are bad people, but what better high-level litmus test for detecting poor intelligence and/or decision-making?

 

[007ELmO]

Is there a better streamer out there than the El Gato? I would like to Twitch my Framemeister (or perhaps anything else).

Thanks!

 

[007ELmO]

I've received my modded Jungle Green Ultra HDMI N64 today. It outputs 1080p60 and dynamically tries to remove the VI blur filter the N64 is famous for.

I also picked up a new Gold controller from eBay (Japanese).

 

[Fallen Kell]

Let me know how the N64 HDMI mod works out. I have been debating getting that done to my system. Mine has the RGB restore mod performed and it works pretty well, but not as well as what the HDMI mod should as it does so much more video processing.

 

[007ELmO]

I should get a chance to test it out this weekend, I'll let you know - although I don't have an RGB modded one to compare it to.

I'll tell you after using the HD NES vs. the SNES RGB + Framemeister, I do prefer the HD NES. The digital signal has no noise whatsoever. The SNES + FrameMeiser I had to play a lot with the sync levels, and Analog Digital distortion ratio in order to get something acceptable/nice from SNES RGB.

I asked Gametech to coerce Kevtris to do an SNES HDMI mod. He isn't interested, lol. I wonder how many people would buy an SNES HDMI - I would, and probably sell my SNES Mini afterwards.

 

[007ELmO]

My VGA Toro finally came from Turkey (took about a month).

 

[007ELmO]

Let me know how the N64 HDMI mod works out. I have been debating getting that done to my system. Mine has the RGB restore mod performed and it works pretty well, but not as well as what the HDMI mod should as it does so much more video processing.

Hi,

I played the Ultra HDMI N64 mod last night. The mod definitely works, I played with scanlines/1080p/sharp pixels/VI Deblur/etc.

Nothing can really save the N64 from looking bad, lol. The Deblur is interesting, as is the sharp pixels. I play with VI Deblur on, sharp pixels off, and scanlines. I have trouble thinking N64 looked this bad (haha).

The colors look good. The games can look very pixelated with this upgrade. Not sure if it'd be worth it based on not seeing the RGB upgrade.

 

[CZroe]

My VGA Toro finally came from Turkey (took about a month).

I have several brand new in box Dreamcast VMUs if you're interested in a couple. These things look like they still aren't worth too much.

I know I had clear green and clear blue with a lot of one and only one or two of the other, but I can't recall which color I have in excess.

 

[007ELmO]

I could use a clear green VMU. I somehow got non VMU and a rumble pack (strange, I didn't know the DC had 2 ports on the controller).

 

[Fallen Kell]

I don't think I have played my Dreamcast since I bought it. The one I got had an early VGA mod which worked pretty well. There were one or two more games I always wanted to pickup for it (I have no idea what I own, except for Crazy Taxi, the Berserk game, and Ikaruga an awesome top-down scrolling shooter arcade style game in which the ship you were in could flip between having "white" or "black" shields/guns and you would absorb shots that used the same color as your shields and die if you were hit by the opposite color).

 

[007ELmO]

VERY surprisingly, I have a Sony PS2 coming, and I only listed like 2-3 games I wanted for it in my collection. Huh? PS2 was one of the best consoles in video gaming history. It's funny what games we actually remember playing.

Dreamcast, I had 50 burnt games in college. I was a video game reviewer as a side job back then, and I'd get sent games on all platforms to review. Dreamcast was one of them. 3 paragraphs netted me $15 and I could keep the game (which I'd inevitably sell, because $30 to a college kid is lunch at pizza hut for the week vs. the cafeteria).

The left is Ultra HDMI N64 with Sharp Pixels ON, VI Deblur OFF.
The right is Ultra HDMI N64 with Sharp Pixels ON, VI Deblur ON.

I've been working on the basement the last few days. I should probably think of moving part of my retro collection down here, or all of it. I kind of like having my NES/SNES/etc. in the living room. Maybe I'll keep just those consoles there, and move the rest elsewhere (perhaps connected to a CRT, dunno).