Be Excellent To Each Other

So I'm going to buy the boy an old system in a couple of weeks. He does not care about graphics too much so I'm thinking something like megadrive 2, SNES or the master system 2. He has a real love of side scrollers such as sonic/mario and I suspect he would like the beat 'em ups and driving games too. He just isn't that challenged by the games of today - I think it's quite telling how quickly he gets bored with them and goes back to sonic on his laptop. He wants to move fast and the ups and downs of dying a lot and getting very pissed off about it following on to the joy of victory when he beats the game, modern games don't seem to do this, plus he's not even remotely interested in cut scenes.

Not interested in getting any of the old school games that have come out on my latest consoles because I like my latest consoles intact. Also N64 does not have the side scrolling goodness I require.

If you do have a game suggestion I would really appreciate it if you were to post a picture or youtube link with it because the boy needs to see everything first :autism:

I reckon a modded xbox 1 would provide as many side scrollers as needed

I reckon a modded xbox 1 would provide as many side scrollers as needed

Or a PSP loaded up with Snes/Mega drive emulators.

But if you really want to get an actual old console, after years of deliberation, a while ago I came to the conclusion that the Snes is the better 16-bit console, and has the best games.

Edit: Some of my favourite snes platformers:

I vote for SNES.

Castlevania Dracula X, Actraiser 2 are very challenging and fun.
If you're RPG fans, secret boss in Final Fantasy V and Chrono trigger are also challenging.

SNES also accepts floppy adapters, which means you can play every game that it roms is provided on the internet.

Gosh. Are you real? Hello.

Yup, and oddly I have made the space for it which probably says a lot about my home furnishing priorities.

I see the proud Beex tradition of answering a question similar to, but not the same as, the actual query is still going strong.

Although they are expensive to find - the other question is why not simply an emulator and then use the games on the laptop ?
(or do you need to do the console thing)

Q: Which are better, apples or oranges?
A: Have you thought about pears at all?

I can't post links just yet as I'm at work, but the Master System has quite a few decent platformers so I'd probably go for that if he's not fussy about slick graphics and sound. Wonder Boy III - The Dragon's Trap is still one of the best platform games, plus there's Psycho Fox, Wonder Boy in Monster Land and others that don't spring to mind right now.

EDIT - I'd try and get one with Alex Kidd in Miracle World built-in too.

The Master System is sadly neglected and therefore should be the one. It is strong on 2D platformy adventure things that don't involve fat plumbers.

You know I suspect this may be the definition of irony, the boy's laptop just went bang. Sounds like bullshit but isn't - also not unexpected and he got a netbook for his birthday so he's cool.

The Boy likes gaming on consoles.

edit: thanks for the youtube stuff LewieP just saw your edit.

Bloody snipers.

Messy post, sorry, these are the youtubes LewieP posted. I can't view them in FF with spoiler tags on











Only console I had as a kid was a MS 2, my granny bought one to try and get the grandchildren to come visit more. It worked.

The New Zealand Story conversion is pretty nice too. Better than the NES and PC Engine conversions.

Still, I'd say Super NES all the way. Best "old school" console ever. I like the other two machines, don't get me wrong, but if I had to take one to a desert island, there would be no contest.

(The advantage of the Mega Drive and Master System was that you could find the software in charity shops easily, unlike Super NES games, as Sega's VHS-style games cases are more durable and were confused with VHS tapes by the staff. Unfortunately since charity shops by and large don't stock VHS any more, finding Sega cartridges has become more difficult. )

Give him the gift of Super Metroid.

(Actually, I'd highly recommend getting both a SNES and a Mega Drive eventually. SNES has lots of great platformers but has very few worthwhile shmups. Also, he needs Devil Crash MD. )

Get him using MAME, too! We'll compile a list of must-plays in no time.

Fair enough - i guess the one negative point about doing it on a real system will be trying to source the original games - although as long as they work i'd suggest trying for cart only ebay auctions as you can grab the manuals various places online if needed, and as the boxes were cardboard you'll find a lot of auctions for the full pack 'mint' get very expensive very quickly.

A very rough grab of a few old snes titles I cant really access youtube to check up on these but I'd think they would all show up if you go to youtube and stick in snes + title (the video i link at the end is just shown blind - it could be 100 rubbish games for all I know)

Plok
Super Mario All Stars
Super Mario World
Actraiser (this is basically a bit of a godgame sim plus a hack n slash but the sim part is not that complex)
Contra (Probotector here in the UK)
Super Castlevania
Sunset Riders (although i think the Megadrive version of this was slightly better)
Super Star Wars
Super Empire Strikes Back
Super Return of the Jedi
Aladdin (again the Megadrive version is probably slightly better than the Snes)
Tiny Toons
Pooky and Rocky (strange japanese style shoot em up with cute characters)
Super Ghouls n Ghosts
Kirby
Sparkster
Zombies Ate my Neighbour (Think its just called Zombies in the uk?)
Donkey Kong Country
Metroid

I know you said no cut scenes and stuff - but I do wonder if he could concentrate on things enough to get to grips with something like Zelda - it does have a story and a quest but there are a lot of action bits to keep him interested ?

And this is a youtube video with 100 snes games in 10 minutes - perhaps get him to watch that and see if anything looks interesting

Probably worth bearing in mind that (many) Snes carts have batteries inside them used for save games, and they have all started running out.

do you have a Wii?
Near all of those SNES games Zaphod lists are available on the virtual console?

Also worth considering is that a fair few of the Snes games mentioned won't come cheap. Not a problem if buying just one or two, but to get a decent number could get quite expensive.

However, it may well be cheaper to buy another Wii for the boy to use, rather than buying original hardware these days...

the only problem I can see is getting hold of the games. SNES games do seem to be a bit pricey second hand and I don't suppose they're going to get any cheaper.

Have you thought about one of those Megadrive knock offs that have a load of games preinstalled and hook right up to the telly?

I believe the correct phrase is 'I'm not reading one post...' Apologies.

That aside Trooper is right, it may be cheaper just to get another Wii, and then he has access to Wii/Gamecube too...

The snes does look like it's coming out on top for games I like the look of but it's also looking to be the most expencive. Megadrive looks to be the most value for money. I am looking at some pre-loaded consoles on ebay but they may be gone by the time I get paid.

a. Not cheaper to buy a second £100 wii over a £40 megadrive with 8 games.
b. My boy is awesome, he hates the Wii, I don't know why, but the boy has taste.

The SNES is awesome, but can be expensive for games (especially if you want them boxed).

Megadrives are cheap and cheerful and have a decent library of games.

Obviously doesn't change any of the other points, but you can get a Wii for £55 delivered.

Someone said this earlier: from a price point of view, it be hard to beat a modded Xbox 1 with emulators on. I'd imagine they are pennies on eBay now...?

Edit -- or perhaps not, as I can't find any. Perhaps eBay won't list them. Modding an Xbox is probably beyond how much effort Decca wants to put in, I imagine.

I wonder if my two still boot up.

You said he likes fast games, so I'd reckon the obvious choice would be a MD with all the Sonic games for starters - you could probably pick one up for dirt cheap, too. Definitely from a price-conscious point of view I'd say the MD wins out.

What's the legality of mod chips now anyway? I just checked, and the place I used to get mine from don't appear to list them anymore. Although I guess you didn't necessarily need a chip to mod an Xbox.

I'd say a Mega Drive too given the nature of the request, they're like Fisher Price toys in their contruction. Cheaper to get the games for too since every emo douchebag everywhere isn't buying them all up, unlike NES/SNES stuff.

Ebay will not allow you to list them "modded" however if you look around you can sometimes find ones which promise 'extras' in some type of sordid way :-)

You don't need anything complicated to soft mod them anyway (a memory stick and a copy of Splinter cell) so no real need for the chips unless your changing the drive over

For example :

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/XBOX-Console- ... 2a12c594b5

And no way he'll sell that for £60

Or this one

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Original-XBOX ... 43a8b8492c

If its running XBMC then its modded and the fact he's throwing in splinter cell suggests its soft modded

I've got an XBox that's more or less unused, ad all kinds of memory sticks but i've never seen a port on my XBox that'd fit one. How's it all work?


As for which console? SNES, with a copy of Unirally if he likes fast side scrolling platform games. It's a racer but that's fine.

To hack an original Xbox, you need a console, a copy of one of the game that works (splinter cell is the one I can remember, and the easiest to get hold of, and the only one where the glitch is in all printings of it) and an Xbox memory card with some files off a PC on it (and the only way to put those files on it is either getting a USB - Xbox memory card wire, or knowing someone else who has got a hacked Xbox).

I hacked my Xbox and put a new and bigger hard drive in it. It's ace!

Why not get him a cheap PC and do all of this via emulation?

SNES games are harder to find and some of them cost more than new 360 and PS3 games.

So, an Xbox then?

What about getting a Neo Geo that can emulate the Playstation?

Modded XBox with X-MAME on it seems to way to go here.

It's entirely capable of playing all the 68000/68020 based shooters, and everything before that, which is basically every side-scrolling game of note ever.

His laptop went bang because it's a electronic petri dish. Trust me it has evolved virus that are capable of interspecies breeding. The one before this was just as bad, this one lasted 18 months and cost £100 from ebay. It is fixable (network card is frozzled) but I did not get the recovery disks with it and well, honestly, fuck that. The one before cost me £150 from ebay and lasted 3 years - both were acer . That's why he has the netbook to replace it and not a new laptop. The Boy is not allowed on my PC.

He does not need all the games in the world, I'd say he would be happy with 5 to start with. I am tempted to buy a mame xbox but I don't want to confuse him with the choices. I know this is very Rhys specific (and you would have no way of knowing it) but thinking more about it he may very well load up game after game after game to find intro music he liked and then play said music over and over and over again. I'll have to muse on it more but the question would be "who is this for, me or him?" He would like a lot of the snes games posted though. Choices..choices....

Well a modded XBox does MAME, SNES, and Megadrive.

Surely it's a bit of a no-brainer? Especially from a cost perspective as time goes on.

It's not like you have to put every game in the world on there to start with, just a few at a time. You can FTP them over from a PC easily.

Xbox!! (Some assembly required.)

SNESs and Mega Drives are made of dust (or at least the connectors all are), have crappy and difficult to replace adapters and pads.

I absolutely love messing around with lumps of plastic, trying to find a big enough surface to put them on, hoping the ends of the cables haven't become brittle and snapped inside and hoping that the games themselves haven't succumed to battery failure or magnetic fade. Travelling to places finding stuff and making it work is very exciting.

BUT if I wanted to put Rod-Land on right now, I'd use WinUAE or WinUAEX.

It would WORK.

I was going to offer up one of my spare Master Systems for free, but I wanted to wait till I got home to check what I'd got - glad I did as I can't find them anywhere - I had three spare Master System IIs at one point.. hopefully they're still stashed at my parents' house.



Decent condition SNES pads can be a bugger to get hold of but generally all the old Sega and Nintendo kit seems to be rock solid for me.

And while I appreciate the posts saying how easy it is to set up a modded Xbox, it's surely not as easy as buying a suitable Sega/Nintendo bundle on Ebay and whacking a cart in.

Oh, if you do get a snes, I have three controllers lying here that you could have for £reasonable. My Snes broke

Fairly certain they are all in perfect working order.