Nintendo Discontinues the NES Classic Edition (polygon.com) 104
A Nintendo representative has confirmed today that the company will be discontinuing the NES Classic Edition, "a plug-and-play console that became popular with collectors as soon as it launched last fall," reports Polygon. The last shipments of the consoles will hit stores this month. From the report: [Nintendo said in a statement to IGN:] "Throughout April, NOA territories will receive the last shipments of Nintendo Entertainment System: NES Classic Edition systems for this year. We encourage anyone interested in obtaining this system to check with retail outlets regarding availability. We understand that it has been difficult for many consumers to find a system, and for that we apologize. We have paid close attention to consumer feedback, and we greatly appreciate the incredible level of consumer interest and support for this product." "NES Classic Edition wasn't intended to be an ongoing, long-term product. However, due to high demand, we did add extra shipments to our original plans," it told IGN.
Only Nintendo... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Only Nintendo... (Score:5, Insightful)
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They are. Mad. Market demand and I will pay say nothing to them. Who did they kill they cannot produce more DS/DSi?
On the internet, no one knows you're a dog. Unless you type like that. Then everyone knows you're a dog.
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That makes no sense, Nintendo knows when the switch is coming out, if they really didn't want it cutting into their VC they won't even release NES mini in the first place because now people have the NES minis in their house
Exactly: no cross, *yet*. (Score:2)
No one is cross shopping a switch and an NES Classic Mini.
That's exactly the point :
- Currently, retro-loving geeks will buy a NES Classic (of which Nintendo only makes a few bucks through licensing and that's about it).
They would never ever had thought about buying a Switch. The idea would have never crossed their mind.
- If NES Classic is shut down, retro-geeks will be left without a platform. Some of them might end up biting the bullet and buy a Switch, and then re-buy all the old classics again from the virtual shop of the Switch. (Nintendo thus makes more mone
Re: Exactly: no cross, *yet*. (Score:2)
Re: Exactly: no cross, *yet*. (Score:4, Informative)
Or they'll realize that NES ROM's are really easy to find, and that building a RetroPi is stupidly easy
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Or they'll realize that NES ROM's are really easy to find, and that installing an emulator on their current computer is even easier, faster and cheaper.
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Or they'll blow the dust off their old NES, get a less shitty power supply and play the games on the original hardware. Maybe even buy a multicart.
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Thankfully Blinking Light Win [arcadeworks.net] works like a charm!
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They can either have a retro console that THEY SELL to "cut" into sales of the Switch or they can have people download NES ROMs and use emulators.
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Artificial scarcity though limited production runs keeps the value high and keeps the the people wanting it when they introduce it again next year.
In the mean time the focus is on the Switch. Who runs the company? People who know what they are doing.
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Artificial scarcity is great to keep price high and so profit high, but when you don't sell the product, you don't make any profit, no matter the value or the demand. The only ones who will benefit from artificial scarcity are resellers. So unless Nintendo is looking at selling the NES on Ebay, Artificial scarcity in this case is just really, really dumb. As for the Switch, as many people said, it's a different market. I would buy a Classic NES, but there's no way I will buy a Switch.
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but when you don't sell the product
Who says they're not selling the product? Emphasis mine:
NOA territories will receive the last shipments of Nintendo Entertainment System: NES Classic Edition systems for this year.
Limited production runs per time period is pretty much one of the definitions of artificial scarcity. The run ending at a time when you're pushing an alternative platform is then just good business sense.
As for the Switch, as many people said, it's a different market.
It's only a different market to people who are after a certain thing: The latest current console. In terms of general entertainment it's actually the same market only with a bias towards nostalgia vs a bias towards portability (not technology, because
1/n because Slashdot suck. (Score:1)
The lameness filter is so disturbing. I'll never understand the US and how they treat speech and text there. Say whatever you want but absolutely don't swear! When the filter doesn't inform you what the problem is ... It's so annoying:
Stuck in it so I'll post in parts until it go through.. Stupid /., you s***.
Only Nintendo would discontinue a product due to high demand. Who runs that company, a couple of ***** plumbers?
Well. Valve did their own controller with touchpads to be able to play not-for-controller-game-controller-schemes on their specific controller and then thought it was a great idea to support other cont
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Are you sure it isn't the shitty internet filter installed by your bitch-ass parents, you fucking faggot?
(I was originally going to use the n-word instead of faggot, but apparently you do have part of a point. Because /. wouldn't let me post this with the n-word, but the exact same post with the n-word removed, and it cleared the lameness filter. Go figure. *shrug*)
Yeah, that's ok if you just want to post a bit of a text and you haven't used as many such words. /. is stupid incompetent idiots who can't make a good forum and can't fix it for 5h1t.
The thing is I wanted to post a lot of text with a lot of words which maybe they didn't liked, so that made it frustrated.
I could of course try parts of the text without ever posting just to figure it out but instead I posted all of it for each text piece which passed because
2/n because Slashdot suck (Score:1)
They also decided that the way to really be able to make PC gaming compete with gaming consoles was to go with the same experience, so hence to even configure your controller at all you have to launch the slow bloated Big picture mode which is slow as **** and ****ed down and ****** just like anything using controllers could be assumed to be to both enable the controller and select the configuration for your controller and launching your game.
Because to make PC gaming "work" that's exactly what we need! Not
Re: 2/n because Slashdot suck (Score:2)
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You have to use the big picture mode so you can actually navigate your games library with a controller. It's not rocket science and it runs fine
But I don't want to browse it with my controller.
Just because I have a controller connected to my PC doesn't mean I don't have a keyboard and mouse too.
It's just a desktop PC with a controller. It's not a gaming console without keyboard and mouse. I want to use the controller for playing the game not for controlling Steam. If I wanted it for controlling Steam then I could always switch to big picture mode voluntarily. Why can't I configure the controller without entering big picture mode? Why do I have to h
3/n because Slashdot suck (Score:1)
Of course now Microsoft is in on it too so now we've got Xbox on Windows with their Game bar on top of games too. Push Windows + G to enter it. Because gamers totally like to have the Windows button enabled; it's not like you'd accidentally been thrown out of a game to open up the start-menu by pressing that one before is it?
And why wouldn't you want even more blo**-ware overlays on top of your games?
Everyone do their own thing too. Before to use the DS4 controller you could use something like DS4Windows, I
4/n because Slashdot suck (Score:1)
So where am I going with all this? .. so you may still get destroyed.)
Well, beyond this controller stuff and ****** overlay, Valve still haven't released Half-Life 3 and the CS:GO updates they do are stuff like music kits with StatTrak to show your MVPs and even more knifes and what not, and maps where you can walk on top of the map, and a $2000 negev with ~infinite ammo which shot straight as * (but to be fair the enemy will at-least know where you are when using it
So Nintendo may act like ***** plumbers.
WTF, Nintendo?! (Score:3)
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Why? It's a gigantic plastic PoS. Do yourself a favor and get yourself an Analogue Nt Mini.
All that Nintendo has these days is its IP, so it's stuck selling the same shit it innovated way back when and haven't created anything worthwhile in some time.
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Except that it isn't. It's an ARM-based emulator. Has nothing to do with the original hardware. If it was an NES implemented in a little FPGA or something it'd be kinda neat but it's just software emulation.
They still make the 6502 and the 65816... that plus a cheap CPLD or two and you could probably have something closer to the real deal.
Re:WTF, Nintendo?! (Score:4, Informative)
I had the same problem, couldnt find one in retail stores, still cant, and I've checked in many different states (I'm a road warrior).
So I finally said screw it, got myself a Raspberry Pi, installed RetroPi, and it was so stupidly simple I wondered why I'd bothered worrying about the NES Classic. I ended up building a second one to take on the road with me, since my wife and kids enjoy the first one so much that they'd slit my throat if I tried to take the first one with me for weeks at a time
How could they not expect this? (Score:1)
Especially in the American market. Of course everyone was going to jump on this gem!
I thought that was the entire point of this to begin with?
Uhhh... (Score:5, Interesting)
Throughout April, NOA territories will receive the last shipments of Nintendo Entertainment System: NES Classic Edition systems for this year.
for this year
for this year
I would not be surprised if news of the NES Classic's demise is being greatly exaggerated.
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perhaps you have overestimated their writing abilities to actually mean what is said and not implied.
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this would be a better option and maybe the wording makes more sense with that in mind.
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Because of the Switch? (Score:5, Interesting)
If they are in fact halting production because of the Switch and it maybe getting virtual console support (which it currently does not have) I think its another big misreading of the market by Nintendo. I can't see a big crossover between buyers of the NES Classic and Switch. Most people aren't going to buy a $300 console to play a few virtual console NES games, but a lot will pay $60 for the Classic. If anything I think the Classic could be a bridge product for people who haven't bought Nintendo games/consoles for a while and get them interested in their products again. Discontinuing the NES Classic seems like yet another blunder by a company who has had a lot of difficulty reading the market.
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My read is that it is because of the Switch, but NOT because they think the NES Classic is cannibalizing sales from the Switch. At least not directly. Nintendo only seems to want to spend X amount of money on manufacturing capacity, so if you want to increase the number of Switch units, something else has to give. So you've got the Switch, 3DS, and NES Classic. Which one do you cut to free up capacity for the Switch? If you ignore the option of simply increasing the budget to buy more production time in som
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Dear Nintendo (Score:2)
I don't own an NES classic, but I grew up playing these games, and I love them dearly. Playing them periodically is a joy, both for myself and my young son. Shall I...
A) Enjoy my favorite NES games illegally on a PC emulator?
or
B) Enjoy my favorite NES games legally on an NES Classic Edition?
I look forward to your reply. Thank you.
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Play them on the Virtual Console for Wii, 3DS, and Wii U (and probably Switch eventually). That is, most Nintendo consoles in the past 11 years.
Play them in other repackaged forms on Nintendo consoles that have been coming out since the SuperNES (e.g. Super Mario All-Stars).
Play them on the original hardware that you can find in garage sales or eBay.
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VC games are overpriced, under-featured (compared to emulators), and worst of all, you don't actually own them.
Most games aren't repackaged for newer consoles (at least not outside of VC).
Playing on original hardware is legal, but Nintendo don't see any of that money anyway. I'm not a collector, so I don't want a bunch of old crap laying about just to be "legal", and I don't really want to pay collector prices.
One big problem is copyright is way way way longer than it should be, really it should be around 1
Switch Virtual Console (Score:2)
Hopefully this means that the virtual console is coming to the switch sooner rather than later.
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Technically the virtual console has been there since almost day one. Its just that thus far, it has exclusively been NeoGeo games.
Piracy Vessel (prevailing theories) (Score:5, Interesting)
Shortly after the NES Classic was released, people found out it was easily hacked, and released tools that allowed you to expand the 30 bundled games to over 300 unlicensed ROMs. It all fit neatly into their UI and everything (from what I saw.) I've heard it surmised many times on the Internet (and that makes it true) that they weren't interested in shipping their own 'Kodi Box' equivalent.
However... there's also the stories of 'how to build your own NES classic' using a Raspberry PI or equivalent, including adding all the ROMS you want. Supposedly it's cheaper than the NES Classic as well. The only thing you don't get is the nostalgic (tiny) little box and the cute ( short tailed) controllers.
You could ask, 'why don't they decide to own that market, and just write off the 30 vs 300 as irrelevant?' (They'd already picked the best 30.) At least then they'd get their mark-up. (Whatever that was.)
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I'd argue that this discontinuation, like the lack of availability is going to contribute more to piracy.
Having tried multiple times to find one during the first couple of months it was out, I gave up and simply went the RetroPi route.
Shame Nintendo didn't want to take my money.
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Yup, same here. When the NES Classic was announced, I got excited. I knew I could get my own emulator cheaper (I didn't yet know about RetroPi), but would rather go the legal route, and felt it would be nice to support Nintendo for producing something like this.
I gave up on finding one, and threw together a RetroPi. So I can say that Nintendo caused me to build a RetroPi. Had they not made the NES Classic, I wouldn't have been reminded of the fun NES games of my youth, and wouldn't have felt the desire to p
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doesnt matter, the vast majority of people never even saw one in real life, its a unicorn touting piricy on a 30 year old console where every rom has been available for download for 25 years
nintendo failed, again, to keep track of what actually makes them popular
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yea there are tons of 3d printed cases on etsy for all the rPI variants. So you can make it look like a mini-nes, snes, n64, atari, whatever you want. Nintendo style usb controllers have also existed for a long long time
So there really is no point to an NES classic, unless you are that much against downloading some roms that you would now be willing to pay 100-300$ for 30 games. If you are willing to mod an NES classic to insert all your own roms than why even bother
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People wanted more games on the NES Mini. If Nintendo had put a VC store on the damnable thing, they'd have made a mint. Likewise if they unified their VC platform.
Too bad it ran at 60fps instead of 59.94. I'd have preferred hardware NES with a proper hardware clock and software mappers. It'd be trivial to add some boot software that comes up with a register mapping to a system controller, giving access to access a flash filesystem, configure Wifi, and make network calls.
In the best-case engineering
Grrrrr (Score:4, Interesting)
I was being casual about trying to get one, now I'm just angry. I think to punish Nintendo, I'm going to NOT buy a Switch now.
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I wasnt going to buy a switch anyway, its just a portable wii-u for a pile of money
why bother? I can play 1.5 gen old games on my phone and not have to carry a fragile brick with me
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Buttons and joysticks. All i want is a phone i can play games on without shitty touch controls. And I don't want to carry a seperate controller.
dear Nintendo (Score:3, Insightful)
I have yet to find one unit since its initial release in any store locally. I can get them from CL for $400 and now you discontinue it? Go fuck yourself.
Because nintendo hates money (Score:2)
Probably similar to Atari Flashback (Score:4, Interesting)
Atari Flashback has been released, discontinued, revised, a bunch of times. There are differences in versions, there are changes in licenses but I'd guess that selling memories requires driving up the artificial demand by limiting availability.
NES Classic 2 (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm guessing Nintendo stopped manufacturing the NES Classic BECAUSE it was such a huge hit. They were probably expecting modest sales far lower than what they were, so they outsourced as much as they could, half-assing the device. Thus why it's not (officially) expandable, has no internet connectivity etc.
So they're ending production now in preparation of an improved version, likely with longer controller cables, internet connectivity that lets you purchase additional games, and improved DRM (e.g. Nintendo-signed ROM files tied to your device hardware ID.) Perhaps it'll even support Super Nintendo games, or access to games already purchased for Virtual Console. If they kept selling units up to the day they introduce an improved version at the same price, people will be peeved they got the older model; however, pulling it for 6+ months before the new one is out will make it feel more like a 'new generation' and reduce buyer's remorse for those who got the old ones. I'm kind of surprised by the implication this won't be released for holiday '17, though, maybe they're too busy with the Switch.
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This could be a pretty good theory. I own one. To be more precise, I have owned 3 of them (2 sent back for warranty due to hardware failure).
It's wonderful when it works.
Now I'm left wondering if I should keep it as a collector's item instead of playing it (and then have it fail on me).
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I don't know.
The standalone version works quite well - plug in a controller, plug in the TV, plug in power, and game away. It's super simple to use.
Add in all the network connectivity and expandability and you've complicated it 100 times. Plus it has to cost more - additional storage, network/wifi equipment, etc. And then there's the whole billing and account stuff that needs to be done.
The NES Classic as it is right now is perfect. You can be playing games in about 30 seconds. An enhanced version will cos
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I'm guessing Nintendo stopped manufacturing the NES Classic BECAUSE it was such a huge hit. They were probably expecting modest sales far lower than what they were, so they outsourced as much as they could, half-assing the device. Thus why it's not (officially) expandable, has no internet connectivity etc.
The NES classic sold around 1.5 million units. The Wii U sold 13.56 million over its lifetime. Arguably the Wii U had a much longer lifetime, and you could actually buy one for a larger % of that lifetime. But I wouldn't say the NES classic was a huge success, for Nintendo. It had no continuing revenue stream after sale, was found to be easily hacked to play other NES, SNES, and even N64 games. From an accountant's perspective, that's a negative revenue stream since it may erode Virtual Console sales.
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The Wii U was out for approximately 52 months before the Switch launched last month. That means sales of 0.26 million per month on average, with the system being easily findable over that period of time.
The NES Classic has been out for five months, mid-November to mid-April, for an average of 0.3 million sales per month.
The WiiU was probably selling higher at the beginning of its 52 mon
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and once this margical fart classic 2 comes out, you wont be able to buy one of them either, just like all of nintendo's current lineup
Put it on your coffee table (Score:2)
the controller cable is way too short.
It's like the short controller cords on the Famicom and the Super Famicom. The length is just fine if the console sits on a kotatsu or coffee table with the video cable reaching from there to your TV.
Nintendo explicitly stated what they were doing (Score:2)
“We also see the nostalgic interest in these products as an opportunity to draw consumers’ attention to our latest game system, Nintendo Switch.” http://www.news.com.au/technol... [news.com.au]
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Same formula, different direction. They do that a lot. Breath of the Wild is getting a lot of commentary on how it's different and confusing, because it's still Zelda but maybe not Zelda. We were used to Ocarina of Time, Majora's Mask, Wind Waker (not sailing), Twilight Princess, and Skyward Sword, and now there's ... this ... which isn't so different, but not so much the same.
Nintendo did that with Metroid Prime 2 and 3. Prime had elevators and areas; Prime 2 had a dark world to go with the light wo
Not a loss (Score:2)
Not a big loss since you can't find one anyway. It's the Unicorn of the Console World.
Just buy a RetroPi and some USB controllers (Score:1)