Jeremy Parish

PATRON EXCLUSIVE | NES Works Gaiden: Epoch #01 (Patreon)

Published:

2022-09-27 18:03:37

Imported:

2024-04

Tags:

baseball epoch exclusive nes works nes works gaiden yosaku

Content

Welcome to a video that has been, literally, years in the making.

I've been promising patron-exclusive videos for quite a while now, and that day has come at last, thanks in large part to the diligent efforts of Christa Lee of Sound Retro Co., who spent more time than either of us care to admit trying to figure out how to make a Cassette Vision output a clean S-Video signal. Or close enough, as eventually turned out to be the case.

I foresee NES Works Gaiden Epoch as a 15-part series that will carry us into 2024, so I figured it deserved its own branding (or sub-branding). Note that sometime after the series is complete, I'll begin releasing it to the public on a monthly basis, so this is more of a timed exclusive than a true exclusive... mainly because it seems counterproductive to keep this much esoteric game history behind a paywall forever.

Anyway, you will believe that a man can talk about two visually primitive first-gen console games for 20 minutes. Please enjoy, and thank you for your support, which makes side excursions like this possible (without eating into my existing weekly publishing schedule).

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Pinning down a proper "first" in video game history can be a challenging proposition. The medium didn't evolve in rigid steps with clearly defined milestones; it shifted gradually, in strange and hard-to-classify fits and starts. But I feel confident in dropping a pin here, with the Epoch Cassette Vision, as the "first" proper console to emerge from Japan. Several Japanese manufacturers had produced dedicated consoles for years before Cassette Vision came along, and Bandai even manufactured one that accepted cartridges that worked like the jumper cards Magnavox included with the original Odyssey. However, with Cassette Vision, Epoch produced the first game system to have been built from the ground-up in Japan that offered distinct software on standalone carts. It arrived a full two years before Nintendo's Famicom and Sega's SG-1000, and it presented a compelling mix of dated-but-entertaining games at a highly competitive price. The Japanese console games industry got its true start here, although it wouldn't become a true force to be reckoned with until the Famicom took off. In NES Works Gaiden Epoch, I'll be exploring the history and design of the Cassette Vision library before moving along to the more robust Super Cassette Vision and the noble failure that was the Game Pocket Computer. Beginning with Kikori no Yosaku and Baseball, these games clearly hail from an era before Famicom; they're simple and primitive, but interesting nevertheless. Production notes: Video Works is funded via Patreon (http://www.patreon.com/gamespite) — support the show and get access to every episode up to two weeks in advance of its YouTube debut! Plus, exclusive podcasts, eBooks, and more! Cassette Vision footage recorded from original hardware, modded for S-Video output by Christa Lee of Sound Retro Co. Super Cassette Vision footage recorded from original hardware via legacy RGB cable. NES/Famicom footage captured from @Analogue Nt Mini; SG-1000 footage recorded from Analogue Mega Sg Video upscaled to 720 with @Micomsoft xRGB Mini Framemeister.