Feeling nostalgic for those wonderful Nintendo 64 games? You’ll soon be able to play those again.
GoldenEye, Super Mario 64 and Zelda: Ocarina of Time: they are three of the best games ever made, and all of them came out on the Nintendo 64.
To play them now, you usually need an emulator, or maybe an old picture tube you plug your console into. But soon that may change.
A ‘revamped’ Nintendo 64
The Nintendo 64 can safely be called one of the best consoles ever. Nintendo released countless legendary games for it, which we enjoyed for hours. Maybe your old game cartridge is still in the attic somewhere.
Soon you will be able to get those cartridges out again, because a new device will allow you to play the games in top quality. All you have to do is plug them into the modified console.
The new Nintendo 64. (Image; Analogue)
To accomplish this, the company programmed an FPGA chip to emulate the original console at the hardware level. This means you can just use the cartridges from your games while the technology upscales the image quality to 4K. It doesn’t matter what region your Nintendo 64 games come from.
This is great news because although you can connect the original Nintendo 64 to a modern television, you run into a big problem. This is because the games were designed for a much lower resolution, often 320×240 pixels or even less. A 4K TV, however, has a resolution of 3840×2160 pixels.
Why is this necessary?
Modern televisions often cannot handle these low resolutions well. While some TVs will fully display the image, in others the image will be distorted or blurred. There is also another problem: image refresh rate. While modern games run at least at 30 fps, and some even at 60 or 120 fps, old Nintendo 64 games usually had only 20 fps. This difference is much more noticeable on a modern TV than on an older model.
In short, gaming on an original Nintendo 64 on a modern television is not ideal. There are solutions available, but they often require complicated adjustments. However, Analogue’s device solves this automatically, regardless of the technology of the Nintendo 64 cartridge and the resolution of the original game.
Nintendo 64 games. (Image: Analogue)
This is not the first time Analogue has done something like this. The company previously released versions of the NES, SNES, Genesis and Game Boy. What’s special about these devices is that they support original physical games instead of digital ROMs. This is a big advantage, as it gives the games a better and more natural playback, with less lag compared to emulators.
However, don’t expect your Nintendo 64 games to suddenly look like titles for the PlayStation 5 or Xbox Series X. But they will be significantly more playable, allowing you to relive those wonderful classics.
Price and availability of the ‘new’ Nintendo 64
The console that can play Nintendo 64 games comes with an American plug, a USB cable, an HDMI cable and a 16 GB SD card. However, no controller is included, so you’ll have to get your own. You can use the original one or a modern replacement.
The device will be available for pre-order on Analogue’s website starting Oct. 21 at 5 p.m. Dutch time. Be quick, as the company’s consoles often sell out quickly due to scalpers. Keep in mind that the device is not cheap; it costs $250.
If that’s too much money, you can also buy Nintendo’s newest gadget: an alarm clock. You can read more about it below!
