Click the Knob

Friday, May 1, 2009

Case Wars

As some of you may be aware, there exists a chemical defect in many of the first Super Nintendos to be released in America. Apparently, a flame-retardant chemical used in the plasting casing eventually breaks down, causing the system to change from its usual grey to an undesireable sort of yellow colour. You can see the difference in the picture below

Coloured SNES on left, normal SNES on right

The SNES on the left is the one I've had for ages, so as you can see it suffers from the yellowing syndrome (there are some that are worse, though). The one on the right is a garage sale SNES that cost me $3.

It would have been easy to simply exchange my old SNES for the one here, except I'm kind of attached to it and the other SNES doesn't actually even work. So, I'm going to do the next logical thing and swap the outside casing on the two systems.

Getting the SNES open is something of a pain, much like the N64 it uses an unconventional type of screw. Thankfully, one of the many zillions of screwdriver bits I have lying around will grip them and getting the system apart is not difficult.

A SNES, taken apart

As you can see, all of the innards are all screwed to the bottom casing. Rather than risk unscrewing these and having everything get out of place, I decide to only switch the tops. The top is the piece that suffers from the heaviest discolouration, anyway.

Here it is, screwed back together

The two halves are still very slightly different colours but you have to look real close to see it. At least the two-tone colour scheme looks better with the browner plastic on the bottom.

Of course, the most important question is, does it work?

And there you have it. $3 well spent. And as an added bonus, it came with a copy of Super Star Wars.


Addendum: Oops, it later occured to me that in the process, I re-region locked my SNES (the region lockout is part of the top half of the SNES). A short tab cutting later and it's back to playing Japanese games.

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What's On:

NES:

Adventure Island 3
Chip and Dale Rescue Rangers
Contra
Darkwing Duck
Die Hard
Double Dragon 2
DuckTales
DuckTales 2
Eliminator Boat Duel
Felix the Cat
Galaxy 5000
GI Joe: A Real American Hero
Hi no Tori
Ivan "Ironman" Stewart's Super Off Road
Jackal
The Jetsons: Cogswell's Caper
Journey to Silius
KickMaster
The Little Mermaid
Little Nemo the Dream Master
Low G Man
MC Kids
Megaman 2
Metal Storm
Ninja Gaiden
Paperboy
Power Blade
Rampart
SCAT
Shatterhand
Snake Rattle n' Roll
Stunt Kids
Super C
Super Mario Bros
Super Robin Hood
TaleSpin
Widget
Yume Penguin Monogatari


Master System:

Wonder Boy in Monster Land
Wonder Boy 3: The Dragon's Trap


SNES:

Aladdin
Battle Dodgeball
Battletoads and Double Dragon
Biker Mice From Mars
Bonkers
Bubsy
Cool Spot
Demon's Crest
Dolucky's A-League Soccer
Donkey Kong Country
F1 ROC 2 Race of Champions
Ganbare Goemon 2
The Magical Quest Starring Mickey Mouse
Megaman X
NBA Jam TE
Pac Man 2: The New Adventures
Pieces
Plok
Pocky and Rocky
Sparkster
Super James Pond
Super Mario World
Tetris Battle Gaiden
Tiny Toon Adventures: Buster Busts Loose
U.N. Squadron
Wario's Woods
Yoshi's Cookie


Genesis:

Alien Soldier
Castlevania Bloodlines
Chiki Chiki Boys
Cyberball
Knuckles Chaotix
Puggsy
Rocket Knight Adventures
Sonic the Hedgehog 2


N64:

Bust a Move '99
Diddy Kong Racing
Mario Kart 64
Mystical Ninja Starring Goemon
NFL Blitz Special Edition
Penny Racers
Pokemon Puzzle League
Sin and Punishment
Snowboard Kids
Super Mario 64


PSX:

Bishi Bashi Special 2
Bishi Bashi Special 3
Choro Q2
Monster Rancher 2
Pocket Fighter
Snowboard Kids Plus
Spyro 2: Ripto's Rage


GC

Sonic Adventure 2 Battle


PS3

Puyo Puyo Tetris


GB

Batman
Megaman V
Trip World


GBA

Megaman Zero
Summon Night Swordcraft Story


DOS:

Holiday Hare
Jazz Jackrabbit
XMas Skyroads

Community Access Channel

Here I've listed a handful of games I've considered doing runs for. If you have a particular preference for one of these games, you can vote for it here. There's no guarantee that a game that gets a lot of votes would get done right away, but it might influence me when picking the next game to do.

Should I switch to using Youtube?

Player Info:

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I'm just a guy who plays far too many video games. I own an Intellivision, NES, SNES, N64, Playstation, Playstation 2, Gamecube, Dreamcast, Wii, Gameboy, Gameboy Colour, Gameboy Advance, DS, and PSP, as well as far more games than I could count.

I started doing these game runs both as a way to show off and to challenge myself. Mostly the former, though.