Nintendo Power: Pak Source

By: PoisonRamune, the Apathetic Lizardman

While looking through my room for my lost Wacom pen, I came across a very interesting book. The book was the "Nintendo Power - Pak Source," a small insert that was enclosed in a 1990 issue of Nintendo Power. I never understood how to interpret this magazine until my adult years (yes, I was a dumb kid). However, I found it was a type of buyer's guide to all the NES cartridges available at the time. Had I known how to read this thing, I probably would have saved a lot of money.

While, I originally wanted to just post the book with no comments, I felt that was sort of a cop-out. However, I'm sure a lot of you don't really care about my stupid statements regarding a 20 year old game magazine, so I compromised. I'll be doing a very light commentary. I kept the pics small on this page for layout reasons, but you can click on any of them for the readable view.

"The cover & inner cover... I love that 80's magenta. And to all of you who are reading the 'how to use this guide section,' I know it's a simple concept... Once again I was a very stupid child (Josh and Ron can back me up on this one)."

"You may not be able to photocopy these codes... But in the near future, you can scan them."

"How about you give me a real tip for Hoops? Honestly, it's a common rule in basketball (real-life and electronic)."

"RC-Pro Am is a sports title? That's like calling Mario Kart a sports title."

"I had Double Dare... I knew in my heart of hearts that it was a terrible game, yet I can remember tearing into my room after church every Sunday to play it. Maybe the joy of the Lord was too great for me as a kid and I needed something to bring me down."

"See kids, this is R.O.B. he helped you play games. Before he was Brawling and fixing Arwings, this is what he did... And boy, did he suck at it."

"I like this 'Tips on locating hard-to-find game paks' portion. There was a dark time when the internet was just a dream in Al Gore's mind and if you couldn't find a game your friend had, tough tits. I remember my dad drove 3 towns over to get me SMB3... And as for that light gun trouble shooter... 'Is there something stuck in the barrel?' Come on, the damn barrel had a convex lens that would deter stuff from going in it."

"Marble Madness does not deserve a 4 in controls (unless it was out of 10). The ball control sucked and to this day has left me secretly in fear of isometric viewed games."

"You're telling me Bionic Commando and Simon's Quest deserve the same scores. Do you guys smoke crack at Nintendo HQ? And if so, got any openings?"

"SMB2 gets a better score than SMB3 and River City Ransom, sorry to be score griping... But this one is ridiculous and flat out wrong."

"Dude, I'm not even going to talk about the licensed games on page 21. However, I will talk about passwords... I think I learned my excellent penmanship by writing down old Simon's Quest, Goonies 2 and Metroid passwords. It also helped my memory for worthless strings of sequence, which now helps my drunk friends find things."

"There were that many games for the Power Pad? Then why the hell did everyone I know only have World Class Crap Meet?"

"Nice tip for Double Dragon, asshole... I think I've seen the last boss two times in my life. How about some help getting through the caves?"

"In this book's defense, I never knew that Ghosts n' Goblins trick... Now I'm playing with power."

"DAMN YOU NES X-MEN!!! I thought I blocked you out of my mind! Anyhow, since I'm forced to think about it... I spent my whole week's allowance to rent this game from Blockbuster ($4), it was the only game I've ever returned days before the due date. And it was the only time I felt like a rental ripped me off."

"I always thought 720 and Skate or Die were the same game... Oh wait, 720 would say 'skate or die' just to hurry your ass up and eat your quarter."

"Wrecking Crew is not an action game... And from your description of action games and how they don't require brain power, it's obvious you never played WC. However, it's on VC now, so you can redeem yourselves and try it. And as for the company contact info... I'm tempted in seeing what numbers are still valid and playing a little "phone rodeo" at work with these people."

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