Nester's Adventures #29

At one time, Nintendo Power ran a monthly comic called "Howard and Nester", co-starring Howard Philips of Nintendo of America. The storylines gave hints for whatever the big game of the time was (typically the comic's theme was last month's cover game) with some mild joke or pun on par with comic strips of today. After Howard left for a job at JVC (in real life), the comic strip was renamed "Nester's Adventures", but the quality of the artwork started to slip (in my opinion) and without Howard, instead relying on random bit players (whether kids or video game players). This eventually proved the beginning of the end, and it was ended in the end of 1993. Nester has made a few comic appearances since (including 1997 and 2008) but not much since then.

This is a 2-page Nester's Adventures strip from Issue 29, and you can see that it's even less funny than H&N (though I have to admit, the Madonna line made me chuckle) and not much game hints either.

These aren't my scans and were taken from Retromags, but I do have the magazines.

Nintendo Power Volume 109 (June/98)

This is the June 1998 issue with Banjo-Kazooie featured on it. Cover price $4.95 in the United States, this issue has a few things going for it, including...

- Some tips on Banjo-Kazooie, specifically finding trinkets like Jiggy Pieces, Jinjos, and Extra Honeycomb Pieces.
- A comparison of Mortal Kombat 4 for Nintendo 64 and its arcade counterpart. Of course, this being Nintendo Power, you know which one wins (even if controls and graphics take a nosedive)
- BioFreaks review: which has some ludicrous presence that some mutant-cyborgs can bring the United States back together again. Or something like that.
- An E3 report!! The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time makes its final showing (the Zelda 64 title is still used). Twelve Tales: Conker 64 (a new name for Conker's Quest) makes its second showing, and would go on for two more until the game was cancelled and transformed into Conker's Bad Fur Day, Space Station: Silicon Valley, the ultimately disappointing Quest 64, the lamented EarthBound 64, which was eventually cancelled and released as a pared-down 2D Game Boy Advance adventure, and a few others. Another cancelled game that was less high-profile was Survivor: Day One, a game by Konami. It was cancelled.



Less depressing than the cancelled games and the disappointing games (including Earthworm Jim 3D and the infamous Superman) was the announcement of Pokémon and the Game Boy Color. While becoming a big success, it only helped reinforced the idea that the N64 and Nintendo was the "kiddie" console.

The contests, which Nintendo Power had up until their sale to Future, usually had a t-shirt (third prize), the "featured game and maybe something extra", and "featured game+something awesome". Often times, it was only tangibly related: a Donkey Kong Country 2: Diddy's Kong Quest featured a trip to Six Flags Magic Mountain, or a truckload of coins (for Blast Corps, I think). This one featured a trip to the Seattle area to see Kobe Bryant play against the Seattle Sonics (with two courtside tickets). And of course, this being Seattle (as they were the home team but rival to Kobe Bryant), you got to check out Nintendo of America headquarters. You also got Kobe Bryant in NBA Courtside for N64, as the 5 runner-ups got (except, instead of Seattle, they get an autographed basketball).

There was also Game Boy Camera "strategies" and a review (it scored 8.3 overall). The strategies were tips, including taking pictures of drawings, and splicing together a film. The example showed 8 panels of a clown being incinerated by a spaceship.

And, if you were a good enough artist, you could win things like a DVD player or digital camera, which, being in 1998, was pretty expensive. Heck, I have a 2001 camera, and I don't know how much it originally cost, but it still produces tolerable shots.

The Game Boy Advance that Never Was

Originally done 6/12/09


Our first post comes from the October 1999 issue of Nintendo Power. Check out those dimensions on the screen...that's smaller than the current GBA screen. Nintendo did show a video camera (which was cancelled around 2003) that would've been a super-updated version of Game Boy Camera, but no GBA Internet ever surfaced (possibly due to the failure of Game.com, Tiger Electronics' game console).