The Super Nintendo we all know is arguably the greatest system ever created. All the forces of nature were working in its favor, as the first-party games of Nintendo were almost all masterpieces, and the company even got a slew of instant classics from second and even third-party developers. IGN even managed a list of the 100 greatest SNES games, and as of now have not included a title that felt like just filler to complete the ranking (except for that one unicycle game). In my personal ranking of the 20 greatest video games in history, a good percentage of them are on the Super Nintendo. And in terms of musical soundtracks, the SNES occupies the top titles on the list. The Super Nintendo has handed us a better controller, and a more consistent (in terms of quality not quantity) and varied library of games than any other system out there. The XBox 360 was closest, but failed to deliver enough RPGs and (great) platform games to take the crown.
Part of the appeal of the Virtual Console when it was announced was that we gamers could purchase SNES gems at a cheap price to enjoy and to introduce them to a new generation of gamers. Years after the Virtual Console debut, check out these pitiful numbers: only 94 SNES titles for the Japanese gamers, and only 71 for the United States. Now keep in mind IGN has a list of the 100 best games for the SNES. These numbers are ridiculous, and totally unnecessary. Even the Playstation 3 has schooled Nintendo in terms of bringing back classics wither plethora of PSOne titles that are available for purchase online. Check out these lists—although the Japanese once again get triple the content that the Western Hemisphere gamers get. You would think that Nintendo would be the company shelling out and whoring out their greatest hits. The WiiU can change this unfortunate predicament. While the WiiU has been rumored to focus on re-releasing Gamecube titles, I think they should go a step further by creating the SNES HD.
Picture this: taking all of the classic SNES titles that we all know and love, clean up the graphics, enhance them a little, widen the screen ratio to match those of the HDTV around the world, add a few nice touches and surprises, and re-releasing them yet again for the WiiU. This also gives Nintendo a second chance to unleash the full potential of the Virtual Console, and gain support from the third-parties that helped shape the Super Nintendo so long ago. It would be the section of the Virtual Console we're definitely going to visit the most.
Can you imagine Super Metroid HD? Super Mario World HD? Earthbound HD? Mega Man X HD? Contra III HD? Donkey Kong Country 2 HD? Link to the Past HD? Super Mario RPG HD? Mortal Kombat II HD? Yoshi’s Island HD? Turtles in Time HD? Super Mario Kart HD? Now if the game already looks stellar, we don’t have to add any 3-D or other effects to the game, but instead clean the frame rate, clean any potential glitches, and give it the widescreen support. And for most of the games I’ve mentioned, that’s all you need.
With most SNES games, a small high-definition clean-up is all you have to do to make that $10 purchase a good one. A great one actually. We can even take it a step further by offering an enhanced soundtrack to most of these games. Can you imagine playing Super Metroid with one of several OCRemix songs playing in the background? Street Fighter II Turbo for XBox Live did that and look how well it turned out. Now this would work on the WiiU not only because it’s a more powerful system and the demand for HD versions of classic games remains decently high (See: Marvel vs. Capcom 2 HD), but also because the WiiU controller and its massive screen in the middle would be utterly perfect for playing Super Nintendo games. Now for those pondering, it wasn’t totally my idea—the idea stems from the XBox Live recent support of adding a nice HD touch to games from the past like Street Fighter II and Perfect Dark (my favorite example—still the best shooter of all-time).
Bottom Line: Nintendo can really step up to the plate and deliver next year if they can do what they did with the SNES games on the Wii—except offer much more than a measly 71 games out of a potential 700+, and then add some HD abilities to most of their games. While this is indeed a long shot, if games like Super Mario World, Super Mario RPG, Final Fantasy III, and others can receive the HD treatment and attention that HD remakes like Street Fighter and Perfect Dark had gotten, we could see a major reason why it would be worth getting a WiiU.
An idea like this can definitely get the blessing of third-party companies, as I’m sure they’ll love to have their classics enhanced for a new audience. Companies like Sega and Capcom can definitely benefit from a linking to the past for the WiiU. Come on now, wouldn’t you fork over a cool 10 bucks to replay a Super Metroid game with cleaned-up graphics and HD-widescreen support? I am sure there is a league of gamers that would. These classic games stretched the hardware and software limitations of the Super Nintendo. With the WiiU, that limit has been stretched much farther, and its time for these games' full potential to be reached.
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