4. The Zapper

I can still clearly hear that dog laughing at me.

The light gun was a staple of the 80s arcade scene and Nintendo had the crazy idea of bringing it into the living room. Their plan was to include it with every Nintendo Entertainment System along with Duck Hunt and the original hit classic Super Mario Bros. Taken from Wikipedia:

“When the trigger on the Zapper is pressed, the game causes the entire screen to become black for one frame. Then, on the next frame, all valid targets that are on screen are drawn all white as the rest of the screen remains black. The Zapper detects this change from low light to bright light, and determines if any of the targets are in the zapper’s hit zone. If a target is hit, the game determines which one was hit based on the duration of the flash, as each target flashes for a different duration.”

Nintendo featured the Zapper in Splatoon as an unlockable weapon.

You have to admit, even by today’s standards, that’s pretty fucking impressive. Jeremy Parish of USgamer stated that Duck Hunt and the NES Zapper “made the NES memorable” and was one of the key factors behind the success of the NES. They had to go on to release another hit after this right?

3. The Power Glove

An attempt to tie into Nintendo's “Now You’re Playing with Power” tagline.

Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, I present to you one of the largest critical and commercial failures the video game industry has ever seen: the Nintendo Power Glove. The Power Glove was a peripheral for the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) that had a normal controller on the the forearm portion of the glove and featured motion control functionality. Yes, you read that right. Motion controls in 1989. The Power Glove was developed by Mattel and one of its co-designers had previously created an original prototype that was rejected by Nintendo. Originally released for the expensive price (at the time) of $75, this thing bombed and only sold around 100,000 units — it was discontinued just a year later. I remember this abomination growing up and really thinking it was the future. But after trying it out with my siblings for more than five minutes, I quickly realized how much of a dud it was. How the hell was I supposed to look cool the way that guy did in the commercials!? Ah, screw it. I’ll just use the regular controller.

2. The Power Pad

The distinct smell of that plastic till this day gives me instant flashbacks.

Originally released in Japan by Bandai in 1986 for the Famicom, the Family Trainer would later be reintroduced in North America as The Power Pad alongside the NES classic World Class Track Meet. The Power Pad was a plastic foldable pad with 12 pressure sensitive points mapped to colorful numbers that you stepped on. For example, your left foot would be mapped to nine and your right foot would be mapped to 10 and you would rapidly run in place hitting both repeatedly to make your on-screen character run forward. Two players could stand side by side and try to out stomp the other. The Power Pad also served as a sure fire way to piss off your downstairs neighbors. This was way before Dance Dance Revolution and yet another example of the wacky Japanese company planting seeds for what would later become the Wii Fit Balance Board. The Power Pad provided my siblings and I with a ton of hilarious memories and showed us that this dumb gaming machine could challenge us in new ways.

Fun fact: a new unopened copy of the original Bandai title Stadium Events is valued at $41,300 with the used version going for a cool $1,000.

1. The Virtual Boy