B Shoots; CLAY Jumps!

Dog, Cow, and Farmer
Harvest Moon

Super Nintendo might not be the first system that comes to mind when people think about the Harvest Moon series, which is fair enough. It wasn’t released in North America until summer of 1997, well after the Nintendo 64 was released, and it didn’t make it to Europe until 1998. The original Harvest Moon was a big deal in my circle of friends, but I think most people missed it.

Harvest Moon 64 - which I believe most of us agree was the high point in the series - was released in 1999, and also failed to become much more than a cult hit if I’m not mistaken, but countless sequels followed, nonetheless. Good on the publishers for continuing to support the series after a slow start, even if the later games were never quite as good as the first few.

Rabite and Mushboom
Secret of Mana

Rabite gets whacked!
Mushboom gets whacked!

Helmasaur King
The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past

Happy 20th birthday, Super Nintendo! You’re a little older and a little more yellow, but you still know how to play it loud.

(I know it’s impossible to mark a specific date as the Super Nintendo’s launch date, but Wikipedia says 23 August, and I’m going with it.)

Yoshi and Mario
Super Mario World

Super Mario World - it’s a blast from the past!

Tomorrow is the 20th anniversary of the release of the Super Nintendo Entertainment System in the US. Like every other video game site on the Internet, B Shoots; CLAY Jumps! will be celebrating this occasion with Super Nintendo-related content all week.

Fun Yoshi Facts!

• In Super Mario Bros.: The Movie, Yoshi gets stabbed in the neck.
• In the Super Mario World cartoon show, Yoshi was terrified of water. He would later disintegrate in bodies of water in Super Mario Sunshine.
• Although the earliest drawings and design concepts of Yoshi date as far back as the first Super Mario Bros. game, Yoshi did not appear until Super Mario World on the SNES. However, Yoshi did later appear in several NES games, including Yoshi, Yoshi’s Cookie, and Mario is Missing.
• Yoshi is most often voiced by Kazumi Totaka, Nintendo’s famous game music composer who was also the basis for Animal Crossing’s K.K. Slider (aka, Totakeke).
• Nintendo and PAAS teamed up in 1993 to release a Mario Paint-branded Easter egg dying kit that encouraged you to paint Yoshi-style eggs. I still own this complete kit in the box because I am a tremendous geek.
• Although he lays eggs, Yoshi is canonically male.
• Yoshi is a dinosaur. I thought this was well-known, but I once heard some kids at a store arguing over whether he’s a dragon or a frog.

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