Nintendo 64

N64 History

Code-named Project Reality, the N64 did not so much start off as a Nintendo console as such: computer graphics market leaders Silicon Graphics, Inc. (SGI) wanted to expand and took their video game system design to Sega but they rejected it even after showing initial interest. Nintendo, however, were next to be shown SGI's design and they came up with a favourable business agreement, officially beginning Project Reality in 1993. In the early days, the CD format was considered for Nintendo's new console but they were convinced that cartridges were the better option for games due to their faster loading times compared to CDs.

By 1994 Project Reality became Ultra 64 and was shown off for the first time later in the year to the public and Midway even released arcade machines with Ultra 64 branding even though internally the hardware was hardly related to what would become the N64. Arcade machines actually based on N64 hardware did come about and are called 'Aleck 64' machines, the result of a partnership with Nintendo and Seta.

It wasn't until 1995 that the public was introduced to the 'Nintendo 64' console in full but the console's release for sale was delayed to 23rd June 1996 in Japan. It seems the delay was caused by a combination of issues with the hardware and needing to give developers more time to work on games. For North America the N64 first became available there to buy on 26th September 1996 but Europeans would have to wait until 1st March 1997 to experience Nintendo's new console.

Console Specification

The N64's CPU is a 64-bit VR4300 (based on MIPS R4300i) running at 93.75 MHz, capable of 125 MIPS/93.75 MFLOPS and was produced by NEC. Interestingly, the PlayStation 1 also used a MIPS CPu but a 32-bit MIPS R3000A instead and the Sega Saturn featured x2 Hitachi SH-2 CPUs. It's worth mentioning that although the N64's CPU is capable of 64-bit operations and indeed that also applies to other components of the N64, the main system bus is only 32-bit and games that ran on the N64 typically didn't take full advantage of the 64-bit capabilities as to save memory space and to increase speed; at the time it wasn't always necessary for programs to do 64-bit operations. Even so, when the N64 was released and leading up to its release, the number of bits of a games machine was a big selling point, which we see with the Atari Jaguar (which was debatable whether it was actually a 64-bit system).

For the graphics, the N64's GPU is a 64-bit 'Reality' co-processor, clocked at 62.5 MHz with claimed performance of around 100 MFLOPS. The co-processor consists of 2 sub-processors which are the Reality Signal Processor (RSP) and the Reality Display Processor (RDP). The RSP is programmable through microcode which although not exactly relatable to modern day GPU shaders can be thought of in a similar way. By writing better microcode a game could perform better graphically or have more advanced features such as more virtual lights. Aside from a few clever developers - namely Factor 5 and Rare - and Nintendo themselves, most game developers made do with the standard microcode provided by Nintendo which was difficult to understand due to its poor documentation. It is also thought that Nintendo did not help third party developers with better microcode because they wanted their own games to look the best. A notable exception is Conker's Bad Fury Day, which was created by Rare, and is probably the best looking N64 game in terms of graphics for its time.

Going into more detail about the Reality co-processor it was capable of perspective correction, anti-aliasing, Z-buffering, bilinear filtering, trilinear filtering, Gouraud shading, 8-bit alpha blending, and level of detail management. Note that neither the PlayStation nor the Sega Saturn had a Z-buffer.

The N64 can generate 16-bit stereo CD quality sound (selectable between 44.1 kHz and 48 kHz) but due to the nature of the N64 being cartridge based for its software, often MIDI tracks would be used in place of actual music recordings including those with vocals. The PlayStation and Sega Saturn thus had an advantage over the N64 since they used CD media which had plenty of storage for lots of speech and music recordings. The supported video modes of the N64 are: 240p (320×240), 288p (384×288), 480i (640×480), 576i (720×576). The colour palette has 16,777,216 colours (24-bit colour depth) and 2,097,152 (21-bit colour) possible colours can be on screen at once.

Known as RDRAM (Rambus DRAM), the N64 had 4MB of system RAM running at 250 MHz with a further 4MB that could be added through the use of the expansion pak, which was required by some games or for others could enhance the game (e.g. enable high resolution graphics). The RAM was general purpose and could be used for instructions, graphics, audio, and so on. The PlayStation, however, had non-unified RAM, 2MB main RAM and 1MB video memory, and this is also the case for the Sega Saturn which has 2MB main RAM, 1.5MB video RAM and 512KB sound RAM. The Saturn, just as with the N64, can have its RAM increased but by way of an 'extended RAM cartridge', which increases the Saturn's RAM by either 1MB or 4MB depending on the version purchased.

Even when power is turned off, the N64's RAM will retain data for a very short amount of time and this quirk was to be utilised by Banjo-Kazooie, Banjo-Tooie and possibly Donkey Kong 64 as well, using the Stop 'n' Swop feature. Once certain items had been collected in Kazooie the game could then be replaced with Tooie within a brief amount of time (perhaps as much as 30 seconds) to unlock something. However, Nintendo changed the N64's specifications, reducing the time for swapping the games down to just 1 second and so Stop 'n' Swop was dropped (although references remain in the aforementioned Rare games). You can read more about Stop 'n' Swop, and in particular its relationship with DK 64, at:

https://www.therwp.com/article/dk64-stop-n-swop-connection

There may have been some confusion as to what exactly the N64 was capable of in its early days as people were under the impression it could generate 'photo realistic' graphics but considering how difficult the N64 was to develop for the claims seemed untrue. What probably didn't help were the various demos and presentations that weren't a true reflection of what the N64 could produce in terms of graphical quality.

For e.g., here is a link to what is believed to be an early N64 demo:

Most likely what you see in the video linked above was running on an SGI machine more powerful than an N64. Another good example of supposedly what the N64 could produce but in reality was likely pre-rendered on SGI machines:

Console Overview

In the photo below you can see a cherry red translucent (PAL) Nintendo 64, with matching controller to the left. The N64 has four control ports at the front (too bad a lot of the games for the N64 were only one or two player), a power and reset button on top of which the memory expansion socket is located in the middle of (some games such as Donkey Kong 64 required the expansion pack whereas others could make use of it if available to enhance the game's graphics, for example). At the bottom of the N64 is the EXT. port used by the 64DD add-on and at the back of the N64 is where the power supply plugs in, as well as where the multi out connector is located to connect an A/V lead (compatible with both the SNES and Gamecube).

Above the N64 to the left is a Rumble pak which can be plugged into an N64 controller as to provide feedback by games that support it, such as when an explosion occurs in the game. These Rumble paks either used batteries or took power from the N64 via the controller. To the right of the Rumble pack is a Controller pak that, like the Rumble pak, could be plugged into an N64 controller but was used by some games to save data onto instead of, or in addition to storing data on the game cartridge. A lot of these Controller paks needed a battery to keep the data stored which eventually ran out, but some used a soldered battery that would be difficult for most people to replace. It could be quite a pain to have to keep swapping in and out a Rumble pak and Controller pak as needed so some companies released a combination of a Rumble pak and Controller pak which had a switch to swap between the two.

Super Mario 64 is also shown in the photo, a very popular game for the N64, which was Mario's first true 3D adventure and the game is regarded by most as one of the best games ever made and served as a standard for platforming games that followed it. Most N64 games came in cardboard boxes which easily broke so finding mint game boxes can set you back a lot of money. Considering how expensive the games were, it makes you wonder how more expensive they would have been had the game cases been made from something stronger.

Games

The N64 plays cartridge based games called 'Game paks' and had many best selling titles such as Super Mario 64, Mario Kart 64, Donkey Kong 64 and The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, to name a few. Super Mario 64 in particular, even though it was an early game for the N64, was very influential and set the standard for games that followed it. On the other side of the coin, an example of a notoriously bad game released for the N64 is Superman: The New Superman Adventures (a.k.a. Superman 64), was ridiculed for its game breaking bugs, difficult controls and poor graphics but surprisingly sold well (probably because of it being a Superman game) but could have performed so much better had the developers released a better, earlier version.

One very notable missing franchise from the N64 is Metroid and had 'Metroid 64' been a reality it no doubt would have sold more N64 consoles yet the closest we got to seeing Samus in 64-bit polygons was her playable appearance as a fighter in Super Smash Bros. Supposedly the reason the for lack of Metroid 64 was that Nintendo was unsure how to bring alive the Metroid world on the N64 and so they asked an unknown developer to create a Metroid game for the N64 but they turned the offer down.

Although using cartridges for the games had its advantages, such as very brief loading times (and was one reason Resident Evil 0 originally was to be released on the N64), it was also a big downside to the N64. Compared to games on CD (as used by the Sega Saturn, Sony PlayStation, and others), cartridges were expensive to produce and to buy so that was off-putting to both developers and customers, and due to the limited storage capabilities of a cartridge compared to CDs games were much more limited on the N64. To give a comparison, the highest capacity N64 cartridge could hold 64MB (Resident Evil 2 and Conker's Bad Fur Day being examples) whereas PlayStation 1 games could use up to 660MB on a single disc and it was not unusual for PS1 games to be released on multiple discs.

There were examples of developers trying to break the N64's boundaries even accomplishing feats such as Full Motion Videos (FMVs), as seen in Resident Evil 2 although at the cost of very poor quality movies. Donkey Kong 64 features an almost 4 minute introduction rap using in-game graphics which is impressive in terms of having full vocals but unfortunately the rap was generally not well received. The Pokemon Stadium games had a fair amount of speech which made it seem more like you was actually participating in a match but the vocals were quite repetitive (to be fair, that is the case for even more modern games).

Being cartridge based. the N64 did have the advantage of its game format making illegal copies difficult due to the high cost of cartridges and thanks to the security system built into both the game cartridge and the N64 itself (nowadays we have modern, affordable solutions such as the Everdrive 64). By contrast, in theory copying a CD based game should be easier and cheaper and although mechanisms were put into place to try to stop illegal copies of games for CD based consoles (such as the PlayStation), mod chips were released which bypassed security checks that would otherwise prevent unauthorised copies.

Being cartridge based the N64 was able to host advanced cheat devices, including the Gameshark, Action Replay, Equalizer and Xplorer64, which let the user input cheat codes (infinite lives, infinite health, etc.) which could also bypass security or region lock checks. Other cartridge devices, including official ones, could extend the N64's capabilities in other ways, giving it a big advantage over CD based consoles such as the Saturn and PlayStation.

The last game officially released for the N64 is Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3, available 20/8/2 in North America only. 40 Winks, originally planned for the N64 but cancelled, was later unofficially released for the N64 on 12/2/18 following a successful Kickstarter campaign.

If you are interested in how N64 games were developed, how they changed over time and what secrets were left in such games be sure to check out The Cutting Room Floor's N64 section:

https://tcrf.net/Category:Nintendo_64_games

Accessories

Controller

The standard controller that came with an N64 matched the colour of the console that it came with and there were many colours available, including translucent versions. The controller's ease of use has divided many people from the placement of the analog stick being in the middle of the controller to the 'Z' button on the bottom that can easily be knocked. The reasoning from Nintendo's side as to the 3 prong approach was so that the gamer could hold the controller in different ways depending on the type of game and what controls were needed to play it.

Controller pak

While some games could save to the cartridge's internal save memory the space available was very limited as well as expensive and so some games supported saving to a memory card, known as a Controller pak, which not only offered additional rewritable storage space but also had the advantage of being able to load saved data into a friend's copy of a game. The Controller pak inserts into the expansion socket on the back of an N64 controller which means you could not have a Rumble pak (for vibration, see rumble pak section below) and Controller pak inserted at the same time. To get around the issue, third party Controller pak devices were sold that have a built-in Rumble pak that could be switched on as needed, disabling the Controller pak (typically games prompted the player when to insert a Controller pak/Rumble pak).

The standard Controller pak contained 32KB of save memory split into 123 pages and each game would require a different number of pages for saving, however, only a maximum of 16 game save files could be stored on a single controller pak. Some third party Controller paks offered more save memory but could only get around the save capacity limit by splitting the save memory up into effectively multiple virtual Controller paks that were typically selected using a button on the device.

Rumble pak

Force feedback built into a controller is something we take for granted today but N64 users had to purchase a Rumble pak (may also be known as its earlier name Jolting pak) , which was inserted into a controller's expansion slot in the same manner (as mentioned in the Controller pak section above, third party solutions combined a rumble pak and Controller pak into one add-on). With the Rumble pak inserted into a controller, games that supported it could trigger the rumble pak to vibrate when certain actions are performed in a game or to give a warning or hint of danger or other activity.

While the official Rumble pak requires x2 AAA batteries to work some third party Rumble paks drew power from the N64 via the controller, although typically resulting in lower vibration. Some unofficial Rumble paks that required batteries to work had a switch for selecting between different levels of vibration.

Super Mario 64 and Wave Race 64 were re-released as Japan only 'Shindou' versions with support for the Rumble pak.

Transfer pak

The Transfer pak was an accessory that plugged into the back of an N64 controller in order for select N64 games to transfer data between the N64 game and a Game Boy/Game Boy Color game plugged into the Transfer pak. A total of 18 N64 games (some released in Japan only) support the Transfer pak in some form with Pokemon Stadium and Pokemon Stadium 2 being unique as, in addition to transferring data, they also let emulated versions of Pokemon Game Boy games to be played on the N64. It is possible to use the Japanese Game Boy camera with the Transfer pak but is only supported by the Mario Artist series of games for the 64DD (please see the Nintendo 64DD section).

Jumper pak/Expansion pak

The standard N64 had 4MB of RAM and came with the Jumper pak already installed, effectively acting as a bypass to allow the memory to function correctly when there was no expansion memory present. To double the N64's memory to 8MB the Jumper pak had to be removed with an ejector tool provided with the Expansion pak and then the Expansion pak could be installed. Only games designed for the Expansion pak could take advantage of it; just adding the Expansion pak did not automatically enhance all games.

A total of 62 games supported the Expansion pak; for some games the Expansion pak was optional, for e.g., if the extra memory was present Resident Evil 2 would increase its resolution so that the game looked better. All 64DD games (see sectioon below) required the Expansion pak and two N64 games needed the Expansion pak to work: Donkey Kong 64 and The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask, but Perfect Dark should also be included as most of the game is unavailable without the Expansion pak. Note that Donkey Kong 64 was one of the first games to require the Expansion pak and this was supposedly partly due to a game breaking bug that would cause the game to crash if the Expansion pak was not used.

The N64 was not the first games console that could make use of a RAM upgrade since the Sega Saturn had beat Nintendo to that idea a few years earlier with their Extended RAM cartridge, which came in 2 versions, either to increases the Saturn's memory by 1MB or 4MB. The key difference is that while the N64 Expansion pak was available to buy outside of Japan the Saturn's Extended RAM cartridge could only be purchased in Japan and the only Saturn game outside of Japan that could make use of the Extended RAM cartridge was bundled with the upgrade.

Nintendo 64DD

The Nintendo 64DD was an add-on for the N64 that plugged into the bottom of the console using the extension port (note that later releases of the N64, such as the Pikachu edition, lacked the necessary interface) that granted the N64 the ability to use magnetic disks (similar to a floppy disk), much like Famicom Disk System. In addition, the 64DD also provided a real-time clock, and standard audio and font libraries in the built-in 4.5MB ROM which software could use, saving space and standardising code. Equipped with a 64DD, an N64 could load software either from a 64DD disk or from an N64 cartridge, in the case of the latter the N64 software could also access a 64DD floppy which could serve as, for e.g., an expansion to give new levels to a game. 64DD cartridges were released to allow users to capture audio and video, create movies and animations, and access the Internet through a service called Randnet, using a modem cartridge provided with the 64DD.

The 64DD was supposed to launch with or just after the N64 was to be released but suffered multiple delays and ended up becoming available much later, on 1st December 1999 in Japan. Due to the poor sales of the 64DD in Japan, possibly because of the initially very limited number of games available for it and being released late in the N64's life, the 64DD was never released outside of Japan but there were plans to release it also at least in the USA. In fact, an American prototype of the 64DD has been found and you can learn more about it by watching this video:

Considering how much the N64 was criticised for being cartridge based and not just by fans since some developers (such as Square) favoured the PlayStation over the N64 because of its CD media, you would think Nintendo would have opted for a CD drive add-on. Other than Nintendo's falling out with Sony during the SNES days when they had hired them to make a CD drive for the SNES, Nintendo was not happy with the slow loading of CD games. Additionally, the 64DD's magnetic disk approach meant that games could store much more data that internally in a cartridge or controller pak, allowing for much more detailed information about the player's progress or game world state to be stored on the 64DD disk.

A 64DD disk could hold 64MB of data, which is also the maximum amount that an N64 cartridge could hold, but at a much lower cost per game. This storage amount, 64, gives rise to the '64' in 64DD (which could also be a reference to the N64) and the 'DD' possibly stands for 'dynamic drive' or 'disk drive'.

A number of games including Donkey Kong 64 and The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time being a couple of examples, would have made use of the 64DD but these features or versions were scrapped and the games released as pure N64 releases (but still contained references or even checks for the 64DD in the game's code). A sequel to Super Mario 64 on the 64DD had been suggested but never surfaced, however, a 64DD version of the original Super Mario 64 was created as a prototype and was shown off to demonstrate the quick loading times of the 64DD.

Only 9 games were released for the 64DD which are listed below with release dates and links to videos so you can learn more about them:

F-Zero X Expansion Kit 21st April 2000

Japan Pro Golf Tour 64 (Nippon Pro Golf Tour 64) 2nd May 2000

Doshin the Giant 1st December 1999

Doshin the Giant: Tinkling Toddler Liberation Front! Assemble! (Kyojin no Doshin Kaihou Sensen Chibikko Chikko Daishuugou) 17th May 2000

Mario Artist: Communication Kit 29th June 2000

Mario Artist: Paint Studio 1st December 1999

Mario Artist: Polygon Studio 29th August 2000

Mario Artist: Talent Studio 23rd February 2000

Not only was Talent Studio very well made software it was also the inspiration for what would become the Nintendo Mii system.

SimCity 64 23rd February 2000

With only around 15000 units sold the 64DD was deemed a failure and thus was discontinued on 14th February 2001, but today has become very much a collector's item due to its rarity.

For futher information about the 64DD why not check out IGN's article:

https://www.ign.com/articles/2001/02/10/everything-about-the-64dd

Light gun

No light gun was released for the N64 and this could have been for a number of reasons such as Nintendo not seeing the light gun market as profitable enough, especially with CRT TVs being phased out (there are light guns that work on all TV types though, such as the Guncon 3 for PS3). Another factor that may have dissuaded Nintendo from producing a light gun for the N64 could have been the failure of the SNES' very own light gun, the Super Scope. Even so, Nintendo had at least considered a light gun for the N64 as you can read about the very brief mention of a gun attachment on this site:

https://web.archive.org/web/19961222151835/http://www.nintendo.com/newsroom/features/show/panel.html

There was also a third party light gun in the works for the N64 as evidenced on this site:

https://www.tapatalk.com/groups/nintendo_64_forever/the-n64-light-gun-that-never-was-t2628.html

Discontinuation and Successor

Although in the early days the N64 performed better than the PlayStation and Saturn in North America, over time the PlayStation outsold the N64, selling 102.49 million units compared to the N64 only selling 32.93 million units. The N64 was discontinued worldwide in 2002 and was succeeded by the GameCube which was Nintendo's first optical disc based games console. However, the N64 did live on in the iQue Player, essentially an 'N64 in a controller' designed especially for the Chinese market and released in 2003 and discontinued in 2016.

Playing on Modern Screens and Alternative Ways to Play

When the N64 was originally released the most common way to connect an N64 to a TV was through RF or composite, with the latter providing somewhat better quality audio and video than RF. Unfortunately, due to the N64's low resolution output (by today's standards) and low quality A/V connection methods, playing an N64 on a modern TV can look blurry or washed out and some TVs will stretch the N64's video to fill the entire screen, resulting in very poor looking images. One way to make N64 games look a bit better on a modern TV and more naturally fill the screen is to use a composite to HDMI converter/upscaler.

To further complicate matters, N64 games could make use of hardware anti-aliasing to improve the look of jagged lines but the blur effect it employs looks bad on modern screens and such there has been effort to disable the technique in N64 games, such as buy using cheat codes. Take a look at this video for more information:

Some originally N64 games have appeared on other consoles since the N64's release. You can play ports of The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time including the Master Quest using the bonus disc which came with the GameCube version of The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker. Ports of Ocarina of Time and Majora's Mask are also included in The Legend of Zelda Collector's Edition for the GameCube. A number of N64 games were also re-released on the Wii and Wii U and Rare games Banjo-Kazooie, Banjo-Tooie, and Perfect Dark can be played on the original Xbox.

Emulation

Another means to play N64 games on other platforms and also not limiting what titles can be played, is to use an emulator which runs N64 games on modern platforms, such as PC and smartphone. An emulator is a program that attempts to mimic a console (such as an N64) and runs ROMs (representations of game cartridges) to the effect that the games think they are running on the original hardware. The advantages of emulators is that there is no need to own the hardware it's emulating, the A/V is much better quality than on real hardware, and emulators provide options to boost the game's resolution or add other enhancing features. While emulators themselves are legal and usually free the ROMs are a 'grey area' when it comes to owning them even if you also have a copy of the actual game cartridge as well. As such, I will not link to any ROM sites, only the emulators.

Project64

Probably one of the best N64 emulators in terms of faithfully reproducing an N64 and comes with cheat code support and the ability to run 64DD games. The emulator is available on both PC (will run on modern O/S as recent as Windows 10) and Android (currently in beta). The most recent version of Project64 is 2.3.2, which was released in 2017. Download from:

https://www.pj64-emu.com/

Nemu

Nemu64 doesn't do as well a job as other N64 emulators in emulating an N64 and the emulator has not been updated in a long while (it only made it up to V0.8), it does a decent job of virtually running an N64 environment and for me in particular was a great help in creating codes for N64 games. Nemu is only available for PC and sadly, I have been unable to get it to run past opening a ROM on Windows 10, with Windows 7 being the most recent O/S I was able to get Nemu to fully run on. If you feel like checking out Nemu then follow this link:

https://www.zophar.net/n64/Nemu64.html

Mupen64Plus

Mupen64Plus is a popular N64 emulator that runs on Linux, Windows and Mac, and at the time of writing this its most recent version is 2.5.9, released early 2019. Although it emulates the N64 well it does not as standard come with a GUI interface but there are front-ends available for Mupen64Plus. Please see the official site linked below for more information:

https://mupen64plus.org/

N64 Ports

Super Mario 64 for PC

While emulators do a good job of pretending your PC or smartphone is an N64, the games you run in an emulator aren't playing natively on your system and are reliant on the emulator at simulating the target system as reliably as possible. If a game, however, is ported to a system and ported well it should run better than an emulated version since the complete code, that is the game, is running on a system with no emulator overhead or errors. This leads us to the efforts individuals have made to reverse compile the code for a number of N64 games, so that we essentially have the original high level program code Nintendo used to make the game originally. While not exactly identical to what Nintendo produced and lacking details such as comments from the Nintendo programmers, the reverse engineered source code is a huge step in porting N64 games to other systems. Which is how the Super Mario 64 PC port came about, offering Mario in super high resolution and higher frame rate than the N64 could ever dream of.

Super Mario 64 for PC unfortunately hasn't got off to the best start as the executable was leaked and Nintendo took it down although you can probably still find a copy if you look hard enough. Unofficial ports of Nintendo (or any company) games is always going to be a legal nightmare as a game, even ported from reverse engineered source code, is still for all intents and purposes a property that belongs to Nintendo. It does at least give us a little taste of Super Mario 64 on modern systems and perhaps in time Nintendo will give us a new version of SM64 (which seems very possible for the Nintendo Switch).

Modern N64 Games

Toward the end of the N64's life, developers had discovered techniques to improve the graphics and performance of N64 games but sadly by then it was a little too late but nonetheless showed what the N64 was capable of. Today, like many other retro consoles, the N64 has a very much alive following and fans have created demos to further show off what the N64 can achieve. Here are some example videos:

Nacho64 demo

Sonic adventure 64

Note: doesn't run on real N64 so probably taking advantage of N64 emulator capabilities.

Links

A great N64 resource with photos:

https://jrra.zone/n64/

All content of this and related pages is copyright (c) James S. 2020-2021