BaD #14: Nintendo Adventures

On 02/20/2017 at 08:56 PM by daftman

Those of us who read Nintendo Power in the early '90s probably have fond memories of the comics they ran back then. The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past and Super Mario World both had great comic adaptations that, while loose with the source material, were a ton of fun to read. Rereading them today, though, was an arduous task even if you still had your old issues of NP after all these years. But the Zelda comic was finally reprinted in 2015 and the Mario comic got the same treatment last October. I'm reading it right now and having a wonderful time. They put so much personality into the characters. I feel like if they made a comic for Mario today it would be a sterile corporate creation, but this comic is brimming with life all its own. And I had forgotten how awesome Peach—er, Princess Toadstool is in here. Great stuff.

Yes, Bowser does rap once at the beginning. Yay, early '90s lol.

Cary Woodham

02/20/2017 at 09:10 PM

While Nintendo Power was clearly propoganda, I still have a lot of respect for that magazine as it did a lot of video game journalism 'firsts' and was one of the inspirations for me to major in Magazine Journalism in college to do that one day. Didn't work out that way later, but that's life.

daftman

02/20/2017 at 10:45 PM

Yeah, NP was a giant commercial but an effective one. I have a lot of good memories from it. *gets out old man soapbox* And ya know, kids today will never understand what it's like waiting anxiously for a magazine to come in the mail. Everything is just right there at their fingertips online.

Super Step Contributing Writer

02/20/2017 at 10:28 PM

I miss magazine comics, from the stuff in Boy's Life, to this, to the comics that came at the end of EGM near the Seanbaby review.

02/20/2017 at 10:41 PM

I loved the Hsu and Chan comics!

KnightDriver

02/21/2017 at 12:46 AM

I miss magazines. I have podcasts now.

I've been rereading a bunch of old Dragon Magazines and they put some comics at the end. I really like Wormy. That was a good one.

The Last Ninja

02/21/2017 at 01:25 AM

I also bought this book and LOVE it!!!! The story and characters are true to the games and I love also how the characters are all drawn perfectly.

Matt Snee Staff Writer

02/21/2017 at 10:26 AM

whoa, that looks sweet man! I don't remember being into those comics too much though.

Nick DiMola Director

02/22/2017 at 12:08 AM

This book is awesome! Chessa got it for me for Christmas and I basically read it to my kids one chapter at a time every night, voices for the characters and all. We had a ton of fun with it.

I agree wholeheartedly though; these days Nintendo would never make something like that. There's tons of adult humor and topics they'd stay far away from today. The games still have the soul, but Nintendo's image (and their characters) are so tightly curated these days that something like this would be completely neutered if it were published now.

PixlBit