As always this time of year I've been playing my NES for a few weeks in the morning. It has become increasingly harder though because my bootleg Ninja Cleaner broke down last year and the official NES cleaner simply isn't as good. More difficult to clean the system as a result but I have been successful playing some games anyway by taking out and inserting the game again and again.

This morning I decided to fire up Contra, or Probotector as it's known over here. Only meant to play a few levels but I ended up playing through the whole game It's not that long anyway.

So yeah, I can now officially say I have beaten Contra before breakfast using the 30 life code -What?

Ah yes the Konami Code that made Contra beatable! I too used that code to beat Contra and I feel no shame in doing it .

NES story time!


I've been having issues with my beloved childhood NES ever since my off-brand cleaning device broke as that was the thing that was essential for the system to work. I haven't found a replacement and I suspect I'm not the only one who's discovered that it's way better than Nintendo's official product.
I tried getting it to work this morning but to no avail, so I fired up the second NES I have that I got as a backup (yup; you know me!). That one worked first try so I played Contra through.

Just now I decided to take my own NES apart again to see if I could clean the internal contacts. This is a risky thing as the screw heads might be damaged and thus impossible to remove and also the plastic they latch on to might give, so I always have to be careful.

I didn't find the contacts too dirty but I got a little bit off and after some fiddling I got the shield underneath back and the connector. Everything but the top shield and the lid itself. I also didn't screw all the screws back, only two in order to provide at least some sturdiness. Plugged it back in and popped in Contra.

It worked! First try! I'm always scared damaging something when I take it apart like this but it all worked fine. I also tried two other games and I did have to fiddle with them a bit before they worked but at least that's much easier now when the lid and top shield are easy to remove. I think I'm gonna leave them loose from now on actually. I would much like it to be all back as it should but if it at least work I can live with it. No idea screwing it all back as having it off makes it easier to clean the contacts with another part of the cleaning kit I have.

You can take apart a Nintendo? But you can do this because you have a spare. Gooeness. How many consoles do you have?

Me: Atari 2600 (it's in a box. Probably still works, just need an old CRT TV to find out)
... Nintendo, although I forget if it's NES or SNES
... Playstation 2
.... two Playstation 3s (one is kaput)
... Xbox 360

I skipped the Xbox 1 / PS4 generation. Maybe I'll get one of those too someday.

Sure. The NES is just screwed together with Philips screws.


Yeah, but also because I've done it before so I'm somewhat confident in doing it. And since it wouldn't work anyway I took the risk.


Two NES, one Mega Drive (Genesis), one xbox 360, one original Game Boy, two clear Game Boy and one Game Boy Light

whoa whoa whoa you have an Xbox? 360??? What do you play on that? Any Bethesda games? Don't tell me you've still got that all contained in its original box!

No kidding, you have a Sega as well.

I got the Xbox three years ago. My boss's kid was about to just throw it away and even though I told him to sell it and get whatever he could for it, he'd just go nah. So instead of letting him throw it away, I took it off his hands. I've never played it and it didn't come with a Beth game or anything interesting. And even if it did, I prefer the PC.

When it comes to consoles I just prefer the NES and Contra/Probotector is something I can always pop in and have a go at!

I see. Well if you ever get interested and want to know anything about your free Xbox, I can help.

So Khajiit and Mrs. Khajiit started watching the Star Wars movies in order starting on May 4th because apparently we are suckers for fake holidays. Anyway, as we were watching the pod-racing sequence in The Phantom Menace, Khajiit got a strong desire to play the N64 classic Star Wars: Episode 1- Podracer. As soon as we get the interwebz out where we live now, Khajiit might get it from GOG.

I think I still have that one on disc, from way back in the day.

I've got a 360 too. Well, we technically have two of them but the older one is currently off-line (CDROM not working). We have to share the remaining one. Plenty of games on it still. We saw no reason to upgrade to One (other than to lighten our wallets which we declined).

What? The Star Wars prequels are on N64??

I only remember the podracing game. The Naboo starfighter was an unlockable fighter in the excellent Rogue Squadron, but that game was set during the Galactic Civil War era. I don’t remember any other prequel games on N64.