Playing With Power

Playing With Power – Nintendo Power #8

Overall, issue 8 feels like it spends a lot of time looking forward and not as much on what’s current. But given that this issue would have been produced during the summer of 1989, there wouldn’t have been too many games coming out around that time.  Still, in this issue we get a great look at the NES classic Ducktales and more information on the RPG that Nintendo hoped would storm America, Dragon Warrior.  We also get a feature on the NES Satellite which allowed 4 player gameplay on games that supported it.  The games listed that support it are mostly sports game but I was a bit surprised to see that Nightmare on Elm Street supports 4 players.

The preview on the Game Boy is pretty enjoyable to read to get a little insight in to Alexey Pajitnov before he was a famous name among gaming circles, even though they spelled his name wrong in the feature.  After the Game Boy feature, we get previews of a number of games that would go on to become favorites among NES gamers such as River City Ransom, Batman, and A Boy and His Blob.  Finally we see Mario 3 debut on the top 30 list and it would remain on the list for the next 5 years!

As with the previous issue, we got another insert strategy guide walking through the second half of Mario 2.  I really enjoyed these inserts and they would start a trend that Nintendo would continue as the years went on giving strategy guides away as subscriber bonuses and 2 upcoming issues of the official magazine were nothing but strategy guides for the hot games of the day.

While not as groundbreaking as the previous issues, this was another solid issue that gave a lot to look forward to for the rest of 1989.  Next time the game that swept Russia would take over America.  See you then and remember…Play with Power!