Long-time readers of Time Extension will be keenly aware of Bitmap Bureau's quest to release its top-down shooter Xeno Crisis on every consumer device known to man; what began life as a Mega Drive release has since expanded to N64, SNES, Dreamcast and beyond, with the most recent conquest being the humble GBA.

We covered the North American and European variants of that version a while back but have only just gotten our grubby hands on the Japanese iteration—and it's the jewel in the crown, if you ask us.

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If you've been keeping track of all the Switch 2 excitement, then you might be aware that the Nintendo Switch Online Expansion Pack is getting some new features, including the ability to rewind gameplay and apply a CRT-style filter.

Now, it's understandable that Nintendo might make some of these features exclusive to its latest console—it did a similar thing with SNES games on the New Nintendo 3DS—but some people have quite rightly pointed out that things like screen filters are not something you'd usually expect to be locked beyond a hardware upgrade, as it's not like they require the power of Switch 2 in order to work.

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We've seen quite a few retro games get the decompilation treatment recently, but there's a new work-in-progress project that is attempting to do something a little different.

The process of decompilation basically turns 'executable' code back into human-readable source code, and zeldaret is doing just that with the N64 emulator used in the GameCube release of The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time.

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UK auction house Ewbank's has a massive haul of Nintendo-related items on its site as part of its growing retro game sales drive.

Nintendo items going up for auction aren't anything new, of course, but this lot includes some rather unusual and interesting items—with the most unique being a factory-sealed retail pack of six brand-new GBA SP Rip Curl consoles.

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Emulating systems like the Game Boy Advance, SNES and Mega Drive / Genesis is pretty straightforward these days, but the Nintendo DS is a slightly trickier proposition, thanks to its dual display format and touchscreen capabilities.

We have the AYANEO Flip DS, but that powerful handheld PC is so expensive that most people won't be willing to fork out the cash just to play DS titles. Thankfully, a more wallet-friendly alternative is on the horizon via MagicX and its Zero 40 handheld (thanks, Retro Handhelds).

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Rechargeable batteries are found in pretty much every piece of consumer electronics these days and are a wonderful inclusion when you want portable power without the need for old-school disposable batteries. However, they don't last forever—and, in some cases, when they reach the end of their operational life span, they can cause damage to your hardware.

You might recall an issue we reported a while back concerning PSP batteries ballooning in size and cracking the battery compartment of the console. It seems that the Nintendo Wii U's GamePad battery sufferers from similar issues, as noted by SlimJimmy on social media:

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In case you hadn't noticed, the release of Super Mario World's soundtrack on vinyl is a pretty big moment in the world of Nintendo music—the company hasn't embraced the format in quite the same way as others, so this is hopefully a turning point.

Even so, it's worth noting that the company behind this release is Warner Music Japan, not Nintendo—this is a vinyl reissue of the 1991 soundtrack album, which was issued in Japan on CD.

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The fan-made Star Fox EX Exploration Showcase has just been updated to version 1.11.02, we're happy to report.

Kandowontu's ROM hack includes 17 new levels, new enemies, fresh music, as well as new graphics modes, ship customisation and more.

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Ninty Media has already given us the GameBook and GameBook Color, and it is completing the trilogy with GameBook Advance, a crowdfunded tribute to Nintendo's all-conquering 32-bit handheld.

Over 550 people raised £42,568 to help make this particular book happen, and, in doing so, helped to secure talent such as former Nintendo Official Mag Editor Tim Street, Did You Know Gaming's Liam Robertson, Retro Gamer's Nick Thorpe and ex-Nintendo Life staffer Ryan Craddock, as well as artists such as Jay Cobs, Jonathan Traynor, Thiago Radice and Iago Machado.

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The Wii U GamePad is surely one of Nintendo's most contentious innovations. On one hand, it offered asymmetric gameplay possibilities that had never been witnessed before, and also allowed you to play games on the controller when the main TV was being used for something else—a feature which, you could argue, directly inspired its successor, the Switch.

On the downside, the Wii U GamePad was criminally underused and, beyond a handful of titles, never really justified itself. It was also hamstrung by the fact that only one player could use it (Nintendo never did follow through on its claim that multiple GamePads could be connected to a single console), and its battery life was disappointing.

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As gaming hardware gets older, finding replacement parts gets harder and, therefore, more expensive.

It's for this reason that we've seen a bunch of community-made replacements, one of which is the Open Source Expansion Pak (OEXP), a replacement for the N64's Expansion Pak which aims to provide a cheaper alternative to the real deal by combining two 2MB RAM chips rather than using a single (harder to come by) 4MB module.

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Indie developer S. TALBAIN has just released a new title for the Game Boy Color that is clearly inspired by Konami's Castlevania franchise.

"Step into the decaying world of Kagenovia in Dawnrazor, a brand-new original Game Boy Color title developed for real hardware," says the developer. "Take control of Zedekiah, a betrayed knight reborn through parasitic vampirism, as he fights through blood-soaked ruins and biomechanical horrors."

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A selection of over 200 beta GBA, DS, DSi And 3DS carts could be at risk of falling into the hands of a private owner, it has been revealed.

The non-profit preservation group Video Game Preservation Museum was in discussion with the seller about dumping and preserving the carts. However, it was revealed yesterday that the seller backed out of the arrangement after being contacted by other individuals, presumably with higher offers.

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Super Mario 64 is a solid-gold classic, and for that reason, fans have spent the past few decades digging into the game to find as many secrets as possible. Amazingly, despite the time that has passed since it launched on the N64, it seems the game still has hidden features to reveal.

Hacker Kaze Emanuar, who has been systematically pulling apart Nintendo's 3D classic for a while now, has discovered yet another Mario 64 secret which, he claims, has only been found because Nintendo "didn't anticipate anyone would be as annoying as I am being right now."

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According to a brand new video from the YouTuber Matt KC Bytes, the 2002 party game Mario Party 4 has become the first Nintendo GameCube to officially be decompiled.

Decompilation, as you may already be aware, has become something of a popular topic in the retro community over the last few years, thanks to the existence of various projects that aim to reverse engineer the source code of classic titles for older machines.

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We recently saw Rare's N64 classic Diddy Kong Racing get the decompilation treatment, and now it's the turn of Mario Kart 64 to get the same benefit.

Decompilation, in case you didn't know, is the process of translating an executable file into source code. The decompilation process is essential for native PC ports to exist, and creating such ports ('recompiling') has been made easier recently thanks to the N64: Recompiled project.

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The first Telenet Shooting Collection was notable for containing Granada and Gaiares, two decent-quality Genesis shmups which made the cost of entry almost worth it on their own.

The second volume is close to release, and while it's nice to see some lesser-known titles get a new lease of life, there's arguably nothing up to the standard of Gaiares in Telenet Shooting Collection II.

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A new indie title by the name of Maverick's Baghdad Extraction is coming to Kickstarter soon and has apparently been referred to by some critics as "Zelda with guns".

The NES title—which has support for the Zapper light gun—places you in the shoes of John Maverick in his "most dangerous mission yet," even more risky than his subsequent adventure, Desert Of The Undead New Frontiers.

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At Nintendo's SpaceWorld 2000 event, the company showed off its GameCube console to the general public – but it wasn't quite the same design as the one we'd eventually get.

While the external casing looks identical to the final retail edition, there's a clear section on the lid which allows you to see the disc inside the optical drive, and the 'Open' button doesn't have that little depression in the middle. The side of the unit is also slightly different.

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Nintendo's WaveBird wireless controller for the GameCube is considered to be one of the best pads ever made, but as time goes on, finding a controller with its all-important receiver is getting harder and harder—within a reasonable budget, at least.

James Smith (AKA loopj) has created the solution. The open-source WavePhoenix project allows you to build a replacement receiver for less than $5. The receiver uses a cheap, off-the-shelf wireless module—the RF-BM-BG22C3—and this can either be hand-wired or assembled onto a custom PCB.

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Physical publisher Limited Run Games has come under fire for allegedly using recycled chips in one of its latest releases, Shantae Advance: Risky Revolution on the GBA (thanks, VGC).

The game—which was originally supposed to launch last year but was delayed—is set between the original Shantae and Shantae: Risky's Revenge. Development began back in 2002, but was cancelled a couple of years later due to a lack of interest from publishers. The project was revived in 2023, with Limited Run being confirmed as the distributor.

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It may not have been overshadowed by the likes of the Mega Drive / Genesis and PC Engine back in the day when it came to quality shooters, but thanks to the efforts of modern developers, the NES / Famicom is clawing back some respectability in the genre.

Last year's Changeable Guardian Estique set the standard pretty high, and we've got @baNesaka's Metal Cancer to look forward to this year.

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While emulation is commonplace these days, we're seeing an exciting new trend emerge: decompilation.

This complex process translates an executable file into source code and is an integral step in allowing the homebrew community to recompile native (not emulated) PC versions of classic games. We've seen the likes of Star Fox, Super Mario 64 and Zelda: Ocarina of Time benefit from this approach so far.

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The Homebrew Channel, a means of running unofficial apps and games on the Wii, has ceased development after it was alleged that key figures in the homebrew development community stole code from both Nintendo and other open-source projects.

As is the case with much of the homebrew software for Wii, the Homebrew Channel relies on the libogc software library, which had previously been found to contain large portions of code "stolen directly from the Nintendo SDK or games using the Nintendo SDK."

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The accessory maker 8BitDo isn't a stranger to releasing products inspired by the NES.

In the past, for instance, it notably released an NES-inspired design for its Retro Mechanical Keyboard — one that we ended up reviewing rather favorably back in 2023, calling it "one of the more pleasant mechanical keyboards we've used" and "a solid recommendation".

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