Month: January 2017

For anyone looking to scratch that retro gaming itch, the NES Classic is the perfect solution. Well, almost. Nintendo may have included 30 classic games pre-installed on the system, like Super Mario Bros., The Legend of Zelda, and Tecmo Bowl, but once you blow through those, there’s no way to get more titles. The NES Classic doesn’t connect to the internet or Nintendo’s eShop, so the current roster of games is all you’ll get until the inevitable follow-up that the company is sure to produce.

But what if you just need to play some Battletoads or Contra right now? As usual, there’s a hack for that. Ars Technica is reporting that hackers have found a way to add more titles to the existing NES Classic library, including favorites like Darkwing Duck, Bucky O’Hare, and the rest of the Mega Man collection (the NES Classic only includes Mega Man 2).

There’s a Reddit thread with a set of directions detailing how the hacker, named MadMonkey, accomplished this. The process involves hooking your NES Classic to a computer through the micro-USB cable, then uploading NES ROMs from the computer to the NES Classic.

A hack like this, in theory, can add any NES game you can find to your Classic—although a video found by The Verge claims that some people have run into trouble after uploading more than 80 games. Just know that all of these hacks involve a fair amount of computer savvy, as a wrong move can easily ruin your Classic device. Plus, there’s also no legal way to do any of this, since downloading a ROM is considered pirating.

If you don’t want to turn your NES Classic into an expensive paperweight, you can always legally download older titles from Nintendo’s paid Virtual Console service, provided you have a Wii U or Nintendo 3DS.

[h/t Ars Technica]

Though her filmography consists of more than 80 credits, the late Debbie Reynolds is best known for her role as aspiring actress Kathy Selden, the singing-and-dancing love interest of movie star Don Lockwood (played by Gene Kelly) in Stanley Donen’s classic musical, Singin’ in the Rain. To celebrate the life of the iconic actress, who passed away on December 28, Entertainment Weekly reports that the film will return to theaters across the country for a special two-day engagement beginning this weekend.

The Oscar-nominated film, which turns 65 this year, will screen as part of Fathom and Turner Classic Movies’ Big Screen Classics series. The film will screen on Sunday, January 15 and Wednesday, January 18 and will include a brief introduction from TCM host Ben Mankiewicz.

Over the next year, the series will bring a host of classic films—including North by Northwest, Smokey and the Bandit, The Godfather, E.T., and The Princess Bride—back into cinemas. But the year’s lineup will kick off with Singin’ in the Rain, of which Reynolds once wrote: “Singin’ in the Rain and childbirth were the hardest things I ever had to do in my life.”

[h/t: Entertainment Weekly]