Dance Dance Revolution, know your roots.

[Raziaar]

Of course I'm talking about the Nintendo Entertainment System Power Pad.

This was a plastic mat that you unrolled and plugged into your NES, and basically you could play certain games using it and really utilize your endurance and speed of movement to be better than the other players.

I know personally in my household, we loved the thing. We'd have competitions to see who was the best, including both speed of being able to run on the pads to get the game character from point A to point B, but also who had the quickest reaction time hopping up and back down on the pad and continuing to furiously run.

Probably one of the most novel and greatest hardware memories of mine for the NES, followed by the NES Zapper for duck hunt, which is undoubtedly a grandfather for the Wii controller in the way it's utilized.

Anybody else have fond memories of this classic device, or both?

 

[Stigmata]

That looks like the most amazing NES controller ever

Also: how the **** does a lightgun work?

 

[Raziaar]

That looks like the most amazing NES controller ever

Also: how the **** does a lightgun work?

From wikipedia. Quite fascinating.

Technical overview
The orange NES Zapper.

When the trigger was pulled, the game blanked out the screen with a black background for one frame, then, for one additional frame, drew a solid white rectangle around the sprite the user was supposed to be shooting at. The photodiode at the back of the Zapper would detect these changes in intensity and send a signal to the NES to indicate whether it was over a lit pixel or not. A drop followed by a spike in intensity signaled a hit. Multiple sprites were supported by flashing a solid white rectangle around each potential sprite, one per frame.

It is possible to cheat in games by changing the brightness and contrast of the television, or pointing the gun at a bright light. The gun thinks it is pointing at a solid white target and will report a hit. If there are multiple targets, the "hit" target will be the first to be lit with the white square. This is not as consistent with a fluorescent lamp due to the possible differences in timing of the lamp's flicker verses the timing of the television's refresh rate.

Additionally, by using a magnifying glass on the gun, it fools the receptor into thinking that the rectangle is much larger than it actually is, allowing for a shotgun-like effect that will cover the entire screen.

We never knew about the cheating factors. DAMN, I could of cheated with that thing! Argh!

 

[Darkside55]

Haha, I was just thinking the other day how I still don't understand how the lightgun worked, and now I know. I used to love the zapper. I used to tie the cord around my waist like a belt and holster the gun in in it, and fire from the hip like I was Captain N.

I also have a not-so-fond memory of it, when as a little kid I distracted my mom while she was playing the hardest setting on Duck Hunt and made her miss one. She would've had a perfect score otherwise. Still feel bad about that...

 

[Raziaar]

Haha, I was just thinking the other day how I still don't understand how the lightgun worked, and now I know. I used to love the zapper. I used to tie the cord around my waist like a belt and holster the gun in in it, and fire from the hip like I was Captain N.

I also have a not-so-fond memory of it, when as a little kid I distracted my mom while she was playing the hardest setting on Duck Hunt and made her miss one. She would've had a perfect score otherwise. Still feel bad about that...

She should of shot you.

 

[Darkside55]

Probably should have. If they ever release Duck Hunt on the Wii I'm gonna see if she can get a perfect score, 20-some years later.