Epilogue SN Operator Review: Super Nintendo Entertainment

There were workarounds—European or Australian gamers will probably remember dual-boot adapters that used a local cart to ‘spoof’ the console into accepting an imported American game—but with different TV standards to consider, most players were limited to games released in their home region.

With SN Operator, all that is consigned to the past. All cart sizes are the same, and lock chips are ignored—put the game anywhere in the world and, as long as it’s working properly, it will load. Modern displays mean that old barriers such as different NTSC or PAL display standards are irrelevant.

That brings a few obvious advantages for purists. Where NTSC vs. PAL is the difference it was problem, it often meant that PAL games ran much slower due to the lower 50-Hz refresh rate compared to NTSC’s 60 Hz. Since I’m in the UK, I can finally play Street Fighter II Turbo at its true speed, or a classic action platformer Spider-Man and the X-Men in Arcade’s Revenge except for Spidey who feels like he’s swimming in mud. Region-free also benefits North American players, allowing previously incompatible exclusives from other countries to be imported without worry—good for the ambitions of a cult like Konami. Pop’n Twinbee games, released in Japan and Europe only.

Playback software also shows what the regional version of the game is—it accurately covers my UK copy Star Wing (Nintendo couldn’t use the Star Fox name at that time). Counterfeit carts are also detected. Talking about it Star Fox/Wingthere are a number of options for adjusting how SN Operator handles Mode 7, the SNES’ pseudo-3D visual trick. Upsampling and upscaling features can render 30+-year-old games very old.

Another nice touch is the way it works with older devices like the SNES Mouse, supporting titles like Mario Paint or Many people II—a strategy game and another PAL exclusive—for your regular, modern, non-SNES mouse. That mouse could represent the Super Scope, Nintendo’s light-gun peripheral designed for outdated CRT screens. The only downside is that the mouse cursor’s high dots-per-inch (dpi) accuracy makes those games incredibly easy, as I found out with the Japanese copy Super Scope 6, a six-game show for the tool. (Unfortunately, only two games, Blastris again The LazerBlazerwith three modes in one—historically false advertising!) Still, there were only 12 Super Scope games released, so it’s good to see this important category of games being considered.

The best improvement over GB Operator, however, is the expanded collection of data backup tools. Saving progress to the cart like you would on the original SNES remains a baked-in feature, and SN Operator has the ability to transfer game saves between your computer and the cart, but virtual save modes are now supported. At any time, you can create saved snapshots no matter where you are in the game—an absolute godsend in gaming Mana’s secreta ’90s Japanese role-playing game (JRPG), and one that I can now pick up and put down without worrying about in-game save points.