super nintendo entertainment system super nintendo redirects here for the planned nintendothemed area in universal studios japan see super nintendo world super nintendo entertainment systemtop north american snes circa 1991bottom japanese super famicom which has the same casing later used in european and australian consolesother variations are pictured under casing belowalso known assnessuper nesjp super famicomkor super comboysuper nintendomanufacturernintendotypehome video game consolegenerationfourth generationrelease datejp november 21 1990 north america 2335 million japan 1717 millionother 858 millionmediarom cartridgecpuricoh 5a22 358 mhzsoundnintendo ssmponline servicessatellaview japan only xband nintendo power japan onlybestselling game super mario world packin2060 million donkey kong country packin 9 million super mario kart packin 8 million street fighter ii the world warrior standalone 63 million predecessornintendo entertainment systemsuccessornintendo 64 the super nintendo entertainment system officially abbreviated the super nes by playtronic although each version is essentially the same several forms of regional lockout prevent the different versions from being compatible with one another the snes is nintendos second programmable home console following the nintendo entertainment system nes the console introduced advanced graphics and sound capabilities compared with other systems at the time the development of a variety of enhancement chips integrated in game cartridges helped to keep it competitive in the marketplace the snes was a global success becoming the bestselling console of the 16bit era despite its relatively late start and the intense competition it faced in north america and europe from segas genesis console the snes remained popular well into the 32bit era having sold 491 million worldwide comparative to the ness 619 million it continues to be popular among collectors and retro gamers some of whom still make homebrew rom images in addition to its popularity in nintendos emulated rereleases such as in virtual console environment history early concept designs for the snes referred to as the nintendo entertainment system 2 to compete with the popular family computer in japan nec corporation launched the pc engine in 1987 and sega followed suit with the mega drive in 1988 the two platforms were later launched in north america in 1989 as the turbografx16 and the sega genesis respectively both systems were built on 16bit architectures and offered improved graphics and sound over the 8bit nes however it took several years for segas system to become successful launch media all and the fourcolor super famicom mark left is part of the super nes logo in the pal and jp regions the colors correspond to those of the abxy buttons of the control pad in those regions a different logo was used for the north american version right consisting of a striped background outlining four oval shapes designed by masayuki uemura the designer of the original famicom the super famicom was released in japan on wednesday november 21 1990 for 25000 yen 210 it was an instant success nintendos initial shipment of 300000 units sold out within hours and the resulting social disturbance led the japanese government to ask video game manufacturers to schedule future console releases on weekends with the super famicom quickly outselling its chief rivals nintendo reasserted itself as the leader of the japanese console market nintendo released the super nintendo entertainment system a redesigned version of the super famicom in north america for 199 it began shipping in limited quantities on august 23 1991 the snes was released in the united kingdom and ireland in april 1992 for 150 with a german release following a few weeks later most of the pal region versions of the console use the japanese super famicom design except for labeling and the length of the joypad leads the playtronic super nes in brazil although palm uses the north american design the snes and super famicom launched with few games but these games were well received in the marketplace in japan only two games were initially available super mario world and fzero console wars console wars the rivalry between nintendo and sega resulted in what has been described as one of the most notable console wars in video game history changes in policy during the nes era nintendo maintained exclusive control over games released for the systemthe company had to approve every game each thirdparty developer could only release up to five games per year but some third parties got around this by using different names for example konamis ultra games brand those games could not be released on another console within two years and nintendo was the exclusive manufacturer and supplier of nes cartridges however competition from segas console brought an end to this practice in 1991 acclaim began releasing games for both platforms with most of nintendos other licensees following suit over the next several years capcom which licensed some games to sega instead of producing them directly and square were the most notable holdouts nintendo continued to carefully review submitted games scoring them on a 40point scale and allocating marketing resources accordingly each region performed separate evaluations game players were not the only ones to notice the violence in this game us senators herb kohl and joe lieberman convened a congressional hearing on december 9 1993 to investigate the marketing of violent video games to children 32bit era and beyond while other companies were moving on to 32bit systems rare and nintendo proved that the snes was still a strong contender in the market in november 1994 rare released donkey kong country a platform game featuring 3d models and textures prerendered on sgi workstations with its detailed graphics fluid animation and highquality music donkey kong country rivaled the aesthetic quality of games that were being released on newer 32bit cdbased consoles in the last 45 days of 1994 the game sold 61 million units making it the fastestselling video game in history to that date this game sent a message that early 32bit systems had little to offer over the snes and helped make way for the more advanced consoles on the horizon in october 1997 nintendo released a redesigned model of the snes the sns101 model referred to as newstyle super nes in north america for us99 with some units including the packin game super mario world 2 yoshis island nintendo ceased production of the snes in 1999 many popular snes games have since been ported to the game boy advance which has similar video capabilities in 2005 nintendo announced that snes games would be made available for download via the wii and wii us virtual console service technical specifications the 16bit design of the snes central processing unit and ram cpu reference processor ricoh 5a22 based on a 16bit 65c816 core clock rates ntsc input2147727mhzbus358mhz 268mhz or 179mhz clock rates pal input2128137mhzbus355mhz 266mhz or 177mhz buses 24bit and 8bit address buses 8bit data bus additional features dma and hdma timed irq parallel io processing hardware multiplication and division the cpu is a ricoh 5a22 it is a derivative of the 16bit 65c816 in ntsc regions its nominal clock speed is 358 mhz but the cpu will slow down to either 268mhz or 179mhz when accessing some slower peripherals this cpu has an 8bit data bus and two address buses the 24bit busa is used for general accesses while the 8bit busb is used to access support chip registers such as the video and audio coprocessors the 5a22 also sports a 8 channel dma unit an 8bit parallel io port a controller port interface circuits allowing serial and parallel access to controller data a 16bit multiplication and division unit and circuitry for generating nonmaskable interrupts on vblank and irq interrupts on calculated screen positions the console contains 128kib of general purpose ram separated from the ram dedicated to the video and audio subsystems video video reference resolutions progressive 256224 512224 256239 512239interlaced 512448 512478 pixel depth 2 4 7 or 8 bpp indexed 8 or 11 bpp direct total colors 32768 15bit sprites 128 32 max per line up to 6464 pixels backgrounds up to 4 planes each up to 10241024 pixels effects pixelization mosaic per background color addition and subtraction clipping windows per background affecting color math or both scrolling per 88 tile mode7 matrix operations the picture processing unit ppu consists of two separate but closely tied ic packages it contains 64 kib of sram for storing video data 544 bytes of object attribute memory oam for storing sprite data and 25615 bits of color generator ram cgram for storing palette data this cgram allows the console to display up to 256 colors chosen from the 15bit rgb color space for a total of 32768 possible colors the ppu is clocked by the same signal as the cpu and generates a pixel every two or four cycles seven video modes are available to the programmer mode0 4layers all using 4color palettes each bg uses its own section of the snes palette up to 96 colors can be displayed on the backgrounds 24 colors per layer mode1 3layers two using 16color palettes and one using 4color palettes up to 120 colors can be displayed by first two layers and 24 colors by third layer mode2 2layers both using 16color palettes each tile can be individually scrolled up to 120 colors can be displayed on screen mode3 2layers one using the full 256color palette and one using 16color palettes the 256color layer can also directly specify colors from an 11bit rgb443 colorspace up to 256 colors displayed by first layer and 120 colors by second layer mode4 2layers one using the full 256color palette and one using 4color palettes the 256color layer can directly specify colors and each tile can be individually scrolled up to 256 colors displayed by first layer and 24 colors by second layer mode5 2layers one using 16color palettes and one using 4color palettes tile decoding is altered to facilitate use of the 512width and interlaced resolutions up to 120 colors displayed by first layer and 24 colors by second layer mode6 1layer using 16color palettes tile decoding is as in mode5 and each tile can be individually scrolled up to 120 colors can be displayed on screen mode7 1layer of 128128 tiles of size 88 from a set of 256 which may be interpreted as a 256color oneplane layer or a 128color twoplane layer the layer may be rotated and scaled using matrix transformations a programming technique called hdma can be used to change the matrix parameters for each scanline in order to generate perspective effects audio audio reference processors nintendo ssmp clock rates input24576mhzspc7001024mhz output 8 channels stereo effects adsr envelope control frequency scaling and modulation using gaussian interpolation echo 8tap fir filter with up to 24s delay noise generation the audio subsystem the ssmp is a dedicated single chip consisting of a 8bit cpu along with a 16bit dsp and 64 kib of sram it is designed and produced by sony and is completely independent from the rest of the system it is clocked at a nominal 24576mhz in both ntsc and pal systems it is capable of producing stereo sound composed from 8 voices generated using 16 bit audio samples and various effects such as reverberation regional lockout nintendo employed several types of regional lockout including both physical and hardware incompatibilities a cartridge shape comparisontop north american designbottom japanese and pal region design the bottom cartridge also illustrates the optional pins used by enhancement chips such as the super fx 3d chip on a physical level the cartridges are shaped differently for different regions north american cartridges have a rectangular bottom with inset grooves matching protruding tabs in the console while other regions cartridges are narrower with a smooth curve on the front and no grooves the physical incompatibility can be overcome with use of various adapters or through modification of the console internally a regional lockout chip cic within the console and in each cartridge prevents pal region games from being played on japanese or north american consoles and vice versa the japanese and north american machines have the same region chip this can be overcome through the use of adapters typically by inserting the imported cartridge in one slot and a cartridge with the correct region chip in a second slot alternatively disconnecting one pin of the consoles lockout chip will prevent it from locking the console hardware in later games can detect this situation so it later became common to install a switch to reconnect the lockout chip as needed pal consoles face another incompatibility when playing outofregion cartridges the ntsc video standard specifies video at 60hz while pal operates at 50hz resulting in approximately 167 slower framerate additionally pals higher resolution results in letterboxing of the output image casing japanese shvc001 model19901998 american sns001 model19911997 palregion snsp001a model19921998 newstyle super nes sns10119971999 japanese shvc101 model19982003 south korean snsn001 model all versions of the super nes are predominantly gray of slightly different shades the original north american version designed by nintendo of america industrial designer lance barr the japanese and european versions are more rounded with darker gray accents and buttons the north american sns101 model and the japanese super famicom jr model shvc101 all designed by barr are both smaller with a rounded contour however the sns101 buttons are purple where the super famicom jr buttons are gray the european and american versions of the snes controllers have much longer cables compared to the japanese super famicom controllers all versions incorporate a toploading slot for game cartridges although the shape of the slot differs between regions to match the different shapes of the cartridges the multi out connector later used on the nintendo 64 and gamecube can output composite video svideo and rgb signals as well as rf with an external rf modulator yellowing of console plastic the abs plastic used in the casing of some older snes and super famicom consoles is particularly susceptible to oxidization with exposure to air likely due to an incorrect mixture of the stabilizing or flame retarding additives this along with the particularly light color of the original plastic causes affected consoles to quickly become yellow if the sections of the casing came from different batches of plastic a twotone effect results game cartridge super nintendo entertainment system game pak the cartridge media of the console is officially referred to as game pak in most western regions while the smallest games contain only 2mbit cartridges may also contain batterybacked sram to save the game state extra working ram custom coprocessors or any other hardware that will not exceed the maximum current rating of the console peripherals the north american snes controller the standard snes controller adds x and y face buttons to the design of the nes iteration arranging the four in a diamond shape and adds two shoulder buttons it features an ergonomic design by lance barr later used for the nes102 model controllers also designed by barr throughout the course of its life a number of peripherals were released which added to the functionality of the snes many of these devices were modeled after earlier addons for the nes the super scope is a light gun functionally similar to the nes zapper though the super scope features wireless capabilities and the super advantage is an arcadestyle joystick with adjustable turbo settings akin to the nes advantage nintendo also released the snes mouse in conjunction with mario paint hudson soft under license from nintendo released the super multitap a multiplayer adapter for use with its popular series of bomberman games some of the more unusual controllers include the batterup baseball bat the life fitness entertainment system an exercise bike controller with builtin monitoring software the super game boy allows game boy games to be played on the snes while nintendo never released an adapter for playing nes games on the snes the super game boy adapter cartridge allows games designed for nintendos portable game boy system to be played on the snes the super game boy touts several feature enhancements over the game boy including palette substitution custom screen borders and access to the snes consoles features by specially enhanced game boy games japan also saw the release of the super game boy 2 which adds a communication port to enable a second game boy to connect for multiplayer games like the nes before it the snes has unlicensed thirdparty peripherals including a new version of the game genie cheat cartridge designed for use with snes games soon after the release of the snes companies began marketing backup devices such as the super wildcard super pro fighter q and game doctor these devices create a backup of a cartridge they can also be used to play illicit rom images or to create copies of rented video games violating copyright laws in many jurisdictions satellaview with super famicom japan saw the release of the satellaview a modem which attaches to the super famicoms expansion port and connected to the stgiga satellite radio station from april 23 1995 to june 30 2000 satellaview users could download gaming news and specially designed games which were frequently either remakes of or sequels to older famicom games and released in installments in the united states the relatively shortlived xband allowed users to connect to a network via a dialup modem to compete against other players around the country during the sness life nintendo contracted with two different companies to develop a cdrombased peripheral for the console to compete with segas cdrom based addon sega cd although a snescd prototype console was produced by sony nintendos deals with both sony and philips were canceled with philips gaining the right to release a series of games based on nintendo franchises for its cdi multimedia console and sony going on to develop its own playstation console based on its initial dealings with nintendo enhancement chips list of super nes enhancement chips star fox the first game to utilize the super fx chip as shown with the polygonal models that compose a large portion of the games graphics as part of the overall plan for the snes rather than include an expensive cpu that would still become obsolete in a few years the hardware designers made it easy to interface special coprocessor chips to the console just like the mmc chips used for most nes games this is most often characterized by 16 additional pins on the cartridge card edge the super fx is a risc cpu designed to perform functions that the main cpu can not feasibly do the chip is primarily used to create 3d game worlds made with polygons texture mapping and light source shading the chip can also be used to enhance 2d games the nintendo fixedpoint digital signal processor dsp chip allowed for fast vectorbased calculations bitmap conversions both 2d and 3d coordinate transformations and other functions similar to the 5a22 cpu in the console the sa1 chip contains a 65c816 processor core clocked at 10mhz a memory mapper dma decompression and bitplane conversion circuitry several programmable timers and cic region lockout functionality in japan games could be downloaded cheaper than standard cartridges from nintendo power kiosks onto special cartridges containing flash memory and a megachips mx15001tfc chip the chip managed communication with the kiosks to download rom images and provided an initial menu to select which of the downloaded games would be played some were available both in cartridge and download form while others were download only the service closed on february 8 2007 many cartridges contain other enhancement chips most of which were created for use by a single company in a few games the only limitations are the speed of the snes itself to transfer data from the chip and the current limit of the console emulation see also list of snes emulators like the nes before it the snes has retained a longlived fan base it has continued to thrive on the secondhand market emulators and remakes the snes has taken the same revival path as the nes emulation projects began with the initial release of vsmc in 1994 and super pasofami became the first working snes emulator in 1996 in 2004 higan began development as bsnes in an effort to emulate the system as closely as possible nintendo of america took the same stance against the distribution of snes rom image files and the use of emulators as it did with the nes insisting that they represented flagrant software piracy the frailty of snes rom cartridges and consoles and the lack of certain foreign imports emulation of the super nes is also available on platforms such as android while individual games have been included with emulators on some gamecube discs nintendos virtual console service for the wii marks the introduction of officially sanctioned general snes emulation a dedicated miniconsole the super nes classic edition was released in september 2017 after the nes classic edition the emulationbased system which is physically modeled after the north american and european versions of the snes in their respective regions is bundled with two snesstyle controllers and comes preloaded with 21 games including the previously unreleased star fox 2 legacy approximately 491million super nintendo systems were sold worldwide with 2335million of those units sold in the americas and 1717million in japan the snes was the bestselling console of its era in 2007 gametrailers named the snes as the secondbest console of all time in their list of top ten consoles that left their mark on the history of gaming citing its graphics sound and library of topquality games nintendo portal video games portal mario portal 1990s portal list of super nintendo entertainment system accessories nintendo selects notes bibliography kent steven l 2001 the ultimate history of video games the story behind the craze that touched our lives and changed the world roseville california prima publishing isbn0761536434 sheff david 1993 game over how nintendo zapped an american industry captured your dollars and enslaved your children first ed new york random house isbn0679404694 wikimedia commons has media related to super famicom and variants super nes programming at wikibooks vtesuper nintendo entertainment systemknown in japan as the super famicom and in south korea as the super comboyaccessoriesnintendo mouse super scope nintendo power super game boy satellaview cdrom thirdparty ascii turbo fire action replay batterup barcode battler game genie konami justifier miracle piano teaching system super 8 voicerkun xband turbo touch 360 games list of super nes games bestselling games hardware ricoh 5a22 game pak list of enhancement chips variants nintendo super system newstyle super famicom box super nes classic edition see also super fx super smartjoy snesamp satellaview broadcasts preceded by nintendo entertainment system succeeded by nintendo 64 vtenintendo video game hardwareconsoleshome nes famicom titler twin famicom nes101 sharp nintendo television nes classic edition accessories super nes newstyle sf naizou tv sf1 super nes classic edition nintendo 64 ique player gamecube panasonic q accessories wii wii u switch handheld game boy game boy color virtual boy game boy advance sp micro dockable entertainment pokmon mini nintendo ds lite dsi nintendo 3ds 2ds new 3ds new 2ds xl dedicatedhome color tvgame nes classic edition super nes classic edition handheld game watch mini classics pokmon pikachu arcade vs system playchoice10 super famicom box nintendo super system peripheralsaddons 3d system data recorder disk system satellaview super nes cdrom unreleased super game boy game boy camera game boy printer 64dd rumble pak ereader game boy player connectivity nes four score nes satellite game link cable gcngba link cable controllers family basic nes advantage nes zapper power pad rob speedboard snes mouse super scope nintendo 64 controller gamecube controller wavebird wireless wii balance board wii remote classic controller motionplus wii zapper thirdparty accessories wii speak wii u gamepad wii u pro controller joycon networking family computer network system teleplay modem xband satellaview nintendo wifi usb connector other nintendo power nintendo ds dsi browser amiibo technologymedia nes game pak snes game pak n64 game pak game boy advance video nintendo optical discs nintendo game card processors 2a03 ppu 5a22 gsu rcp gekko broadway hollywood pica200 espresso erista allwinner r16 list of products vtevideo game consoles fourth generationtypes home video game console list handheld game console list microconsole list dedicated console list generations first 197280 second 197692 third 19832003 fourth 19872004 fifth 19932005 sixth 19982013 seventh 200517 eighth 2012present fourthgenerationhome commodore cdtv neo geo neo geo cd philips cdi laseractive sega genesis sega pico super acan super nintendo entertainment system sns101 turbografx16 handheld game boy family game boy atari lynx game gear turboexpress gamate watara supervision mega duckcougar boy game master third generation fifth generation emulator game history list manufacturer vtehome video game consolesatari atari 2600 atari 5200 atari 7800 atari xegs atari jaguar atari vcs bandai super vision 8000 arcadia rx78 playdia apple bandai pippin casio pv1000 casio loopy commodore commodore 64 games system commodore cdtv amiga cd32 mattel intellivision hyperscan microsoft xbox xbox 360 xbox one nec turbografx16 pcfx nintendo nes snes n64 gamecube wii wii u switch philips magnavox odyssey odyssey videopac g7400 philips cdi sega sg1000 master system sega genesis sega saturn dreamcast snk neo geo neo geo cd sony playstation playstation 2 psx playstation 3 playstation 4 vtech vtech creativision socrates vsmile vflash others1970s apfmp1000 bally astrocade fairchild channel f rca studio ii interton vc 40001292 advanced programmable video system 1980s action max arcadia 2001 colecovision epoch cassette vision super cassette vision rdi halcyon vectrex viewmaster interactive vision 1990s 3do interactive multiplayer amstrad gx4000 cps changer fm towns marty laseractive super acan 2000s discover evo smart console game wave nuon xavix zeebo list authority control gnd 43041863 