Yes, you can play Duck Hunt without a television

Duck Hunt is considered a classic of the Nintendo Entertainment System. But surprisingly, the concept of hunting ducks did not originate in 1984– people have wanted to hunt ducks since at least 1951, when Daffy Duck proclaimed it to be “Duck Season” in the Looney Tunes short Rabbit Fire. But Nintendo didn’t make video games that connected to your television until 1977. What if I wanted to hunt ducks in 1976? The Nicole Express blog looks into it.

In this case Nintendo was doing what Seg-already-did, as Sega had Duck Hunt as early as 1968. (It’s a generic term) But that was an electromechanical game, with physical moving targets, and a game for the commercial circuit to boot– Sega didn’t sell anything to the masses in those days. So it was up to Nintendo to package the concept in a nice beige box that you could bring home.

But one thing I found is that I could not shoot the ducks. Now, I’m pretty bad at light gun games, and that’s been an obstacle several times on this blog. But it wasn’t just that– my wife couldn’t shoot them either, and she’s a much better shot. Plus, the gun wasn’t actually letting out any visible light at all.

Check out some reverse engineering and troubleshooting in the post here.


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