The year was 1994. The Super Nintendo had been on the market for just under four years, and with an excellent lineup of games, it had become the best-selling console of its generation. However, Nintendo published the patent for an "editing device" called Nintendo Game Processor. Upon analyzing that patent and its connection to the console, we uncovered a computer specially prepared to let users develop their own Super Nintendo games through visual programming and save them onto a compatible cartridge...
The Super Nintendo debuted in Japan on November 21, 1990. The American version hit store shelves in August 1991, with Super Mario World, F-Zero, Pilotwings, Gradius III, and SimCity as its launch titles. The competition was fierce (after all, Sega didn't sit idle with the Genesis/Mega Drive), but nearly 50 million consoles speak for themselves. There were plenty of reasons to expand Super Nintendo development, and the masterminds in Japan explored this possibility with a project not everyone knows: Nintendo Game Processor
Nintendo Game Processor: A Computer for Making SNES Games
The idea was to give the user/player the resources to create new Super Nintendo titles visually, without writing code. The diagram from its patent US6115036A shows a system with four ports: two for SNES gamepads, and the rest for a keyboard and mouse, with a cartridge slot on top. In addition to basic peripherals and televisions, the system was also compatible with modems, floppy disk drives, and even identification cards.
However, the story doesn't end there. The patent description indicates that the main CPU and the game CPU cooperate in execution and the editing process. The main processor generates an editing image overlaid on the game screen, executed with dedicated hardware. From a certain point of view, the patent talks about two systems in one.
What do we know about the software? Not much, but the associated images reveal an advanced and intuitive platform called Mario Factory. Programmed actions, sounds, direction and sprite construction, animation, music... all that and much more seems to be within reach of Mario Factory, which, to be honest, reminds us of Super Mario Maker.
Once finished, the games are saved on a Game Processor RAM Cassette, a special cartridge with four SRAM memory chips and a CR2025 battery. This detail suggests that its content disappears when the battery runs out, but some enthusiasts have managed to obtain at least a partial dump of existing cartridges.
So, if the cartridges are real, where is the rest of the equipment? Unfortunately, we don't know. There are also no copies of Mario Factory, and the main reference remains the patent content. Our wish is that a prototype of the Nintendo Game Processor is gathering dust somewhere, waiting to be discovered to solve the mystery. It has happened before.
