For those who love retro gaming, it’s a well-known fact that the NES never officially got any expansions for its port. But hold on to your controllers because RetroTime has come up with something exciting! If you own the NES-001 model and are curious about using that long-neglected port, there’s a cool new gadget for you—it’s called the “NES Hub,” and you can now pre-order it from 8BitMods.
This nifty expansion, the NES Hub, brings some modern flair to the classic console by allowing you to connect Bluetooth controllers and enhancing the audio quality. It even comes with its own add-on system. One such add-on is the “SNES Add-on,” which lets you use wired SNES and 15-pin Famicom controllers with your old NES.
Mark your calendars because both the NES Hub and its SNES Add-on are slated to start shipping in December 2024. If you’re interested in getting both, the NES Hub is priced at $57.28, and the SNES Add-on at $26.03, bringing your total to $83.31 before taxes. With the NES Hub, you can connect up to four Bluetooth controllers at once. And if you’ve got a modified NES capable of playing Famicom games, the Hub lets you enjoy enriched audio experiences on certain Famicom games by leveraging Expansion Audio mode.
Let’s take a quick nostalgic trip: in Japan, the Famicom, short for “Family Computer,” was the original name for what we know as the Nintendo Entertainment System. Interestingly, the Famicom was quite forward-thinking for its time. It even offered Internet connectivity for tasks like checking stock prices. While Japanese gamers were dabbling with online capabilities from the get-go, American gamers didn’t see such features until way later with consoles like the Sega Dreamcast and the original Xbox.
Bluetooth support as we know it was a much later arrival in the console world. It became common during the Seventh Generation of consoles that kicked off around 2005 with the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and Nintendo Wii. The NES, being a third-generation console, made its debut in October 1985. That’s a hefty 14 years before Bluetooth hit the scene in 1999. So, seeing Bluetooth finally being added to the NES is a delightful surprise, closing the gap between playing on original hardware and the convenience of emulation on a Nintendo Virtual Console or PC.
That said, this kind of enhancement has a pretty specific audience, and the price reflects that niche appeal. If you’re looking to bring modern controller support to your NES-001 model, the NES Hub seems to be the perfect solution.
