Relive the Blockbuster experience with Super Metroid SP’s maxed-out endgame save file

You start with every power-up and item

In case you missed it, Nintendo just updated the eShop following that recent explosive Nintendo Direct, and there’s a few goodies to sift through. One of them includes a Super Metroid SP version.

Remember those? Special editions, or “SPs,” have been periodically dumped on the eShop for NES games in the past, and provide cheat codes of a sort for people to dive in and instantly get something done. I didn’t even notice it when logging in (thanks, All N: A Nintendo Podcast!), but it’s there next to EarthBound! Just look for the “Super Metroid SP [Special]” ribbon when selecting a game.

This sort of thing, as our own Jordan Devore mentioned when he showed me this news, really brings back memories of the “Blockbuster experience.” For all you young people out there, folks used to “rent” games physically at stores. Wild! I know you’ve probably seen Blockbuster in Captain Marvel or in one of the few documentaries/John Oliver bits, but actually living it was pretty wild.

Amid many other perks (like going out with family, as an event, to pick out a movie or game), the Blockbuster experience also had the added perk of save file roulette. You never knew who was playing a rental before you, so sometimes you’d find endgame save files previous renters preserved — or work toward the end as a group.

One of my favorite variants of this was re-renting a game, only to find out that someone had saved a file adjacent in a separate slot: keeping my original one intact. I once had a chain-game of Chrono Trigger across multiple rentals, with someone else doing the same thing. That all ended in the PlayStation era with memory cards (which had its pros and cons). But I’ll never forget it!