Review: The NES Classic Edition and all 30 games on it

Nintendo is courting nostalgia for the holidays this year, like pretty much every year -- but the NES Classic Edition, a palm-size recreation of the original console with 30 games built-in, rates highly on the nostalgia scale even for a company whose heart is stuck in the 1980s. It's already a highly coveted item for millions of 30-something gamers, and make no mistake: This is a love letter to Nintendo's oldest fans. First of all, we have to talk about the device itself: It's tiny. Like, fits in your palm tiny. There's no cartridge slot to put an SD card full of games, no old-school video out on the back, just HDMI. The NES turns on instantly; you'll be prompted the first time to set up your language, but thereafter you'll be sent directly to the game selection screen. Enjoy the jaunty NES-style menu theme -- I want it for my phone. The menu really shows lovely attention to detail; Nintendo could have phoned it in, but instead took great care, and whole experience is better for it. Hitting Up on the controller brings you to the settings menu, where you'll find display options (more on this later), language, a couple of miscellaneous tweaks like demo/screen saver mode and auto shutdown, some legal information and a decidedly unhelpful link to download manuals to your phone.