The Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) is an 8-bit third-generation home video game console produced by Nintendo. It was first released in Japan in 1983 as the Family Computer (FC), commonly known as the Famicom. The NES, a redesigned version, was released in American test markets in October 1985, before becoming widely available in the rest of North America and other countries.
After developing a series of successful arcade games in the early 1980s, Nintendo NES planned to create a home video game console. Rejecting more complex proposals, president Hiroshi Yamauchi called for a simple, cheap console that ran games stored on cartridges. The controller design was reused from Nintendo’s portable Game & Watch games. Several add-ons were released, such as a light gun for shooting games.
The Nintendo NES was one of the bestselling consoles of its time, and helped revitalize the US game industry following the video game crash of 1983. It introduced a now-standard business model of licensing third-party developers to produce and distribute games. The NES featured a number of groundbreaking games, such as the platform game Super Mario Bros. and the action-adventure games The Legend of Zelda and Metroid, which became long-running franchises. It was succeeded in 1990 by the Super Nintendo Entertainment System.
