Bitmap Books has been running its excellent 'Visual Compendium' series for a while now, covering some of the most iconic gaming platforms of the past few decades. Now, it's the turn of the Nintendo 64, the machine that took Nintendo well and truly into the 3D age.
We were fortunate enough to be sent a copy of N64: A Visual Compendium ahead of its launch today, and have been leafing through its pages and getting back into the blissful '90s frame of mind via titles such as Mario 64, Zelda: Ocarina of Time, F-Zero X and many, many more.
This 436-page tome covers some of the most famous N64 titles of all time, complete with a short description (often from one of the key creatives behind each game) and a screenshot to illustrate the visuals.
Alongside this, you also have bespoke features which focus on particular elements of the console's history; the pair that caught our attention were focused on the Expansion Pak and 64DD, two accessories which promised much but arguably delivered very little. Nonetheless, reading about their development is fascinating, and the book combines insightful prose with simply gorgeous bespoke photography, as Bitmap has done with other offerings in this range previously.
You've also got interviews with some key figures from the N64's history, including Kev Bayliss (ex-Rare), Julian Eggebrecht (founder of Factor 5) and Jim Wornell (former Nintendo of America staffer). These provide plenty of anecdotes and historical nuggets relating to what it was like to be so closely involved with the 64-bit console on a professional level.
Given that the N64 is such a polarising console in the world of gaming, it's fair to say that not everyone is going to warm to a book which is entirely focused on it; indeed, you could argue that the N64's visuals have aged so poorly that, when blown up to a full page, they look almost ugly when compared to the sumptuous 2D visuals seen in Bitmap's prior books, focused on the likes of the Mega Drive and SNES.
However, there's no denying the incredible impact the N64 had on the world of gaming – not just via its acclaimed games but also via its groundbreaking controller, which would lay down the foundations for future generations thanks to the fact that it had analogue input out-of-the-box rather than via some optional pad. This book does a wonderful job of covering the N64's successes and failures, ultimately summing up what makes it such a notable platform, even today.
You can pick up N64: A Visual Compendium from Bitmap Books right now. It costs £29.99.
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Comments 9
I have the SNES one and love it, but I'm not entirely convinced the N64 polygon art will hold up as well as lovely SNES pixel art in terms of making a visual compendium out of it. I may be wrong though.
I have the NES and SNES visual compendiums, but i'll skip this one, i don't have as many fond memories of N64 as i do of NES and SNES, maybe it was my age, or that both 3D graphics and gameplay (Wrestling with the camera and stuff) were still pretty rough at the time, and some might even say "Aged like milk".
Now if they made a Gameboy or Gameboy advance visual compendium, i'd love those!
this is kind of petty but I feel much less willing to get these console compendiums ever since they had to cancel the Mega Drive compendium. It ran into some legal troubles or something.
Mega Drive was my childhood machine, it would feel weird to get books for all these other machines without having the Mega Drive one that they're not allowed to make.
I do have their Guide to Japanese Role-Playing Games though, and it's pretty cool.
Purchased mine as soon as orders opened. My gaming history started with the SNES and OG Gameboy, but the N64 was the moment I properly became a gamer. It's hard to imagine now, but the graphics were breathtaking at the time. I remember plugging in Zelda OoT and being blown away by the opening sequence of Navi flying through the Kokiri village. Obviously time has not been kind to the graphics of this console! But I think it is still possible to appreciate the legacy of this console and the sharp polygons that defined this new 3D era.
@EarthboundBenjy
What’s the story with the Mega Drive book, I’d been holding out how they would make one, one day. But this now sounds very unlikely? I thought they had managed to make a Master System book though?
Looks amazing! Anyone bought the n64 book by Chris Scullion from Nintendolife?! Wonder what their experiences with that one were too.
@Bod2019
Honestly, no clue.
https://www.bitmapbooks.com/blogs/news/the-unofficial-md-gen-a-visual-compendium
This page is all the information I have.
@EarthboundBenjy
Thanks for the link. I should have read that before. I always wandered why there was a massive hole in their collections.
That is a real shame, and it’s come from Sega, not Nintendo, who you’d more likely suspect of these shenanigans.
I received my copy of the book today; it looks brilliant!
I never owned an N64 at the time (I was a PS1 kid) but have many happy memories of playing my friends N64 growing up.
The book is as good as the others I have from Bitmap sitting on my shelf, highly reccomended!
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