Super Scope

The Super Scope or the Nintendo Scope in Europe, is the official Super NES light gun. It is shaped like a bazooka and is the successor of the vastly popular NES Zapper. The Super Scope was released in the European and US-markets (in Japan it was very limited due to a lack of consumer demand). It is a wireless gun, like the Sega Menacer, and is connected by an infrared receiver which plugs into the console. It has three buttons and a power switch and is powered by 6 AA batteries.

The Super Scope was popular with fans and game developers. It has appeared inside several video games for the Super Nintendo and subsequent products. For example, In Super Smash Bros. Melee for the GameCube, the Super Scope appears as an item that can be used against other players. It can shoot normal, small shots (which can be fired like a mini-gun, so an enemy gets hit over and over until the shooter runs out of ammo), and can charge up to three major shots, sending the opponent flying and resulting in a "Bull's Eye KO" bonus.

The Super Scope also appears in Superstar Saga as a weapon carried by the Sniper Bill enemy in Bowser's castle.

The Super Scope does not work if used on the NES in conjunction with a SNES to NES peripheral converter.

Physical description

The gun body is a bazooka shaped device, about just under 2 ½ feet long. Located about midway on top of the barrel are two buttons and a switch. The first is "fire" button, which is used to fire at the enemies onscreen, and a "pause" button, which maps to the same button on the SNES controller. The switch is used to turn on the Super Scope, and to switch between regular or turbo mode. In the middle, on both the left and right hand side, are two clips on which you slide the sight. On the far end of the gun, on the bottom, is a 6" grip. On the grip is another, small button labeled "Cursor", which, moves the cursor in some games that use it (although the Super Scope 6 Game Pak does not).

On the end is the lens, slightly larger than the size of a quarter, which picks up the light from your TV, and right above that is the infared transmitter. The sight mount is shaped like a wide, very shallow "U", about five inches long. One end, that faces toward the shoulder mount end, has a round open cylinder holder, where the eyepiece goes. The other end has a short, narrow tube, which forms the sight when one looks through the eyepiece that is in-line across from it. The end of the eyepiece is very simple: it is a cylinder with the diameter of a quarter, with a removable rubber piece through which the shooter looks. If all is set up right, the shooter will see a small bit of the screen right through the sight. The sensor is a small box, 2 ½" by 2 ½" by 1", with a standard SNES controller cord attached. On the front is an oval-shaped black area, receding back from the two sides to a red sensor, about the size of a dime.

Technical details

The Super Scope does not use the more common (and inexpensive) technique of simply having a photoelectric cell that detects if the sensor is pointed at a bright spot of the screen. Instead, the Super Scope monitors the actual scope in the image to find the position of a sprite with high precision. Upon firing, the Scope relays information about where on the screen it is aimed to an infared receiver on top of the television set. This receiver is plugged into controller slot two of the SNES. Some modern LCD televisions are incompatible with the super scope due to the lack of a scope for the light sensor to monitor.

Legacy

The Super Scope was never very commercially successful. Critics blasted it as a bulky and cumbersome device that was difficult to use, especially in comparison to the lightweight NES Zapper. Consumers were also frustrated by the Super Scope's quick battery consumption. After four hours of continuous gameplay, the 6 AA batteries had to be replaced. In addition, the device was hurt by a lack of compatible software, although it is difficult to know whether a lack of software can be blamed for the Scope's unpopularity, or if the Scope's unpopularity simply scared off software developers.

Trivia

The Super Scope made a brief cameo in Mario Bros. The Movie, albeit being much bigger than a regular scope- the weapons made to 'de-evolutionise' are Super Scopes.

Games

Battle Clash
Bazooka Blitzkrieg
The Hunt for Red October (it is used for bonus games)
Lamborghini American Challenge (it accesses a different game mode from the normal one)
Falcon's Revenge - Battle Clash's sequel
Operation Thunderbolt
Super-Scope-6 cart (it is bundled with the hardware and features six games, under Lazer Blazer and Blastris categories)
The Arcade Game
Tin Star
X-Zone
Yoshi's Safari

Cameos and other appearances

''Super Smash Bros. Melee (Item)
Superstar Saga
Super Mario Bros Movie 1993 (as Koopas weapon)

External links

Nintendo hardware | Super NES | Light guns | Nintendo items | Smash Bros. items

スーパースコープ | Super Scope | Super Scope

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