That's kind of neat, but we'll never know why it happens.  Nope, it's one of those unexplainable myst-

The "glitch" involves the tail wag sound effect and the 1-up sound effect's calls getting merged. The sound code reads both, treats it like a 1-up sound effect, but writes the wrong length, so it plays more notes than it should. We're still doing some research here, but the general consensus among us is that it's just a glitch.

Alright, so there's a working theory about why it happens, but we'll never know how to deliberately trigger the effect.  Nope, it's a secret to everyb-

Simply wag Mario's tail 5 frames (1/12sec) after the "1UP" symbol appears. Done right, the sound effects will conflict and the longer "version" will play. This is extremely difficult to replicate on purpose, which might explain why it was never caught.

Fine, so it can be reproduced under exact circumstances.  But an exact explanation as to why the game glitches in this exact way?  Some questions just don't have answ-

The tail wag sound effect is written (B0), then the 1-UP (40) is ORed, resulting in F0. It writes the wrong "length" for the 1-up, and as it reads bytes in reverse, the beginning is broken instead of the end.

I love that the Internet is home to people devoted enough to explore these sorts of things.  "Video Game Archaeologist" isn't a real job title yet, but it definitely should be.

(via The Mushroom Kingdom)

The Peggle Masters are bouncing through Azeroth with the peg-busting phenomenon. Join them today in this special World of Warcraft Edition of Peggle — created by PopCap and Blizzard Entertainment.

• Play 10 WoW themed levels with the new backgrounds from Blizzard artists.
• Compete against a friend or the computer in Duel mode
• Quick Play levels anytime you want to hone your Peggle skills
• Add to your Peggle Master rank with super-extra-hard challenges

I'm not into Warcraft, but I do enjoy a good round of Peggle, and free Peggle is even better, so I'll certainly give this productivity drainer a shot.  See you sometime next month, then.

(via GameSetWatch)

I think it's important to know, a lot of people wonder why we do these updates when it just says something about security enhancements or that playability of software will be better. Actually, behind the scenes, there are reams of documents sometimes with improvements for developers, where they can take advantage of a bunch of new tools, or new ways to allocate memory, or other ways to improve performance. So I'd start off by saying that.

You'll definitely see another firmware update this year, but it won't be like what the rumors say. We're working on some consumer features that consumers will definitely like, but it's nothing like what you're reading about, and at this time I don't want to confirm any of those features because they're not completely locked down yet. We're looking pretty good, and timing is a little rough, but just in terms of that rumor, it's not the case.

Everyone has their firmware feature wish list, but at the top of mine is the ability to flip into the web browser for a moment in the middle of a game.  Sometimes I like to check a game guide while playing and it's a hassle to completely drop out of a game to look up a few sentences.  It's must be possible to do.  Burnout Paradise does it already when it forces the Criterion Games website to appear when the game starts up (and, ironically, this is one time that I want the browser to go away so I can get into the game as soon as possible).

(via Kombo)

I just missed the landmark Atari 2600 years, so this video doesn't send shivers down my spine like it may those who were around for that console generation, but I can still appreciate the concept. Still, demos like this Mega Man creation and its five screens worth of playable content make me glad that I came aboard the world of gaming during the Nintendo Entertainment System era.

Moving on, this week's question hops over the thin blue line.  We've talked about pirated products and cheap knock-offs of our beloved video games, but have you ever intentionally purchased a game that you knew to be a pirated copy?  Let's hear your stories.