30 YEARS OF THE SUPER SCOPE
Have you seen the bit in Commando where Arnie preps his gear? Setting up the Super Scope is the same: loading six AA batteries like shotgun shells, clipping the battery lid, slotting the sight assembly, adjusting the viewfinder, sliding the Scope’s switch from off to on then to turbo, clicking the infrared receiver into port two, inserting the cartridge, flicking the SNES power, and then – finally – nestling the shoulder mount like Arnie holds his rocket launcher. There were lightguns before and after the Scope, but nothing is as imposing as Nintendo’s wireless behemoth, not even Sega’s copycat Menacer gun.
By 1992 lightguns were well established, but the Scope afforded greater precision. Nintendo Of America’s dev manual said, “The Super Scope detects where the device is aimed, unlike the NES Zapper which detects targets. The instant the CRT electron beam scans across the area seen by the Scope it sends a signal to the SNES which registers the PPU raster counter. With this data the SNES detects the point where the
