The Old Nintendo Trick

Anybody who grew up in the Nintendo generation knows a thing or two about dealing with a game that won't work. Back then you had a few options, the first being blow directly into the cartridge. Sometimes you could switch it up and put it under your shirt with the shirt acting as some kind of magical filter. That was my prefered method. Thing is though, did that really work? Was there some sort of strange science going on or was it just dumb luck. Mental Floss put together a great article covering the intricacies of the original Nintendo and it's game cartridges inside and out. Contributor Chris Higgins met with some Nintendo pros to find out what made the games work and if the myth of blowing into them really did work. I won't get into great detail here but the short answer is no, the blowing trick was bullshit. Most likely your problem was with connectors inside the cartridge. In order for the game to work properly in the old system the copper connectors inside the game had to sync up with the connectors inside the console. Over years of wear and tear the connectors would become tarnished and worn down making it harder to make a good connection. This is where you would get the glitch screens and things like that. When it came to blowing into the game, bad news. It's basically counter productive because the moisture in your breath would build up on the copper connectors in the game and rust them. Again, causing glitches or just a total breakdown all together. Same goes with blowing into the console, moisture builds up inside and the whole unit is toast. So if you're lucky enough to still have a functioning NES take good care of that bastard and for god's sake man, don't blow your stinky breath in to the games. For a much better explanation and pictures to go along with it check out the whole article at Mental Floss.