In the early 80s, Nintendo made the decision to open an idol production branch to promote their first ever cartridge-based video game system. Their agents scouted for talent until they came upon a girl who won a high school talent show for her exceptional singing. And that girl would later be known as Famicom!
Born of Okinawan descent, Famicom's mother moved to Kyoto after World War II in search of a better life. There she had a daughter who would be part of an amazing opportunity to work for what would soon become one of the biggest video game developers in the world.
Famicom's journey to become a world-famous idol was not without difficulties. According to interviews, she says that she was particularly bad at dancing to start with and even even sustained a significant injury within her first year. How's that for bad luck! Fortunately Nintendo made the decision not to fire her and instead continued training to bring out the best of her talent.
Famicom's overseas counterpart is the NES, so her concerts are mainly known only in Japan. She has done the first ever performances of some of the most well known Nintendo music, including the Super Mario Bros. theme itself. Many famous video game songs from Zelda, Metroid, Mega Man, Castlevania, and even games that were originally Japan-only like Fire Emblem and Earthbound (Mother) also debuted alongside her! Famicom's performances may seem simple by today's standards, but they are timeless and always a joy to go back and revisit.
During the middle of her career the Famicom Disk System was released with a new costume and games to boot. These FDS versions of the games actually sound different from the NES that we know and love! Zelda's title theme is an especially good example of this. In addition she also had "VRC-6" training later on, giving a different sound to some titles such as Castlevania III.
When not on stage, Famicom is known to be a big fan of computers, and is a hobbyist programmer. Her first opportunity to do so was with the Family BASIC set, a keyboard and disk drive set released only in Japan that allowed you to make rudimentary Famicom games. Rumor has it that she took the opportunity to be an idol from Nintendo specifically because of her interest in electronics!
Unfortunately due to her age there are not a whole lot of videos of her concerts in good quality, so most of her songs are known from CD or game releases. But in 2016 Famicom once again took the stage in a comeback tour! There are a lot of good quality videos of this tour if you know where to look. Dubbed the "Classic edition," she took on the mantle of being an idol once again, performing various songs from back in her day and even releasing a new single. While she might have gotten older, her style and charisma hardly faded over the years. She also went on tour with Super Famicom the following year. Fans have been asking for other comeback tours in a similar vein, but Nintendo has yet to announce anything of this writing.
Most people outside of Japan who grew up with the NES probably never knew Famicom even existed. She has some differences from NES, and plenty of exclusive games. Regardless of region, we still love and appreciate her performances and her impact on Nintendo and Japan's idol industry even today.
