Poll reminder – How do you pronounce NES?
Saturday, March 14th, 2009 at 11:59am by David
Simple question, but I’ve heard it a couple different ways. This week we want to know:
How do you pronounce NES?
Be sure to make your voice heard! Results will be revealed on the next Infendo Radio.
March 10th, 2009 at 8:55 am
isay it three different ways and it varies between them.
Nes, N.E.S., and Nintendo Entertainment System
March 10th, 2009 at 9:11 am
I usually say “the old nintendo” or something like that, unless my interlocutor knows what “nes” is.
March 10th, 2009 at 9:51 am
I can’t believe my eyes. It’s N E S, people.
March 10th, 2009 at 10:00 am
N.E.S., however, in our household, we have always called that particular machine the “Old Nintendo” ever since the Super Nintendo came out. We use the word “old” very endearingly, though. ;D
But I never say “ness.” I think that sounds too much like cheesy, “hip” lingo. Like “yo” or “brah” or “tubular.”
March 10th, 2009 at 10:19 am
I don’t know me and my friends usually called it the regular Nintendo.
March 10th, 2009 at 10:19 am
def went the “ness” route. though that got me in trouble with tougher acronyms like tmnt….
March 10th, 2009 at 10:46 am
Gah! It’s N.E.S! I can’t believe anyone would actually say “ness”. T_T
Oh wait, Adam Sessler does that (he also says “sness). And Adam Sessler sucks, so….yeah. N.E.S.
March 10th, 2009 at 11:05 am
I say it N.E.S. and on a side note, me and bro joke around by calling the D.S. the “dis” but saying it like Borat would.
March 10th, 2009 at 11:09 am
I actually “Nintendinho”, which translated to English, would be “Lil’ Nintendo”. And the Super NES would be “Super Nintendo”. But “Ness” and “Super Ness” would definitely be the other way to say it. I only heard the term “N. E. S.” when I started listening to the Infendo podcast.
March 10th, 2009 at 11:18 am
Where’s the option for both NES and N.E.S? Both are used at NOA, I can attest, where the latter seems to be a bit more formal. Where do people think Nester from Howard and Nester, and Ness from Mother/Earthbound got their names from, after all? And, unlike most things Nintendo, there was no official pronunciation that would get you chided if you strayed from it, to my knowledge. Prior to the Retro developed titles, pronouncing Samus as “Sam-uss” rather than “Same-uss” was a faux pas amongst management types.
March 10th, 2009 at 11:32 am
No matter how YOU prefer to have things said, I say, let it be.
I’d probably only use “N.E.S.” around touchy people like yourselves.
For me it’s either usually “the old Nintendo” (in Spanish) or “ness” around gamers. No “sness” though, just “super nintendo”. The only thing I say by its letters is the “DS” but as an in-joke I call it the “duhs”.
The ex-Team Ninja guy doesn’t complain when you guys say Ninja “Gay-den”… or how you slaughter Oneechan-bara to “onishambra”… or how some people say “merio” instead of Mario.
March 10th, 2009 at 11:42 am
None of the above?
for me it’s more like nezz
March 10th, 2009 at 11:45 am
“NEZ”
for the SNES it’s “SNEZ”
March 10th, 2009 at 11:46 am
When you read the word “Dr.” do you say “durr”? When you read the word “PhD” do you say “Phud”? It’s an abbreviation, dammit!
@ Richter: But “Sam-uss” is the correct way to pronounce her name, right? Please say it is.
March 10th, 2009 at 11:47 am
Add me to the N.E.S. school, with my second choice being the “old Nintendo” or the “original Nintendo”
March 10th, 2009 at 11:53 am
Usually I appreciate the open minds and tolerance that prevail in the comments section, but in this case I think this calls for an all out flame war! People that say “nes” are idiots! Whose with me?
HELLO?
hello?
March 10th, 2009 at 12:03 pm
Yeah, it’s totally N. E. S. Ness sounds silly.
March 10th, 2009 at 12:09 pm
only softcore gamers refer to it as Ness
March 10th, 2009 at 12:46 pm
Weird. I have always said “N-E-S,” but the Super Nintendo has always been either “Super N-E-S” or “Sness.” Why, I have no idea. I guess I just like the way Sness sounds (but Ness sounds moronic).
March 10th, 2009 at 1:04 pm
@ Samas
Don’t make me go all PK Thunda on you, boy.
March 10th, 2009 at 1:13 pm
Anybody who pronounces it “Ness” is a fuckface.
March 10th, 2009 at 1:20 pm
Anybody who calls someone a “fuckface” over pronunciation is probably best not listened to.
March 10th, 2009 at 1:39 pm
I have no data to support this, but it seems to be an east coast/west coast thing. Most people i’ve talked to that say “Ness” live on the east coast, folks I know here on the west coast spell it out – N-E-S. I believe the “Official” way to say it is N-E-S, I’ve heard Nintendo employees say it this way, and after all – NOA is on the West Coast. I’ve gotten used to Ness, but it’s not for me. “Sness” just sounds strange to me.
March 10th, 2009 at 2:07 pm
Hell, I live on the South Coast and I call it N-E-S.
March 10th, 2009 at 3:15 pm
@Juja
I was just kidding! I love your enthusiasm, but you might need to tone it down. Although I did LOL
March 10th, 2009 at 3:42 pm
“aegreen says…
March 10th, 2009 at 1:20 pm
Anybody who calls someone a “fuckface” over pronunciation is probably best not listened to.”
Fuck you, fuckface.
March 10th, 2009 at 4:10 pm
Come on guys, get up close and personal with your NESSSSSS, accept NESSSS into your hearts.
Only then can you truly say you’ve felt the love a gamer feels for their NESSSS and later on Super NESSSSS.
N-E-S just sounds impersonal…
March 10th, 2009 at 4:21 pm
@Poochy: It is now, thanks to Retro. Before then, the Nintendo Word Of God on it was that it was pronounced “Same-uss”, like the Scottish Seamus without the pronounced ‘H’ (of which Samus, uncoincidentally, is the female version), which is the Celtic version of James. So her name used to really be Jamie Aran.
March 10th, 2009 at 5:18 pm
@ Richter:
Interesting. Though I’ve always called her “Sa-mus”, I thought that, because of the Seamus connection, Samus was of Scottish heritage (this idea is supported by the manga, where her parents were named Rod and Virginia—Scottish names, I believe). But I never imagined that the original, official Nintendo pronounciation of her name was “Same-uss”. Thanks for the info.
March 10th, 2009 at 5:19 pm
Here in Brazil we everybody say NES, as a word, not pronoucing letter by letter; other form to refer to the old 8 bit system is saying “Nintendo 8bit; but the most known form is “Nintendinho” (literally “little Nintendo”).
March 10th, 2009 at 5:38 pm
Just to add to the discussion on the pronunciation of “Samus:”
I’ve always said “Sam-uss.” “Same-uss” just sounds strange to me. And I’m pretty certain her name is actually pronounced “Sam-uss” in the original Super Smash Bros. which was before the Prime series.
On a side note; I once knew someone who pronounced her name “Sam-oose.” I hated that person.
March 10th, 2009 at 5:39 pm
@Poochy: No problem. I found out the hard way by being chided by a Nintendo Power employee while talking to a friend about Metroid when we were on our way to Cafe Mario. I asked around and got it confirmed later. This was around the time the original Prime on the GCN was coming out, so Metroid was obviously a hot topic. I still preferred the sound of “Sam-uss”, so I’m glad Retro made the change.
March 10th, 2009 at 5:50 pm
I say N.E.S., but I’ve heard people call it NESS. And then they call the SNES, Super NESS. I find that to be wrong, but to each’s own.
March 10th, 2009 at 7:20 pm
I say N.E.S and Ness, but I only say Super N.E.S. Wierd, huh?
March 10th, 2009 at 8:08 pm
I use both inflections.
March 11th, 2009 at 3:55 am
N. E. S. and S. N. E. S. (or Super N. E. S.)
One of my friends calls them “Ness” and “Sness” and it bugs the hell out of me. It’s just wrong.
March 11th, 2009 at 2:49 pm
It’s a guilty pleasure of mine to use all three of those names. But since I was a toddler, I called it “Nintendo.” So I’ll stick with how I was raised to say it.
March 12th, 2009 at 8:29 am
Who cares? What a desperate poll!
March 14th, 2009 at 3:24 pm
Hey, can we have a new poll about whether or not you guys should go talk to your advertisers about not running an ad with some fat woman’s gross legs and feet staring me in the face? Absolutely foul.
March 16th, 2009 at 1:26 pm
i wonder if regional differences play a role in pronunciation. i’ve always said ness or N.E.S, but most of my friends called it ness so i probably use that term more. i rarely hear anyone actually say N.E.S., but maybe that’s just southern california?
March 16th, 2009 at 6:29 pm
“Ness”
Do you say NASA, N-A-S-A
or NASCAR, N-A-S-C-A-R?