June 3rd, 2025 - The NES-ential Celebration, a lovingly made 40th anniversary tribute to the Nintendo Entertainment System has today been announced by Playbug Books, with its Kickstarter campaign now underway. A timely companion to the Switch 2 era, The NES-ential Celebration is a beautifully produced hardcover book that serves as both a tribute to - and a thoughtful examination of - the system that helped define modern video gaming.
Edited by veteran games journalist Tom Regan (The Guardian, Fandom, GamesRadar), The NES-ential Celebration features contributions from some of the most respected voices in the industry, including Andy Robinson (VGC), Mark Brown (Gamemaker’s Toolkit), Christian Donlan (Eurogamer), Matthew Castle (Official Nintendo Magazine, The Backpage Podcast) Alex Donaldson (RPG Site, VG 24/7), Jeremy Ray (GamesHub, Fandom), Jen Glennon (Inverse), and Andy Kelly (Edge, PC Gamer) to name a few.
These sit alongside exclusive essays from legendary developers like Nintendo’s Takaya Imamura, Racoon Logic’s Alex Hutchinson, RARE’s Gavin Price, The Game Kitchen (Blasphemous), Ironwood Studios (Pacific Drive), Sabotage Studios (Sea Of Stars) and beloved indie developers, musicians and devoted superfans.
Featuring stunning original artwork interspersed with nostalgia-tickling spritework, this beautiful collector’s book explores the NES’s legacy from multiple angles — from chronicling its role in reviving a dying industry after the 1983 crash, to how NES games laid the foundation for the IPs and genres that we still play today.
The NES-ential Celebration is the perfect coffee table companion, mixing insightful essays on the birth of console gaming with fun, nostalgic looks at the franchises and formats that defined an artform.
While most of us wait through a long and uncertain Switch 2 pre-order season, the Kickstarter campaign for The NES-ential Celebration offers a lovingly-portioned jolt of Nintendo nostalgia. You may not have your new console just yet, but this book is ready to take you back to where your love of Nintendo began — with essays, stories, and artwork that celebrate the humble origins of a gaming behemoth.
The NES-ential Celebration is available to back on Kickstarter now, with editions starting at just $30.