Tech

How to play multiplayer GoldenEye on four TV screens with only one N64

One console, four displays, zero "split-screen" antics

Enlarge / One console, four displays, zero “split-screen” antics (credit: B&H Photo and Video)

Anyone who remembers playing GoldenEye 007 on the N64 likely remembers having to account for the “screencheaters” that would glance at another quadrant of the split-screen shooter to gauge an opponent’s locations. There’s even a modern game that forces players to rely on the tactic to track invisible opponents.

Now, 25 years after GoldenEye‘s launch, a museum has managed to do something about those screencheaters, rigging up a way to split a game of GoldenEye across four TV screens without modifying the original cartridge or N64 hardware.

The multi-screen GoldenEye gameplay will be featured as part of the “25 Years of GoldenEye” event at Cambridge, England’s Centre for Computing History this weekend. A proof of concept for the unique playstyle (with all the monitors awkwardly facing the same direction) attracted some attention via a tweet Wednesday, leading Ars to reach out for more details on how the museum pulled it off.

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