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The NES Thread Where We Talk About Playing The Nintendo
- Thread starter Issun
- Start date
or if they're not goodies then they're at least pretty OKies.
Here are some of my favorites that I don't think are mentioned as much as the really big names (or aren't mentioned at all):
Rygar.
Power Blade.
Tecmo World Wrestling.
The arcade ports of Jackal and Rampage.
The ports of home computer games like
Skate or Die!, Shadowgate and Might & Magic 1 (which is true to the frustrating difficulty of the original but has some nice pixel art for the enemies).
4-So
Spicy
Outside of the well-known and well-trod, some important games in my misspent youth:
Wizards & Warriors
Rygar
3-D World Runner
Karnov
Legacy of the Wizard
Star Voyager
R.C. Pro-Am
RBI Baseball
T&C Surf Designs: Wood and Water Rage
Super Glove Ball
Double Dribble
Journey to Silius
Jackie Chan's Action Kung-fu
Tiny Toon Adventures
Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure
...and that's just off the top of my head. Great console, that NES.
Wizards & Warriors
Rygar
3-D World Runner
Karnov
Legacy of the Wizard
Star Voyager
R.C. Pro-Am
RBI Baseball
T&C Surf Designs: Wood and Water Rage
Super Glove Ball
Double Dribble
Journey to Silius
Jackie Chan's Action Kung-fu
Tiny Toon Adventures
Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure
...and that's just off the top of my head. Great console, that NES.
Mr. Sensible
Pitch and Putt Duffer
As someone who was given a copy of Star Voyager as a lad, and made several earnest attempts to play it, and still has that same copy on their game shelf, I need to say that Star Voyager really sucks.
Now Solar Jetman, there's an NES game about doing cool stuff in space. Okay this game also kind of sucks, but it's got a neat physics model and some awesome music, so there.
jpfriction
(He, Him)
Little jpfriction clutching his copy of King’s Knight says hi.
Tiny Octo had Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
Trust me when there are few games that benefitted less from a Game Genie invincibility code
Trust me when there are few games that benefitted less from a Game Genie invincibility code
Have you guys ever heard of this game called Clash at Demonhead? It was pretty nifty.
Sarge
hardcore retro gamin'
If the NES is antiquated, then screw it, I'll be antiquated right along with it. It's my second-favorite system of all time, right behind the SNES. And honestly, I think it has the SNES beat in the platformer department overall, just in terms of sheer breadth and selection. (Of course the SNES has some all-time greats, too.)
While we're mentioning games, The Guardian Legend is one of the best hybrid games in existence - providing both an excellent shooter and Zelda-like exploration while showcasing Compile's programming wizardry.
As far as emulation goes, there are a few. Mesen is supposed to be the most accurate, but I find myself mostly using Nestopia UE, just because I used vanilla Nestopia for so many years.
While we're mentioning games, The Guardian Legend is one of the best hybrid games in existence - providing both an excellent shooter and Zelda-like exploration while showcasing Compile's programming wizardry.
As far as emulation goes, there are a few. Mesen is supposed to be the most accurate, but I find myself mostly using Nestopia UE, just because I used vanilla Nestopia for so many years.
I didn't mention The Guardian Legend because I thought most Tyrants were aware of or familiar with it.
Is it time for talking about this now?
Oh no! Does this mean that we have to exile Lokii?
Sarge
hardcore retro gamin'
True, although I've also lost perspective on what people have and haven't heard of at this point. I've been plumbing the depths of the NES library for a long time now...
Well, since Natsume's Shatterhand was mentioned, I'll also go ahead and recommend Shadow of the Ninja, which is just a cut beneath it, and Mitsume Ga Tooru, a very fun import title that has at least a little bit of a Mega Man vibe to it but definitely retains that Natsume flavor.
Small Kirin’s NES collection was *almost* entirely made up of the usual suspects - your Marios, Zeldos, Mega Mens, and Capcom/Disney joints (plus Little Nemo which is awesome) - but I did have the good ol’ weirdness of Clash at the D. Plus Marble Madness but I feel like that’s a known quantity as well. Oh and my friend‘s copy of Air Fortress which was neat and maddening.
ArugulaZ
Fearful asymmetry
Someone was talking about finding joy in the worst or at least most flawed NES games, and I can see that now. It's important to note that the games in question can't just be some movie licensed schlock, but games that were ambitious but didn't quite work out due to an unfamiliarity with the hardware. At the very least, they've got to be charismatic. It's why I'll defend a game like Rambo, which WAS movie licensed schlock but somehow also offered a side-scrolling adventure game that was at least as fun to play as Zelda II. The villains' heads all expand when you hit them, and your traitorous commanding officer can be turned into a frog when you shoot kanji at him, then led back to Vietnam where he left you.
There's a lot of NES games that don't work as games, but are still valiant attempts at entertainment. Someone mentioned King's Knight by Square, and I think that's a good example, a sort of shooter in RPG's clothing where everything's cryptic and nothing really makes sense. That's a good example. One I remember was Flying Dragon, a martial arts adventure game that tries to bring one on one fighting, Kung Fu-style platform-brawling, and narrative-driven games together. Was it successful? Maybe, maybe not, but you could tell it was an early NES game by an obscure development team, and they were trying their damnedest to make this forward thinking concept work. The road to brief but memorable amusement is paved with nifty ideas that the design team couldn't quite mold into games. They were getting there, though. If we didn't have these games that tried and failed to provide a foundation for later generations of genre-straddling titles, we might not have those later games.
There's a lot of NES games that don't work as games, but are still valiant attempts at entertainment. Someone mentioned King's Knight by Square, and I think that's a good example, a sort of shooter in RPG's clothing where everything's cryptic and nothing really makes sense. That's a good example. One I remember was Flying Dragon, a martial arts adventure game that tries to bring one on one fighting, Kung Fu-style platform-brawling, and narrative-driven games together. Was it successful? Maybe, maybe not, but you could tell it was an early NES game by an obscure development team, and they were trying their damnedest to make this forward thinking concept work. The road to brief but memorable amusement is paved with nifty ideas that the design team couldn't quite mold into games. They were getting there, though. If we didn't have these games that tried and failed to provide a foundation for later generations of genre-straddling titles, we might not have those later games.
Sarge
hardcore retro gamin'
I still need to grab Flying Dragon - it's the first of the Hiryu no Ken series, which we also got in the form of a highly modified Flying Warriors that basically combines the second and third game. From what I can tell, HnK2 has fairer stage designs, but I also don't know what I'm doing since I don't read Japanese. It and its sequel are two games I'd really like to see a fan translation for.
Speaking of Culture Brain stuff, anyone play their other stuff like The Magic of Scheherazade, Baseball Simulator 1.000, or Little Ninja Brothers? I spent a lot of time on the first two in my youth, and think of them as their best output on the system.
@ArugulaZ : While I think Zelda II is the far superior game, I'll always take up for Rambo. It's not the most polished experience, but it's pretty darn ambitious and way better than its reputation suggests.
Speaking of Culture Brain stuff, anyone play their other stuff like The Magic of Scheherazade, Baseball Simulator 1.000, or Little Ninja Brothers? I spent a lot of time on the first two in my youth, and think of them as their best output on the system.
@ArugulaZ : While I think Zelda II is the far superior game, I'll always take up for Rambo. It's not the most polished experience, but it's pretty darn ambitious and way better than its reputation suggests.
4-So
Spicy
My brother will go to bat all day for The Magic of Scheherazade but I never got a chance to play it.
I think my favorite Ninja Bros*. game was the one on SNES but, yeah, that's another one I have fond memories of. (*I might be thinking about Kung-fu Heroes here, actually.) A few others I remember making impressions, for better or worse:
Trojan
Section Z
Bart vs. The Space Mutants
Little Nemo
Bugs Bunny Crazy Castle
Who Frame Roger Rabbit
Ikari Warriors
Lot more licensed stuff on NES than I remember.
I think my favorite Ninja Bros*. game was the one on SNES but, yeah, that's another one I have fond memories of. (*I might be thinking about Kung-fu Heroes here, actually.) A few others I remember making impressions, for better or worse:
Trojan
Section Z
Bart vs. The Space Mutants
Little Nemo
Bugs Bunny Crazy Castle
Who Frame Roger Rabbit
Ikari Warriors
Lot more licensed stuff on NES than I remember.
Considering I done an LP of it on the old forums I would be remiss if I didn't mention The Adventures of Rad Gravity. An ambitious, but messy, game that I played a bunch as a youngin' and still have fond memories for, and regret we didn't get an upgraded sequel on the SNES. The game ends with a shockingly crisp (for the NES) voice clip of Rad himself saying 'Farewell till we meet again'.
But we never do.
Rad Gravity is the NES equivalent of the father who went out one day for space smokes and never came back.
But we never do.
Rad Gravity is the NES equivalent of the father who went out one day for space smokes and never came back.
‘Twas!
8-bit Bruce Campbell, sporting a rather spiffy pompadour.
Oh man, I also had this one. It was Not Good but I played a bunch of it!
Johnny Unusual
(He/Him)
I remember the first level being somewhat ambitious at least in playing like a weird mix of adventure game and platformer, then not so much.
Bart vs. the Space Mutants would have been far better, I think, if it lacked enemies and maybe death-defying platforming. Sort of like a point-and-click adventure where you control the main character.
Wait, what did they change from the Famicom release? I always liked Power Blade, despite the fact that half the time I go the wrong way and find the door before the passcode and get annoyed with myself.
I did a deep dive on my Culture Clash feature: