There really is nothing quite like punching a guy in the gut, jump-kicking him in the face and watching him fall backwards out of a chopper's open side-door, then imagining his terror as he plummets to a watery death in the waves below. The original Battletoads was definitely awesome, but I seemed to favor the design that paired up those TMNT-ripoff characters with the classic brawler characters. Not content to just slash his foes to death, Niki had to slice and dice them with a whirlwind blade just to be that much more radical. The ship rising out of the scrolling ocean, the . But, for now, it stands as a hidden gem that only the hardcore faithful got to experience 20 years ago. You played as a sunglasses-wearing muscleman equipped with a cybernetic boomerang, blasting his way through alien-invested futuristic environments on his way to restore the compromised integrity of the Master Computer, and your hero looked an awful lot like Arnold Schwarzenegger. Between territories are neutral zones, filled with shops that carry life-giving junk food and high-priced moves that become absolutely necessary as you progress. Just be careful writing down those passwords! However, word of mouth combined with a Nintendo Power promotion that sent copies of the game around the country allowed it to blow up. Don't be. I'd always have the 30 man code active in the beginning, but eventually stopped using it as I got better over the years. Main character Ryu Hayabusa wielded a katana with deadly precision, and he had a grouping of special weapons to use as well. And here's the kicker the pit stop comes to you! As a kid, Shadowgate was straight spooky. Everyone remembers the simple, but effective cinematic in which series hero Ryu Hayabusa stands atop a mountaintop and stares off into the distant landscape. Zelda II's entire system suggested it was trying to be more of an RPG, and in many ways, it was a huge success. I had no qualms with wasting the POW block if I didn't get my way. Natsume may be completely stuck in the rut of cranking out nothing but Harvest Moon sequels these days, but back on the NES the developer had some unique and inventive adventures like Abadox, Shadow of the Ninja and this game, Power Blade. It's flashy, it's clever, and it's one of the few puzzle games worth revisiting on the NES. ** No Japanese exclusives ** The likes of Jackal doesn't count but Gunsmoke does because the screen automatically scrolls up even though it's not your traditional. Completely unlike anything else at the time. In fact, Tecmo took a page from the book of another successful action-platformer of the day, Konami's Castlevania, and mimicked its special weapon system almost to a tee. The key to Jackal's success, like so many other games on this list, is cooperative gameplay. It's effectively a full Battletoads follow up with our boys Billy and Jimmy Lee along for the ride. After releasing several games for the Atari 2600 and other computer-based consoles, famed Pitfall! In fact, all the negative feelings around this one almost kept it off the list, but when it comes down to it Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles was one of the greats, and a dang good title. There's another game you should be keep an eye on as developments progress, and that's Jackal; A remake of the NES top-down shooter of the same name, graphically enhanced to take advantage of the Amiga (OCS-ECS) hardware, which is . Could you get past the bee-throwing enemy on stage four without losing a life? Fester's Quest was an amazing game that was both deep in its delivery and excruciatingly difficult in its execution. Years before Yoshi first crammed a fat plumber on his back, Adventure Island II offered some of the coolest dinosaur wrangling in the business. I was playing the amazing Super Mario Bros. in a 7-eleven game room months before the NES was even announced in the US. - Craig Harris, IGN Nintendo Executive Editor. It's like Marble Madness turned into a platformerand it worked! Scattered mushrooms are the . I'm a lifelong boxing fan, so being able to "sim" matches this early was something of a breakthrough for me. When all's said and done, the chapters' events and characters culminate in an amazing endgame. Yeah, it can do that too. Although prominently featuring traditional Japanese settings and mythology, Demon Sword seems to have suffered from a poor North American localization, as evidenced by the goofy box art featuring a naked blonde guy glaring at his sword. Baseball Stars is unequivocally the best baseball game, and overall sports simulation, the NES ever saw. As I played it for the first time in two decades, I recalled many afternoons spent with the cutesy Twinbee fighters. Little Nemo, an American comic strip, had received the anime treatment in Japan at the time and thus the game was created, but the license was no doubt long forgotten by American audiences when Nemo came stateside. It was much harder than the first game, which I liked, and even though I played through it a couple of times, it didn't leave me with a "been there, done that" feeling that so many other games did. In fact, I liked Willow so much that I'd put it up there on my top list of NES RPG favorites with games like Dragon Warrior, Final Fantasy and Crystalis. A key eye for subtle detail was needed for success, as your exploration could often come to a sudden and gruesome end if you missed even a single key weapon or item early in the labyrinth. Top Down Shooter Engine. Carry on about how this game just isn't as good as the arcades (I do), but the truth is NES had some killer shooters, and this was one that I went back to over and over again. Dragon Warrior is an old-school grinding RPG that necessitated acute attention to leveling up, equipment management and smart planning. More importantly, this clever title takes platforming's greatest crutch gravity and turns it on its head. I can remember looking at the Rad Racer flap at Toys R Us (remember the old system of flaps and slips?) Developed on the same engine as Kid Icarus, and released around the same time, Metroid toned down the action-platforming found in Icarus and focused on exploration. This game of skating and slap shots was perfectly balanced, simple fun with just the right touch of planning and strategy to keep things interesting match after match. That's a shame, because its blend of three different types of gameplay set it apart from the crowd and made it a classic. Contra deftly captures the spirit of the testosterone-fueled '80s summer blockbusters, with obvious nods to the Alien and Rambo series. Qix for NES is the definitive home version due to its spot-on emulation and availability, although it was also resurrected on various PC platforms and Nintendo even published a GameBoy version featuring characters from the Mario pantheon. Willow begins simply, buts grows in strength and power as he explores dungeons, gains new items and learns powerful magic spells. But even without it, Maniac Mansion was still an excellent adventure game with a good sense of humor. The game was extremely popular, resulting in an official sequel, a Game Boy Advance spinoff title, and a spiritual successor in the form of the PS2 game called Heavenly Guardian. And then there was Zelda II: The Adventure of Link, the follow-up to the smash hit The Legend of Zelda. This was just the beginning of the Tengen/Nintendo feud. But while action games on the NES are a dime a dozen, it's this very fact that made Batman stand out amongst the competition. It was also the longest Mega Man title in the classic series, reintroducing all of the Robot Masters from Mega Man 2 in addition to an extended trek through Dr. Wily's dangerous castle. 95. Review score. Gamers' apprehension quickly dissipated, though, when what resulted was an amazing game full of an inordinate amount of depth. The sequel features the same great stuff as the first: catchy, mead-swilling tunes; stylized fantasy graphics; and the peculiar use of "ye olde Engrish." Metroid was unique for so many reasons, among them the ability to explore at your own pace. For many, the NES was the machine that played Mario. Mega Man's unique approach is what initially made it so interesting to gamers. Its action-platforming style was well-known by Mega Man 3's release, and with the addition of two important new characters, Rush and Protoman, and a new skill, sliding, Mega Man 3 is many fans' favorite in the franchise. As someone who has gone through the effort of tracking down this neglected gem of a Game Pak, I can affirm that Little Samson can hold his own with the Belmonts, Mega Men and Master Higgins' of the era. The new Rush Adaptors combined Mega Man with his robotic dog into one unit for the first time, and yes, Dr. Wily is again behind the robotic destruction coursing through the game, this time masquerading as the ill-disguised Mr. X. Last, you throw Radical into the mix. Although "licensed software" is a term that causes the blood of today's game reviewers to run cold, in the late 1980s, Disney and Capcom formed a union that inexplicably resulted in a steady series of excellent titles for the NES based on Disney trademarks. Throughout the game's island world, which include tropical jungles, tepid swamps and cool caverns, our man Higgins happens upon various implements of stone-age destruction, like axes and, uh skateboards. You could choose from three different player body types, and outfit your team with any combination of them; fast but weak Skinny Guys, brawny but slow Fat Guys, or well-balanced, middle-ground Normal Guys. If you can stomach the Princess in all her pinkness, her levitation ability will get you over the game's widest gaps. In 1991, Turtlemania was in full swing, and every marketer worth his or her weight in branded merchandise wanted a piece of animals-that-kick-ass pie. The Ice Climbers, as the two starring characters are popularly known, are relentless lovers of the alpine trek, and they'll stop at nothing to climb mountain after mountain just to reach its apex, where untold valuable items can be found. And it's the insanely crisp gameplay. The care gameplay is right on, the visuals aren't bad at all, and it stinks of Mega Man inspired robot blasting. Next time you think all movie licensed games are garbage, dust off this old classic and surprise yourself all over again. Two guys with a knife and a suicide complex decide to invade Russia. As the boy treks into the underground maze, Blaster Master presents its deviously challenging mixture of side-scrolling platforming, shooting, and overhead dungeon exploration with action taking place in and outside of the cockpit. Thankfully, Zombie Nation arrived in the latter days of the NES to smash the zombie barrier. Over the years though Bionic Commando is a game I keep going back to, and it wasn't until I really realized the RPG-lite experience in there (trucks lead to 1Ups, kills equal strength and RPG-like leveling) that I was able to really dominate the game. Post by nia_prene Sat Jul 03, 2021 9:07 pm. Section Z was a forced-scrolling shooter made by Capcom, one of that company's few entries into a genre more closely associated with Konami in the 8-bit era. - Sam Claiborn, Associate IGN Game Help Editor. I spent hours tackling puzzles using different methods to trap enemies or to drop them through flooring. If one company was known for its amazing licensed NES games, it's Sunsoft. And my older brothers, both casual players, could never get past the first stage. In it, our metal-clad protagonist, Kuros, sets out on a quest to save not one, but several distressed damsels (and we're not talking about some ugly dude in mushroom regalia). By the time Mega Man 5 was released, many imagined this would be the Blue Bomber's last foray in the 8-bit world. Set in a procedurally generated galaxy, the game sees you exploring a vast open world while making a name for yourself by joining factions, mining asteroids, trading, and bounty hunting. Who ever thought I could be addicted to such a simple, repetitive game? That is, until my copy started getting corrupted. Seen from a three-quarters viewpoint that placed every environment on an angle relative to the player, you were tasked to take command of a snake that, initially, had no body. These are the 25 most underrated games on the SNES: 25. It was so much fun to play that we didn't know many people who cared that it didn't look quite as good as its source material. Capcom seemed to remove Mega Man's classic foil, Dr. Wily, in lieu of a new creator of evil robots, Dr. Cossack. Thankfully, Sunsoft didn't throw this game into the dumpster after losing the Terminator license, because Journey to Silius is one of those seldom-played but everyone-should-play-it NES gems. I was one of those poor saps that actually enjoyed a similar and ultimately less impressive game, Legend of Kage, so I took to this game immediately. We had two conditions: they had to be released in the U.S. and they had to be fun. I grew up in a hockey town, so I didn't know a single person who owned a NES system that didn't have a copy of this awesome sports game. Crazy how that happens, no? While not entirely innovative, Final Fantasy did make some interesting iterations on the RPG formula. Alternates between sidescrolling and top-down scrolling. If Battletoads & Double Dragon: The Ultimate Team strikes you as a bit gimmicky, we've got news for you: it is! It wasn't until a decade or two later that I finally understood that a poor localization was responsible for the game's extreme weirdness. Jackal - A top down shooter based around the NES version get a new Amiga v6 demo via Neeso Games! My mom and one of my sisters were out all day, and when they came home, my mom had an NES box in her hand. In the original Dragon Warrior, the hero was on his own. You could upgrade its engine, increase the rate of fire of its bullets, increase the number of its bullets, give it the power to fire secondary missiles and even wrap it in a force field. You'd leap off the peaks in your path and go flying through the air, and have to adjust the angle of your descent in order to maintain your momentum and keep from crashing and you'd also have to keep an eye on your engine's temperature gauge all the while, as overheating would cause lengthy cool-down delays that would likely keep you from claiming first place. As far as legacy, we never would have had games like Symphony of the Night if the trail wasn't blazed back on 8-bit with Simon's Quest. Re: Top Down Shooter Engine. We're still eagerly awaiting a Goonies III. But man, the game delivered. I bought my own cart off of eBay and experienced the wonders of this influential grinding J-RPG without the help of my peers. Although it's actually the second entry in the predominately Japanese TwinBee series, the re-branded Stinger was the only entry that saw release on the North American NES. You had sniper shooter levels, like those you might remember from The Adventures of Bayou Billy. Get ready to relive the days when shooting down enemy forces and dodging oncoming fire while sipping a can of Surge was all we needed for a quick adrenaline rush. The entire game fit on an infinitesimally small cartridge sized at 192 kilobits. He's hidden himself inside the enormous, Tower of Babylon-esque World Tree a massive, multi-leveled living structure that holds the entire game's worth of town, fortresses and enemy lairs within its roots, trunk and branches. Aside from its special place in history, however, Kung Fu is also a rewarding example of early "beat-'em-up" videogames in all of its 2D glory. Pro-Am, and cast players as the captains of a high-speed, heavily-armored attack ship cutting through tropical waters to take on sharks, rival watercrafts and giant sea serpents. But back on the NES, there was no besting LucasArts' Maniac Mansion for deep, involved and genuinely funny pointing and clicking action. And I get to hit him with a whip? You take direct control of the samurai's giant head in a sort of side-scrolling shooter that's too deliberately loony not to check out. Naturally, it was only a matter of time before a videogame followed the television show and toys. Many gamers wanted a port of Konami's arcade beat-'em-up of the same name instead, but had to wait until 1991, when a port of the arcade classic came to the NES under the TMNT 2 moniker. It's one of the earliest games that convinced me that RPGs were my favorite. Perhaps the NES's only intentional B-game, Zombie Nation is actually pretty fun, and always good for a laugh. But those 4 are the only ones I know! So what if it wasn't originally a Mario game? You have to deal with enemies galore and traps aplenty; the game even gave the player the option to kill his or her character off by pressing the Select button if they found themselves trapped or unable to proceed, a true testament to Lolo 3's deep and difficult gameplay built on a deceivingly-childlike facade. What was most interesting about Mega Man 4 was its ability to tell a deeper story than what was told in the past three iterations in the series. We'd head to Mr. Movies in Minnesota, I'd see the box art, freak out, and he'd pick up something else. He then leaps down a nearby hole in the ground and disappears into a vast subterranean labyrinth without a trace. The answer was simple line up the appropriate colors of pills matching the viruses, and voila, they disappear. It was unique, novel and also pretty confusing. I'm still working on getting this game to Virtual Console, though Sammy (now SEGA) has no idea they even own it. This is a game that looks,. What's more, it was a fledgling HAL Laboratory that created the series, a company more popularly-known today for the Lolo-like character Kirby. Then, Skate or Die 2 came along and trumped its predecessor in many ways, offering a full storyline adventure in addition to the standalone skating events as well as adding in the "Double Trouble" half pipe, a massive structure that spanned two full game screens and let you pull off highly stylish (for the time) vert skating tricks. The entire game can be played with a wingman, but make sure whoever it is can appreciate a heaping dollop of cuteness, served Japanese-style (with extra "cute" on the side). In an era of 8-bit graphics and MIDI music, Konami crafted a game that immersed you in the horror of Dracula's castle, while all you were looking at and hearing was an artful combination of the typical sights and sounds of the day. 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