I’ve been trying to get into the NES library, but not too sure what’s some titles worth playing. I’ve played Popeye and Zelda 1. Popeye was alright, but Zelda 1 I just couldn’t get into. I played through the whole thing and didn’t really enjoy it all that much. It wasn’t bad, just not my thing.
Currently I’m looking to try Arkanoid, Bubble Bobble, Donkey Kong Jr, Donkey Kong Jr Math, Dr. Mario, Mendel Palace, River City Ransom, Terra Cresta, and Tetris. My friend also recommended me Super Mario Bros, Punch-Out, Metroid, and Panic Restaurant. I’m really into racing games and puzzle games, but haven’t been enjoying brawlers all that much lately (there’s a few I like like the Devil May Cry series, Lego games, and the Batman Arkham series).
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Mario 3 and Megaman 2 are the best games on the console.
Highly recommend both.
For some of the more underrated games, check out Jackal or Startropics.
Second all the Mega Man games on the console.
Oh wow I haven’t seen anybody reccomend Jackal before. Underrated for sure. I had this one mastered as a kid and could get through it with 0 deaths most times.
I quite liked the two weapon system on the Jeeps. B button shoots a machine gun that is always facing straight up, and the A button fires either a grenade (basic) or rocket (upgraded) based on the direction you’re facing.
Blaster Master is a metroidvania where your frog gets out of its tank (aquarium) so you get in a tank (pew pew vehicle) to go get him.
Blaster Master has some pretty damn good music too.
I’ve got the boss music in my head now.
I love this heavy metal remix medley by Vomitron. It does have a NSFW album cover though.
Super Mario 3
SMB3 can also be played on All-Stars in the SNES.
Truthfully, I’m of the opinion that a lot of the NES’s library hasn’t aged super well if you didn’t grow up on them, and many of the best classics have better remakes elsewhere. There are of course some gems worth playing, but if you can’t get into something like Zelda 1 I think you’re going to find a lot of recommendations are kinda downhill from there.
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Super Mario Bros 1, 2, 3 - Obviously. For 1 and 2 (and 2j, but idk if I should be recommending that one here) I prefer NES, but 3 I actually like SNES better.
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Kirby’s Adventure - Arguably the most technically impressive NES game, pushes the limits of the hardware super hard. Only knock against it is that said pushing does result in some lag. So you may prefer the GBA remake, or the 3DS 3D Classics version which faithfully reproduces everything but the lag.
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Mike Tyson’s Punch-Out!! - My absolute favorite NES game, but its brutal difficulty curve will be an acquired taste. If you can get into it I think it holds up well.
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Wario’s Woods - Fantastic versus puzzler if you have a friend to play with. If you don’t, the SNES version has a vs CPU mode. The singleplayer is solid too, but I really love the versus.
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Dr. Mario - I’d be remiss not to mention this here since I recently made a small video essay about the game, but I have to attach the disclaimer that I actually think NES is the weakest version. Like Wario’s Woods, there’s no vs CPU in this version. NES isn’t bad if you have someone to play with, and the tournament scene actually prefers it so maybe don’t listen to me at all, but I’m partial to 64.
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Celeste Mario’s Zap & Dash - If you want to try some romhacks, here’s SMB1 turned into a Metroidvania with Celeste mechanics ported in. I think what impresses me the most is that they got 4-directional scrolling into this engine.
I still like giving old systems a chance. I used to feel that way about the Atari 2600, but after asking for recs I actually found some really addicting games I come back to frequently.
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Of your list, I suggest you give Dr Mario a try. I would also say that River City Ransom is the one of those that I put the most time into. If you like racing games and want to try something adjacent also give Roadblasters a try.
I rarely see it mentioned, but I loved Felix the Cat on NES.
Smb 3 is probably one of the most defining jump’n’run games ever made. Lots of fun to this day. Must play.
Mega Man. If you only play one, play Mega Man 2. The other ones are fine too, if you enjoyed 2.
Startropics. Action adventure similar to Zelda, but honestly probably more enjoyable nowadays.
Earthbound. Unlike the FFs it never got a remake, so it’s really the only way to experience it.
Ducktales is a masterpiece.
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles is a bizarre ordeal, but it’s a touchstone, and you can at least get to the dam and recognize why a lot of people at-the-time also stopped at the dam. The music slaps.
Mega Mans - 1 is a fascinating relic made better by savestates, 2 is a Nintendo-hard pinnacle everyone glazes, 3 is literally an unfinished beta, 4 is a solid but unremarkable sequel, 5 has killer music but meh difficulty, and 6 is just kinda weird.
Batman is celebrated, but I haven’t played it personally.
Kirby’s Adventure is a solid entry in a long and weird franchise where basically all of the platformers are rightly celebrated.
Wario’s Woods is probably better on SNES.
Bram Stoker’s Dracula is worth a go. It’s not amazing, but it’s pretty good for a licensed movie affair.
There’s a surprisingly good port of Elite that was never commercially released but is widely available.
Also I made a first-person shooter that’s reasonably good.
Check out NARC, R.C. Pro Am, Spy Hunter, and Kung Fu. Two beat-em-ups, two racing/arcade games I used to play as a kid. Kirby was also a classic, and never had a bad platformer game in those days
off the top of my head i’d recommend wario’s woods, solar jetman and castlevania 3
Conquest of the Crystal Palace
Castlevania
Ninja Gaiden
I enjoyed Sweet Home. You should be able to find a translated ROM somewhere.
Ninja Crusaders (better with a friend) Kirby
I just wanted to +1 bubble bobble. Amazing game.
Legacy of the Wizard is a side-scrolling action dungeon crawler. You have to experiment with skillfully using different characters and items in order to progress, so it’s also a puzzle in that respect.
