Fester’s Quest is in this thread somewhere. That game sucked - Sunsoft took their overhead mode from Blaster Master, gave your character a weapon which literally could only shoot the wall, and you get TWO hits before you have to go back to the beginning of the game. How anybody ever beat that game without some kind of assistance is beyond me. At least it had decent music.
I’ve now surpassed 100 games since starting this challenge. I still intend to continue it until I finish all of the finishable NES games (minus the sports games and games which got a better port for a different system)…so there’s only 500 or so more to go…I might just have to do Battletoads next. I never did beat that game in one sitting before.
That damned PYRAMID! I remember that part very vividly. HATED it!
(I still have my original NES with a bunch of the DW games. I hope to have it up and running one day in the near future to torture myself with these again.)
Whew, finished the whole thread! I commend you FuSoYa, for doing all this. It brings back a lot of memories and makes me want to download a lot of games I haven’t played before or for a while.
I’d like to nominate Rygar for you. It’s an early NES game, the I bought it from some guy in science class in 8th grade. It’s long for a game that has no saves and no passwords, and I remember I spent hours and hours trying to beat that final boss. From what I remember about this game, for being such an early predecessor of so many adventure/exploring action games, it had a good mix of exploration and unique and challenging bosses. Also, the music’s catchy for the time, I can still hum it now 16 years later. There was some boss in a tree/water level that was giving me fits until I totally changed my strategy for him and whipped his ass.
I also like to re-nominate The Guardian Legend again. To me, one of the most underrated games on the NES. Huge, fun, unique, and great music. Even though you only really use the fireball and that lightsaber, the game made you want to explore every nook and cranny for all of the special items and their upgrades.
Another action game with a lot of exploring is Battle of Olympus. I was obsessed with this game to the point where I almost stole it from someone
8 Eyes is a Castlevania-type game that was known for its difficulty. When you play it, it’s not hard to see why: your character can barely jump across 2 blocks, his main weapon’s a tiny little sword, he’s slow, the levels are long and filled with enemies, and you have to beat these 8 bosses in 8 areas then take on this game’s version of Dr. Wily. However, you do have a bird with you that you can sorta control, and using him to hit switches from far away or dive bomb bosses is the key to winning. It also has pretty good music for the time.
I’ve played all of the games you’ve suggested, although the only one I never beat was The Guardian Legend. I never really got ALL of the hype that game has, but then again I never got very far into it.
I’m gonna play Rygar tonight. One of my friends owned that game and I have good memories of it, including leaving turbo on for a couple of hours and maxing out my experience in the first level by fighting turtles.
I would also like to stop this 8 Eyes = Castlevania myth right here. 8 Eyes LOOKS like Castlevania from the screen shots, but Nintendo Power also convinced me to buy that game when their mini review said it WAS like CV. It isn’t like CV at all, and it was one of my most disappointing purchases (I mean, it was only $5 from Funcoland, but still). It is significantly less fun, and mostly consists of trying to find your way through mansions (okay, it’s a bit like the mansions from CV2) and using a falcon to hit switches to open doors. It’s actually more similar to Mega Man in that you have access to every stage from the beginning, and each boss is weak to the sword you get from one other boss. But again, not nearly as fun as Mega Man.
The Guardian Legend can be kind of tedious, but it passes quickly due to the differences in stages. Did you enjoy the music at least? I know some emulators don’t replicate the NES sound chip exactly and you get missing background beats but I’ve always thought the greatest strength of that game was the music.
How about a hybrid between Castlevania and Mega Man? It certainly has stages similiar to Castlevania along with a character pretty much physically as weak as the Castlevania games. I’ll grant that the boss weapons are like Mega Man, but I still see too much similiarities to totally dismiss the comparison. I guess what I’m trying to say is that it “feels” like Castlevania. The gothic setting, moody music, and vague creepiness all remind me of that game. All it needs it a vampire.
I’ve been playing some games too, spurred by this thread. So far, I’ve beaten Mega Man 1-3, The Guardian Legend, and Ninja Gaiden 1 and 2, along with some simplistic games like Donkey Kong Classics and Donkey Kong 3. I won’t claim to be as good as you are though, but I did own most of these games and played the heck out of them years ago. Going back was like riding a bike, as soon as the music started I was instantly transported back. I’m even surprised how much muscle memory was left as I could remember myself repeating the same moves I did back then (NG2, using the Fire Wheel weapon in the exact place I did back then). Fun times. I’m going to start on Ninja Gaiden 3 and possibly the rest of the Mega Man series all the way to 6, then go for Bayou Billy again. I can’t believe I beat that on the NES without throwing a controller, I seemed to remember a lot of jump kicks…
On a lark, I beat Rygar last night. Man, how the hell did I beat this way back when there was no save states?
The shitty thing about this game is that you could die so easily and you only have one life (albeit unlimited continues). Things knock you off platforms, you die. Walk too close to the edge on the overworld map, you die. But the most annoying thing is getting that damn wind pulley to hook onto the zip lines. I swear you have about a 2 pixel margin of error before you plunge off a cliff.
I didn’t have the instruction book when I bought the game from some guy in science class, so I had no idea about leveling up attack and defense to 4095. I think I would have been saved a ton of trouble, especially on that last boss, if I knew about it. No wonder I died to him so much. All in all, it took me a little less than 2 hours to beat it, but without save states, I could easily see me playing this for 3 or 4 hours.
I have an itchin’ to play the Jackal, that jeep game. I had a lot of fun with it back in the day.
Also, do you know if there’s an actual ending to Ikari Warriors? 2 players on that kicks ass but I don’t think I’ve ever beaten it.
Rygar & I go a long way back. One of my friends who lived down the street from me owned this game. We figured out pretty early on that if you get a turbo controller and put weight on the down and B buttons, you could leave your character standing with his back against a wall and fight enemies for a couple hours, gaining enough experience (which increases your energy meter, strength and defense) to start off the game fully powered. We also left this game on for DAYS at a time, because this is a long one, especially if you don’t know where to go, and has NO saves and NO passwords. You are expected to beat it in one sitting. If you DO know what you’re doing, it would still take at least an hour. Your character is this guy who has a weapon which could best be described as a shield on a rope, which he throws at enemies. About half of the game is side scrolling, similar to most NES platform games, and the other half is overhead, sort of like Zelda. This is also one of the first Metroidvania games. Your character gets various upgrades (mostly things to improve your climbing skills) which let you access new areas, some of which require quite a bit of backtracking (and you need to have a good memory for which areas you weren’t able to access earlier). For some reason when you climb ladders, he looks like he is humping them. One VERY VERY VERY VERY annoying thing about this game, and something that almost broke my tv when I threw my controller at it in fustration, is that you have to be EXACT when using the grappling hook and pully, or else he will not activate them and you will fall to your death. Also, this game’s soundtrack ranges from EXCELLENT to AWFUL, with no mediocre middle.
God I hated Rygar. I got it for Christmas one year, and played it for hours at a time. I could NEVER beat the final boss. And that music haunts me to this day - I just hated it.
Argh. Way overrated game. You’re this futuristic secret agent who uses a sword which was an obvious inspiration for Symphony of the Night’s Crissigaen and you have to track down and kill some other spys, or something. I think. The translation was so horrible I never had any clue what was really going on. You hop from country to country (this is probably the only video game that has Kazakhstan for a level, and just like 8 Eyes, it thinks Africa is a country even though they both have Egypt levels too), although the game takes a weak Metroidvania approach since you need to get power ups (magnet shoes!) and keys in order to finish off most of the levels, which means a lot of backtracking - it works like Duck Tales or Mega Man where you have a home base and can pick a level to go to next. This is definitely a game where it paid to read the manual, because i was playing for about a half hour before I realized that your character (named Hiryu - Strider is is rank) can bounc off walls, a la Super Metroid, which is required to get through the Pyramid. You also get upgraded weapons (called Tricks) which are pretty much useless because you never get very much ammo for them, even after the level upgrades after each level (which also gives you more energy). This game has a couple of other big frustrations - the biggest being that the game gives you NO indication when you are taking damage - you don’t get knocked back and don’t even BLINK, so you can be standing with one foot too close to a spike and not even notice that you are about to die if you aren’t looking at your energy counter. It also has some big problems with screen scrolling, which made me feel sea sick, and also has that Capcom style problem where you can scroll enemies off of the screen, but also stand in spots where they will immediately keep respawning if you kill them, forcing you to move through their path. Also, the boss battles are REALLY easy, and the bosses get recycled (I fought the extra same boss THREE times in a row, and all in different countries!). Mega Man, this game is not…but at least it’s better than Street Fighter 2010.
I decided to see if the Grim Reaper in Castlevania was still a bitch to defeat after all these years.
Yes, yes he was…
Luckily, knowing which weapons to use against which bosses was something I was used to back then. Only this time, I didn’t have to accidentally pick up the stupid watch or dagger while breaking random candles. Hurrah for save states!
What took hours and hours of trial and error back then only took about 35 mins this time, thankfully
I’m in the mood for leveling up so I think I’m going to try the original Dragon Warrior. I can’t remember if you can level past 20 but if not, I may just stop there and ignore killing the Dragonlord. I remember he was still really hard to beat even at that level.
I loved this game! I got so good at tapping the jump then hitting the attack button that I went through the entire game that way. In the arcade, if you mash the attack button, you could get several hits on the foot soldiers and kill them before they could attack back. However, the NES version gave enemies a small window of invincibility after you hit them so they would always hit you back. Annoyed the heck out of me. With the jump attack, you would knock out the regular foot soldiers with one hit.
There was a rumor that Donatello’s staff had longer reach than the other turtles, I dunno if that was true or not. It certainly seemed that way in the arcade version.
Here’s the one I know you’ve all been waiting for…man, I severely underestimated this game. I rented it back when it first came out, but I remember it was a weekend where I was very busy, and only gave the game an hour or so. It seemed like a typical beat-em-up, a la Double Dragon, but with ripoffs of TMNT. This game is a lot more than that - infact, the beat-em-up segments are REALLY easy, which is why I never understood how this game had such a reputation for being so hard. The reason is because this game is full of INSANE run/drive/jump stages which require you to MEMORIZE the entire game. And I mean MEMORIZE, because there are many places where you have to jump, and not even be able to see where you can land (and in some places, you have to jump AROUND spikes which are also out of view). There’s a crazy stage with snakes which comes out the wall, and you have to tag along with them (some of them move incredibly fast) by staying on their backs and climbing them when they go vertical - Super Mario World did a similar segment, but that one was easy in comparison. And then there are the vehicle stages, where you have to jump/swerve out of the way of barricades - some of which you have to position yourself for BEFORE they even appear on the screen (once again, memorizing the whole game if you don’t want to die). This is the exact reason why Mega Man 8 was my least favorite in the series, because of the snowboarding sequences, but the Battletoads version is much more evil. Before this game, I ranked Bayou Billy as being the toughest game I beat in this challenge…but Billy just requires you to be really tough and skilled and is beatable with practice - Battletoads is hard just for the sake of being hard, which really killed the enjoyment of getting through it. What makes matters even worse is that you have a health meter, but most things kill you in one hit, so it’s pretty pointless. Also, you only get THREE continues, and then its back to stage 1. This is absolute bullshit - if the game was designed in the way that you HAVE to learn the game through trial and error in order to advance, why would they punish you like that? Thank god for save states, because I don’t know how in the fuck anyone would have enough lives left to learn the layout of the last couple stages. And of course, no passwords either, so you have to endure the entire game in one sitting! As an interesting bit of trivia, Battletoads held the Nintendo Power record for longest review, with 35 pages, and covered the entire game. Strangely, whoever wrote it was neglecting to mention the fact that playing this game is masochistic, and gave it a 3.9 out of 5 for challenge (NES Open Tournament Golf, in the same issue, got a 4.0./5!).
DW1 goes to level 30, but 18 is plenty for beating the game. Especially if you level grinded on Goldmen, so you can afford the Silver Shield which doubles your defence.
sigh, so I guess I’m gonna have to beat Ghostbusters next.
I’m at 20 now, but I think I’m going until I can fight my way through Charlock instead of running from everything. That was my old plan, might as well try something new this time
Beat it at level 22. Man this game makes you level up a lot! Those were the good (bad) old days…
Next I’m going to finally finish Jackal after leaving that thing off somewhere. I was playing and playing it, but then suddenly I didn’t want to play it anymore. It was weird, like eating too much cheese and suddenly you get sick of it while it’s in your mouth and you don’t want to chew it anymore.
Fusoya, where’s this game log you mentioned that you had on GameFAQs?
Err? I don’t post to GameFAQs at all. or any other video game site other than SDMB.
You gonna do the other 3 DWs? I beat DW4 when it first came out (it seriously takes like 80 hours!) and I’ve been slowly been playing through the DS Remake, although the way they put accents on all of the characters makes it really annoying to follow along.
Love Jackal. I beat that one a couple years ago (should be a couple pages back), but I had lots of 2 player good times when I was a kid.
I could have sworn you said a few years back and a few pages back that you had some kind of game log that others could follow. I’ll have to reread some pages.
The other 3 DW’s will have to be left for another time. I’ve beaten #2 years ago, tried it again last year, but lost interest right before I got to Rhone. I have the other 2 on emulator but never got around to it.
What emulator do you use? I use the classic NESticle, but certain games have never functioned right on that thing. Maniac Mansion always messes up, the graphics glitch horribly. And I can’t even run Dr. Mario! It’s been years since that had an update so I doubt they’re coming out with a newer version anytime soon. And the “Print Screen, take picture” trick doesn’t work and I want to take pics of my better accomplishments!
