I have a ton of NES games. Also a love and admiration of that generation of games that goes way back. But didn't actually own one until my senior year of high school (two console generations later). I was the kid who made friends with other kids who had a Nintendo. Eventually I worked out a trade with a buddy of mine at the time to trade my Magic the Gathering card collection for his NES with about 20something games and a very nice collection of accessories, we're talking the 4 score, the advantage, the powerpad, a couple zappers, an absurd number of controllers a few regular and a few turbo pads, game genie, and everything short of the power glove (which is a piece of shit anyway).
Now that I actually owned this fine machine and its various accessories and games, I set out to reconquer the past, games I struggled with, games I only got to play briefly, games that I loved and played a great deal, all finally within my grasp. I grew up in a small town and game stores were not something I had access to until I got my driver's license and could drive "into town". So I had access to a few game stores that sold NES games for like 5 bucks a pop or less. Rarer games I could either find on Ebay (which was still relatively new) or get lucky at a few stores and find a deal on. I played the shit out of that thing and enjoyed the hell out of it, beat all kinds of games, those were some of my best gaming years of my life, while other people were fucking around with what I thought (and still do think) were shitty N64, decent PSX, non-existant Dreamcast, and emerging crappy PS2 and Gamecube games, I was enjoying the classics, and even caught up on some good SNES games that had come and gone before I had a chance to play or even hear of them while they were in the mainstream retail market. So that should give the rest of this some context.
I want to talk about a few games that stood out for two reasons. One; they were super fucking hard. Two; they were beatable and didn't have crippling flaws that accounted for their difficulty. Very few people actually beat them, or I knew very few people who beat them (we'll say less than 5 people, that's probably accurate). Anyway I'm going to highlight 5 particular titles, I was going to try for 10, but I only found 7 and the 5 I settled on were really easy to pick out of that 7. So I'll do a count down of the 5 best hard games I ever played (and maybe even beat or know someone who beat them). Also if the game is part of a series and maybe the sequels are more difficult I just went with the first game in that series (since difficult games with sequels tended to breed tough(er) sequels).
Number 5: Ghosts and Goblins. This game is super hard and not impossible. Two hits and you're dead, but you have a variety of weapons, interesting game progression, good music and a lot of different stuff to keep you going. Also infinite continues and you start off from either the beginning of the stage you died on, or the halfway point if you made it that far, so there was enough to keep you going so the difficulty factor didn't turn you away from the game. The controls are good, there's not a lot to complain about, it's just hard. Also in order to get the good ending you have to beat the whole game twice, and the second time around is noticeably harder. I did manage to beat this game, but when I took a crack at it recently I found myself easily discouraged and giving up after about an hour. I suppose when I beat it about 10 years ago I didn't have the distraction of a dozen easy newer games to play instead and a much lower overall difficulty expectation from my games, plus the bragging rights were enough drive to keep me going then, nowadays, it doesn't quite elevate my sense of worth the same as it used to, and the only person I have to brag to is my wife and she could probably case less. *shrugs* Onwards!
Strange cover art, typical of early Capcom games on the NES
This may not seem like a big deal, but this is a serious "oh shit, oh shit, oh shit" moment. This game is full of these, and most aren't even boss fights like this one.
Number 4: Castlevania! My buddy George introduced me to the Castlevania series and I was honestly disappointed that after all these years I had never touched a Castlevania game. Now George and I had a lot more fun with Castlevania 3 at first because of the neat backup characters and the "choose your path" style that gave the game the illusion of being non-linear. However, one magical weekend, my love for the first game was ignited. Two good buddies of mine (Don and Brian) decided we needed to beat the original Castlevania because we didn't know anybody who had ever beat it and we needed that satisfaction. After 2 days of playing about 8 hours each day, we emerged victorious. Six grueling levels of some of the most difficult action/platforming you can imagine was all that stood between us and victory. Don was the only one who could seem to kill the Grim Reaper (level 5 boss), and after the first day we literally gave up on beating Dracula after trying for several hours to beat him. Day two we started again, fresh and determined. Our familiarity with the game after day one gave us a profound edge on day two, Don of course beat the Grim Reaper again allowing us to get past that hurdle once more, and after almost SIX HOURS of fighting Count Dracula, I FINALLY BEAT HIM! Which would have been more exciting for everyone had we not burned out pretty bad after playing it for so long. So mission accomplished, we beat what was thought to be the unbeatable and moved on to our next conquest....
Konami kept their covers classy and relevant.
This may seem like a spoiler, but if you play this game with the intent of beating it, you will see this screen more than any other in the entire game.
Number 3: Ninja Gaiden. I remember playing this briefly as a kid and a friend and I never got past the second level, EVER. So as far as I was concerned this game didn't exist past level 2. After I got my NES in high school I think I got as far as level 4 before quitting that time, and that was with help. So the weekend before or following Castlvania we decided that Ninja Gaiden was a game that needed to be beaten. Don, Brian and myself went to work. This one we spent 3 days on. The first day we got to the last boss and quit, day two Brian beat the last boss, and day three Don beat the last boss. I didn't beat the last boss but I think I got to the last phase once or twice and got close without actually beating him. I was satisfied with my contribution up to that point where I didn't feel the need to really play through the game again so I could beat it myself, I got to see the end, which was totally sweet, and we all pretty much laid the ground work for playing through the game quite seamlessly each discovering new tricks how to get past certain areas, and figuring out which weapons and tactics worked against certain bosses and so-forth. But as far as I know, Don, Brian, (and from his account) an old roommate were the only people I knew personally who had beaten the game. I even watched a fairly reputable gaming reviewer give up on an attempt he had made to beat the game not too long ago, so I guess that just goes to show how significant the victory over this punishing game could be. About the game itself, excellent controls, AWESOME music, sweet cut scenes that helped give the game some storyline substance, neat mood setting graphics for the time. All this came together to make this a sweet game, it was just super fucking hard also. This game was a huge tease too, the levels were split into sub-stages, if you died or even got a game over you only had to start at the beginning of whatever sub-stage you were on, when you got to the final boss, and died, you got sent ALL THE WAY BACK to the first sub-stage of the last level (out of three long ass sub-stages), so we got hella fucking good at blazing through those three stages after three days of playing that motherfucker. So yeah, fuck, that was frustrating as all hell.
Awesome cover art, the ninja being the only thing you'll recognize in the actual game. This would probably be more accurate for the second Ninja Turtles game on the NES because the first level actually takes place in a burning building, no burning buildings in Ninja Gaiden, not a single one.
Fist level, you can stick to walls, jump back and forth between walls, and there is this fun trick where you can move up a wall by jumping out and back real quick, but I wasn't very good at it and Don and Brian made fun of me for that pretty much the whole time.
Awesome cut scenes, very cinematic, gave the game a lot of substance beneath an already excellent game, and the translations weren't that bad either.
This is either the halfway point cut scene or the end cut scene, or maybe both, but cool nonetheless.
Number 2: Kid Icarus. This game is like Mario, Metroid, and Zelda all kind of had a baby and it was in the form of the hardest fucking platforming game of all time as far as I'm concerned. I know one guy who has beaten this game, and he seriously told me that it was years in the making (as much as a decade or more of playing the fucking game before he beat it). I think it has to do with a combination of slightly awkward (but not necessarily broken) controls and unpredictable game play changes that really make this game a toughie. Sad part is IF you can make it to the final level, that level and the final boss are easy mode, but I personally don't have the patience to get past the second level (and that was after a solid 6 hours of play time in an afternoon at one point). So maybe some people may have beaten this one, but I don't know anybody who could likely recreate that scenario today. I do believe that it is a beatable game because I have credible accounts from folks that have cleared it (prior to YouTube or any number of ways to just see some crazed person or pre-programmed robot seamlessly cruise through the game), so it meets my criteria for this list for that reason. My recent attempt at this game was brief and frustrating as expected. By the time I reached (1-2) I was both mentally and emotionally exhausted and not tempted to move on in the least.
Nintendo brand Nintendo games actually gave you an idea of what your game was going to look like and what you're in for. They fail to mention this game is super fucking hard though.
Vertical platforming, this game teaches the lesson that perhaps it should be used in small doses, not half or more of your game :/
Number 1: Burai Fighter. So this is a shoot em up, and not very many people have heard of it or really give a crap about it, but it's number 1 on this list for a very good reason. It's a good fucking game if you give it a chance, and it's hard as shit! The controls in this game are awesome, solid music soundtrack, you have free range to move around the screen while it scrolls along either up down or sideways (pretty unique for a shoot em up at the time). You're a guy in a spacesuit of some kind and you have one of 3 guns you can power up to try and fight off the swarms of crazy crap that's going to come at you from all directions, this is further complicated by the fact that you're dodging obstacles and maneuvering through increasingly complicated terrain. The difficulty in this game comes from two factors, the first being that if you touch or get hit by anything you're dead, and the second is some of the most intense boss fights outside of Blaster Master that I've ever experienced. Another thing that really ups the ante is that you can't experience the entire game unless you play on the highest difficulty. Easy mode you play the first 6 stages, Normal is the first 8, and Hard mode allows you to actually play through all 10 stages. Really gives you some incentive to try all three difficulties where most games wouldn't offer anything other than the added challenge. I haven't had problems clearing easy mode on my own in the past, and I could probably beat Normal mode once in a great while if I had the patience, but Hard mode ups the ante and creates a pretty hectic shoot em up that I really can't seem to beat. However, back in the day, my buddy's older brother who was like the gaming expert back then did in fact manage to beat the game on Hard and finally beat the game, but for him, it was literally countless hours and days spent over the course of years before he put this one to rest, and if I recall correctly it was the last game in his collection that he finally beat. I gave this one a shot on easy mode and managed to get to stage 2 after quite a few attempts, however did not get past the stage two boss after about an hour of playing.
Sweet ass cover art, and of course like any gutsy difficult game, they dangle the last boss in front of you even though you'll never fucking get to him probably ever. Surprisingly, everything pictured is actually in the game though, good show Taxan.
You can move anywhere on the screen and shoot in 8 directions, just don't touch or get hit by anything and you'll be cool, also the direction in which you scroll will shift at certain parts in every level.
First boss, and the only boss picture I could find online... A testament to the difficulty of the game I suppose. This guy moves around the screen pretty fast, those crazy arms swing around randomly, and he shoots little bullets at you, oh and you can only damage him by shooting out his three eyes which those arms block. If your gun isn't powered up pretty good you're probably fucked.
For my generation, the NES came out when I was real young, and frankly NES games were typically much harder than my gaming abilities, luckily my buddy had an older brother in high school, and he was a gaming god as far as I was concerned. He set the bar for what a good gamer should be for me for a long time. He was the person that influenced a lot of my taste in old games, and who's gaming library and games I watched him play over the years had a strong influence over how my current NES and SNES collection shaped up over the years. He even helped me beat some of my PC games that didn't have NES counterparts because he enjoyed the challenge and the change of pace from normal console games. Our association was mutually beneficial because if I remember correctly he used the money saved up from babysitting my sister and I to buy his SNES on the day it was released to the public.
So there you go, there's my top 5 really hard, but also really good, NES game list with some good old anecdotes thrown in for good measure. I probably won't do many lists like this unless it will give me a chance to briefly cover several games all at once that have similar memories and experiences tied up in them.
