Lesser known (good) NES(/Famicom) games

Gil_Hamilton · Post by **Gil_Hamilton** » Wed Feb 18, 2009 8:09 am

Adding to the list again...

Crisis Force. Famicom shooter.
It is awesome.

Your ship can shift between three modes, switchable on the fly. You have two weapons selectable via collecting red or blue powerups, but each mode fires them differently, so basically you have 6 guns, and can select from 3 at any time.

Each ship also has it's own distinct bomb usage.

And you have a "super mode" that makes your plane bigger and invincible for many seconds, as well as powering up the gun to awesome levels(sadly, there is only one super mode).

Sweet music, too. Konami used one of those mapper chips with additional sound hardware, if I recall.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ws5ujH65hfg

Apparently it gets even awesomer in 2-player mode. I've not had occasion to try that.

Joe Camacho wrote:
blackmyst wrote:Gremlins 2 is awesome.

Gil_Hamilton wrote:Notably The Guardian Legend. Half shooter, half Legend of Zelda with a gun and a robochick.
I always wonder when people say a game is "like Zelda" or "like Metroid" if it actually has the complex nonlinear world and level designs with all the puzzles, or if they just say that cuz it looks like that if you play it for two minutes.
I think that "on those days" when something was "top-down" view, it was regarded as "Zelda type", I know I used that term.

No idea about "like metroid" though.

I actually didn't have the game "back in the day."

But it DOES feel like Zelda with a gun. I think the single-screen scrolling is what does it.

It's certainly more advanced than Zelda was.

Describing Blaster Master as "Metroid with a tank!" really does both games a dis-service though, and I should be ashamed of myself.

Neo Kaiser: What is this, Game Pro?
I find screen shots worth very little, as they don't show what the game actually plays like. And if we were worried about graphics, we wouldn't be playing NES games. That's why I typed a bunch of words to sell the game.

I WOULD have linked a YouTube clip of Metal Storm if I could've found a half-decent one that didn't start at level 1 or have a voice-over, as it's one that deserves to be seen in motion.

The elevator level is awesome, as is the stage 6 boss.

Neither features the 3 background layers that are so impressive for an NES game(which aren't visible in screen shots since... no animation), but... meh. We're not here for the graphics.

franpa · Post by **franpa** » Wed Feb 18, 2009 9:00 am

I think that having a set number of levels all connected by a single overworld and everything having secrets throughout is what makes it a Zelda game.

Guardian Legend is in the later levels, insane but doable.

Gil_Hamilton · Post by **Gil_Hamilton** » Wed Feb 18, 2009 10:03 am

funkyass wrote:A good question about Faxanadu.

seriously that games needs a sequel.

Wasn't it a port of some J PC game?

*looks it up*

Sorta kinda, I guess. 'S a spinoff of Xanadu, which was itself a spinoff of J PC RPG Dragon Slayer(the first Xanadu was Dragon Slayer 2, but it looks like they forked into two separate series after that).

Looks like the other Xanadu games are top-down games.

Hmmm, Dragon Slayer 4 looks kinda familiar...

*digs a little more*

Try Legacy of the Wizard. That's the US name of the NES port of Dragon Slayer 4, which is side-scrolling action RPG.

Same developers, sorta kinda maybe the same series, and what appears to be a related play style(never played Legacy, and I haven't played Faxanadu in AGES).

If you already knew all this and I'm just being annoying... oh well.

FirebrandX · Post by **FirebrandX** » Wed Feb 18, 2009 5:20 pm

A couple of game I found surprisingly good were Kid Niki and Legendary Wings. Kid Niki was arguably better than the arcade, and I enjoyed completing it. Legendary Wings was a game I would complete in something like 30 minutes while friends watched. As long as you took care to gain the maximum weapon strength, the game was easy but fun.

Snark · Post by **Snark** » Wed Feb 18, 2009 7:43 pm

The Adventures of Bayou Billy
.....Just kidding. Seriously don't play that, it's awful.

Somewhat related though (Also made by "Ultra"/Konami) and actually fun imo is Rollergames

As you can see it's loosely based on the arcade but the Nes hardware is clearly years/decades behind technically speaking compared to the arcade game, so again, more of a loose adaptation using the same name.

FirebrandX wrote:A couple of game I found surprisingly good were Kid Niki and Legendary Wings. Kid Niki was arguably better than the arcade, and I enjoyed completing it. Legendary Wings was a game I would complete in something like 30 minutes while friends watched. As long as you took care to gain the maximum weapon strength, the game was easy but fun.

Yah Kid Niki, good game but repetitive music though even by Nes standards.

Gil Hamilton wrote:Crisis Force. Famicom shooter.

Never knew that one by Konami. Looks like Nes/Famicom Life Force/Salamander on Steroids.

Post by **grinvader** » Wed Feb 18, 2009 9:01 pm

funkyass wrote:A good question about Faxanadu.

seriously that games needs a sequel.

You'd need more golds for that.

Snark · Post by **Snark** » Wed Feb 18, 2009 9:25 pm

adventure_of_link wrote: that being said, how about Hatris?

I don't know on what platform Hatris first appeared on actually, but if I had to guess I wouldn't say Nes. (and I'm trashing the "original Nes only" rule since even faithful ports on the Nes always differed from the originals anyway)

(Nes) Hatris can be fun but it's not everyone's cup of tea. More of a planing than reflex oriented game.

darkbenny · Post by **darkbenny** » Fri Feb 20, 2009 10:33 pm

Snark wrote:The Adventures of Bayou Billy
.....Just kidding. Seriously don't play that, it's awful.

I actually liked Bayou Billy. Tough as hell, but the 3 modes of play were pretty cool.

Snark · Post by **Snark** » Sat Feb 21, 2009 4:28 am

darkbenny wrote:
Snark wrote:The Adventures of Bayou Billy
.....Just kidding. Seriously don't play that, it's awful.

I actually liked Bayou Billy. Tough as hell, but the 3 modes of play were pretty cool.

Yeah, I must have actually finished Bayou Billy when I was a kid, embarrassing as that is. Back in those days, I had much more higher tolerance for bad games (But not Nes "Ghost Busters" bad) ...honestly, probably only because I didn't have much in the way of choice. Still had enough common sense to know the games were bad though.

Bayou Billy isn't really hard imo. It's just a matter of knowing the right pattern and using it over and over. The beat em up stages for example, the game engine is so badly made that the only sure way to beat the bad guys is to stand just a hair above them --> hit --> let them follow you --> stand above them --> hit --> repeat until beaten. (a trick that works in a lot of beat 'em ups)

Speaking of tough...
Not an original Nes game but worthy of mention is the Mega Man II hack: Deus Ex Machina Amazing hack everything's been redone from the Stage's design and theme, boss pattern, music and even the weapons you receive.

http://www.romhacking.net/hacks/433/

Post by **badinsults** » Sat Feb 21, 2009 5:06 am

funkyass wrote:A good question about Faxanadu.

seriously that games needs a sequel.

Faxanadu was actually a spinoff of a series of games. Legacy of the Wizard is part of that series (I can't recommend that one, though).

kick · Post by **kick** » Tue Feb 24, 2009 3:54 am

Gimmick! by Sunsoft - awwwwwwwwwwwesome!
(the Japanese version, not the crippled PAL crap called 'Mr. Gimmick')

Almost all Sunsoft games on the NES and Game Boy were high quality masterpieces.

I.S.T. · Post by **I.S.T.** » Sun Mar 01, 2009 3:34 am

Neo Kaiser wrote:Holy Diver (Too bad that it dint came to the USA.)

http://hg101.classicgaming.gamespy.com/ ... eview.html

Too bad it's Fuck You In The Ass hard.

Edit: I now want to have sex with every single Crisis Force cart ever.

Gil_Hamilton · Post by **Gil_Hamilton** » Sun Mar 01, 2009 7:56 am

I.S.T. wrote:Edit: I now want to have sex with every single Crisis Force cart ever.

That sounds... unsanitary.

I.S.T. · Post by **I.S.T.** » Sun Mar 01, 2009 7:57 am

Gil_Hamilton wrote:
I.S.T. wrote:Edit: I now want to have sex with every single Crisis Force cart ever.
That sounds... hawt.

Care to join me?

Gil_Hamilton · Post by **Gil_Hamilton** » Sun Mar 01, 2009 8:09 am

I.S.T. wrote:
Gil_Hamilton wrote:
I.S.T. wrote:Edit: I now want to have sex with every single Crisis Force cart ever.
That sounds... hawt.
Care to join me?

Naw. I'll just sex the Zanac carts instead.

kick · Post by **kick** » Sun Mar 01, 2009 8:13 am

I.S.T. wrote: Too bad it's fucking hard.

Try "Bomber King" for the Famicom (without savestates or cheating).Then you'll see what's hard.

Gil_Hamilton · Post by **Gil_Hamilton** » Sun Mar 01, 2009 10:11 am

kick wrote:
I.S.T. wrote: Too bad it's fucking hard.
Try "Bomber King" for the NES (without savestates or cheating)

AKA Robo Warrior in the US.

Neo Kaiser · Post by **Neo Kaiser** » Sun Mar 01, 2009 8:07 pm

I.S.T. wrote:
Neo Kaiser wrote:Holy Diver (Too bad that it dint came to the USA.)

http://hg101.classicgaming.gamespy.com/ ... eview.html
Too bad it's Fuck You In The Ass hard.

Edit: I now want to have sex with every single Crisis Force cart ever.

That's because you are weak. If you practice hard enough you will beat this game. I found Holy Diver to be very well balanced in the way that potions are given just wen you need them.

I.S.T. · Post by **I.S.T.** » Sun Mar 01, 2009 11:56 pm

Neo Kaiser wrote:
I.S.T. wrote:
Neo Kaiser wrote:Holy Diver (Too bad that it dint came to the USA.)

http://hg101.classicgaming.gamespy.com/ ... eview.html
Too bad it's Fuck You In The Ass hard.

Edit: I now want to have sex with every single Crisis Force cart ever.
That's because you are weak. If you practice hard enough you will beat this game. I found Holy Diver to be very well balanced in the way that potions are given just wen you need them.

I should mention I suck at action games.

Or, really, all games in general. >.>

Given I can't get past the first level, I had no idea the game was hard but balanced.

Post by **badinsults** » Mon Mar 02, 2009 2:21 am

Any game that is named after a Dio song must be awesome by default.

I.S.T. · Post by **I.S.T.** » Mon Mar 02, 2009 4:03 am

badinsults wrote:Any game that is named after a Dio song must be awesome by default.

I would have thought that is obvious.

Snark · Post by **Snark** » Mon Mar 02, 2009 5:17 am

kick wrote:Gimmick! by Sunsoft - awwwwwwwwwwwesome!
(the Japanese version, not the crippled PAL crap called 'Mr. Gimmick')

Almost all Sunsoft games on the NES and Game Boy were high quality masterpieces.

QFT

Air Fotress by Hal (another good Nes dev imo) was one of my favorite back then.

kick · Post by **kick** » Mon Mar 02, 2009 8:00 am

Snark wrote:
QFT

Sunsoft was the only company capable of creating a good Batman game

Snark · Post by **Snark** » Mon Mar 02, 2009 8:37 am

I wasn't kidding about the similarity of sounds effects looks like it also applies to the music

Just noticed:

Is it just me or does the music in Air Fortress (during the first/flying phase) sounds suspiciously like the main theme of Adventure of Lolo?

Air Fortress (1:00)

Adventure of Lolo (0:50)

edit: maybe this is due to companies re-using the same "instruments" (if such a thing exist for the NES) for their music

Gil_Hamilton · Post by **Gil_Hamilton** » Mon Mar 02, 2009 9:47 am

Snark wrote: edit: maybe this is due to companies re-using the same "instruments" (if such a thing exist for the NES) for their music

Ignoring japanese mappers and the FDS...

NES sound consists of 2 square waves, one triangle wave, a noise channel, and a sample playback channel.

The cost of large ROMs meant that samples were very low quality by necessity. And the low quality of the sound hardware meant that the square waves and triangle wave were VERY rounded, giving them a fairly unique sound relative to most other PSGs.

The only game-specific "instrument" is the sample channel.

Having said that, there's a very good deal of variability in there. Much of the similarity comes from intentional re-use of tunes, or re-use of style.

Consider, for a moment, that Koji Kondo composed the music for both Super Mario Brothers and Legend of Zelda.
I don't think anyone would argue the two games share a similar musical style, despite being the same composer, publisher, system, and just a year apart.

On the other hand, even today you can tell almost immediately if a game has a Motoi Sakuraba soundtrack. Hell, "Mission to Deep Space" may as well be used on the tri-Ace logo splash, it shows up in so many of their games.

Sound effects, being limited to one channel and typically very short duration, have much more overlap.
One 15 KHz triangle wave sounds a lot like another.