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I forgot about Punch Out. That was another game I couldn't pass. Mr Dream was ridiculous.
I could make it to Mike Tyson but could never survive the first round. If I had known about the Easter Egg with the fan in the crowd who'd react each time Mike was about to strike, I think I would have made it to the second round.
C'mon, Contra wasn't that difficult. Ninja Gaiden's difficult blew Contra out of the water.
At 8 years old both Contra and Bad Dudes were hard. I could never finish either without my brothers help. I've never played Ninja Gaiden but i rank Bad Dudes above Castlevania in difficulty. Of course I have played Castlevania so much it's a breeze.
NES did have some difficult games (especially compared to easier, subsequent gaming systems).
Another (late)80s game console that had a lot of challenging games: TurboGrafx 16. On average, harder games than the NES, my opinion..
Personally, I think it was mainly because of how short they were. If they were "easy", then you would have had people beating the game in a day or two rental, with no reason to buy. The thing is, if some of these games weren't "Nintendo hard", they would never have gotten the audience they did.
NES games relied almost solely on timing and learning patterns, which takes time to learn. Would people still talk about Contra (since people keep using it as an example) today if it were just an easy run through? Maybe, but it certainly wouldn't have been looked at as highly as it is today.
That being said, there is a difference between a game being "hard", and a game being unfair. There are many games on the NES that are simply unfair. Take the TMNT game (the original, not the arcade ports). There were stages you could only pass with a certain character, but if that character was dead, you were SOL. Don't get me started on the seaweed level either.... Then you have games where you can't tell what you can jump on, or what is part of the background. You have the ones that just increase the difficulty so much that getting to a boss with the amount of health needed to win was almost impossible, and to do so enough times to figure out the pattern was even harder. Like Ghosts N' Goblins, which also had 1 to 2 hit kills to begin with.
Personally, I am glad they made the games hard, because they would have offered very little replayability if they were easy. They would have been boring. Granted, a lot less frustrating, but boring.
Have played NES games for decades that I have never beaten but still enjoy playing from time to time. Something that just doesn't happen with modern games.
Personally, I think it was mainly because of how short they were. If they were "easy", then you would have had people beating the game in a day or two rental, with no reason to buy. The thing is, if some of these games weren't "Nintendo hard", they would never have gotten the audience they did.
NES games relied almost solely on timing and learning patterns, which takes time to learn. Would people still talk about Contra (since people keep using it as an example) today if it were just an easy run through? Maybe, but it certainly wouldn't have been looked at as highly as it is today.
That being said, there is a difference between a game being "hard", and a game being unfair. There are many games on the NES that are simply unfair. Take the TMNT game (the original, not the arcade ports). There were stages you could only pass with a certain character, but if that character was dead, you were SOL. Don't get me started on the seaweed level either.... Then you have games where you can't tell what you can jump on, or what is part of the background. You have the ones that just increase the difficulty so much that getting to a boss with the amount of health needed to win was almost impossible, and to do so enough times to figure out the pattern was even harder. Like Ghosts N' Goblins, which also had 1 to 2 hit kills to begin with.
Personally, I am glad they made the games hard, because they would have offered very little replayability if they were easy. They would have been boring. Granted, a lot less frustrating, but boring.
That underwater level in the first TMNT game was the second friggin' level, and it pissed me off for months! I finally figured out the best order to defuse the bombs. It was the area where the turtles and Splinter were kidnapped and had to be rescued that annoyed me the most. I could never figure out where I needed to go in order to progress the game. Then there was that stupid jump with a low ceiling.
The Angry Video Game Nerd's rage matches mine about that game.
Those machines weren't practical for displaying video, and reading endless text is boring. So those games had to lean heavily on difficulty to lengthen the play experience.
With modern technology, a full game experience can resemble Netflix movies with occasional button prompts, not unlike a popular Black Mirror episode.
I remember looking forward to shopping trips to the mall, so I could hang out at Waldenbooks to read Nintendo guide books & finally learn Street Fighter combos & strategies.
You too, huh ? It's the only way I could beat Legend of Zelda (or whatever the NES version was). Those paperback books with a chapter dedicated to certain games were extraordinarily helpful.
Quote:
Originally Posted by everwinter
… how he witnessed his friend pass Battletoads with 3 lives …
Was that the game where you had two toads each astride some sort of hovercraft motorcycle and you had to dodge up-'n-down to avoid hitting obstacles ? It would auto-scroll faster and faster so you could not go slowly. I never made it past the second or third level/screen. It was just too fast.
Was that the game where you had two toads each astride some sort of hovercraft motorcycle and you had to dodge up-'n-down to avoid hitting obstacles ? It would auto-scroll faster and faster so you could not go slowly. I never made it past the second or third level/screen. It was just too fast.
Ya, I think so. I never actually played it, but always heard it was a hard game. You'd have bragging rights on the playground if you beat it!
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