Board 8 > Jeff Gerstmann has taken it upon himself to rank every NES game

(+) Yeah! (+)

I was going to say "this might be the longest amount of time anyone has ever spent with Action 52" but I'm sure some pervert has grinded their Cheetahmen speedrun strats for 14 hours straight or something

Its really impressive to make 52 things and theyre all bad

Couldnt even get one sort of right by accident

39
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gXQK9deTirQ

00:00:00 - Intro
00:04:55 - DuckTales
01:07:08 - Ghostbusters II
01:28:38 - Crash 'n The Boys: Street Challenge
02:10:37 - S.C.A.T.: Special Cybernetic Attack Team
02:36:08 - The Adventures of Captain Comic

hey ducktales. i rented it and game genied it but never really got good at it. tried it in the disney afternoon collection but didnt really play much. good game. and of course The Moon. would love a new game based on the remake of the show

also finished the action 52 ep. i dont think i have anything else to say

also made a retro achievements account and decided to do a little science myself. played some tiny toons and got like 13 achievements! controlled way loose and floatier than i remember and i couldnt make it to the 2nd boss :/ . i may have doubted The Science when i shouldnt have

Wait though, doesnt Tiny Toons directly steal the physics from Mario 3? Like literal plagiarism of the code?

I bet I posted this in this topic already but yeah
https://upsilandre.over-blog.com/2021/10/du-clonage-chez-konami.html

it really doesnt feel like mario 3 to me. could be something to do with some sort of retro arch settings or something. ill try out mario sometime and see

Wow DuckTales at 6. Honestly, I've never gotten the hype over DuckTales, I think it's a playable but mediocre NES game. It's not, like, bad, but it wouldn't even make my top 100.

I don't think there were 100 'playable' NES games before DuckTales came out!

Darkwing Duck is the superior Disney game though

After Action 52 was so long it skipped my mind that there would be regular rankings as well this week

I've never cared much for DuckTales either. It's weirdly unforgiving

pjbasis posted...

Darkwing Duck is the superior Disney game though

This. DuckTales was fun to pogo back in the NES days, but it wasn't very good back then and even the remaster from a few years ago wasn't up to modern expectations either.

Paratroopa1 posted...

Wow DuckTales at 6. Honestly, I've never gotten the hype over DuckTales, I think it's a playable but mediocre NES game. It's not, like, bad, but it wouldn't even make my top 100.

not making the top 100 seems wild to me, I think Id really struggle to come up with 100 of these games that Id even like enough to put on a list

Im curious, roughly how many of the games he already ranked do you think youd put above Ducktales?

MoogleKupo141 posted...

Im curious, roughly how many of the games he already ranked do you think youd put above Ducktales?

I went through the list and decided to list every game I either KNOW I like more than DuckTales or I'M PRETTY SURE I'd like it more based on having seen the game played (I've played like 2/3 of these)

Bionic Commando
Super Mario Bros.
River City Ransom
Super Mario Bros. 2
Contra
Mike Tyson's Punch-Out!!
Blaster Master
Super Dodge Ball
Little Samson
Solomon's Key
Jackal
R.C. Pro-Am
Gun-Nac
Mega Man
Cobra Triangle
Tecmo Bowl
Castlevania
Kickle Cubicle
Shatterhand
Gradius
Tetris
Chip 'n Dale: Rescue Rangers
Kid Icarus
Batman: The Video Game
Snake Rattle 'n Roll
Wrecking Crew
R.C. Pro-Am II
Little Nemo: The Dream Master
The Little Mermaid
Bubble Bobble
Excitebike
Galaga: Demons of Death
Donkey Kong
Battletoads
Dr. Mario
Wario's Woods

That's 36 games just from the list alone. Obviously there's a whole heaping handful of yet-unplayed NES games that I also know I'd like more - we have five Mega Mans to go through alone. This is also not counting games that I haven't played enough to be sure if I'd prefer them over DuckTales. I also didn't list some borderline ones - depending on the day and if I have a friend to play with I might prefer something like Mario Bros over DuckTales but it's close. I kinda suspect that if I played every NES game I'd eventually find 100 that I like more than DuckTales, but it'd be close. DuckTales is still like, playable and accessible enough to enjoy but there's just nothing about it that I really like.

Interesting, I think ill play it today or tomorrow to better judge. I beat that remake they did a while ago and liked it, but its very possible Ive never actually played the NES version.

Im realizing that I havent given NES games in their original form much time in general. Like Im sure Ive started stuff like Bionic Commando and Ninja Gaiden in my teens, but l probably just got frustrated at the first game over and booted up something else.

Jeffs series has encouraged me to try some of these games with more deliberate intention to get through them, which has been kind of cool. Retroachievements has helped with the motivation too.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oRs1xq4rmhs

What is time

00:04:15 - Mario's Time Machine
00:46:20 - Baseball Stars
01:12:40 - Burai Fighter
01:41:10 - Volleyball
01:59:20 - Platoon
02:19:10 - Pac-Man
02:36:25 - Dragon Fighter

Dragon Fighter is one of the few NES games Ive never even seen gameplay of before

hell yeah Pinball

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VABX9gSZtqg

00:02:48 - Pinball
00:30:50 - Milon's Secret Castle
01:14:45 - Hudson Hawk
01:31:56 - Where in Time is Carmen Sandiego?
01:52:30 - Phantom Fighter
02:24:30 - Castle of Dragon
02:43:02 - Star Force

That was the highest score I have ever seen of Pinball

dragon fighter was neat

the movement in milon looks horrible. that would kill it even if the rest of it was good which uh doesnt appear to be the case

aw yeah carmen sandiego. played that on pc in elementary school. was terrible at it lmoa. dont think we had the book he mentioned but im sure if we did a buncha school kids ruined it at some point. i remember watching the gameshow quite a bit and maybe a little of the cartoon.

phantom fighter is fucking neat. too bad we didnt get Wolf Move

saw castle of dragon at a gdq. completely forgot about until now lol

I have a soft spot for Castle of Dragon but its definitely a bad game. The arcade version is a little better and also has a ridiculous speedrun, like sub 4 minutes if I remember right. The sequel Sword Master is a great improvement.

Re: Milons Secret Castle, the devastating consequences of Tower of Druaga on the first couple years of Famicom games cannot be overstated

will TMNT2 make the Top 10? Let's find out

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T5uwq45tx0U

00:06:45 - Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Arcade Game
01:07:00 - Castelian
01:44:05 - Mad Max
02:11:55 - Godzilla: Monster of Monsters!

Jeff had an even worse time with Castelian than I expected

That game feels really bad! I cant believe it was ported so many times.

I've never liked the way the NES port of TMNT Arcade feels. Manhattan Project is so much of an improvement in that regard

We begin and end with bangers today

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vMr8Tff5fn0

00:05:38 - Mega Man 2
01:13:20 - Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom
01:32:37 - Robodemons
01:49:10 - Track & Field
02:13:40 - Captain America & The Avengers
02:36:09 - Barbie

watching Jeff go through the science and realize Mega Man 2 is the new #1 NES game was so satisfying for me

May it forever reign

SHINE_GET_64 posted...

watching Jeff go through the science and realize Mega Man 2 is the new #1 NES game was so satisfying for me

Same. I was waiting on it so badly lmao

And we got 2 new games in the bottom 5

Given how he has ranked a few other games, I was a bit worried that he would get Mega Man 2 wrong going into the video.

But I could tell before the ranking part of the video he would get it right.
He tried to drag it out tho lol

Glad he got it right

SHINE_GET_64 posted...

watching Jeff go through the science and realize Mega Man 2 is the new #1 NES game was so satisfying for me

May it forever reign

I was very satisfied by this, given that it is also my #1 game out of the ones he has ranked so far! (Not *quite* my favorite NES game of all time, but it's close - it's definitely one of the four or five that are in contention)

mm2 aw yeah. cant argue with it at #1

saw a speedrun of barbie that made it seem halfway decent. casually its probably uh not. seeing a new bottom 10 game is always a treat though. and we got two! but will anything top secret storm??

and from last week tmnt 2 is what it is. enjoyable but yeah not much to it. never did beat it. made it to shredder like once but mostly died in that dojo or whatever. shame tora never came back

castellian is uh yeah. something couldve been there but it doesnt seem to be

Hey wait, why is the boss named Tora not a tiger?

maybe its one of those ironic names

I kind of am glad Jeff didn't get to Wily Stage 4...he probably would have docked it for that stage's boss design. (The game's only flaw)

Much like he docked Arkista's Ring after reaching the end levels. That game would have been ranked higher if he stopped playing just like 10 minutes sooner.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s_hYP0-cWRw

00:02:56 - Clu Clu Land
00:51:20 - Mystery Quest
01:24:32 - Ninja Kid
01:43:55 - Hoops
02:04:32 - Mighty Final Fight
02:33:08 - Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde

ah the game that a nerd built his entire empire on

and I'll be the first to tell you

dont' play Clu Clu Land

Clu Clu Land is fun actually

I kinda like Clu Clu Land I don't think it's nearly as bad as he ranked it

I still have scars on my wrists from my time with clu clu land

Clu Clu Land is good stuff.

Despite owning an NES since the beginning, I actually never played Clu Clu Land until the GCN Animal Crossing. But I liked it then, and still replay it a couple times a year.

Mystery Quest is the first game on the list that I have straight up never even heard of. And it's not hard to tell why! Some previous ones I'd never seen, but at least knew existed

Technically the game on Animal Crossing was "Clu Clu Land D" the Disk system game which is an enhanced version from like seven years later

I only know Clu Clu Land from the Wii U's Remix Pack.

Boy oh boy how I looked forward to those levels.

WazzupGenius00 posted...

Technically the game on Animal Crossing was "Clu Clu Land D" the Disk system game which is an enhanced version from like seven years later

Wow, I did not know this.

Okay Clu Clu Land D is fun actually and I have no opinion on regular Clu Clu Land.

I would be interested in trying a hack/variant like Jeff proposes where your controls are right arm/left arm instead of just pressing the direction you want to go

man that mystery quest sure is a hidden uh whatever the opposite of a gem is

didnt know mighty final fight was a thing but i can agree its neat and cool that it exists but yeah doesnt seem too good

jekyll and hyde higher than i was expecting. the bottom of the list sure is a wild and crazy place

Clu Clu Land is fun when it's slow but it gets so crazy after like 4 levels

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=52h1-rXSCLg

00:04:23 - Metal Storm
00:47:48 - Vegas Dream
01:06:43 - Mappy-Land
01:26:54 - Puss 'n Boots: Pero's Great Adventure
01:54:57 - Lemmings
02:17:28 - The Immortal
02:35:41 - Kung Fu Heroes

He does not last long on The Immortal

I was afraid for a minute that Metal Storm was not going to get its due

mappyland is a name i know of but ive never actually seen. it is uh not what i was expecting. didnt know it was like a series either?? also didnt know lemmings was on the nes

every game in that series besides the arcade game Mappy is bad. Just play Mappy and be happy

also ACAB includes Mappy

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AdIBDZRYwXs

00:03:23 - Double Dragon II: The Revenge
00:44:34 - Fist of the North Star
01:13:43 - Jaws
01:50:30 - Fantasy Zone
02:14:34 - Little Ninja Brothers

I submitted a list of noms earlier this week and here's one of them with Double Dragon II

I can't believe I didnt' nominate Jaws though

This guy is so trash.

He spends all video talking about how the NES Fantasy Zone is an inferior version, which might mean something, except he said he's never gone further than stage 2...yet he keeps going back to that--it's his main complaint. Also btw, the NES version is a very comparable version to the original. The only thing the original has over it, is that the graphics are more colorful, but you can't say the NES version isn't insanely colorful. The gameplay is nearly the same; the NES port is great. He's also trash, because NES games use two main face buttons...A and B, and yet he only used B for a couple seconds, and then complains about dying a bunch of times when he should have been using bombs. He was stingy with his money in the shop because of the temporary buffs, and died because he kept getting bombed by projectiles...which the buffs save you from because you wipe out everything faster. This guy is so fucking bad.