i saw a bunch of NES carts where the sticker was damaged on the top part, i think its because some video stores would put their own stickers on every cart to prevent stealing, often those stickers would be really difficult to remove, and would always leave a mark, and sometimes those stickers would have a piece of magnetized metallic sheet under there, so it would trigger the alarm if someone tried to walk out the video store with a game. These video stores had a big inventory of carts so you often see damaged carts out there. Its pretty crazy to think about some of those games that are worth thousands of dollars these days, that i used to rent constantly back in the day..
Two things: 1. I hope you enjoy *Dragon Strike* . It's more refined that people give it credit for due to its adherence to the AD&D rules; dragons can't hover or change direction without circling with their maneouverability class and can't breathe fire/frost/lightning more than once every few seconds at least. Unfortunately that makes the game more precise and tactics-based than simpler shooters like *Dragon Spirit,* and as a result possibly less fun. 2. I have a friend who worked as a Playboy Bunny card dealer at the London casino and affirms that patrons are not allowed to touch the bunnies. I guess those ones in *Casino Kid II* were off-brand lol
This is one of the few youtube channels that actually covers more obscure Nes game. Each video I watch on here I learn about a new game. Keep up the good work!
Hey thanks! I think after years of collecting I realized I was picking up all these obscure titles but never playing them, just adding them to the shelf. This channel is me catching up :)
The first Power Blade got a Nintendo Power cover spot on an issue somewhere around the volume 19-22 range. It wasn't til way later I learned of Captain Saver.
i am watching this channel daily while eating dinner after my wage cage. very refreshing watching a legacy gaming show that is actually through and through made with much research
4:31 The Chip 'n Dale: Rescue Rangers games on NES are a fun co-op experience! I'd say that the first one is better though. They're mechanically very similar, but the level design in the first one is more charming. That one has you running along giant tree branches, jumping from faucet to faucet in a kitchen, skirting along a towering picket fence - ordinary places made extraordinary by the fact that you're exploring them as little chipmunks. The sequel has a bit of that in the beginning, and in Western World, but most of the levels feel more abstract and generic. It seems like most of the levels would fit just as well if you were exploring them as some blue super fighting robot rather than a adventurous rodent. 10:47 Similar to Karate Champ, another one-on-one fighter is Yie-Ar Kung Fu! Charming, but pretty rudementary.
Im from Poland .Chip and Dale 2 was most popular game here,beside Mario and Contra.I played (in 90s)Flintstones 2,Turtles fighting game,Power Blade 2 .We usually didn`t buy carts,but borrowed them for week ,or exchaged for other cart.
So interesting. I do get comments from folks who grew up in Eastern Europe and played some of the rarer titles. It’s cool to see how different games became more widespread in certain places!
Neither of the Casino Kid games accurately capture the despondent aura I've felt while being in a casino. I haven't played CK2, but I resonate with your comment about it just not being as charming if you can't walk around the casino. As an actual casino kid (my dad and grandpa loved to go to them on vacation), wandering around a casino is a bit nostalgic for me. Of course, I usually got dumped in the arcade... for some reason, the Atari arcade version of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom really stands out - we didn't have one in my home arcades.
@@BigOleWords Yeah! And I was stoked when I picked up the NES game somewhere, turned it on and realized it was a port of the arcade game. ...and that was the end of the positive vibes.
Godzilla 2 was one of my favorite NES games. I played the hell out of it back in the day. Waiting for Mothra to hatch... moving the parts around until the scientists could assemble that cool jet thingy... and the option to deploy nuclear weapons and end the game. It was all so cool and unique.
it looks identical to Advanced Wars on the gameboy advanced. i wonder if it is the same developers? if you've played advanced wars, how does it compare? and if you haven't play it, they are re-releasing Advanced Wars 1 & 2 for nintendo switch
You were trying to build the spaceship from Destroy all monsters to stop King Ghidorah. You built a oxygen destroyer bomb to defeat Godzilla. You used a radar car to find Baragon before he destroyed all your bases. You used the radar to find mothra's egg and get her on your side. You used your planes and tanks to protect the base and move the parts to be assembled.
I had actually bought Power Blade 2, Rescue Rangers 2, Ducktales 2, TMNT Tournament Fighters and a couple other rare ones back in the late 90s from Funcoland for peanuts. I ended up selling them in 2015 because I was short of money at the time and my son needed some clothes for school.
@@BigOleWords Hey I can list some Canadian priced rarities from the 2010s i bought: 1. River City Ransom-9.99 loose cart at value village 2010 2. Mike Tyson's Punchout-$5.99 loose cart at value village 2010 3. North And South-$5.99 loose cart in 2010. Bought that and Tyson same day! 4. The Jetsons Cogswells Caper-$30 boxed in 2010 5. Ducktales 2-$60 loose cart at a indie store in 2011 6. Tmnt Tournament Fighters-$50 loose cart in 2011 7. Power Blade 2-$7 in 2013 at a flea market loose and from an old chinese lady!
I didn't know they made a sequel to Chip and Dale... My sister and I played the first one so much that the level1 theme is still stuck in my head 30 years later 😂
Lots of boxes in Chip and Dale 2 makes sense. In the comics which were more mature than the cartoon, Chip and Dale smashed a lot of Trim. but sense the game was geared towards kids they changed it to smashing actual boxes. Now you know.
Bubble Bobble 2 was the rarest NES sequel that I ever played. I didn't even know about any of the games in this video back then, but I had access to Bubble Bobble 2 because it was a Blockbuster Video exclusive title, and I was able to rent it. It's just crazy to me that Taito would limit the exposure and availability of a highly desired true sequel to one of their most popular games or why they'd not actually put it up for sale to the public, but the main reason for its scarcity is that it came out so late in the NES' life and that you could only rent it (not buy it) from Blockbuster Video.
@@BigOleWords I have heard this about BB part 2 for 15 years now. I never heard exclusive to Blockbuster. I actually always heard it was exclusive to smaller rental stores. One thing I have noticed about BB part 2 is that every copy I have ever owned or seen has a perfect label lol so maybe it was only at small rental places and was never rented.
I was pretty into Nintendo back in the day and vaguely remember Bubble Bobble 2 sitting in the K-Mart display circa 93 or 94. I remember that a neighbor had it too along with a top-loader NES, which would be consistent with getting into the NES scene that late. I'm like 99% positive it had a retail release.
Worst part about rentals is they only included a zerox copy of basic instructions for gameplay. Often lacking any details about story or how to solve it.
Bomberman II is 3 players only because the Famicom version is only 3 players. On the Famicom, player 3 used the Famicom Expansion port and a 15 pin 3rd party controller (ironically, Hudson released one).
@@BigOleWords Nintendo never made one for the Famicom as far as I'm aware, but there was one or two made by 3rd parties such as HORI. 4 players Famicom games did exist before Bomberman II came out, Hudson just didn't make it that last one for that amount of players (the game did come out during the Super Famicom era, probably wasn't worth the programming investment).
thank you for describing theses games as pricey and not over priced. There's a lot of entitled people out there who think everything old should be dirt cheap and just really doesn't care about the laws of Supply and Demand and that very much applies to video games where large demand with low supply does impact how much you should pay for them. So thanks for respecting game rarity and not acting like a spoiled brat who just wants everything (even in the days of perfect emulation)
I have played most of these sequels, but close to none of the originals. These games were all available between 1996 and 1999 in my small home town in Romania on pirated yellow cartridges for about 3 dollars a piece at the weekend market. So, probably there was a lot of NES piracy going on in the last stages of this console's life.
Back in the day, Mega Man was the best series to me because what I wanted in a sequel was just more game and Mega Man was awesome for that. The sequels that changed the game too much were disappointments mostly, like Snake's Revenge or Zoda's Revenge. I owned Mafat Conspiracy as a kid, so, I was disappointed by Top Secret Episode not being as good when I finally discovered it years later. Bomberman II was my first $100 game, I think. That was like 10 years ago. Great video, as per usual, James! Always something new to learn about the NES..... somehow. Been playing the damn thing my whole life!
On the whole I think most sequels were better, but some are kind of so different that it's hard to say, like Zelda II, Simon's Quest, Mario 2, etc. I think they're often more interesting if maybe not as complete of a gameplay experience.
To me the whole point of a sequel is that it plays like the prior game but with new levels and some added mechanics. The MegaMan games were good for that with every one adding new mechanics and levels. I have seen people complain about modern games. "It plays like the first game but with added stuff !" Well yeah, that's a sequel doofus ! You expect them to just change everything up when the people liked the first game ? Just improve on it ! I don't know, people just love to complain about everything now a days and I guess I'm complaining about people complaining.
Can confirm Flintstones 2 was not Blockbuster exclusive - my hometown had 3 independent video stores in the 90s (what a time to be alive!), and all three stores had at least 1 copy at each. "Rental exclusive", maybe, but definitely NOT Blockbuster exclusive.
I miss the days when I could go to a local retro game store and buy any NES game for $3.99. I bought Sonic Blast Man 2 (SNES) for $9.99 and was shocked last year when I realized it was selling for over $200 now loose.
Great video! Dragonstrike is a little rough around the edges, but getting to play as a dragon is worth the price of entry alone lol. Plenty of fun to be had
I've had the Game Boy version of Ducktales 2, and somehow it feels a bit more polished than the NES counterpart. To get the special bonus treasure in the NES version, you have to buy a piece of treasure map at the end of the level store, which makes me think it was an afterthought. Not so in the GB version. GB also features a couple extra items, like an X-Ray pair of glasses that show where hidden treasures are. Not that the NES game isn't good, but it feels like they knew that version had shortcomings and developed the GB version to be a stronger game. Unlike the other NES to GB ports of Capcom's Disney Afternoon games that feel stripped down.
A lot of this may seem obscure to audiences today, but for somebody who was a kid growing up at a time where you could rent nearly any game you wanted for 99 cents over the weekend who's played all of them, anybody would be hard pressed to show me an NES game I wasn't familiar with. My cousins even owned Baby Boomer and Boulderdash, we were huge fans of Faxanadu before it was cool, and my brothers and I bought all the Codemasters games from a local flea market and always wondered why we never saw those gold cartridges in the retail stores. We were among the 20 people outside of the UK who knew who Dizzy was until TH-cam was a thing. 🤣
@@BigOleWords Right? Not at all playable today with a billion other things you'd rather be playing, but at the same time it was nice to have another game that used the light gun since Nintendo did such a poor job ever making any games for their light guns. Really, like a lot of games from that time it was only something that could be enjoyed in the moment and nobody today would understand the appeal of it back then. It was pretty cool that you could even play 2 players with the 2nd person using a cursor target with the Dpad on a controller. So a light gun game and a 2 player game as a bonus. You can only beat Contra so many times before you get bored unless you're speedrunning games for subs on Twitch.
@@jsmith3946 Yeah I was. The 90's were a way better time. Gas regularly got down to around 78 cents per gallon by me too, and you could buy a carton of Marlboros for $12 bucks.
Hillsfar and Pools of Radiance are in the same universe, and Hillsfar is more or less a "side story/quest" for Pools. There's a mechanic in the PC versions where you could transfer characters from Pools to Hillsfar to explore about, build XP and whatnot. Of course, that didn't make it to the NES. Dragonstrike and Heroes of the Lance are also in the same universe, but frankly I know less about either. I don't have much time into Dragonstrike to form an opinion, but the rest are pretty awful. I find Hillsfar the most playable. Lots of people love Pools of Radiance, like you said, but that style D&D game is not for me. So I 110% appreciated your "this is my nightmare" comment. The later "3D dungeon crawling stuff", starting with The Eye of the Beholder series, is where I dumped some time into D&D games. The overhead 2D stuff really didn't get polished and good for me until Baldur's Gate. Great video so far! I'm stopping after AD&D and will pick it up again later today.
Ehhh. As a PC gamer, the D&D NES games are broken pale imitations of the PC SSI goldbox AD&D series. And heroes of the lance on NES is just...what? I will absolutely positively die on that hill. These games dont belong on consoles.
@@childofcascadia I agree with you, that these games are almost entirely better experiences on the PC. Sound and graphics might be better on other consoles, but they're really meant for the more intricate experience that the keyboard gave you. ...but I sitll don't like them there, either. :) I loved Ultima, but the Pools-styles games were just kinda meh. I did enjoy Neverwinter Nights in the AOL days, though. I think it was the online-ness that made it more fascinating. Did you know that there are fan servers for that now?
@Big Ole Words Me? IIRR, I was the one who wrote HILLSFAR SUX, lol. Then I admitted that the pc one was at least playable when someone else said they looooved it. But those damn horse parts even on pc are annoying AF. Its the weakest of the SSI games.
The 3 player mode in bomberman 2 is a holdover from the famicom version. The famicom has hard wire controllers and only one expansion port mainly used for the jp zapper but Hudson came out with a extra controller. Later they also made a multitap but the first more than 2 players games was limited to 3 like bomberman 2 and stinger.
godzila2's reputation was destroyed by AVGN review, but it is very good turn-based strategy, scientists explain your objectives, hints, and new mechanics, in some buildings you 'build' your units, the dilemma here is order of units to build, depends on what you want, some missions could be done in different ways, due to new fancy mechanics: - loork Godzilla and activate nuclear bomb, - find friendly Mothra, - reflect 'nuclear breath/beam' by energy shield back to monsters to destroy them,... two types of attacks 'machinegun" or "cannon" add depth to strategy, but i ll keep the secret when it could be useful. all monsters carefully designed to have weaknesses, and difficulty depends on how much you want to save (cities or units) so as player you will find some interesting challenges "can i save this building or not", it is high quality game. they had to cut budget due to first game disaster, but they cut only artists and musicians and doubled game designers, but strategies itself not as popular as action platformers, so no hype, no players
i'm glad you appreciate the game for its own merits, but I do think James tearing down the games facade was merited since it was such a massive departure from the previous title and of course because it feels like a kick in the pants whenever games featuring Godzilla tries to be tedious (which there's a painful amount of on multiple systems). If the game were just monster themed and not actually featuring the king of all monsters himself, I think a lot more people would have given it a more fair chance and even could have been seen as a hidden gem and not a painful reminder that Godzilla fans don't get to have nice things a lot of the time XD
The D&D gold box pc games ported to NES always were weird. I didn't even know about them till last few years. That's how rare they are, being a huge fan of the PC games.
@@BigOleWords I can't imagine playing a PC CRPG like Pool of Radiance using the clunky NES controls. It would be a nightmare. The game is already long, requiring a controller would triple the time investment.
I remember renting TMNT Tournament Fighters shortly after it came out, and it had a photocopied manual with it. I played the game so much, I was able to advance far in it. I tried it out recently, and got beat down hard lol
That's how it goes with fighting games. I was pretty good at Tekken 3. I think it still has the most time I have ever put into a fighting game and I knew how to use most characters. Loaded it up a month ago and just got my ass handed to me over and over again.
Wow I had no idea a Dragonlance (Heroes of the Lance) game was on NES. I didn’t really get into the main books until the SNES era so that probably helped. Crazy that a new trilogy for that main Dragonlance series of books is currently in the middle of being released.
Fascinating stuff as usual my friend, especially the D&D stuff. FYI I should have that Indy and the Last Crusade ZX Spectrum and Master System vid up soon. If I pull my finger out 😂
The Flintstones game is only medium rare here in South America, you can find the game on local places 2 or 3 times a year even in flea markets. Rescue Rangers game, just common, same with Duck Tales, TMNT and Bomberman. The NES was sold until mid 90s here so we had plenty of NES games in stores for a long time.
Interesting! Are the legit NES cartridges or similar to stuff that came out in Eastern Europe where it looks like a official cart but it’s a bootleg? I think that copy of Power Blade 2 actually came from Mexico, but I don’t know much about the South American market!
@@BigOleWords Legit carts, you can find lots of retro stuff in South America, even new old stock. I still remember the great Atari find on an old warehouse. Last time I saw nes sealed games in stores was like 2006.
Godzilla 2 looks awesome! I liked the first one, my cousin had it, but I never got to spend much time playing. I don't believe I ever got off of earth. I like how they leaned into the strategy aspect. Later I played Master of Monsters on the Genesis, it completely blew me away.
crates are pretty large, so it doesn't really make sense for there to even be chipmunk-sized crates let alone hundreds of them lying around everywhere.
Excellent thumbnail. Reminded me so much of Wario World for the GameCube lol. Also I find it so odd there’s no Famicom version of the Flinstones sequel. Sometimes for the rare games the Famicom ones are less expensive. But then… sometimes common games are much more.
I've discovered all of these thanks to emulator consoles in the past few years. Or, in the case of DuckTales and Rescue Rangers 2, that Disney Afternoon Collection Capcom put out officially. Gotta say, I generally agree with a lot of your "it's similar to the point of being predictable" feelings towards them all. Except for Power Blade 2; that one is way different and is WAY harder than the first one. Oh well. Also am with you when it comes to those old CRPG-style D&D games... those old NES ports of TSR's "Gold Box" games are a hard nope from me as well. The only fighting games for the NES/Famicom I can recall besides Tournament Fighters is Joy Mecha Fight, though there are a bit more if we're counting, like, Taiwanese hack games such as King of Fighters '96 or Tekken 2. If ever you want to make a series about pirate games, you should find some really interesting stuff.... occasionally even decent, lol. That unlicensed KOF '96 ain't bad Oh, and I've heard the term, "Maze Action Game" used to describe stuff like Bomberman, Pac-Man, Adventures of Lolo, Chew Man Fu, and Kid no Hore Hore Daisakusen/Crater Maze/Booby Kids (I _know_ it's meant to be used here like in the term, "Booby Trap" but... c'mon, I think it's okay to giggle at that title like stupid little kids, lol.) in the past. Don't know if that's, like, an official term for old arcade maze games, but just throwing that out there in case no one else has anything better 😃
If you love Power Blade, I highly recommend you give the Japanese version "Power Blazer" a look. They're nothing alike and 'Blazer' is MUCH more difficult.
Big ol dang good long video dere, Bimmy. Big bird would be proud! Never really checked out the D&D games on the NES, I think your suggestion looks about right.
It is! I talked about it and all the Bubble Bobble games in Part 4 of this series: Bubble Bobble and Its Four NES sequels (Nintendo Entertainment System Review) th-cam.com/video/3-oU2W2FSvw/w-d-xo.html
F*CK Hillsfar!! Screw that game!! It was nothing more than a side quest sandwiched between two major AD&D releases. The whole point of Hillsfar was that the character you work on can be imported into the next AD&D title (On the Commodore 64 release, that is). Hillsfar was never meant to be a full game. In addition, there's something about Hillsfar that would overheat my Commodore 128 (in C64 mode). I was too young to understand how thermodynamics worked in computers and too young to understand that replacing thermal paste inside of my machine might fix the problem. So whenever I played that ONE game, I would have to have a huge box fan blow into the grating of my Commodore 128.
Hahaha that’s awesome. And smart of you, I didn’t realize computers overheated til years later!
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Duck Tales 2 is one of the best games on the NES, it also has a very difficult romhack, unfortunately only in russian, which makes some of the puzzles very hard to figure out, but since I played this first in japanese we could not even understand a single word and figured out all what we need :). TMNT Tournament Fighters is also very good for the NES, I tried both the Genesis version and the SNES one, but those not felt the same to me given how many 1 on 1 fighting games I played since the NES one which were not limited by that much on the PC, and the Genesis one is unplayably hard. Cool trick for the NES TMNT: you can play with two Hotheads at the same time (normally this is not enabled since his character is made out of too many sprites and it would cause extreme flickering). First select VS CPU mode and select anybody for yourself except Hothead, then select Hothead for CPU, after that game you can select new characters and you can select Hothead for you, then for the CPU as well :) (okay, technically you cannot play with two Hotheads, the other one must be CPU :) )
I'm surprised Star Tropics 2 wasn't on the list. Also, great to know the D&D games are on here. I played them on computer. I still play D&D with my classmates at my seminary here today.
Indy & the Last Crusade also had two different PC games! At least they were subtitled "The Action Game" and "The Adventure Game" if I recall correctly.
I got an NES in the early 90s as my first console and by that point the games were so cheap. People were throwing them away. I guess people didn't value 'old games' back then in the way we do now. I got a lot of NES games as gifts, hand-me-downs from relatives and second-hand and ended up gathering a large collection. No joke, I remember at one point having 3 copies of Ducktales 2 😂. It was one of my favourites for the NES and I played it a lot more than the first one. I eventually got a SNES in 1995/96 so I think we traded in all of my NES stuff at that point. I wish I still had all of those old games 😢
As with any console a newer generation comes out, people get rid of their games and replace them with ones for the newer system. Then years later they wish that they hadn't gotten rid of them. I had a NES until like 1994 and I remember getting used games for a few dollars a piece. Then I got a Genesis and was getting those games cheap once the PlayStation was a big thing. I remember seeing some rare Sega CD games and passing on them (One of them was Snatcher).
Pool of Radiance is actually, believe it or not, one of my favorite games for the NES. And I didn't even play it back in the day. I only recently picked it up and learned how to work it, being a D&D fan. The game opens up more once you get outside the town, finding yourself in a top-down overworld that has better graphics than anything in the city. Plus, all the early fights kind of rely on you memorizing and using the sleep spell, your absolute best friend early on. But in any case, the computer version, and the later sequels on the computer, are all better. That said, I admit this stuff has a narrow demographic. Heck, I was exactly like you early on and perpetually ignored dungeon crawlers.
@@BigOleWords honestly if you don't like dungeon crawlers, it's not going to really win you over. And the other ones for the NES aren't exactly great. Dungeon Magic is terrible, Bard's Tale is repetitive and soul crushing, Might & Magic is very good but very hard and somewhat soul crushing...there's some better ones for the Famicom, like the Deep Dungeon series. Swords & Serpents is pretty good if you want something really streamlined for the causal player.
Does the NES version of Pool of Radiance do things like tell you that you overhear rumor #78 in the tavern and force you to look up what that is in the manual like the PC version does? As much as I still love a lot of classic games, there are certainly design elements from that era that I don't miss.
Dragon Warrior IV. Traded about $200 of vintage game stuff for my copy. Well worth it tho. Its rare as the SNES was out and Dragon Quest got overshadowed by Final Fantasy stateside.
Bomberman II seems to borrow a lot from the first Bomberman game on pc-engine/TurboGrafx 16. It reuses sprites, enemies, and music from the PC-E game, with a hit to the fidelity of course. Although there is something nice about the flat colors and NES soundchip
I was about to call you out on the 1v1 fighter thing, and then remembered that Yie-Ar Kung Fu didn't make it to the US. Childhood memories of that Famiclone bleeding into my recollection...
The algorithm Gods giveth you a new subscriber. My favorite Late Era NES Sequal is the one I opened up Christmas Morning of 1994... "Zoda's Revenge: Star Tropics II" but its not an expensive Sequel so it doesn't fit this list. The only Expensive Sequels I personally have in my collection are Donkey Kong Jr Math, and RC Pro Am II That is unless you count Stack-up as a Sequel to Gyromite which I don't.
I have no idea what went through the mind of the Godzilla video games developers on the NES. You know, when somebody says Godzilla, you think about monster wrestling duels and a city being leveled. Not Final Fantasy Tactics, lol The tactical board thing is an interesting format, but it is way too ambitious for a 8 bits home console, as you need to have skilled enough level designers to imagine various hive environments and make the best of the storage space on the cartridge. But if you design a well made game as this rogue style, it can have a high replayability, I am sure! It reminds me the approach Dragon Ball Z Budokai 2 had, somewhat.
Flintstones Dinosaur Peak was not a Blockbuster exclusive. I rented this a lot as a kid from the Frys grocery store back in the day when they had a section for renting movies and games.
The NES AD&D games were jank as hell. Translating the tabletop experience to an NES cart is a colossal challenge and the developers didn't quite succeed. The Baldur's Gate PC games do the experience much better.
Very cool video! I would guess that Bomberman 2 was only 3 players because of the limited screen space. Maybe that's what their logic was. Either way, I have enjoyed the game from time to time.
good stuff! thanks for the sweet vid on some really hard to find carts! i had some really good games for the nes and grew up poor so i played the nes into the 90s while everyone else was going to 16bit. i didnt get any of these because i could only afford old games from pawn shops. your carts look much better than mine! i remember a lot of mine had so many other kids names written in sharpie all over them😂
@@BigOleWords i will always remember "EVAN"s games. hope his family was ok. that pawn shop had like his whole collection at one time. as a kid i was happy to get anything not thinking about how it came to be. now my imagination wanders on what could have happened to lose your entire collection. perhaps its because i was poor that everything i had was so cherished as if it was an item in legend of zelda hidden in a treasure chest.
Pool of Radiance and the rest of the SSI D&D games were ports of far superior PC games of the same names. In that era, any game ported from PC to console and vice versa were almost always terrible. Ultima 3 and 4 also got similar bastardizations on the NES. Though come to think of it, Dragonstrike does look like it plays a bit differently from what I remember of the PC version - if I am thinking of the same game.
Yes it is! It's not quite as rare as these 10, but definitely not common. My nephew and I played it in one of the co-op videos: th-cam.com/video/1qoW2lSGSgQ/w-d-xo.html
Back when I was collecting for fun instead of to complete, that and Duck Tales 2 were my dream carts. They were super expensive to me then, but nothing compared to the others!
I can’t believe you opened your bowels on the Pool of Radiance series AND called it a “dungeon crawler”. It was a tactical RPG that spanned 4 games and spawned several spinoffs. It’s better than you make it sound.
Great video as always I have TMNT tournament fighters on my nes n 8 pro and yes it really hard but ,every time I play it I think man just imagine if this was street fighter 2 on the nes because it shows it could be done to a high standard
hilsfar is a sudo-sequel to pool of radiance that was released to fill the void between the first game and it's true sequel "curse of the azure bonds" - which was never ported to nes
That is a sizeable NES collection for someone who doesn't actually know anything about what he's collected. I can't imagine going to the trouble and expense when you don't love or respect what you have.
@@BigOleWords To your statement (?), a counter-statement: the entire video is essentially built around the obscurity of these titles and cursory comments on a few moments of playing them blind. Not even a quick search to give some context or meaning, the difference between this and any random person watching a trailer is the ownership of the cartridges. Ownership with no (desire for) greater insight is just avarice. So I say this does not show even a passing interest in enlightenment, necessary to claim one loves their subject. This is strictly profit-seeking. And you killed Raistlin. Just... awful.
Some of the most sought after games there man. So ridiculous how much they go for these days haha. My chances of ever owing a complete nes collection is slim haha
Really makes you wish you had started collecting back in the early 2000s. Also makes me wish that my stepdad didn't get rid of all my video games/systems when I moved out after High School. Wish I had taken my stuff and started collecting back when things were cheap.
@@Gatorade69 well the sad part is that I started collecting around 2011 and didn't realize that some of these games would become extremely rare and expensive. When I started collecting I went after the games I liked as a kid. Like batman, contra, ect. Games that don't have any value haha. I remember passing up a copy of bonks adventure for 200 bucks and saying 200 for a game is ridiculous.
I saw that was and was like "A Godzilla game that's slow-paced and tactical, and you don't even play as Godzilla. Who tf thought that was a good idea?"
@@HylianFox3 i love the first godzilla game for nes. its fun to spit radiation and stomp and swing your tail around and smash things and fight monsters. they should have stuck to that formula.
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i saw a bunch of NES carts where the sticker was damaged on the top part, i think its because some video stores would put their own stickers on every cart to prevent stealing, often those stickers would be really difficult to remove, and would always leave a mark, and sometimes those stickers would have a piece of magnetized metallic sheet under there, so it would trigger the alarm if someone tried to walk out the video store with a game.
These video stores had a big inventory of carts so you often see damaged carts out there. Its pretty crazy to think about some of those games that are worth thousands of dollars these days, that i used to rent constantly back in the day..
And unfortunately a lot of the rarest titles were a mostly available only at rental stores.
Two things:
1. I hope you enjoy *Dragon Strike* . It's more refined that people give it credit for due to its adherence to the AD&D rules; dragons can't hover or change direction without circling with their maneouverability class and can't breathe fire/frost/lightning more than once every few seconds at least. Unfortunately that makes the game more precise and tactics-based than simpler shooters like *Dragon Spirit,* and as a result possibly less fun.
2. I have a friend who worked as a Playboy Bunny card dealer at the London casino and affirms that patrons are not allowed to touch the bunnies. I guess those ones in *Casino Kid II* were off-brand lol
Did not know there was lore behind those dragon movements!
This is one of the few youtube channels that actually covers more obscure Nes game. Each video I watch on here I learn about a new game. Keep up the good work!
Hey thanks! I think after years of collecting I realized I was picking up all these obscure titles but never playing them, just adding them to the shelf. This channel is me catching up :)
NES Friend covers some lesser talked about games on his channel. SNES Drunk too but he mostly cover SNES Titles.
The first Power Blade got a Nintendo Power cover spot on an issue somewhere around the volume 19-22 range. It wasn't til way later I learned of Captain Saver.
Yeah I think I remember seeing that!
I can't believe cheetamen 2 didn't make the list, Action 52 was such a smash hit when it released, and such good value too less than $4 per game!
Haha that is technically a very rare sequel!
that's insane & wonderful prices!
It was so great it wasn't released because people wouldn't have been able to handle its epicness 😮😂
I didn't think cheetahmen 2 was ever fully released. Either way action 52 was a total ripoff and those games weren't worth 25 cents a piece.
Those games aren't authorized titles. They don't deserve a mention.
i am watching this channel daily while eating dinner after my wage cage. very refreshing watching a legacy gaming show that is actually through and through made with much research
Haha glad you like it :)
4:31 The Chip 'n Dale: Rescue Rangers games on NES are a fun co-op experience! I'd say that the first one is better though. They're mechanically very similar, but the level design in the first one is more charming. That one has you running along giant tree branches, jumping from faucet to faucet in a kitchen, skirting along a towering picket fence - ordinary places made extraordinary by the fact that you're exploring them as little chipmunks. The sequel has a bit of that in the beginning, and in Western World, but most of the levels feel more abstract and generic. It seems like most of the levels would fit just as well if you were exploring them as some blue super fighting robot rather than a adventurous rodent.
10:47 Similar to Karate Champ, another one-on-one fighter is Yie-Ar Kung Fu! Charming, but pretty rudementary.
Im from Poland .Chip and Dale 2 was most popular game here,beside Mario and Contra.I played (in 90s)Flintstones 2,Turtles fighting game,Power Blade 2 .We usually didn`t buy carts,but borrowed them for week ,or exchaged for other cart.
So interesting. I do get comments from folks who grew up in Eastern Europe and played some of the rarer titles. It’s cool to see how different games became more widespread in certain places!
Neither of the Casino Kid games accurately capture the despondent aura I've felt while being in a casino. I haven't played CK2, but I resonate with your comment about it just not being as charming if you can't walk around the casino. As an actual casino kid (my dad and grandpa loved to go to them on vacation), wandering around a casino is a bit nostalgic for me. Of course, I usually got dumped in the arcade... for some reason, the Atari arcade version of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom really stands out - we didn't have one in my home arcades.
Temple of Doom in the casino arcade?! Awesome!
@@BigOleWords Yeah! And I was stoked when I picked up the NES game somewhere, turned it on and realized it was a port of the arcade game.
...and that was the end of the positive vibes.
Godzilla 2 was one of my favorite NES games. I played the hell out of it back in the day. Waiting for Mothra to hatch... moving the parts around until the scientists could assemble that cool jet thingy... and the option to deploy nuclear weapons and end the game. It was all so cool and unique.
You’re the second person to recommend it! Maybe I will give it a second try :)
it looks identical to Advanced Wars on the gameboy advanced. i wonder if it is the same developers? if you've played advanced wars, how does it compare? and if you haven't play it, they are re-releasing Advanced Wars 1 & 2 for nintendo switch
You were trying to build the spaceship from Destroy all monsters to stop King Ghidorah. You built a oxygen destroyer bomb to defeat Godzilla. You used a radar car to find Baragon before he destroyed all your bases. You used the radar to find mothra's egg and get her on your side. You used your planes and tanks to protect the base and move the parts to be assembled.
I had actually bought Power Blade 2, Rescue Rangers 2, Ducktales 2, TMNT Tournament Fighters and a couple other rare ones back in the late 90s from Funcoland for peanuts. I ended up selling them in 2015 because I was short of money at the time and my son needed some clothes for school.
That's a real collector roller coaster of a story right there!
@@BigOleWords Hey I can list some Canadian priced rarities from the 2010s i bought:
1. River City Ransom-9.99 loose cart at value village 2010
2. Mike Tyson's Punchout-$5.99 loose cart at value village 2010
3. North And South-$5.99 loose cart in 2010. Bought that and Tyson same day!
4. The Jetsons Cogswells Caper-$30 boxed in 2010
5. Ducktales 2-$60 loose cart at a indie store in 2011
6. Tmnt Tournament Fighters-$50 loose cart in 2011
7. Power Blade 2-$7 in 2013 at a flea market loose and from an old chinese lady!
Moral of the story is don't have kids so that you can keep what you buy
Fun fact about the 3 versions of TMNT tournament fighters. Every version has at least one character not found in the other versions.
Whoa cool!
As far as I know, only the 4 turtles are actually in every version. Every other character is version exclusive.
Casey jones is in at least 2 versions
@@Kos4Evr You're correct. My b.
I didn't know they made a sequel to Chip and Dale... My sister and I played the first one so much that the level1 theme is still stuck in my head 30 years later 😂
It’s pretty fun! If you liked the first one you’ll dig the second.
Lots of boxes in Chip and Dale 2 makes sense. In the comics which were more mature than the cartoon, Chip and Dale smashed a lot of Trim. but sense the game was geared towards kids they changed it to smashing actual boxes. Now you know.
Damn dude, took it there!
Bubble Bobble 2 was the rarest NES sequel that I ever played. I didn't even know about any of the games in this video back then, but I had access to Bubble Bobble 2 because it was a Blockbuster Video exclusive title, and I was able to rent it. It's just crazy to me that Taito would limit the exposure and availability of a highly desired true sequel to one of their most popular games or why they'd not actually put it up for sale to the public, but the main reason for its scarcity is that it came out so late in the NES' life and that you could only rent it (not buy it) from Blockbuster Video.
Bubble Bobble part 2 is great. Might have to pop that in tonight!
Is that true?! It wasn’t sold in stores?
@@BigOleWords I have heard this about BB part 2 for 15 years now. I never heard exclusive to Blockbuster. I actually always heard it was exclusive to smaller rental stores. One thing I have noticed about BB part 2 is that every copy I have ever owned or seen has a perfect label lol so maybe it was only at small rental places and was never rented.
I was pretty into Nintendo back in the day and vaguely remember Bubble Bobble 2 sitting in the K-Mart display circa 93 or 94. I remember that a neighbor had it too along with a top-loader NES, which would be consistent with getting into the NES scene that late. I'm like 99% positive it had a retail release.
Worst part about rentals is they only included a zerox copy of basic instructions for gameplay. Often lacking any details about story or how to solve it.
Bomberman II is 3 players only because the Famicom version is only 3 players. On the Famicom, player 3 used the Famicom Expansion port and a 15 pin 3rd party controller (ironically, Hudson released one).
Huh! So the Famicom didn’t get the Four Score or Satellite?
@@BigOleWords Nintendo never made one for the Famicom as far as I'm aware, but there was one or two made by 3rd parties such as HORI. 4 players Famicom games did exist before Bomberman II came out, Hudson just didn't make it that last one for that amount of players (the game did come out during the Super Famicom era, probably wasn't worth the programming investment).
Good input! I figured it was a sprite limitation due to the on screen animations of three players worth of bombs.
Glad you enjoyed Ginga Daisakusen! It was planned for release in the US under the name "Squashed!" but was never released
Squashed is a great name :)
thank you for describing theses games as pricey and not over priced. There's a lot of entitled people out there who think everything old should be dirt cheap and just really doesn't care about the laws of Supply and Demand and that very much applies to video games where large demand with low supply does impact how much you should pay for them. So thanks for respecting game rarity and not acting like a spoiled brat who just wants everything (even in the days of perfect emulation)
The suggested AI response is “Yeah it's cool how they're going up in value”. 🤣🤣
@@BigOleWords good, speaking of high value games, I hope you give Kickle Cubicle is own video at some point
I have played most of these sequels, but close to none of the originals. These games were all available between 1996 and 1999 in my small home town in Romania on pirated yellow cartridges for about 3 dollars a piece at the weekend market. So, probably there was a lot of NES piracy going on in the last stages of this console's life.
Nice! Yeah people in Eastern Europe have commented that Power Blade 2 was really popular there, but in America it was not so much.
The original power blade was pretty well known it was on the cover of Nintendo power in the spring of 1991.
I mean so was Puggleys Scavanger Hunt soooo….
Just discovered the channel, excellent content. Keep up the good work!
Hey thanks so much!
Back in the day, Mega Man was the best series to me because what I wanted in a sequel was just more game and Mega Man was awesome for that. The sequels that changed the game too much were disappointments mostly, like Snake's Revenge or Zoda's Revenge.
I owned Mafat Conspiracy as a kid, so, I was disappointed by Top Secret Episode not being as good when I finally discovered it years later.
Bomberman II was my first $100 game, I think. That was like 10 years ago.
Great video, as per usual, James! Always something new to learn about the NES..... somehow. Been playing the damn thing my whole life!
On the whole I think most sequels were better, but some are kind of so different that it's hard to say, like Zelda II, Simon's Quest, Mario 2, etc. I think they're often more interesting if maybe not as complete of a gameplay experience.
To me the whole point of a sequel is that it plays like the prior game but with new levels and some added mechanics. The MegaMan games were good for that with every one adding new mechanics and levels.
I have seen people complain about modern games. "It plays like the first game but with added stuff !" Well yeah, that's a sequel doofus ! You expect them to just change everything up when the people liked the first game ? Just improve on it ! I don't know, people just love to complain about everything now a days and I guess I'm complaining about people complaining.
love your content my dude keep it up!!
You got it!
Can confirm Flintstones 2 was not Blockbuster exclusive - my hometown had 3 independent video stores in the 90s (what a time to be alive!), and all three stores had at least 1 copy at each. "Rental exclusive", maybe, but definitely NOT Blockbuster exclusive.
We’re getting closer to the truth!
I have a copy that my mom got for me from blockbuster... Not sure if she bought it or never returned it 😂 it still says blockbuster on it.
I miss the days when I could go to a local retro game store and buy any NES game for $3.99.
I bought Sonic Blast Man 2 (SNES) for $9.99 and was shocked last year when I realized it was selling for over $200 now loose.
Yeah I really missed my chance to clean out some stores back in the day!
1:16 The GRAND DADdy of all the rare sequels
Clever... very clever ;)
Ummm yeah, totally intentional ;)
I think this is my new favorite channel thank you Greg Newkirks brother..
Thanks! Although I don't know who that is!
@@BigOleWords You don't know your own brother !?
Great video! Dragonstrike is a little rough around the edges, but getting to play as a dragon is worth the price of entry alone lol. Plenty of fun to be had
For sure. Although I’ll probably stick with Dragon Spirit or Dragon Fighter ;)
I've had the Game Boy version of Ducktales 2, and somehow it feels a bit more polished than the NES counterpart. To get the special bonus treasure in the NES version, you have to buy a piece of treasure map at the end of the level store, which makes me think it was an afterthought. Not so in the GB version. GB also features a couple extra items, like an X-Ray pair of glasses that show where hidden treasures are. Not that the NES game isn't good, but it feels like they knew that version had shortcomings and developed the GB version to be a stronger game. Unlike the other NES to GB ports of Capcom's Disney Afternoon games that feel stripped down.
X-ray specs sounds like a rad item!
A lot of this may seem obscure to audiences today, but for somebody who was a kid growing up at a time where you could rent nearly any game you wanted for 99 cents over the weekend who's played all of them, anybody would be hard pressed to show me an NES game I wasn't familiar with. My cousins even owned Baby Boomer and Boulderdash, we were huge fans of Faxanadu before it was cool, and my brothers and I bought all the Codemasters games from a local flea market and always wondered why we never saw those gold cartridges in the retail stores. We were among the 20 people outside of the UK who knew who Dizzy was until TH-cam was a thing. 🤣
Baby Boomer?! Woof!
@@BigOleWords Right? Not at all playable today with a billion other things you'd rather be playing, but at the same time it was nice to have another game that used the light gun since Nintendo did such a poor job ever making any games for their light guns. Really, like a lot of games from that time it was only something that could be enjoyed in the moment and nobody today would understand the appeal of it back then. It was pretty cool that you could even play 2 players with the 2nd person using a cursor target with the Dpad on a controller. So a light gun game and a 2 player game as a bonus. You can only beat Contra so many times before you get bored unless you're speedrunning games for subs on Twitch.
Ya you wasn't renting game fo 99 cents
@@jsmith3946 Yeah I was. The 90's were a way better time. Gas regularly got down to around 78 cents per gallon by me too, and you could buy a carton of Marlboros for $12 bucks.
Yeah, 99 cents was a thing. The good ole days man, when you could still rent games.
Casino Kid 2 becoming Gambling Street Fighter II, complete with literally just Chun-Li, is not a twist I was expecting.
I know right? It’s pretty hilarious
Thank God, I thought you forgot about Donkey Kong Jr. Math
How could anyone ;)
Hillsfar and Pools of Radiance are in the same universe, and Hillsfar is more or less a "side story/quest" for Pools. There's a mechanic in the PC versions where you could transfer characters from Pools to Hillsfar to explore about, build XP and whatnot. Of course, that didn't make it to the NES.
Dragonstrike and Heroes of the Lance are also in the same universe, but frankly I know less about either.
I don't have much time into Dragonstrike to form an opinion, but the rest are pretty awful. I find Hillsfar the most playable.
Lots of people love Pools of Radiance, like you said, but that style D&D game is not for me. So I 110% appreciated your "this is my nightmare" comment.
The later "3D dungeon crawling stuff", starting with The Eye of the Beholder series, is where I dumped some time into D&D games. The overhead 2D stuff really didn't get polished and good for me until Baldur's Gate.
Great video so far! I'm stopping after AD&D and will pick it up again later today.
Ehhh.
As a PC gamer, the D&D NES games are broken pale imitations of the PC SSI goldbox AD&D series. And heroes of the lance on NES is just...what?
I will absolutely positively die on that hill. These games dont belong on consoles.
I remember you saying you loved Hillsfar ;)
This is one of those videos that needs an intermission ;)
@@childofcascadia I agree with you, that these games are almost entirely better experiences on the PC. Sound and graphics might be better on other consoles, but they're really meant for the more intricate experience that the keyboard gave you.
...but I sitll don't like them there, either. :) I loved Ultima, but the Pools-styles games were just kinda meh.
I did enjoy Neverwinter Nights in the AOL days, though. I think it was the online-ness that made it more fascinating. Did you know that there are fan servers for that now?
@Big Ole Words
Me? IIRR, I was the one who wrote HILLSFAR SUX, lol.
Then I admitted that the pc one was at least playable when someone else said they looooved it. But those damn horse parts even on pc are annoying AF. Its the weakest of the SSI games.
The 3 player mode in bomberman 2 is a holdover from the famicom version. The famicom has hard wire controllers and only one expansion port mainly used for the jp zapper but Hudson came out with a extra controller. Later they also made a multitap but the first more than 2 players games was limited to 3 like bomberman 2 and stinger.
Ohhhhhhh that makes sense!
godzila2's reputation was destroyed by AVGN review, but it is very good turn-based strategy,
scientists explain your objectives, hints, and new mechanics,
in some buildings you 'build' your units, the dilemma here is order of units to build, depends on what you want,
some missions could be done in different ways, due to new fancy mechanics:
- loork Godzilla and activate nuclear bomb,
- find friendly Mothra,
- reflect 'nuclear breath/beam' by energy shield back to monsters to destroy them,...
two types of attacks 'machinegun" or "cannon" add depth to strategy, but i ll keep the secret when it could be useful.
all monsters carefully designed to have weaknesses, and difficulty depends on how much you want to save (cities or units)
so as player you will find some interesting challenges "can i save this building or not", it is high quality game.
they had to cut budget due to first game disaster, but they cut only artists and musicians and doubled game designers,
but strategies itself not as popular as action platformers, so no hype, no players
It was an excellent game, one of my favorites.
Alright I’m convinced, I’ll try it again!
i'm glad you appreciate the game for its own merits, but I do think James tearing down the games facade was merited since it was such a massive departure from the previous title and of course because it feels like a kick in the pants whenever games featuring Godzilla tries to be tedious (which there's a painful amount of on multiple systems). If the game were just monster themed and not actually featuring the king of all monsters himself, I think a lot more people would have given it a more fair chance and even could have been seen as a hidden gem and not a painful reminder that Godzilla fans don't get to have nice things a lot of the time XD
The D&D gold box pc games ported to NES always were weird. I didn't even know about them till last few years. That's how rare they are, being a huge fan of the PC games.
Are they really different from the PC versions?
@@BigOleWords a few. I guess these ones aren't too different. I also may just be thinking of the later sequels of Pool of Radiance.
@@BigOleWords I can't imagine playing a PC CRPG like Pool of Radiance using the clunky NES controls. It would be a nightmare. The game is already long, requiring a controller would triple the time investment.
I remember renting TMNT Tournament Fighters shortly after it came out, and it had a photocopied manual with it. I played the game so much, I was able to advance far in it. I tried it out recently, and got beat down hard lol
Yeah I remember the photocopy manuals with rentals. I hated that
That's how it goes with fighting games. I was pretty good at Tekken 3. I think it still has the most time I have ever put into a fighting game and I knew how to use most characters. Loaded it up a month ago and just got my ass handed to me over and over again.
Two more rare sequels (literally by Rare): RC Pro-Am 2, and Battle Toads & Double Dragon.
Both awesome! I'll get to both more at some point...
Wow I had no idea a Dragonlance (Heroes of the Lance) game was on NES. I didn’t really get into the main books until the SNES era so that probably helped. Crazy that a new trilogy for that main Dragonlance series of books is currently in the middle of being released.
Fascinating stuff as usual my friend, especially the D&D stuff. FYI I should have that Indy and the Last Crusade ZX Spectrum and Master System vid up soon. If I pull my finger out 😂
Looking forward to it!
The Flintstones game is only medium rare here in South America, you can find the game on local places 2 or 3 times a year even in flea markets. Rescue Rangers game, just common, same with Duck Tales, TMNT and Bomberman. The NES was sold until mid 90s here so we had plenty of NES games in stores for a long time.
Interesting! Are the legit NES cartridges or similar to stuff that came out in Eastern Europe where it looks like a official cart but it’s a bootleg? I think that copy of Power Blade 2 actually came from Mexico, but I don’t know much about the South American market!
@@BigOleWords Legit carts, you can find lots of retro stuff in South America, even new old stock. I still remember the great Atari find on an old warehouse. Last time I saw nes sealed games in stores was like 2006.
Thanks James for the fun video !!! Video game collecting is fun. 🙂
You got it!
Godzilla 2 looks awesome! I liked the first one, my cousin had it, but I never got to spend much time playing. I don't believe I ever got off of earth. I like how they leaned into the strategy aspect. Later I played Master of Monsters on the Genesis, it completely blew me away.
People have commented that G2 is actually really fun so I’ll have to give it another shot one day
crates are pretty large, so it doesn't really make sense for there to even be chipmunk-sized crates let alone hundreds of them lying around everywhere.
Excellent thumbnail. Reminded me so much of Wario World for the GameCube lol. Also I find it so odd there’s no Famicom version of the Flinstones sequel. Sometimes for the rare games the Famicom ones are less expensive. But then… sometimes common games are much more.
Thanks! Yeah at some point I’ll do a video about North American exclusives :)
I played the crap out of Tournament Fighters. I absolutely loved it and the fact that it was added to the Cowabunga Collection was great.
That’s right, it is on there!
I've discovered all of these thanks to emulator consoles in the past few years. Or, in the case of DuckTales and Rescue Rangers 2, that Disney Afternoon Collection Capcom put out officially. Gotta say, I generally agree with a lot of your "it's similar to the point of being predictable" feelings towards them all. Except for Power Blade 2; that one is way different and is WAY harder than the first one. Oh well. Also am with you when it comes to those old CRPG-style D&D games... those old NES ports of TSR's "Gold Box" games are a hard nope from me as well.
The only fighting games for the NES/Famicom I can recall besides Tournament Fighters is Joy Mecha Fight, though there are a bit more if we're counting, like, Taiwanese hack games such as King of Fighters '96 or Tekken 2. If ever you want to make a series about pirate games, you should find some really interesting stuff.... occasionally even decent, lol. That unlicensed KOF '96 ain't bad
Oh, and I've heard the term, "Maze Action Game" used to describe stuff like Bomberman, Pac-Man, Adventures of Lolo, Chew Man Fu, and Kid no Hore Hore Daisakusen/Crater Maze/Booby Kids (I _know_ it's meant to be used here like in the term, "Booby Trap" but... c'mon, I think it's okay to giggle at that title like stupid little kids, lol.) in the past. Don't know if that's, like, an official term for old arcade maze games, but just throwing that out there in case no one else has anything better 😃
I’m really in to the Hummer Team stuff right now. I’ll hopefully do some bootleg reviews at some point.
I love Bomberman II, the one player mode is great and the vs mode is fantastic. Spent many hours battling my dad back in the day.
-Cast
If you love Power Blade, I highly recommend you give the Japanese version "Power Blazer" a look. They're nothing alike and 'Blazer' is MUCH more difficult.
So I’ve heard! I still haven’t played the Famicom versions of these two, one day!
Big ol dang good long video dere, Bimmy. Big bird would be proud! Never really checked out the D&D games on the NES, I think your suggestion looks about right.
I used to call Pool of Radiance, Pool of Radiation. That's what I thought about the game....
Thanks bud :)
He prefers to be called Bames.
I agree that Ducktales 2 is more fun than the 1st. Glad to hear someone else say it! Wish I'd gotten to play it as a kid!
Yeah it’s like playing an enhanced version of the original!
I played dragonstrike when i was too young to really know what i was doing. I do remember liking it, wouldn't mind playing it again.
Bubble Bobble 2 is pretty expensive these days.
It is! I talked about it and all the Bubble Bobble games in Part 4 of this series:
Bubble Bobble and Its Four NES sequels (Nintendo Entertainment System Review)
th-cam.com/video/3-oU2W2FSvw/w-d-xo.html
F*CK Hillsfar!! Screw that game!! It was nothing more than a side quest sandwiched between two major AD&D releases. The whole point of Hillsfar was that the character you work on can be imported into the next AD&D title (On the Commodore 64 release, that is). Hillsfar was never meant to be a full game. In addition, there's something about Hillsfar that would overheat my Commodore 128 (in C64 mode). I was too young to understand how thermodynamics worked in computers and too young to understand that replacing thermal paste inside of my machine might fix the problem. So whenever I played that ONE game, I would have to have a huge box fan blow into the grating of my Commodore 128.
Hahaha that’s awesome. And smart of you, I didn’t realize computers overheated til years later!
Duck Tales 2 is one of the best games on the NES, it also has a very difficult romhack, unfortunately only in russian, which makes some of the puzzles very hard to figure out, but since I played this first in japanese we could not even understand a single word and figured out all what we need :).
TMNT Tournament Fighters is also very good for the NES, I tried both the Genesis version and the SNES one, but those not felt the same to me given how many 1 on 1 fighting games I played since the NES one which were not limited by that much on the PC, and the Genesis one is unplayably hard.
Cool trick for the NES TMNT: you can play with two Hotheads at the same time (normally this is not enabled since his character is made out of too many sprites and it would cause extreme flickering).
First select VS CPU mode and select anybody for yourself except Hothead, then select Hothead for CPU, after that game you can select new characters and you can select Hothead for you, then for the CPU as well :)
(okay, technically you cannot play with two Hotheads, the other one must be CPU :) )
Man the hoops we've gotta jump through just for dual Hotheads!
I'm surprised Star Tropics 2 wasn't on the list.
Also, great to know the D&D games are on here. I played them on computer. I still play D&D with my classmates at my seminary here today.
Zoda is actually not that rare despite its late release date. You can pick it up today for $20 or so
Indy & the Last Crusade also had two different PC games! At least they were subtitled "The Action Game" and "The Adventure Game" if I recall correctly.
Neat!
I got an NES in the early 90s as my first console and by that point the games were so cheap. People were throwing them away. I guess people didn't value 'old games' back then in the way we do now. I got a lot of NES games as gifts, hand-me-downs from relatives and second-hand and ended up gathering a large collection. No joke, I remember at one point having 3 copies of Ducktales 2 😂. It was one of my favourites for the NES and I played it a lot more than the first one.
I eventually got a SNES in 1995/96 so I think we traded in all of my NES stuff at that point. I wish I still had all of those old games 😢
Three copies?!? You were the real Scrooge McDuck!
As with any console a newer generation comes out, people get rid of their games and replace them with ones for the newer system. Then years later they wish that they hadn't gotten rid of them.
I had a NES until like 1994 and I remember getting used games for a few dollars a piece. Then I got a Genesis and was getting those games cheap once the PlayStation was a big thing. I remember seeing some rare Sega CD games and passing on them (One of them was Snatcher).
Dragon Strike looks awesome! Who doesn't want to fly around as a dragon destroying stuff? 🐉🔥
Right?!
DragonStrike is easily the best of the D&D NES games (to me, anyway)
It's basically Dragon Spirit but more tactical than a straight shoot-em-up.
Pool of Radiance is actually, believe it or not, one of my favorite games for the NES. And I didn't even play it back in the day. I only recently picked it up and learned how to work it, being a D&D fan. The game opens up more once you get outside the town, finding yourself in a top-down overworld that has better graphics than anything in the city. Plus, all the early fights kind of rely on you memorizing and using the sleep spell, your absolute best friend early on.
But in any case, the computer version, and the later sequels on the computer, are all better. That said, I admit this stuff has a narrow demographic. Heck, I was exactly like you early on and perpetually ignored dungeon crawlers.
I mean that’s the strongest endorsement I’ve heard for it so far, maybe I’ll give it another shot!
@@BigOleWords honestly if you don't like dungeon crawlers, it's not going to really win you over. And the other ones for the NES aren't exactly great. Dungeon Magic is terrible, Bard's Tale is repetitive and soul crushing, Might & Magic is very good but very hard and somewhat soul crushing...there's some better ones for the Famicom, like the Deep Dungeon series. Swords & Serpents is pretty good if you want something really streamlined for the causal player.
Does the NES version of Pool of Radiance do things like tell you that you overhear rumor #78 in the tavern and force you to look up what that is in the manual like the PC version does? As much as I still love a lot of classic games, there are certainly design elements from that era that I don't miss.
Haha not that I know if of but good god that is tedious
The military seriously needs to upgrade it's tech if it can't hit a target as big as Godzilla with a missile. Where are our tax dollars even going?
Haha and why did the implement a slots style game in order for their misiles to work?!?
@@BigOleWords it's almost as if they think it's some game at this point. Great video BTW!
Into the politician's pockets of course.
10:42 Check out Joy Mech Fight if you haven't already.
I was thinking of that game while making this, but I'm still to narrowly focused to bring the Famicom into this...yet.
The 4:3 is greatly appreciated.
Haha it fits the footage better at least.
Dragon Warrior IV. Traded about $200 of vintage game stuff for my copy. Well worth it tho. Its rare as the SNES was out and Dragon Quest got overshadowed by Final Fantasy stateside.
Yeah I debated including it. I think it’s a bit more well known than these, but still very rare.
Bomberman II seems to borrow a lot from the first Bomberman game on pc-engine/TurboGrafx 16. It reuses sprites, enemies, and music from the PC-E game, with a hit to the fidelity of course. Although there is something nice about the flat colors and NES soundchip
Huh didn’t realize that. And yeah I love the color scheme
I was about to call you out on the 1v1 fighter thing, and then remembered that Yie-Ar Kung Fu didn't make it to the US. Childhood memories of that Famiclone bleeding into my recollection...
Haha the title should’ve given that away ;). Yeah that and Joy Mech Fight would fit the description for sure
Ya it did it came out on the commondore 64 in the usa
Yeah, I meant to the NES. :)
The algorithm Gods giveth you a new subscriber.
My favorite Late Era NES Sequal is the one I opened up Christmas Morning of 1994... "Zoda's Revenge: Star Tropics II" but its not an expensive Sequel so it doesn't fit this list.
The only Expensive Sequels I personally have in my collection are Donkey Kong Jr Math, and RC Pro Am II
That is unless you count Stack-up as a Sequel to Gyromite which I don't.
Zoda is rad. I've talked about it a little in my Zelda Clones video, but I'll tackle it more at length at some point..
i feel like heros of the lance only appeals to fans of the dragonlance kids books
Yeah maybe!
@Big Ole Words
Narrator: It does not.
(The NES version anyway)
-an old Dragonlance fan
Casino Kid rocked. Rented it a bunch from the Chevron when I was a kid.
It’s way more fun and interesting than I was expecting
I have no idea what went through the mind of the Godzilla video games developers on the NES. You know, when somebody says Godzilla, you think about monster wrestling duels and a city being leveled. Not Final Fantasy Tactics, lol
The tactical board thing is an interesting format, but it is way too ambitious for a 8 bits home console, as you need to have skilled enough level designers to imagine various hive environments and make the best of the storage space on the cartridge. But if you design a well made game as this rogue style, it can have a high replayability, I am sure!
It reminds me the approach Dragon Ball Z Budokai 2 had, somewhat.
Yeah no idea, but people have chimed in to say they actually love this game, so it might be kinda decent.
You didn't mention RC Pro Am 2, but I'm guessing it's probably in one of the other videos in the series.
It’s not quite as rare as these ten, but I’ll definitely get to it at some point :)
Good ish to check out as always!
Casino Kid looks absolutely glorious and I will be playing it for sure 😂
Nice! It’s probably more interesting on paper than it is to play, but still kinda neat :)
Another rare sequel would be Capcom's GI Joe: the Atlantis factor, sequel to the even rarer GI Joe: A real american hero, by Taxxan...
Both uncommon but neither as a stupid pricy as any of these.
Flintstones Dinosaur Peak was not a Blockbuster exclusive. I rented this a lot as a kid from the Frys grocery store back in the day when they had a section for renting movies and games.
that grand dad joke was smooth
The NES AD&D games were jank as hell. Translating the tabletop experience to an NES cart is a colossal challenge and the developers didn't quite succeed. The Baldur's Gate PC games do the experience much better.
Yeah that is a mighty challenge in the 8-bit era
Never knew there was a PowerBlade 2. Have to check my local retro stores next week.
Woof good luck, it’s a tough one to find!
I also love just how utterly worthless Fred's "ducking" ability is.
It’s the best
I really like the name of this channel lol a phrase that can fit and be funny in many different situations
Just because they are rare doesn't mean their good games
That is true
Their what now?
Very cool video!
I would guess that Bomberman 2 was only 3 players because of the limited screen space. Maybe that's what their logic was. Either way, I have enjoyed the game from time to time.
Yeah I’m not sure, but 4players would be nuts!
Pool of Radiance is awesome. I’ve beaten it twice this year.
I’ll take your word for it ;)
good stuff! thanks for the sweet vid on some really hard to find carts! i had some really good games for the nes and grew up poor so i played the nes into the 90s while everyone else was going to 16bit. i didnt get any of these because i could only afford old games from pawn shops. your carts look much better than mine! i remember a lot of mine had so many other kids names written in sharpie all over them😂
Believe me, probably a quarter of my games have been written on or stickered!
@@BigOleWords i will always remember "EVAN"s games. hope his family was ok. that pawn shop had like his whole collection at one time. as a kid i was happy to get anything not thinking about how it came to be. now my imagination wanders on what could have happened to lose your entire collection. perhaps its because i was poor that everything i had was so cherished as if it was an item in legend of zelda hidden in a treasure chest.
Pool of Radiance and the rest of the SSI D&D games were ports of far superior PC games of the same names. In that era, any game ported from PC to console and vice versa were almost always terrible. Ultima 3 and 4 also got similar bastardizations on the NES. Though come to think of it, Dragonstrike does look like it plays a bit differently from what I remember of the PC version - if I am thinking of the same game.
Oof those Ultima games are also ones I've never played! I'm just too intimidated to settled in with them.
Would battle toads double dragon be a sequel?
Yes it is! It's not quite as rare as these 10, but definitely not common. My nephew and I played it in one of the co-op videos: th-cam.com/video/1qoW2lSGSgQ/w-d-xo.html
There is a Power Blade 3 on the ZX Spectrum Next. It's subtitled Delta's Shadow and it's pretty decent.
What?!? No way!
@@BigOleWords th-cam.com/video/n4PArOPWIfo/w-d-xo.html
And I thought RC Pro Am II was expensive at a hundred bucks. I had no idea there were at least 10 sequels more than that.
Back when I was collecting for fun instead of to complete, that and Duck Tales 2 were my dream carts. They were super expensive to me then, but nothing compared to the others!
Just wanted to say your vids are good fun, and David Cross can wail.
Thanks! And yeah, him and Bob are both amazing singers I’m totally different ways
Lil SAMSON?
that makes "I wanna talk to Samson" a whole new statement!!
hahaha
Is that Tiny Toons cartoon maker a sequel? I lent a kid at school that cart and never got it back.
I would say so! I'm working on a trilogies video and I'm including Cartoon Workshop in there.
I had no idea that Hillsfar was rare. Used to be like... $5 at Funcoland. Power Blade 2 I rented once.
I can’t believe you opened your bowels on the Pool of Radiance series AND called it a “dungeon crawler”. It was a tactical RPG that spanned 4 games and spawned several spinoffs. It’s better than you make it sound.
Great video as always I have TMNT tournament fighters on my nes n 8 pro and yes it really hard but ,every time I play it I think man just imagine if this was street fighter 2 on the nes because it shows it could be done to a high standard
And there are all those Taiwanese Street Fighter/Mortal Kombat NES games that kind of pull it off!
hilsfar is a sudo-sequel to pool of radiance that was released to fill the void between the first game and it's true sequel "curse of the azure bonds" - which was never ported to nes
That is a sizeable NES collection for someone who doesn't actually know anything about what he's collected. I can't imagine going to the trouble and expense when you don't love or respect what you have.
I’ll bite, continue your thought. What about this video or my channel makes you think I don’t love or know anything about my NES collection.
@@BigOleWords To your statement (?), a counter-statement: the entire video is essentially built around the obscurity of these titles and cursory comments on a few moments of playing them blind. Not even a quick search to give some context or meaning, the difference between this and any random person watching a trailer is the ownership of the cartridges. Ownership with no (desire for) greater insight is just avarice. So I say this does not show even a passing interest in enlightenment, necessary to claim one loves their subject. This is strictly profit-seeking. And you killed Raistlin. Just... awful.
Pool of radiance was awesome.
If you say so! ;)
Some of the most sought after games there man. So ridiculous how much they go for these days haha. My chances of ever owing a complete nes collection is slim haha
I definitely got ahead on some of these years ago. These days, yeah it's rough.
Really makes you wish you had started collecting back in the early 2000s. Also makes me wish that my stepdad didn't get rid of all my video games/systems when I moved out after High School. Wish I had taken my stuff and started collecting back when things were cheap.
@@Gatorade69 well the sad part is that I started collecting around 2011 and didn't realize that some of these games would become extremely rare and expensive. When I started collecting I went after the games I liked as a kid. Like batman, contra, ect. Games that don't have any value haha. I remember passing up a copy of bonks adventure for 200 bucks and saying 200 for a game is ridiculous.
A Godzilla game where you don't play as Godzilla. Yep, that sounds like a very fun and popular idea. Mmm hmm!
Haha well the early movies were all about fighting Godzilla, but I get I agree!
I saw that was and was like "A Godzilla game that's slow-paced and tactical, and you don't even play as Godzilla. Who tf thought that was a good idea?"
@@HylianFox3 i love the first godzilla game for nes. its fun to spit radiation and stomp and swing your tail around and smash things and fight monsters. they should have stuck to that formula.
I loved Godzilla 2. One of my favorite NES games.