Retronauts - 719: The NES Launch Ranking Hootenanny

Episode Date: September 29, 2025

Jeremy Parish, Kurt Kalata, John Andersen, and about a hundred of YOU definitively rank the 27 games that debuted with the NES 40 (!) years ago from worst to best. This is the final word on these games! Retronauts is made possible by listener support through Patreon! Support the show to enjoy ad-free early access, better audio quality, and great exclusive content. Learn more at http://www.patreon.com/retronauts 

This evening on Retronauts, mini-games enter, one game leaves. I just stole that from the man in the front row. Thank you, sir. Hello, everyone. Welcome to the annual Retronauts Retro World Expo panel. I am Jeremy Parrish. With me here, we have luminaries, including... Craigelana. And... John Anderson. And we are here for the NES launch Slugfest. As you may know, the NES turns 40 years old next month. That's really old. And the NES launched with a lot of games, many more than, say, the Nintendo Switch 2. And so we want to go back through time and say which of those games were actually worth putting out on shelves on day one. Which of those actually sold the system and which made children say, I don't think I like this video game system, Mommy. Please give me the Sega instead.

And this is going to be the definitive ranking. This is a hoot nanny. This is the NES launch ranking hootnanny. And if you were here for last year's 8-bit mascot ranking hoot nanny, then you kind of know how. this works. Basically, we have a list of 27 games, and each of us has our preferred favorites. We've individually ranked each game from 1 to 27. We're going to add those up, but then we have a fourth participant in this voting, and that is you, the audience. I have a decibel app on my phone, and when I talk about each game, I'm going to give you the opportunity to cheer, commensurate,

with your opinion of that game. So you will be recorded for posterity on the decibel meter, and I will add that to the spreadsheet. At the end, we'll see which game got the loudest response. That's the best game. And which game got the most tepid response, that's the worst game. And all the ones in between. And then those will be treated as part of the score.

All those numbers will be added up. And we will have a definitive best and worst and all the stuff in between ranking of, NES launch games from the year 1985, leading into 1986. We could have just done the 1985 stuff, but I wanted to talk about balloon fight.

So we included the 86 launch title. Thank you. The 86 launch window games before the system went nationwide in the middle of the summer. So, without further ado, let's go. We've got 27 games, and it's set up there an hour and a half,

I thought it was two hours. So that's about three minutes a game. That's not very much time. Let's begin. All right, I'm going to hit play, and we're going to see the first game. We're going alphabetically here. So we are going to begin with the letter A. No, there was no NES launch game that began with the letter A. They started with the letter 10. Okay, we're going alphabetical style. So 10-yard fight. This was developed by IREM, actually developed

internally by Nintendo. It is a football game, American football game. Nintendo said we need something to make the Americans like us, and so they put American football on here. Also, European football, but that comes later. Gentlemen, what do you think of 10-yard fight? So the first football game I played on the Nintendo was Tecmo Bowl. So going back several years later and seeing 10-yard fight

was seeing a game from was probably only like, what, three, four years ago, and it felt like the distant past. It felt like high school versus the NFL, if you will. So it was extremely underwhelming. I place this at number 22. 22. Okay.

John, what about yourself? Okay. Well, one of the reasons that I bought at NES was to play arcade games at home because there weren't really any arcades near me where I grew up, both in Illinois and in Maine, in southern Maine. Believe it or not, in Illinois, I grew up 40 minutes away from, unknowingly, 40 minutes away from where they made the Pac-Man arcade cabinet. So having an arcade game was great, you know, on the NES was great. However, it's an okay conversion.

Surprise there weren't any of the digitized football player grunts and huts-huts like in the arcade version. They left those out. And no cheerleaders in the NES version like the arcade version had? No memory on those little tiny ROM chips. No. So I rank this at 17. 17. That's actually pretty generous.

I'm giving it rank. 24. I don't really love American football, but I think this is a pretty lousy take on football. It's very underwhelming, as Kurt said, compared to something like TechMobile. I will say in the defense of the American version of this, the Japanese release was offensive play only. The American version, when Nintendo reprogrammed it, they added defensive play, so there is like two-sidedness to it. So that's, you know, something. But is it enough? I say no. And also, the Japanese version is it? of this had a little blinking LED light in the cartridge that glowed when your

when your Famicom was on. The American version does not have that. Points down. Blummer. So, yeah, 24. Now, I need to know in the form of hoops and hollers what you think of this game. And remember, this should be graduated according to your opinion of this game relative to other games.

So if you love it, let us know about it. But if you don't love it, kind of keep it down because there's... There might be better stuff coming. In my opinion, there's much better stuff coming. So on the count of three, or I'm going to count down from three, everyone, hoot and holler, clap, et cetera, according to what your heart tells you to do. As the spirit moves you, three, two, one. According to the decibel meter, that was 61.6, the equivalent of a quiet street.

wow that was like the that was like the clap equivalent of like someone blowing out their birthday candles and yeah not even not even like an exciting birthday right like okay great grandpa you did it we're happy that you still have breath all right let's move on to happier times because who doesn't love balloon fight. This was Nintendo just straight up ripping off joust from Williams, but gosh, it's such a great joust rip-off. Gentlemen, where do you

stand on the joust rip-off? There is footage of balloon trip coming later. Please do not leave before the exciting balloon trip footage. I love joust, so I love balloon fight. I've never played joust too, but I was under the impression it wasn't particularly well-loved, but I think this was does a very good job of picking that up.

I like the way that the character sprites are made. I like the designs. The levels are different. Blunechip in itself. A lot of these early Nintendo games had separate modes. Some of which weren't really all that standalone, but this does a good job of evolving the jazz formula. I love this game a lot.

I write this number two. Number two, very impressive, John. All right. You can barely hear the music, but it's there. Hiptonaka, putting his heart into it. And look at that, rank one. I got all the way to the end, and then I died. Didn't Satoru Iwata had a ham?

He programmed this game. He came up with the integer math to make the flight physics, and that was ported into Super Mario Bros. for swimming. You called it the flight physics? I called it the float physics. Okay. Okay. So this is the game with a catchy soundtrack,

and one that I keep coming back to. It teaches you lightning, you better run. and you better run. I love how the manual refers to the main character as balloonist. We don't have a name for this character, but we're just going to call him.

No, that's actually his given name. Yeah. It's kind of one of those predestination things. Yeah. It goes to jump there. There you go, yeah. So, I mean, we could not give the main character name.

Maybe it's the guy from the motorbike rider guy from Excite Bike. I don't know. But you know what? I also gave it a two. Wow. Kurt. Well, I'm going to be contrarian here and also give it a two, because I think it rules, it's such a good game, endlessly fun. The music in balloon trip, you just want to play it over and over again until you can finally get to the end. I don't know what happens after rank one. Like, you keep flying and it sticks at rank one. Maybe there's a rank minus one, like in Swirmire Brothers. I don't know. I've never found out, but I want to find out. This game compels me to learn. Audience, what do you think? On the count of zero, three, two, two, We got a 94.

We got a 94.0 there. It sounds like a radio station. You're listening to Balloon Fight on 94.0. All right. Balloon Fight. Awesome. I hope that turns out to be a surprise winner. But is it a surprise? No. We have baseball next. Baseball, it is, as it says,

on the box, baseball. And in 1983, when this came out in Japan, it was kind of mind-blowingly good compared to every other baseball game. In 1985, when it hit the NES, actually still better than just about any other baseball simulation, at least in terms of personality. Maybe not quite as realistic and broadcast-like as World Series Major League Baseball for Intellivision, but so charming, so cute, and it's got the good music too. Gentlemen? The first baseball Nintendo game I played was great baseball

on the master system, which outclassed this handily. I'm not super familiar with the other baseball games on the Nintendo, but just looking at pitchers, they seemed a little bit more advanced in this. I can't get that excited about baseball, so this is number 24. 24. Harsh. John?

Well, you seem like a good American boy. Do you love baseball? I'm all American. for this one I'm keeping in mind that this game actually could have been a disaster for Nintendo in Japan because according to a

Iwada Asks article this game in Japan when it was originally shipped in Japan came with a bug which made the ball disappear and it made some of the white lines on the in certain playable situation

situations. And they recalled it. They brought it, they brought it back. They fixed the bug. They brought the baseball, the actual baseball, back into the game. And they overcame that defect and that recall. And Nintendo continued to be the NES and the Famicom continued. The Famicom continued to be a success. So I'm going to, that's what I call this game. The baseball is like the game that over. Overcame the bug, I overcame the recall, and I rank it at number 12. 12? Yeah. Very generous. Yes. I recently played baseball stars, and therefore I have to give baseball for NES a 20 out of 27. What about you, the audience?

What do you say about baseball for NES? Three, two, one. 64.3. So better than 10-yard fight, but is it? All right. Let's move along. Mosey on to Clu-Clu-Land. I would say, I'm showing my bias here a little bit,

a widely misunderstood game that does not get enough credit for being a weird, interesting take on the Pac-Man maze chase. instead of devouring things in the maze, you are revealing patterns, and that lends some strategy to it. Once you figure out what the patterns are, then that affects the way you move around. You don't have direct control over your character. You grab onto poles and then release as you spin around the pole.

So it creates this very sort of interesting, unusual dynamic around the idea of a maze chase. And there you go right into the sea urchin. Kurt, what do you think? I first found about this game in Animal Crossing for the GameCube, I did not understand how to play it at all. Once I sat down with it, it's one of those games where it's very difficult to control,

but if you didn't have the whole pole swinging thing, I think the game would be very boring. So that control quirk makes it kind of interesting. I reckon number 13. Number 13, not bad. Yeah. John? I agree.

I really, I could not get into this game, unfortunately. I just could not. And it took a, It takes a bit of a, you know, a bit of patience and learning to get into it when you have no idea what's going on. I have, I don't really, unfortunately, have a lot of nice things to say about Clu-Clu-Land. I am not, I'm not Clu-Clu-Clue for Clu-Clu-Land, so I'm going to give this a 24. Oh, power.

Setting fire to our hopes and dreams. All right, I'm giving it a 10 because I think it's actually really good, very charming, and the only, the only, downside to Klu-Klu-Land really is that a better version called Klu-Land-D came along a few years later, but that never came to the U.S. until Animal Crossing, so does it count, I say not. What do you think? On the count of zero, three, two,

one, zero. We got a 78.4. That's a nice temperature. Taking the temperature for Klu-Land. It's balmy there. I don't know what I'm going to be able to be. I'm going to be. All right.

Let's move along to... There's a whole saga here. Get ready for a lot of games starring that big guy. It's Donkey Kong. Are you Bonanza for Donkey Kong? So here's something that you can consider about the original Donkey Kong for NES. One, it was the first time that a almost arcade-accurate version,

minus, you know, an entire level, had showed up on any console. Two, this was the game that Nintendo built the Famicom NES technology around. They created that platform specifically to be able to play the most accurate version of Donkey Kong possible. Everything that the Famicom can do was in service of making, oh, a game where Mario can fall and die. He got better at jumps and falls later. Kurt, what do you think about this very, you know, 800-pound gorilla of a game?

It's Donkey Kong. It's a great port, although I think the fact that it's missing a level is a blemish. considering that Donkey Kong Jr. was able to have all four levels. But it's still a great port and a great game, so I put this in number four. Number four. John? All right. This is one of the games that is an essential for the NES. And given the fact that Miyamoto and his co-workers at Nintendo were literally

actually had a stopwatch and were making sure that the arcade original was going to be faithful for the Famicom for the NES. It just goes to show you how great and how great this game is. So I also gave this a four. Four. And I'm kind of with you guys, except a little more with you guys. I'm actually giving it a three because you don't have the Famicom without Donkey Kong. You don't actually have Nintendo as a video game maker

without Donkey Kong and its success in the arcade. But then that translated to consoles, and that gave us the Nintendo that we know and usually love, most of the time, except when they, you know, bring back the virtual boy and you can't actually own the games, but you have to buy a thing to put on your face for it. That's a little weird. Nintendo's a little weird sometimes, but we still love them, and Donkey Kong is what gave us Nintendo. So that's a three for me. What about for you, the audience? Let's hear it on three, one. All right, that initial peak was 90.8.

So not quite up there with balloon fight, but not too bad. So next we move on to, oh, this got misorganized by the alphabetical system. We're going to Donkey Kong Jr. next, not Donkey Kong 3. This is, I would not say, a more faithful port than Donkey Kong. Like, graphically, it is a downgrade from the arcade version. But it does have all four of the stages, including the weird spark stage that is new to Kurt as of last night, I believe. I don't like Donkey Kong Jr. nearly as much as Donkey Kong. I think that his body, I'm not trying to like body shame here,

but Donkey Kong Jr.'s body makes the game kind of weird the way he's like very long, elongated and stretches out when he jumps. It's hard to judge stuff. And I don't think climbing is as interesting as jumping. But, you know, it's still a pretty charming port. So, Kurt, where do you stand on Donkey Kong Jr.? So I grew up playing a lot of these games on the Atari 8-bit computers, which had the level orders change, like the American version.

So when I played this version for the first time last night, there was a whole other level that I didn't realize existed. I really like this game, too. I think I actually played it a little bit more than the original game. I find the animation is really charming. I like his little bib. I like the little bird and crocodile enemies. But at the end of the game, you literally murder Mario.

And even though he's the antagonist, I feel that's a little much. Well, in fairness, he does murder Donkey Kong at the end of Donkey Kong. And also there's two Mario's that capture, Donkey Kong. So I think one of them dies, and then the other one is the one who becomes the hero. The Shadow Duke looking at there. That's my story. That's my Nintendo Canon. So what's the number there? I'm giving it an eight. Eight. Okay. John? Okay. Wow. I didn't know we'd be talking about murder. It's video games.

Nintendo, though? This Donkey Kong Jr., this was a very fun game, and it's a game that compared to Donkey Kong, requires a bit of patience, considering that when you're navigating Donkey Kong Jr. along the screen, you cannot jump from high places. You have to be careful as you're navigating around levels and stuff like that. So I have fond memories of this game. So Donkey Kong Jr., I'm going to give a five. Wow. All right. Well, I'm here to be the hater. I don't actually like Donkey Kong Jr. that much. I played it a lot when I was younger and thought it was okay, got older and said,

no, it's actually not okay. So I'm giving it a 21. I know that's going to be controversial, but someone's got to be the spoiler here and give you the hard truths, and that's me. So I'm curious to hear what your truth is, audience. Where do you rank Donkey Kong Jr. on the count of zero? Three, two, one.

So you're kind of lukewarm, too. 74.9 is where that ended up. All right, let's see if Donkey Kong 3 fares any better. I'm guessing it won't. But, you know, time, you never know. I actually, I'm going to say it here, I actually really like Donkey Kong 3. For one thing, I played it for the first time in arcades

when I was a kid and didn't have any expectations, except, wow, it's a video game that I can put money into and play. And that was enough for me to like it. But I think it's a pretty fun, interesting shooter with some interesting concepts. It is a little unbalanced. Like, as you'll see here, I believe, oh, maybe I didn't capture the footage,

but if you have the power up, yeah, you can just do this and end the level, like, instantly. So that's not great design. Points off for that. It has a really weird sequel on Japanese computers where Donkey Kong gets abducted by aliens and they do, like, probe experimentation on them. That's not actually part of this game,

but it does kind of color my opinion. I don't think this is the Donkey Kong sequel anybody really wanted or expected, but if you compare each other fixed shoot-em-up games in the era, I think it's pretty good. It does a little bit too many things at once because you're shooting up Donkey Kong's butt. You're also shooting several different types of bugs. It's just probes all the way for this guy. I feel bad for him. And then there are also the bugs they're trying to steal, little flowers at the bottom, and then there are the bugs that break up when you shoot them, so you need to be at the right spot.

So you're juggling a lot of balls at the same time. But I do think it's a really neat little game. Although they took out the grusly Stanley death in this version. In the arcade one, all the bugs descend on his corpse, just leaving his little gun. And I guess somebody, they didn't program it in or just thought it was too gruesome. So they left it out of this version.

Chronically, Stanley is delicious, if you are a bug. So I don't know if that's a plus or minus. But I do like this game. I give it a six. Six. Wow. Okay. John. Okay, well, you know, I never had the opportunity to play Donkey Kong 3 in the arcades. It was just all, you know, Donkey Kong and Donkey Kong Jr. all the way.

For this, for the sequel, the plus side is, you know, Shigaromiya-Muoto design this game, and for this one, however, you know, Mario is nowhere to be found. So I have to agree, I really, Kurt took the words out of my mouth. I have to, you know, agree with him on all these points that he made. So I'm going to give Donkey Kong 3 and 11. Okay. Fair. Middle of the road. I am giving Donkey Kong 3 a 14, and I thought I was going to be the generous one, but apparently not.

So it's me, the Donkey Kong sequel hater. Hi, everyone. Nice to meet you. What do you feel? What are your emotions about Donkey Kong sequels? Let's hear it on the count of 0.3, 2, 1,0. Yay! Okay, we got a 75.9.

So that's one point better than Donkey Kong Jr. I see you all agree with me. Okay. Now on to the champion of our hour. The indisputed best game on. Nintendo's long. Oh, wait a minute. No. Sorry, I thought we were talking about something else. This is Donkey Kong Jr. Math. A game that, I have to say, it did find a second life on Nintendo Switch online. People turned it into a competitive race game by using the wire, like the internet play multiplayer. Other than that, though, unless you're playing on Nintendo Switch online, if you were a child playing in 1986 and this is what you got with your NES at Christmas, this might be a little heartbreaking. It's a math game. And not that, but it's a math game where one of the modes, here you go, has to be played two-player

because Pink Donkey Kong Jr. does nothing. Pink Donkey Kong Jr. has no mind of their own. They just sit there like a lump while you struggle with operators and numerals and so on and so forth. So, I don't know, Kurt, can you give us a rousing defense for this one? Can you come to Pink Donkey Kong Jr.'s rescue?

Unfortunately, I think this is a trick get parents to buy a Nintendo but if you were the child that got this game then you were truly the fool so I put this at 25 25 yeah go ahead John

okay hear me out this was the game that helped convince my parents to get me an NES I think that is the most difficult thing about this game yes that guy in the hat agrees with me he just went yep because

Every game, of course, had a series label with it, and Donkey Kong Jr. Math had an educational series label on the front cover of it, as many people may remember. Quote, series, when it's the only educational game they released. I know. It did so well that they had to follow it up with nothing. Exactly. How do you top this?

I don't know. In Japan, they just released a bunch of educational software for the first. Famicom, you know? They, well, like the Konami's, I think, right? Oh, but I mean, Nintendo's own first party stuff. Yeah. They only released a Popeye English tutor, which I think is a funny concept, but

it's actually, I think it's a better game than Donkey Kong Junior Math, even if it's in another language. We're going to fill you in on Popeye's influence in Japan, yeah. Man, I was like, I was thinking we're going to talk about Popeye, just a little later, but man,

yeah, Popeye and Japan in the late 70s, early 80s. Popeye's coming up later. Let's save that for this. For this one, it helped me get an NES. I immediately, and after kind of getting tired of this game and being a broke kid, I sold this game back to Ultimate Game Club here in Connecticut and got a nice amount of money for it, considering its rarity.

So for Donkey Kong Jr. math, for me, personally, I'm going to give it a 10. 10? Audible gasp. That's right. Okay. I don't even know what's happening anymore. It got me an NES from my parents. Not as good as Popeye's English tutor.

Also, the most expensive Nintendo published game on NES. And absolutely not worth it. That alone is enough to send it spiraling to the near bottom at 26 in my humble, not actually humble opinion. Let's hear your humility audience. What do you think about donkey, Kong Jr. Math on the count of zero. Three, two, one, zero. All right, we got a, we got a 63.3. You guys cracked 63. I think that is, what is I considered? Quiet home. Quiet home. And that is what you live in

when you have Donkey Kong Jr. Math is your only entertainment. There are no, there's no laughter, no joy. It is a silent place to live. I'm still bad at math. Yeah, duck hunt, though, duck hunt. That's the one. Did you know that you can control the ducks with controller too? People say, because I've never read the manual. Yes.

Duck Hunt, this came as a pack-in with the NES. Well, I put like a speedy level in here. This was considered so good, or at least so appealing to Americans, the Nintendo said, let's put this in the console. And that seems to have paid off, even if you can't shoot the dog in this version, which offends some people. Some people think, thank God you can't shoot the dog.

I don't know. I'm not here to judge. But, Kurt, I think you are here to judge. What is your judgment on duck hunt? I grew up with Sega Safari Hunt, which was a more advanced game that also had a similar sense of humor. I have. I have. Okay.

But it's fun. I mean, the dog is for better or worse, there. The ducks are fun. It's pretty basic, but one of the better is apper game, so it makes sense. Position is so highly. I give it 11. 11. Okay. John, what about you? Okay. I remember having to borrow this and the and the light gun from a friend to play it.

And I loved every second of it because this game is a fond memory. It kind of got my dad into the NES. I remember one morning playing this game before going off to school. And my dad is getting, has gotten ready for work. He's about to go out the door. get in the car and go to work, he comes up, takes the gun out of my hand, doesn't say anything, just takes the gun out of my hand, and takes off a couple shots of the duck, and I was like,

what just happened? You know, so, yeah, fun memories of this game, even though I had to borrow this from a friend, finally got a light gun of my own. So, yeah, I give it a seven. A seven? Yeah. Okay.

Yeah, I'm not really big on the concept of light gun games or guns in general or killing little guys. But these little guys, do you actually kill them? Like, the dog seems really happy about it, and the ducks are just kind of like, ugh. So maybe they're merely stunned, like the parrot and the Monty Python skit. Well, let's not forget that there was also that disc shooting game,

the skeet shooting game. Yeah, all the like guns games have a second mode. So there's the neutral version, which is pretty good, get you ready for track and field. So I gave this one an eight because it's pretty good. And I do think that it did a great job of selling the NES back in the day. It was a very approachable, colorful, vibrant, and intuitive game with a great comical appeal. And in the arcade version, you could shoot the dog.

So some people like that. Anyway, what do you think? Audience, let's hear your opinions on Duck Hunt. Give it to me on three, two, one. That was a 90.1. That's not bad. That's some fondness for Duck Hunt, though maybe not quite as much fondness as for Donkey Kong.

But still, ducks and donkeys. That's quite a menagerie you got going on there. All right, moving on to the letter E. We now have Excite Bike, the game about bikes that is exciting. This game was part of the programmable series, which meant you could make your own courses in the game. You could not, however, save them to tape as you could in Japan because they never released the tape cassette here. So if you tried to do it, the game would just freeze.

And if you tried to read the tape with your tape cassette player not existing, then it hung also. So watch out for the pitfall. That is excite bike. But as a racing game, it's pretty charming. And it's, you know, it's got the angles, the forward, the backward. You kind of had to coax your bike, you know, nudge it a little bit to line up with the direction that you were landing and taking off. So there's some finesse to it. And you're racing other guys who don't actually have anything to do with the placement.

So it's really just about your own skills and not about other people. Unless you play versus excite bike, which didn't come to America until many, many years later. Kurt, what do you think? Where are we with Excite Bike? Simple but fun. I remember renting this game barring it from a friend like several years after it came out

and it was pretty basic but I still had a lot of fun with it. I also like the design your own track function even though you couldn't save them. But it's good enough. I give it a 10. A 10? All right. Out of 10?

No, out of 27. Okay. John? You know what? Maybe this is like the only NES game that plays the loose. losing music at the beginning of the game? Does anybody else notice that?

So what does that tell you, right? It's such a catchy little theme. It's kind of upbeat, but also kind of sad. It's bittersweet. It's wistful. It's a wistful video game soundtrack. Yeah, it's getting you prepared that you're going to lose. But anyway, I think this game should have the alternate title,

Son, don't overheat the car. Because this is, like, the game that teaches you about engine and motor overheating and the importance of maintenance and slowing down. One of the things I love about this game is that you're given the warning of overheating before it happens with that loud buzzer sound, which I think you probably just heard, whereas other racing games

sometimes didn't have that overheat warning until it was absolutely too late, allowing you to stall and disable your motorbike or car. So programmable aspect was great, making your own stages, and this was also a fun party game. So for this one, I ranked it, a six. Six.

Very nice. And I'm giving it an 11, which sounds negative, but it's not. I think it's a very charming little game. It's enjoyable. It doesn't have a lot of depth, but it's, you know, still putting in the top half of the Nintendo launch window. So good on you, Excite Bike. What about you, audience?

Where do you stand on the matter of Excite Bike? Are you racing fans, and are you okay with casual racers as opposed to a hardcore F1, shift your gears kind of racing game. Is that cool with you? We're going to find out. Give me a count or a shout. Yes, on the count.

A shout on the count. Right. Three, two, one. 87.3. Not bad. It seems to be well loved among the literati of the NES. Well done. So now I'm moving along to a game that has, I think, come into better esteem in recent years, and that is golf, a game that I think for a long time people kind of tended to dismiss, but then when Mr. Iwada passed, like, his role in this game came to light, and Nintendo's staff treated it as, like, a good luck charm by secretly hiding it in the switch somewhere. I can't remember the exact specifics. But basically, it's like there's a legacy to this game.

Also, if you want to look at it in terms of its design, it's pretty much the template for every golf game that isn't Golden T that was made subsequent to this golf game from its initial launch in 1984 in Japan. So kind of a big deal when you stop and think about it. Kurt, are you impressed or does not Mario the Duffer here offend you? I have never stopped and thought about it. I was not aware of any of that stuff. Oh, okay. For me, golf is a boring dad game. I will never like it.

Are you calling your dad boring? Oh, I mean, it's just like the broad sense of a dad. Oh, okay. Dad and the platonic concept, I got that. Yeah. So I just looking at this makes me want to fall asleep. Nice. So I put this at a 26.

26. So in your opinion, that is as bad, actually worse, than what was my 26? Donkey Kong Jr. Math. All right. Good to know. John? Yeah, for this one, I share the same feelings as Kurt here about this one. But, however, I have to add, I never thought it'd be able to play golf as pop from Speed Racer.

So it doesn't really look like Mario, doesn't. It's not, he's duffer. He's technically another character, according to Captain Rainbow. Really? Yeah. Mario's dad? Could be. He's just duffer.

I don't know. Oh, okay. Duffer. Okay. Maybe it's like Duff Kagan. You know what? I got to say, I think, you know, I really, I enjoyed Iwada's, probably had a hand in this game, but I'm not sure what his role in Howl America's, the Super NES title, a whole in one,

that had some really, you know, Ritz really showcased the Super Nintendo. So I like Awada's whole and one for the Super Nintendo better. So I don't, and this game just really needed music. You have to love how these early NES, titles just did not have like ongoing music when you were the sports titles especially like they had these just short jingles at the beginning of the game at the uh title screen so uh yeah kind of had to add your own soundtrack when playing these sports titles so uh for golf i'm gonna say 23 well apparently i'm a boring dad so i'm giving it a five because i don't i don't even like

sports in general but I enjoy golf games for some reason there's something about golf video games that I find really just kind of relaxing and enjoyable and this is the mothership this is the like the origin of them all really

and you know add to that its legacy and the fact that it was just this really pretty deep simulation of a sport in a time when you didn't see that on consoles and I think it is a game with a great legacy that deserves some respect I am sticking up for it.

I did not expect you guys to anti-stick up for it, but what can you do? Anyway, I'm curious to see where the audience lands on this because we've got some really polar opposite opinions up here, and I'm curious if everyone else is kind of in the same boat as one

or the other of us, or if you're in the middle. So, let's hear it, three, two, one. Kind of in the middle, 78.8. That is a great. Golf clam. Right. That technically should add like 10 points to it because they were... Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm. Power, friends. Let's move along to Gumshu. Notable for being the first Nintendo developed game to not be released in Japan, only in America. It is a light gun game where you counterintuitively shoot your guy to make him survive. You shoot him and he jumps, hops over things. You got to collect balloons, not hit skulls. You got to blast those, I think those are Hennessy bottles. You got to knock those out of the air. And it's a pretty tough game. But the idea of this kind of like indirect, you know, hands-off control style of game wouldn't really become in vogue until stuff like Limnings and, you know, some of that other stuff like Pac-Man 2 or, yeah, what was it was

Pac-Man 2? Yeah. Yeah. So kind of innovative there. Also a little weird, but yeah, that's gumshoe. That is a game. It is a game that is there. Kurt, where do you land on gumshie? The premise of this game is insane. I remember asking my parents what a gumshue was when I was a kid and I was like, oh, it's a detective. Let's give us nothing to do with that.

No, he's a detective. He's got to get the jewels to rescue his daughter from some evil guy who stole his daughter and wanted jewels. I'd like say that she'd be expected some crime solving, but absolutely none of that. At the same time, I think this is a really neat interesting game, because a lot of the other Zapper games were just like,

you know, the mechanical sort of games you'd find in an arcade, whereas this one was, it's something that can only be a video game. I also really like the bongos. So I give it a 12. 12, all right. Good on you. John?

For this one, this was incredibly challenging and frustrating and just overall tough to play. And with just the constant struggle of keeping Mr. Gumshoe up in the air and the constant flashing you're just getting from the screen

from, you know, making sure he, you know, stays up. This is also kind of like a really... It is rough on people with light sensitivity, yes. Yeah. This, and it's just physically exhausting, you know, with just having the gun in the air, with, you know, with a light gun. You really have to keep going with this. I got frustrated from this, so...

And I gave it a low score. I gave it a 22. 22. Sorry, detective. Your daughter's going to stay kidnapped. I gave it What did I give it? Apparently I gave it a seven

Was I hallucinating? Okay, well, that's My vote for this is a seven I don't know why, but So I guess it's a good game I think I was really tired When I put my list together But okay, way to go, Gumshoe

Just call it Super Mario Bros. Yeah, that's right. Super Mario Brothers with a light gun. Super Gun Brothers. Super Gun Brothers. Anyway, audience, I would like to hear about your hallucinations

What do you think of Gumshoe? On the count of 0.3, 2, 1. So you're not a big fan either, 72.1. Okay. So I can't account for my score. I don't know. I don't know what to tell you. Anyway,

Anyway, onward through the letter G. And I think we're about halfway through this presentation. halfway through this presentation, too. Anyway, here we are with the other pack-in game. The game that was so good, Nintendo said, we got to put this in the package. Actually, no. They said, we got to trick the retailers into thinking

that the NES is a toy and not a video game system because they don't want to stock video game systems right now after the Atari crash. So here's a robot, and if you make the robot do stuff, then stuff will happen on the screen. And as you can see, it's a little tricky. you spend a lot of time just sitting there waiting for the robot to do his stuff. And I believe what I'm doing here is crushing the little doctor.

I think I'm going to make Rob raise the blue post and crush the doctor. I could be mistaken, though. Yeah, it's a little bit of an esoteric abstract game. And if you play without Rob the robot, it's extremely boring because it's extremely easy because it really is built around Rob taking like a minute to do the things that you want him to do. so that you can play. Strange concept for a game. But, you know, it ties into Nintendo's legacy as gadget creators.

And also, it did help trick retailers into thinking, oh, we should stock this video game system. According to the Nintendo launch presentation that Frank Sefaldi gave at the last convention I was at the Long Island Retro Expo, retailers knew that the NES was a video game system. They were like, yeah, it's a video game system. We don't really want those.

But, you know, this robot thing, is kind of neat, so we might stock this just because parents would be interested, and parents said, yeah, we don't really want a video game system in our house. But since you're putting a robot in there, that's actually kind of cool. And so, yeah, I think we might buy this. So I guess Gyromite did its job. It tricked people into buying the NES and thank God for that. And then the power pad came out. Kurt, what do you think about Jarmite? The design of the Rob was super cool. And I remember going over to a friend's house. It's just the only bot. Yeah. Oh, is that what's called?

You remember the Omnibot 2000 from Tomey? It was like a remote control robot that would serve you drinks and stuff. They just ripped off the Omnibon. Wasn't that in one of the Rocky movies? I think so, yes. I think it served like champagne to Rocky after his victory or something. Yeah, it's like happy birthday polling. He's like in a hot tub maybe.

I can't remember. It's so 80s. Yes, go ahead. But that did make me want it, which I never was able to get because I didn't get Nintendo for many years later. But anyway, I remember going over a friend's house who did have it. I wanted to play it and they were like, you want to play. gyramite, and they didn't want to play it.

So I've never actually played with a rob. I've only played on an emulator where you can use the second controller to adjust the things up and down. And it's fine. It's all right. I can't believe that they put all the effort into this cool little robot and then made

gyramite. But it's not offensively bad, so I give it a 19. A 19. That's a little offensive. So let me explain a little bit more about the way it plays. Because not everyone knows, actually, how gyro might plays. So basically, you control the little professor guy with the controller 1, and that's your character you're controlling.

And then Rob moves the pillars, the red and the blue pillars up and down by taking these spinning gyros and rotating and putting them on levers. And what the levers do is they're attached to an apparatus that presses the buttons on controller 2. So basically, Rob is your player 2. And you can easily just take the controller out of the Rob cradle and press the buttons and it will instantly do the things that you wanted to do. And that just sucks all the difficulty and challenge out. The challenge is to control Rob and also to watch the gyros because they spin for a crazy long time. I don't know how they engineered that, but they will spin for like five minutes. But they do eventually spin down and they lose their balance and fall.

So you have to kind of put them on the spinner and spin them back up so they get the momentum. So you are, as you said earlier, juggling a lot of balls. You know, you said that about Donkey Kong 3, which, yeah, sure, whatever. Gyro, right, you're literally juggling a lot of gyros, I guess, not quay balls, but it becomes kind of this challenging two-space experience where you're watching what's happening on screen and controlling that, but also you're managing this physical toy. And when it works, it's actually really good and interesting. but if you haven't played it that way, then yes, I can understand where you would say this is bad and stupid.

So I think, yeah, I think really your opinion about gyramite varies according to how you have experienced it. John, how have you experienced Jaromite? Have you experienced it in its native form? No, unfortunately not. A friend had robbed the robot

and we never brought it out and played gyramite. But, however, when he when he put the cartridge in and powered it up, one thing I noticed and it kind of started my love of video game music was the

catchy opening title jingle for this game. And then there was this catchy test theme that had a nice amount of dreamy reverb to it. So it kind of like said to me there's something here with this 8-bit music. And this came kind of makes me want to go

to YouTube and see if anyone hasn't done any extended remixes for this. Oh, I'm sure they have. Yeah, I'm sure they have. There's probably some sort of weird Silva-Gunner mashup with, like, the Star Fox music or something. Yeah. I wish Nintendo sold this separately for the system,

for the NES, rather than just a pack-end. No, they did. They sold it separately. They did. There's two versions of it. There's the pack-in game that is just the, like, the standard N-E-S box. And there is a standalone box that is double-sized.

It's massive, and it has all the stuff in it. It's very rare. But it does exist. They did sell it, and then I think no one bought it, and they said, okay. They took it off the market. Yeah, never saw it. Do you know what year they may have sold that?

Was that like... It would have been probably 85. They sold the NES in the deluxe edition with Rob and the Zapper in two games. And then they sold just the core unit, I believe. And you could buy Rob and Giromite a la carte and the Zahper. Okay. Yeah, so for this, for Jaramite, I'm going to have to give it 26. Didn't you already give something 26?

No, I guess not. Okay. No. Um, so I don't think Jarumite's the most amazing game ever, but I have played it in its true intended form. And it is a really cool experience. And there's really not a lot you can do with Rob, which is why there's only two games for Rob. But this is the one that works and is very interesting. And so I give it a nine.

And I, I highly encourage you, if you ever have the chance to play gyromite with Rob, like fully set up, it is a very interesting experience. And it's very different than any other. NES game, just the way it makes you think differently about real space. So it's worthwhile in that way. But again, that's a pretty big ask. So, you know, Rob doesn't even work with modern televisions. You have to have a CRT because he can't read the flashes on a flat screen TV because

of the display lag. So it's a little rough. But, you know, worth experiencing if you have the opportunity, which, again, maybe I should just like have a gyromite party next year and everyone can come to our booth and play gyromite i don't know might happen probably won't uh what do you think audience have you experienced rob in his true form have you have you experienced rob power or are you uh the kind of person who has only sat there and sadly tapped the a and b button on controller two and said this is terrible uh let's hear it on the count of zero three two one

Yay. 68.3. So I think I need to bring Rob next year. I need to do that for our booth. There's no solution. You guys have to experience true Rob. Rob will have his own dedicated room. Yes.

It's like the romper room, but it's the Rob room. Yeah, there you go. Okay. Okay. On to another. light gun game. We've got Hogan's Alley. Uh-oh. We've got some people leaving, so audience sound is going to be lower. You guys are going to have to cheer louder to compensate for the departures. They're supposed to lock these doors. All right, so Hogan's Alley, another light gun game,

not the best known of the games. It's a police simulation. There's also a game where you shoot cans. And, you know, you have to shoot the bad guys, not shoot the good guys. The bad guys will eventually shoot you even though they're made of paper. It's pretty strange. But, you know, it's got personality, and I guess some people like that. What do you think, Kurt? The designs are fun.

I don't think putting this as a police trainer was all the interesting. There have been other games, like, again, master systems up like gangster towns where you're shooting gangsters and not just pictures of gangsters. Well, I mean, it's got marksman shooting, too, which is like straight up just Hogan's alley. but in a proper alley. Yeah, and that's where they put the Clay Pigeon one.

That one's pretty boring, too. But they made proper, well, not proper. They kept on with those arcade games like that. Anyway, it's all right, but it's not great. I put this at 19. 18. Okay. John, what do you think? Okay. I think Trickshot was like the best part of this game, keeping that can in the air.

I feel like this, I feel like Hogan's Alley needed a couple more mini games like that. because the whole thing of, you know, shooting the cutouts, you know, avoiding shooting an innocent person and getting the bad guys, kind of got kind of got a little stale after a while. So for Hogan's Alley, I gave it a 16. 16, okay, and I gave it a 17 because I think it's fine, but not actually that interesting or good.

So let's hear what you think, audience. Let's hear it cheer or not. The count of zero, three, two, one. You guys are compensating 85.5. That might end up being the best NES game. Who knows? The Mario Brothers clone for two people who like to wear parkas. You know, this is an interesting game because it is trying to capitalize on the success of Mario Brothers. But they hadn't figured out the whole jumping thing.

This is before Super Mario Brothers. So you're climbing by jumping. And in my opinion, it's kind of annoying because of the shallow, shallow arc of your jump. Yes, that's what I was trying to say. and also you have these guys you're making progress and then they come out and kick ice and block your progress and it's terrible. I don't like those little guys.

Anyway, ice climber. Kurt, do you like it? I mean, it is a two-player simultaneous game so that has some appeal to some people. Does that make up for it? Not me. I don't feel like the physics or the hit detection makes a whole lot of sense in this game.

But at the same time, the whole idea of a vertically scrolling platformer. It's kind of neat. I give it a 14. Okay, that's actually pretty generous. John, what do you think? Yeah, I really like this game. This was one of the games that you can learn quickly how to play,

but one of the things that Kurt pointed out were, like, you know, the physics and the detection. Sometimes you would jump up and you'd land on the edge of the platform, and you'd still fall. Mario Brothers, which we'll talk about in a moment, had that same problem of, you know, sometimes, you know, you think you've landed on the edge of the platform, but you're still falling through.

So that was a bit of an issue, but I like this game. I have fond memories of it trying to climb up. This was kind of like, you know, in the vein of climbing up games like Crazy Climber from Nichibutsu or, you know, I think that was probably an inspiration for this one. And I'm surprised nothing more was done with this title by Nintendo

other than having, was it Po. Smash Brothers. Smash, yeah, was it Popo? The character names, yeah. So where do you stand on the numbers? We do have to speed up. Okay. I'm going to say three for Ice Climber.

Yep. Oh. I cannot sanction this tomfoolery. I'm giving it a three plus 20. 23. That's right. I don't like Ice Climber at all. I detest it.

So John and I are going to have a death match afterwards ourselves. Please look forward to it. What do you think about an ice climber audience? Where do you cheer or not? Three, two. Booze still count on the decimal meter as a cheer. So be careful there. Okay, yeah, the ghosts like it.

But what about the living? Three, two, one, zero. All right, that was a 71. 9, but I think, you know, we did lose a few people at the top of the hour. So maybe some of you in the back might want to move forward so I can register your cheers more effectively. Then again, you may not want to get closer to us. I don't know. It's fine. Let's move along to the next game.

Kung Fu, which is a very interesting game. There's a lot of history behind this. Irim wanted it to be their first game that they published for Famicom, and Nintendo liked it so much that the president said, actually, you-o-ink, we're going to develop and publish that ourselves. And that's why I-Rim games on Famicom have those little LED lights, because that was their make-good for stealing this game from I-Rim. But you have to admit, I-Rim's games at that point were not actually that impressive. And Nintendo did a bang-up job with this conversion.

Shigero Miyamoto and his team put this together right before Super Mario Bros. And they were in peak form. It's fluid. It's fast. It looks great. It has sampled voices. It has a storyline. It has Jackie Chan.

I mean, what more do you want? There's butterflies you have to punch. I'm not really an advocate of punching butterflies, but they're kind of dicks in this game, so I'm okay with that. Kurt. This is a game that basically formed the foundation of so many other beat-em-ups that came after it. It's a little simple compared to anything else

that came after, but I think the fundamentals are still there. I think it's still pretty fun. Those digitalized yells were a selling point from the Nintendo for me. And the last. It's really cool. I give it a nine. Nine.

All right. Yes. Actually, without Kung Fu, we would not have Street Fighter 2, or Street Fighter and Street Fighter 2. Because the guy who made this game, Piston Takeshi, went on to make those games. And you can see all the fundamentals right there, including punching butterflies or cars. John? That's right. The arcade, I feel like the arcade version featured better backgrounds with, like, you know, with windows and pillars projecting the Hong Kong

action film element. The NES version featured the same blue background. Great voice samples but the NES voice samples, you know, okay voice samples. The NES voice samples were, you know, a good touch that they added those in,

that they, you know, had room to add those in. A fun game, nonetheless for those who wanted to play like, you know, Jackie Chan or Bruce Lee, makes me wonder like how if Iram, to what extent, Iram approved this version, or if Nintendo and Miyamoto kind of were able to do their own thing.

I mean, however I would not look at this version and think, what have you guys done? I would think, wow, you guys did a bang-up job with this on this hardware. Yeah, I just think that the backgrounds, the Pagoda backgrounds, but they needed a little bit more. Can you think of any other NES games from 1985 that have backgrounds? Everything was pretty much a blank at that point. Not a lot of ROMs. You know, I wouldn't know, like, what, I don't know, like, how long. long it took for them to develop this. Maybe they just did not have time or space in the

cartridge and of itself. So for this one, I'm going to give it a 13. 13. Okay, I gave this one a six because I think it pretty much rules. And it was a very impressive game at launch. This was the game that most stores put out on display. If they didn't put out Duck Hunt, it was kung fu to say, like, you could buy the new Nintendo system or Nintendo, as they often called it back then, because they didn't know. So audience, where do you stand? on this. Were you also blown away by Jackie Chan's Kung Fu? Please tell me by

cheering or not at the count of zero. Three, two, one. All right, we got ourselves in 81.9. That's a good representation for Jackie Chan there. Let's move along to Nintendo's, I guess not the first female protagonist because that was Bubbles from CluClu Land, but their second. The mock rider, she's here.

This is the prelude to Metroid Prime 4 on the viola bike. This is a lady shooting her way through the year 2112, trying to find the temples of syrinx. And basically, Hal Labs, put together an F1 racing game for the NES, for the Famicom that was very impressive for its time. And I think Nintendo said Americans don't like F1. So what if we put guns in it and put you on a motorcycle instead? And I think that was the correct instinct.

They understood Americans. So this is Mock Rider. It is also a programmable game. No one actually uses the programmable mode. They just drive around and explode on their motorcycle in the apocalyptic future of 2112. I appreciate the guns, but I found this game very difficult to play. Oh, it's really hard. I blew up a whole lot.

But I still gave it 15. 15, okay. John? A good motorbike fighter. Bump at the bad guys off reminds me a lot of, like, the arcade games like bump and jump and spy hunter, but, you know, with this angle rather than the overhead angle that those two games had. So I'm going to give this one an 18. 18.

That's... Your word sounded more enthusiastic than your score. Yeah, unfortunately, you know, I did not have this game growing up, so I had to try it later.

It's okay. I had pretty much spy honor and bumpage up at this time. I adopted the NES. I had the NES at 88. I mean, I gave it a glowing review and also I put a 15 on it.

So the reviews editor would have some words with me. This is not consistent. Do you want to rethink your score? But it's too late. I've already ranked at everything. What about you, What do you think about Mock Rider?

Three, two, one. So you don't like it. Okay, 67.4. Whoa. That's way down to the bottom. Sorry, Mock Rider. I guess that's a bad omen for Metroid Prime 4. Next up is Mario Brothers, the game that inspired Ice Climber, but is vastly better.

This is a pretty good port of Mario Brothers. The graphics are obviously diminished from the arcade version, but considering that this came out in Japan, like two months after the arcade version of Mario Brothers, it's really impressive. It was, in my opinion, this is the moment where Nintendo said, we are a console-making company, not an arcade game making company. and they kind of put everything into this and they gave it two-player co-op action. They got all the levels, all the elements, the ice slippiness, and the punching from underneath and the fact that your brother will never talk to you again

because you kept punching them from underneath and making them bump into turtles. It's the true Mario Brothers experience. It's got the power blocks, it's got the double-punch crabs. What more do you want? It's Mario Brothers. Okay, Kurt, do you want more? I think it lacks a little variation

of those earlier single-screen games. but I think mechanically it's just a little bit more interesting. I also really like the crabs. Look at that. They get so angry when you punch them from the knee. And if you don't kill them faster, they get really angry. And they come after you. It's kind of scary. So I give this a seven. Seven. That's a good score. Very respectable.

Nice to have some single digits again after all this double-digit talk. John, where do you stand on Mario Brothers? All right. Another arcade game, another Nintendo arcade game for the home console. So much fun. A little bit, it's kind of had the same issue with ice climber in here, whereas like the landing detection on some of the edge of the platforms kind of did you in. So there was just a little bit of tech issues there, but for this one, great fun. And they've got to keep bringing the POW.

They have to bring the POW thing back in games. You know, they have to have that in there more often. Is the power block in Bonanza? It seems like it should be. It seems like the kind of thing you would put in Donkey Kong Bonanza. Does anyone know? Unless it's hidden.

I don't have a Mario game, not a Donkey Kong game. It's all the same. It's all part of the universe. All right. Colleen rides around on Donkey Kong's back. Later, she dates Mario. I mean, it's like a whole family there. It's that new history.

Yes. I deal with the old history. Okay. All right. For Mario Brothers, I give it an eight. Eight? Okay. What did I give him?

Mario Brothers. I gave Mario Brothers a 12 because I think it's strong, but not the greatest thing ever. I did not give it an 812. Sorry about that. Okay. Mario Brothers, pretty solid. Do you agree, audience? Are you also Mario Bros? Or Mario Noes?

Let's hear it. 3-2-1-0. 88.0. Pretty, pretty. Pretty good. Onward and flip word to pinball. Another game programmed by Satoro Iwada.

This was actually the first game that Hal collaborated with Nintendo on. And before this game, most pinball games on consoles looked like this. They were not pinball games. They were breakout pretending to be pinball because they had elements like a bumper or something. Here you see Mario trying to rescue Pauline before she became Donkey Kong's pal or maybe after. I don't know. I'm not sure what the canon is there. But anyway, the thing about Nintendo's pinball is that it's actually pinball. Like it's a table. It's a table so big. It takes up two screens. It's got targets. It's got interactive elements. It's got, you know, the special mini game. That's what that Mario thing was. It is,

full-fledged Nintendo pinball. And not only that, but it plays really well. Again, Iwada's programming chops came into play here and the ball moves very fluidly with very, very granular particular movement.

And it just feels great to play. It controls so well. Video game pinball games before this were not good. I was there. I remember. Pinball was a big revolution. Stop it, Popeye here. getting out of your lane.

Kurt, what do you think about pinball? It has dancing penguins, so I give it a 16. 16. That's all a dancing penguin is worth to you. Video pinball I don't find all the interesting. I also never understood why they had the Mario on the cover. Because he's in the mini-game. That's not pinball, though. I know, but it's part of pinball.

They should have had the penguins. I would have been interested in. I agree. Penguins are awesome. John, what do you think? Okay. A lot of fun with this game. Iwada did a great job on this. I love the addition of the Nintendo playing cards on the pinball board.

Kind of gives it a good, nice little throwback to Nintendo's playing card business. I'd love to know what the Seals and Penguins were about, but I have this feeling that this pinball game was kind of given a circus feel. Like, that was the theme of the pinball board. Game A is for beginners. Game B is for experts, which should be the default. A fun cameo by Mario and the late, the quote unquote lady in

C and C and C. So for this one, another, if you wanted to play another fun pinball game, kind of on the vein of from Hal, since Iwada was a part of hell, check out Revenge of the Gator on original Game Boy. That's a good,

that's another one. So for this one, I'm going to give it a C, a nine. A nine. Okay, and I gave pinball a four because I think it rules and it's great. And sure, it's simple, but it's such a great piece of history, that still continues to play well, despite its limited nature.

Really, the only video pinball game I like more than this is Alien Crush. So, audience, what do you think? What do you think? Pinball, is it awesome, or is it do you want more penguins less Mario? Let's hear it. On the count of

zero, three, two, one. Hmm, only a 75.5. Oh, my heart breaks quietly, but it's breaking. Okay, on to Popeye, another of the arcade conversions that Nintendo gave us. This one is greatly compromised from the arcade game, if you remember, well, not in terms of gameplay, but in terms of visuals. That was the whole thing about the arcade game. is it had double-resolution graphics,

gigantic characters full of detail, and Bluto, of course, or sorry, Brutus can break the rules. He's a jerk. It's a solid conversion of the game, but yeah, you can't help but wish it looked as good as the arcade version, or at least I can't. Kurt, can you wish differently? I played the Atari 8-bit version again,

which looks approximately on the same level as this. I don't mind the detail loss that much because it still looks pretty good in general. I really, really, really like this game. I think I probably played a lot more than any of the old Donkey Kongs. I like the little sing-songiness of when you grab the little hearts. I like the variety of it. I was always frustrated as a kid when you punched.

You couldn't actually destroy Brutus. Is it? Yeah, it's Brutus. It's a copyright thing, I think, or a trademark. Until you got the spinach, which was fun. Although he was too fast. I think it denied you the ability to just. smash them because he's a real jerk.

But like I said, I like this a lot. It's frustrating that it has not been reissued because there have been other Popeye games since then. And I've been out of the impression they're all pretty bad. Yeah. So it's weird that Nintendo had never worked out something to get this back out there. But I give this a three.

Three? Wow. All right. Someone's really sticking up for Popeye. John? This, like you said, Jeremy, this really wasn't an arcade-perfect version. of this particular title and I was trying to figure out the only fond memories I have of Popeye growing up

was watching him on Saturday was watching him before school the cartoon that would play before I would take off for school. You never watched the Robin Williams movie? I did not. It was weird but good, interesting. But I guess in Japan

there was a Japanese group called Spinach Power that released a disco version of the Popeye song which became a hit, selling 400,000 copies. And, like, Japan Airlines from 1978 to 1985 had Popeye as their mascot for the Japan Airlines ski tour Hokkaido campaign. Yeah, there was a whole, like, subculture of Popeye popularity over there.

But what do you feel about the NES conversion? For the NES conversion, I'm going to have to give it a 14. A 14. Okay, okay. Sorry about that, Popeye. Looks like he's on Brutus' side. I gave Popeye. 18, so there we go. All right. Can't deny

the truths of what Jeremy said a few hours ago when he was typing up these numbers. Audience, what do you think about Popeye for NES? Is it pretty good? Do you prefer the arcade version? Oh, Kurt is coaxing you, so let's see what these tainted results are like. Three, two, one. Uh-huh. 79.1. Sorry, Kurt. the people have spoken and they said,

Nah. Up next is, we've seen American football. Now here is the other football, the one that we call soccer. Japan also calls soccer. We're the weird ones on the planet. Everyone says football. Anyway, this is interesting because by far this was the best soccer game ever to have been seen on a console to this point. Fluid, great-looking characters, very detailed, pretty good control.

hard to control a team-based sport with a two-button controller, but Nintendo did a pretty good job of it. But this one's weird because Nintendo always, like their official notations say that this came out in 1987, but it was there at the NES launch. And I guess it didn't do much because they disappeared it for a little while. I don't know. I'm not sure what happened there. But in any case, soccer, it was at launch. And people who liked this version of football had an option to kick around, oh, is that a chocolate chip cookie? I think that's a chips away. Kurt? I just don't love soccer in any form unless it's one of those Coonio games. So I give it 23.

23. John, what about you? Well, I would rather play soccer for real than play it like this. However, I will say I love the celebratory goal animations of the players celebrating. You know, hey, we even have cheerleaders in the game, even when 10-yard fight did not. So we had, they had... Some football game has to have them. Yeah, they had room for that.

this kind of game along with all the other sports games were fun to play with two players and this was one of the rare early NAA sports games to have music during gameplay. However, I'm going to give it a 21. 21. All right, well, I am going to split the average and give it a 22 because I don't really like it that much.

I understand it's, you know, place in history, but I don't care, honestly. And you can't make me. So anyway, we are getting into the final rounds here. So let's bring up the energy, but you don't have to bring it up too much for this one. It's okay. Let's hear what you think. Three, two, one.

Yeah. Okay. We got, thank you. You gave it a 72.5 with the, see how one person can influence the vote. They say it doesn't matter, but your vote does count. now going on to oh yeah the other rob game is it a game though is it really a game it's okay there's there's two modes to this and i kind of i kind of put my thumb on the scale by showing the the mode that is actually not really much of a game at all you're just telling

the robot to do stuff to move like you're literally stacking blocks sometimes you're doing that to avoid things on a grid, but in this one, you're just programming it to move blocks from one stack to another and match the target colors. There's no way for the game to know if you have succeeded in this or failed. It is entirely on you to live up to the honor. I stack up is so boring that I put in some footage of Rob, just so you can see what it's like when Rob is actually playing gyromite, a better Robb game. And mostly Rob just sits there and he waits for the TV to tell him to do something. And then you can see the controller in the front.

This is, we're not even talking about Stackup at this point, but that's just kind of how it goes. Kurt, do you have any feelings whatsoever about Stackup? Without the Rob, I had no idea what this game was about. So 27. 27. 27, okay. John?

Same. 27. All right. Friends, I also am giving it a 27. So we have consensus. We have consensus. Do we have consensus from the audience, though? and I realize one of you could scream really loudly and tilt the balance here,

but let's be honest, share your true feelings about stack up. Did you own this as a child? Did you pay $2,000 for a copy for your collection a few years ago? So I'm so sorry, it was not worth it. All right, let's hear your thoughts. Three, two, one, zero. Okay, we have some representation. do you really feel that way or you just feel

sorry for Rob? I just feel sorry for Rob. Okay, so we got basically room tone, 43.9. I appreciate you the spirit, though. Rob, Rob needs friends, honestly. They only made two games for him, if you can believe that. Now, let's go to the Antipodes, the polar opposite. Happy 40th birthday, Survivor Brothers.

This game came out in Japan, 40 years ago today. And again, putting my thumb on the scale, but I gave this one two minutes of footage instead of one. Because there's so much to this game. This game, I mean, when you played a console game before this, it was usually like a screen, or maybe it was like pitfall, and it was, you know, a lot of screens, but they were all kind of the same.

This game was just, this game was, you know, screen after screen of action. There was always a variety. There were different enemies. There were hidden tricks. The physics were so slick. John keeps complaining about edge detection and jump control physics.

This game did not have any of those problems. No, it did not. Everything about this game was just fine-tuned. This was, to Nintendo's, you know, intentions, the pinnacle of what you could do with the Famicom and NES hardware, with the default hardware, with the ROMs, you know, the cartridges at the maximum size that was available at the beginning.

This was, they put everything into this, and then immediately after this, they said, okay, we're done with Famicom, now it's time for the disk system, and they made Zelda, which, you know, another banger. But there's just so much in this game, and I remember, you know, seeing this game back when it was brand new and just being amazed because I would watch my friends play it. And every stage was different. There were always secrets. There were hidden vines.

There were cloud levels. to go to. There were underground passages. There were turtles that threw hammers at you. It was wild. So, yeah, in case you can't tell you. I kind of think pretty highly in this game. As you can see, I chickened out there and did not go to the warp zone.

But anyway, Sumarii Brothers, pretty darn good. Do you agree, Kurt? Yes, you do. I would never admit it as a Sega Master System child, but this made me jealous for NES owners. I would go over their house and wanted to play it, and it was the game that came with them. So they're like, why do you want to played this. It's so boring. I still enjoyed

the hell out of it, so it's definitely number one. Alex Kidd wishes he were Super Mario. Sorry. Sorry, Alex. Yeah. John? Yeah, I ranked this game number one. You guys took the words right out of my mouth. This game also had probably just a great

sense of humor as well, the little jokes and character animations. And when Kupa is trying to find the bridge goes out from under him and he's trying to find where the bridge is and he falls. And just, yeah, overall, this is the go-to, go-back-to game, number one all the way, and cemented my love for the Nintendo in NES.

So, yeah, number one. Yeah, the funny thing about Super Mario Brothers is that because it came out only a month before the NES did in America, it was brand new. It was not battle-tested. I mean, it became an instant hit in Japan. It was a best-seller for months. The strategy guide was the best-selling book in Japan for, for a while.

Everyone loved it. But, you know, it was the culmination of three years of Famicom. Like, everything had led to that moment. In America, it was, like, Nintendo didn't know. Are people going to react to this? It's very, like, video game-y.

Well, they want this? They want toys, right? We don't know. So the marketing, there was no test marketing for it. So they were actually kind of cautious with it. If you looked at the early Nintendo NES marketing, they didn't talk about Super Mario Brothers. It was, you know, duck hunt.

It was excite bike, it was gyromite, it was kung fu, it was all these other games that had been around that they had, you know, kind of focus tested and said, oh, people like this. Super Warrior Brothers was not kind of the big appeal there. But, you know, people saw this. They played it, or they played the arcade version that came out the next year versus Super Mario Brothers. And everyone, like, I don't know how you cannot love this game. And Nintendo immediately said, well, this is a big deal. so they started including Super Mario Brothers as a pack-in with the console.

And that's the model that I got that had Mario with it. Not Mario Duck Hunt, not Mario Duck Hunt. World-class track meet or, sorry, stadium game. No, world-class track meet, that's right. Yeah. It was just Mario. And I was kind of over at it by that point,

but it was still really good. And going back to it now, it is still, in my opinion, the number one game at the NES launch. I want to hear from you, are you guys going to break the chain here? Are you going to make this a less popular game? Are you going to let, what is it, balloon fight

be more popular than Super Mario Brothers? I would like to hear your honest, heartfelt opinion about Super Mario Brothers. Have we just been, you know, talking out our butts here about how great this game is and it's actually garbage? Now is the time for you to speak up or not. On the count of zero, three, two, one, zero. All right.

You guys did it even though there's been some attrition here in the room and there's not as much volume potential, 94.4 just edging out balloon fight. I think we have a winner, unless you guys really cheer for Urban Champion. I feel like it's a safe bet, though. So just a couple more games, four more games, actually. Here we have tennis. This was actually, technically, the first NES game to come to America. A year and a half before the NES launched,

the versus system came out in arcades, and this was the first of the versus titles that shipped here. So this was brand new in Japan at the time. No one had ever heard of an NES. No one knew what a Nintendo was, really, unless they really paid attention to the Donkey Kong marquee. But the versus system came here, and I have to say that in 1984, I remember seeing the versus system games back then, because I'm very old,

and this game did look really cool. Like, to me, when the NES came out, it actually kind of muted my enthusiasm for the system a little bit because I had seen the versus system, and I had seen these games, you know, two years ahead of time, and I was very impressed by them. You know, it is kind of basic tennis, but if you compare it to any tennis game that came before it,

it's hugely sophisticated. Look at the way the ball grows in size as it comes over the net, and it still casts a shadow. So you can tell immediately where it is relative to your player and to the opposing player on the back court. The one thing that this game lacks,

really, is two-player competitive play. It only has doubles against the computer because I think Nintendo felt like the person in the back court would have a disadvantage because they're so much smaller and there's less space. space for him to move with because of the

sense of the linear perspective on that. So that's a downside, and they would amend that with tennis for Game Boy, which allowed actual proper competitive play, but that was like five years later. So, I mean, for the time being, this was

pretty rad, in my opinion. Kurt, are you able to cast your mind back to the dim and distant era of 1985? Not to then. Okay. But I've been ranking a lot of the sports Sports games are pretty low because I find sports video games three generally pretty boring.

But when Nintendo Emulator started coming out in the mid to late 90s, I played some extremely funny, dirty rom hacks of this game. And so I have some fond memories of it. So instead of yelling, fall, Mary would yell, ass. Okay. Rom hackers of the early days were very classic people. So I give this a 21. 21. All right.

John, what about you? I'm going to give this one. a 20. There was one of the things that I just found with, you know, like I said previously, no music during the gameplay, you know, but you had to kind of turn the volume up on your

own tunes with your own soundtrack for this game. But what I liked were the character animations. You know, like you said, Jeremy, you know, the animation of the ball, animation of the players. But for this, I'm going to give it a 20. A 20. Okay. I give

tennis 13, because I do think it's a very remarkable game in history. This is, again, kind of like golf, sort of the baseline for future games in this genre. They were all just kind of riffing on this. And so that's pretty significant. There were better tennis games that came along better, but you don't get there without tennis for NES. So that's 13 for me. What is it for you, audience? Let's say here on the count of zero. Three, two, one, zero. All right, we got a 74.3, respectable, but not enthusiastic by any means. Three more to go, the final three, starting with, oh, everyone's favorite, it's Urban Champion. This is one of my favorite punching bags, which is ironic because it's a game about punching.

There's some cute stuff in this game, like that. the neighbors get annoyed that you're brawling in front of their homes so they drop pots on you sometimes you're getting the upper hand against your opponent and the police drive by and so both of your guys separate and pretend to be all nonchalant like oh yeah sorry sorry smoky we're not doing nothing nope nope nothing happening here it's it's charming you win by knocking the other guy into a manhole so you know it has its appeal but it's actually there's not a lot of depth to it not a lot of fun in my opinion. I'm going to go ahead and go first here.

I'm giving it a 25. Out of 27. Kurt, what about you? I had this... One of the Irving Nintendo Powers came with this Pac-Watch little catalog which gave ratings to all of the Nintendo games at that time, and I'm pretty sure they didn't even

like Urban Champion. It was ranked very low. And yet it keeps showing up. Like, they did a 3D classics of this. Why? How would you do that? I was curious, and I looked up the Japanese reception of this game,

And it's not, people don't love it over there. But there are some, like, heartfelt, like, blog entries of people really, like, becoming the urban champion and winning enough matches. And I don't think anybody put that much effort into it. This is the game that taught me to win on the streets, man. I don't know. They're definitely better versus fighting games,

even though, like, when you think of that stuff as things like International Karate or Karate Champ or YAR Kung Fu, and this is worse than those. But if you think this is more of a sumo game than a fighting game, it's not that. Urban sumo. I like it. I like it. That could have been the theme. What's your score? So I will give this a 20. 20. Okay. John. All right. Who gets into a fight in front of a snack bar, bookstore, discount shop, and barbershop?

When you are the urban champion, you don't care. You are indiscriminate. You are brawling anywhere. It's a dust up anytime, any place. Yeah. Apparently with unexciting, unchangeable backgrounds. Where's the duddy milk? Or duddy mulk, sorry. Who? It's from, is that from vigilante? Ninja Warriors. Oh, Ninja Warriors, that's right.

Okay. Yeah, this did not hold my attention for that long, because I had long since moved on to fighting games like Renegade and Double Dragon. So for this one, yeah, see you at the snack bar. I'm going to give this a 19. 19. Okay. Audience, are you urban champions, or do you prefer a more refined approach to the streets?

Let's hear it from you. 3-2-oh-no, oh no, yeah, 3-2-1-0, that's right. Huh. All right, I think someone's putting their thumb on the scale again. We got a 78.1, but you know what? I'm going to allow it. I feel a little bad for Urban Champion. Sure, they did give it a 3D classics, which it didn't deserve, but someone's got to, you know,

compensate for how mean I am to it in my videos. Next to last, we have Wrecking Crew. In my opinion, a misunderstood game. This is a puzzle game that's kind of like a sandbox puzzle game. It even has the editing mode. I feel like this is the one game where you really needed to be able to save your data. It's got a lot of Mario elements in it. Mario is running around crashing, smashing, breaking stuff up.

You can play with another player, Luigi. Sometimes pre-Wario, four-man Spike shows up and tries to mess with you. It's an interesting game because there are a lot of points of no return. Like, if you're not careful, form and spike can come and smash you off a platform, and then there's no way to get back to that platform if you've broken the ladders to it. So it's a game where they have to have, like, instant lose as an option. You pause and then hit select, and you lose your life and start over. But, you know, they were trying something here, and I respect that.

And there has been a little bit of a legacy to wrecking crew. They made a block puzzle game called Recing Crew 98, and also, So Foreman Spike apparently showed up in the Mario movie that I haven't seen. So, you know, it hasn't been totally forgotten by someone, by Chris Pratt. I don't know. Kurt, what do you think? I had never really spent any time with this game before. And when I sat down with it, I really like those sort of games like Load Runner,

where you're just a small character on a screen, sort of solving, it's kind of a puzzle game, but it's also kind of an action game. I do get annoyed whenever you get an unmoodable situation. But just so it goes. So I gave it a five. Five. Okay, I'm actually I'm impressed

Okay, five I thought it was an unappreciated game But clearly I was wrong John, do you also appreciate Wrecking Crew? No, I don't I am I would rather play

Dady East's conversion of Rampage on the NES Oh, that's a little harsh Yeah, I know Truth hurts So for this one Yeah, I'm going to give it a 25 sorry Mario good thing he found a new career immediately after this

as the guy who punches mushrooms and I gave it a what was it an 18 no 16 16 I think it's a pretty cute little puzzle game it's got the multiplayer component it's got the customization component you can play any of the hundred levels that was a lot of levels that was like

load runner on computers level of content so you know it had some stuff going for it and again Mario's final out before he became the true hero as opposed to just like the guy who did dirty tasks that no one else wanted to do like catching monkeys and breaking

down scenery. So, you know, a bit of his history there. Audience, what do you think about wrecking crew? Are you also on board with the idea of breaking buildings while being attacked and antagonized by eggplants? Let's hear it. Give me a score in 3-2-1-0.

73.0. Not a lot of love out there for wrecking crew, but that's okay. You just wrecked Mario's happiness. Final game here. One last one. Marty McFly's favorite. Whoa, I got restarted. Sorry about that. Oh, I know what happened. I time traveled. I traveled. What is going on here?

Oh, did I skip something? Did I forget to put the footage in there? Oh, my gosh. You've been infected with the flux capacitor. Yeah, so I've time traveled. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. Wild Gunman's parents never fell in love.

And if you check the photo, it's faded away to nothing. Okay, Wild Gunman, don't have footage of it, but I'm pretty sure you know it because it is an iconic classic of the early NES era. You fight various Old West stereotypes, some a little on the maybe borderline offensive side, some not so much. You can also shoot a bunch of guys in a saloon. It's a very simple game where you don't actually have to aim. You just press the trigger, and you have to press the trigger before the other guy does.

There's a lot of history behind Wild Gunman. It was originally a projector game made with live film footage that was put in arcades in like 19, 1974, 75, and Nintendo revived it as the lead title for their Famicom gun, which in Japan looked like a Western six-shooter because it was a tie-in with wild gunmen. It was not a futuristic zapper molded in orange. It was a black and fairly realistic looking gun that I do not recommend taking through air support security, not that I know for personal experience. So, yeah, it's a game that has quite a legacy, quite a bit of appeal, and it's pretty okay. The fact that it's so reflex-based makes it a little bit more interesting than while Hogan's Alley, even though I think its appeal is ultimately pretty limited, but I give it a 17.

Okay, 17. John? All right, well, there were great character animations, music. I wish the backgrounds changed a little more. more. This game really was just about, it's just a game of draw, you know, draw your gun. But with the

Game C, the gang at the saloon for me was like the only enjoyable aspect of the game. You actually have to aim on that one. Yeah, pretty much. Again, a lot of great history to this one. You know, as part of the Nintendo legacy, as you mentioned.

For this one, I'm going to say, I'm going to give it a score of 15. 15. 15. I have a lot of respect for Wild Gunman's integrity and history, but if you look at my numbers up here, you can tell that I don't actually love it that much. I don't think it's that fun. It's charming and cute, but it doesn't have a lot of durability to it. So I gave it a 19.

But maybe you, the audience this evening, will beg to differ and will give Wild Gunman a rousing send-off as we wrap up this ringing hoot nanny. So let me put away the pop-ups. and let's see what you tell the app. Three, two, one, zero. 74.5. Not very rousing after all. Okay, so now the moment of truth,

I have to figure out how to tally these things up, which I really, really should have done in advance, and I don't know what I was thinking. This is a... Folks, I'm working in Excel here, and I normally do my stuff in Google Sheets. You want to talk for a little bit to... Yeah, why don't you? Might figure it out.

Kurt, how do we follow you on social media? Oh, where am I? I'm on Blue Sky. I think it's just HG 101. The whole website is www. Hardcore Gaming 101.net. We also have a podcast called the top 47,8508 games of all time. Oh, yeah, I sometimes pop in on my own podcast.

I never see the face. your voices. Yeah. I think we're about 1,500 through there, so... Yeah, it's getting stupid now. It's like, the numbers are... The numbers make no sense. It's been going on for 10 years. Total nonsense, but we have fun. Yes, it's all about the banter back and forth.

And also, you can follow me on Twitter at John Anderson 21. Sorry, excuse me, X. X at John Anderson 21. I'm also on Blue Sky at John Anderson.com. sky.social, it's Anderson

spelled with an S-E-N at the end. I post a lot of fun, quirky stuff about video game history on my Blue Sky feed, which you can follow, and I've done a documentary called Arcadia National Bar.

Sorry, Arcadia National Bar from one year to the next, which actually aired on Maine PBS, MPBN and Vermont PBS. It's about how a local arcade bar in Port in Maine went from one year to the next in terms of renovations and how it kind of brings the whole community together as an arcade bar. So definitely check that out. My next project,

I hope to, my next documentary project, I hope it'll take me to Japan where I'll interview some awesome game designers. And one of the things that I got to say about Nintendo is that with all of these games, you've got to give it to Nintendo. They were juggling both arcade development and NES development at the same time. And one of the most interesting aspects of this is that it almost all went to Atari because Atari was kind of, as many of you might be aware, from the book Game Over from David Schiff, Atari was kind of courting Nintendo in possibly, possibly bringing over the Famicom to the United States before Nintendo of America took over.

So, you know, you have to wonder, you know, some of the things that we talked about with these games, the limits, you know, no music, maybe level design, background design was maybe a little limited. You have to wonder just how much pressure Miyamoto and people like Iwada were under in regards to game design and getting games both to, both out for the Famicom, and also trying to make good on promises being made to Atari. Because one of the few of the games that Nintendo was developing at the time for Atari, because Atari was planning this deal where they were going to release the Famicom,

they were going to import it into the United States. One of the things that Iwada was doing was that he was making Atari games. Joust, what was the two other ones that Hal America made, that Hal America published? Defender 2. Milipede. Yeah, Defender 2 and Milipede. So those three games he made early on around at the same time, around the same time period as pinball and stuff.

So he was, O'Wada was a very busy man during that period, making these games for Nintendo, for the Famicom, the NEM, what would become the NES. So just a very, very interesting time period. So how's it going? Pretty good. Thank you for extemporizing. We now have an official ranking from number 27 to number one.

So I'm going to start at the bottom and work my way up. Even though you can see it, that's okay. People in the recording, who are listening to this as a podcast, cannot. And that's what counts. No, I'm just kidding. You actually count the most. Just kidding. Listeners, they actually don't count as much as you at home.

So at number 27, we have stack up. No surprise. That was a unanimous vote. 108 points out of 108 possible. In a way, you kind of have to admire it. It sucks so hard that is universally recognized. Number 26 is 10-yard fight with 89 points. There's a pretty big gap between bottom and not quite bottom.

Right above that is Donkey Kong Jr. Math. I actually am kind of surprised about that. People actually dislike this football game more than the math game. But facts is facts. Right above that, we have soccer at 85 points. At 80 points, baseball, tied for 20, what is that? First place, we have with 76 points, gyromite and urban champion. I don't know if I agree with that, but it's okay. I'm going to let a slide. Tried for number 19 with 71 points. We have Mock Rider and Tennis. At number 18, Wild Gunman with 67 points. Another tie at number 16 with 64 points, wrecking crew and golf. 15 points, gumshoe. Sorry, at 15 with 61 points. I guess that's also a tie with ice climber. So they're tied for 14th.

sure. Ice climber and gumshoe. Another tie at number 12 with 58 points for KluClu Land and Hogan's Alley. Donkey Kong Jr. at 11 with 49 points. Popai and Donkey Kong 3, both tied for ninth place with 44 points. 43 points out of 108 possible. We have pinball. Number seven, we have Kung Fu with 36 points. Number six, we have Excite Bike with 33 points. With only 32 points at number five, we have Mario Brothers. With 30 points, we have Duck Hunt. And then we get into the Crem d'A Crem. It is with a mere 14 points, which is good. You want a low number here. Lowest possible ranking or lowest possible score is four. Donkey Kong only has 14 at third place. Well done Donkey Kong. With even fewer points,

a mere eight, a unanimous vote for number two, balloon fight. And, of course, at number one, the unanimous pick, Super Mario Brothers. But in a way, we're all winners here because we all participated in this panel, and that's awesome. Anyway, thanks all of you for coming. Really appreciate having you here again this year to vote and cheer and occasionally razz a game when it deserved it. Razz quietly. That's the important thing. I respect that.

You understood the assignment. This has been great. Kurt, John, thank you all very much. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Very much.

No thanks to you. The people listening is a podcast. You cannot participate, but thanks for listening anyway. And this wraps it up for the Retronauts Retro World Expo Panel for 2025. We will probably see you next year, and we might even keep it under an hour next time. Who knows? Thanks, everyone. Have a good show.

Thank you, guys. Thank you. Thank you. You know, Thank you.