Bugs Bunny's Birthday Blowout

System: NES

Cheats Used: None

This was Kemco’s second and last Bugs Bunny game for the NES and it was released to coincide with Bugs’s 50th anniversary celebration (which I recall went on for a year and included a TV special and the first new Bugs cartoon in about 20 years). Like Crazy Castle, Birthday Blowout is simple yet challenging. Most of the challenge, though comes from some tricky platforming bits. The game is otherwise fairly easy because most enemies can be avoided and you rack up a ridiculous amount of extra lives by collecting all the carrots you see and using them in a bonus game after every level

There’s a good amount of variety in the environments you traverse and there’s a boss fight every two levels (although some of the bosses repeat). One particularly clever boss fight has both Foghorn Leghorn and Henery Hawk and the trick is that you’re supposed to hit only one of them with the other being a decoy. Also, in the later parts of the game, there were several levels that I had to try several times to get through, so it does provide some challenge. All in all, this is a nice alternative to Mario if you don’t feel like playing that one for the hundredth time. Thumbs up!

Bugs Bunny's Crazy Castle

System: NES

Cheats Used: None

My sisters and I received an NES for Christmas when I was four years old. Aside from Mario, Crazy Castle was the first videogame I ever played and I must admit, I still have a soft spot for it. The game has a whopping 60 levels and each one is like a puzzle. The enemies move in patterns and the challenge is to memorize these patterns and use them to get through the levels. Each level has a password, but you’re not likely to need them unless you don’t feel like playing through the whole game in one go because with each level you complete you get an extra life, making it nearly impossible to run out.

Some levels are tricky and took me several tries, but most are easy enough that anyone should be able to beat the game without much trouble. What’s interesting about this game is that it was originally based on Roger Rabbit, but someone else had the American videogame rights to that film, so Kemco changed it to Bugs Bunny for its American release. The series would have four sequels on the Game Boy and Game Boy Advance, with the last one featuring Woody Woodpecker in place of Bugs Bunny. I’ve not played the sequels, but the original is great fun and an excellent way to kill a couple of hours.

Transformers: Convoy no Nazo (The Mystery of Convoy)

System: NES

Cheats Used: Invincibility

In this game based on the classic G1 TV series, Optimus Prime has disappeared and, as Ultra Magnus, you must traverse ten levels to rescue him. This game is notorious for its difficulty, and after trying it without cheats, I can see why. You only get three lives to make it through the game and you die if you get hit just once. Also, level nine is a maze similar to the ones in Super Mario Bros., but in this game, rather then looping around, it lets you get all the way to the end of the level before bumping you back to the start if you took the wrong path. In this day and age when cheats are just a Google search away, I honestly wonder how many gamers have made it to the end without them. Still, even so, this is a fun game to play and if you’re a fan of Transformers at all, you owe it to yourself to give it a try.

The Great Maze

System: NES

Cheats Used: None

Now this is a maze game done right! In this first-person game, you have to find all the key fragments before you can exit the maze. You can also find various powerups to help you along (you can play minigames to get some of them). The first level is easy enough to ease you into the game, and then the challenge level rises sharply, with level two being two floors and level three being three floors. To add to the challenge, you only have a limited amount of time to finish the level before you get a game over and have to try again (although you can continue from the beginning of the level). This is what Gals’ Dungeon should have been.

Super Mario Bros.

System: NES

Cheats Used: Infinite lives

Having not played this game in years, I thought it would be the perfect place to start. After all, it is one of the most important games ever made. I don’t think I would be exaggerating by saying that Super Mario Bros. single-handedly saved the videogame industry after the great crash of 1983.

The game is notable for several reasons. First, it cemented the gameplay style of 2D, side-scrolling plat formers, a genre that would be the dominant one for years. Second, it cemented the idea of a “killer app”, that one game you would be willing to buy the system in order to play. Third, by being packed in with the system when you bought it, it cemented the idea that you should expect a free game when you bought the system. This last is something that is still occasionally done (i.e. Wii Sports and the various bundles for the Xbox 360).

What’s amazing is that even after all these years, it is still a fantastically fun game to play. The last four levels are still fiendishly difficult, especially the maze of the final castle. If you tell me you figured it out without looking at a guide, you’re lying. It’s a good thing I had infinite lives, ’cause I’d have never finished otherwise. The final castle alone took me 30 or 40 tries. It didn’t help that I spent most of the game as small Mario. Naturally, I died a lot. But that’s okay because that’s what cheat codes are for.

I realize that “hardcore” gamers are probably laughing at me right now, but ya know what? I don’t care. I play videogames for the fun of it and to me, cheat codes make games more fun because it gives me a chance of actually completing them. I admire someone who’s good enough not to need them, but I’m not that good. Thankfully, more modern games are generally easier, so I don’t use codes on them most of the time, although there can still be some challenge (like the FLUDDless levels in Super Mario Sunshine, which can make you want to break the controller at times). TVTropes doesn’t call it “Nintendo Hard” for nothing, ya know.