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NES Recap: The Best of 1985-87 (Patreon)

Published:
2025-03-20 14:30:21
Imported:
2026-06
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Content

Don't look at the tags for this episode, you'll spoil the countdown for yourself.

Yes, in order to bring NES Works and Segaiden into parity, I have created... a top 10 countdown. This one focuses on the NES library from 1985-87. I had intended to make this a recap of the entire NES library from 1985 through "peak NES" (August 1989), but there is just no way to give credit to all the greats in the library for that period with a mere top 10 countdown. And a top 20 would be verging on an hour in length. Who has time for that! I don't!

The audio in this episode sounds a little clipped—I think some settings on my mixing board got jostled when I was organizing my office space. I'll be sure to correct that before recording the next episode. Alas!!

Files

Previews only

The Best of NES 1985-87: NES Works Recap No. 1

While the NES Works series waits for those slackers at Sega to catch up to August 1989 and get on with the business of launching the 16-bit generation, this seems like as good a time as ever to revisit what has come before and ask, "What are the best games to have appeared on the console to date?" Like we did with Master System. Except that NES had a LOT more games than Master System, so I'm splitting this best-of into reasonable chunks... in this case, by year. For the first recap, we look back 40 years to the NES launch era and the first two years of releases to follow, selecting the 10(-ish) best games on the console for that period. The no. 1 pick isn't Super Mario Bros., by the way, despite the thumbnail for this episode. I just love the Japanese box illustration. It's so good! Look at that l'il guy go. Production notes: Video Works is funded via Patreon (http://www.patreon.com/gamespite) — support the show and get access to every episode up to two weeks in advance of its YouTube debut! Plus, exclusive podcasts, eBooks, and more! Why watch when you can read? Check out the massive hardcover print editions of NES Works, Super NES Works, and Virtual Boy works, available now at Limited Run Games (https://limitedrungames.com/collections/books)! SG-1000 Works: Segaiden Vol. I is available NOW. NES footage captured from Analogue Nt Mini. Video upscaled to 4K with RetroTink 4X and 720p with xRGB Mini Framemeister.

Comments

Raftronaut

I love that Balloon Fight landed on this list 🎈

ackattack

From 3:36 to 3:47 there's some tiny gameplay footage. Otherwise, nice video as always.

Blur2040

You telling me not to look at the tags made me look at the tags!

Kevin Quillen

Was young but so fortunate to live through this era, not just for the NES, but the experience of going to the local video rental mom n pop and seeing a wall of NES box art. Picking ones that seemed cool from the art, others that I had seen in Nintendo Power. I cherish the memory of those days. But if theres a lot of argument on Rygar, I would place Wizards and Warriors over that, personally. Rygar was perhaps too ambitious at the time without great direction for the player as to what to do or where to go. At least thats how I remembered it as a kid.

Beefington von Barnstorm

15:59 "Castlevania demands you learn the cadences of gameplay, timing your actions to deliver damage..." is delivered twice

Marcus Trapp

I love that Super Pitfall is shown as 1987's representative at the beginning. It's never not funny to bag on that game.