An impressive NES game, especially for 1986, but it's been absolutely torn apart by the passage of time. One of the only games I've played that possibly gets consistently worse as time goes on.

It starts off with some promise if you put in the patience, but quickly depletes itself of any enjoyment within two or three stages. It gets horrible near the end and reaches a tipping point when you find out you need to replay the entire game in order to get the actual ending.

It's not bad or hard, it's just boring.

It's actually fun to get used to your jump arc, but the game demands so much from so little that it quickly loses what little steam it had.

A boiler plate experience. I'm sure using an NES zapper would make it more interesting, but I can't imagine it'd be that much more engaging.

It's a port of an arcade game from the mid 80's, of course it's gonna be annoying and have limited continues.

Even though it's full of bullshit and annoying segments, It's not a bad starting point for the series. Most future entries would simply continue to refine and polish the formula that was established here.

Good enough fun. I don't think I'll ever play this for more than half an hour, though.

Perfectly fine puzzle game, I just suck at it.

The worst parts of 1 outweighing the best aspects of 2.

Its simplicity can be both charming and detrimental. That's not to talk about the myriad of technical and balancing issues that comes with being an RPG on the NES.

Revolutionary as it was, I absolutely hate controlling this version of Mario. Give me a weekend afternoon to complete it and I'll shut up about that by World 2, though.

Is it even worth talking about comparisons to Mario 1 since it's just Doki Doki Panic? I don't think so, but it still feels better to play.

An unfortunate casualty of a cryptic NES translation. If they fixed that, added a map, some other QOL stuff, this could easily be a classic.

A charming but terribly short game, perfect as an entry point to anybody looking to get into the NES library.

A huge improvement from the messiness of 3. Felt like the devs were actually paying attention when they made levels this time.

See: Castlevania II notes. Only thing I'd add to that would be to turn the difficulty down a notch (or two)

Probably the best arcade-style experience on the system. Higher entries on the list started as arcade games but feel more at home on the console, while Jackal still feels like a classic arcade game you're just playing on the couch.

The first good Mega Man game, but is still a little rough around the edges when it comes to level design.

I don't even want to say anything critical about this game, more people should play it.

A further polishing of 4. Not much new introduced, but enough was tweaked to make it a slightly better experience. Can be a bit too easy at times, but I'd rather take that than stressful difficulty.

To get the full and best Zelda 1 experience, play while drawing out your own map. Amazing way to increase immersion.

Something I've noticed during my time with the NES library is that the simpler a game's premise is, the better it usually is. Punch-Out is a wonderful example of that, while also keeping things fresh till the end.

Classic Mega Man refined to a razor edge and easily one of the best looking games on the NES. Only downside is that you can't jump out of a slide for some reason.

I find Castlevania's annoying difficulty more rewarding to overcome than most Mega Man games.

The archetypal Kirby game, for better or worse. That still means it's one of the most mechanically sound and polished NES games.

I'm not gonna say its the closest thing to a perfect game that exists. It's still great, though.

An insane bounce back from Castlevania II with some of the best music and visuals the NES could muster. Play the Japanese version if you want to maintain your sanity.

Classic 2D Mario at its functional peak. World might have it beat in terms of character, but I always find this game more satisfying to play.