The A to Z of Crappy NES Games: A

Back in the 8-bit era, Nintendo prided themselves on the quality of games they allowed to be released for their console (in America, anyway), making sure to place the "Official Nintendo Seal of Quality" stamp on all boxes, and only allowing third-party developers a set number of releases per year. That's great in theory, but turned out to be somewhat of an empty gesture, because there was no lack of poor games during its lifespan.

This isn't intended to be a definitive list of all terrible NES games; instead, this is more of a sample platter of some of the dreck that slipped through Nintendo's approval process.

A

Amagon





Amagon is perhaps a strange choice for this list, because unlike others, this one is actually playable. Somewhat. What makes it noteworthy though is just the bizarre concept behind it and some strange gameplay choices.

One of the truly unique things about the 8-bit era is that I think some games were made simply because someone thought of a cool name. Amagon's Japanese title translates to, apparently, "Suddenly! Machoman," which sounds like an in-joke gone horribly wrong.



Despite looking like a ten year old, Amagon is apparently, according to the game's manual, "the most decorated Marine," who "was assigned a mission by his commander to investigate a strange, monster-infested South Pacific island, from which no man had ever returned alive." Whoever this guy's commander was had a hell of a sense of humor. Apparently he was also sent "with a machine gun as his only weapon," and "took off by plane and crash-landed on the island's beachhead."

This "most decorated Marine" sound like a hell of a screwup.



Here's where the game's real conceit comes in- the fabled "Suddenly! Machoman." After collecting an icon from some fallen jungle creature, pressing the select button allows you to become a hulking "Megagon" (their word, not mine) who forgets how to use the machine gun and can only throw uppercuts and energy blasts from his chest.

The game looks decent enough, but Amagon jumps all screwy and his bullets have laughably short range and limited ammo to boot, leading to clumsy deaths at inopportune times. Apparently there's aliens and dinosaurs at later levels but I never made it that far.

http://www.atarihq.com/tsr/manuals/amagon.txt
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amagon

The Adventures of Bayou Billy





A cool game in concept, Bayou Billy was a multiple-format action game that involved Double Dragon-style beat-em-up sections, third person driving sections, and even levels that let you use the NES' Zapper.



I wish I could tell you more about the game but even back when the game was new my friends and I could only make it to level 4 (of 9) before losing. When I started up the game today to take screenshots, I spent half an hour failing to beat the first level. This game is legendarily fucking hard.



Bayou Billy did teach me one really important thing, however. If you're ever really hungry, if your life bar is reaching its end, all you have to do is punch some rednecks and alligators and eventually one of them will drop a fully cooked chicken or two. Also that Konami had some serious issues in the 80s with difficulty levels. And commercials.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bayou_Billy