Gimmick!

This game is kind of amazing. The player handling is slippery and the stage designs are shockingly difficult for what looks like a simple, easy-going game in screenshots.

It's not just a torturous gauntlet, though. The development team inserted all kinds of little details and signs of life that have nothing whatsoever to do with the player's job. Every little asshole design choice is offset by something charming. The stock enemies have rudimentary AI that allows them to hop over chasms and chase you across blocky terrain. My favourite detail so far: the little dog-like NPC at the beginning of the sixth level.

Compare with Kirby's Adventure, another cutesy, late-era NES game, which has a gigantic number of stages and powerups -- several times more than Gimmick. Yet Gimmick feels livelier. Seriously, this might be the best NES game I've ever played.

I recently beat level five's boss. Level six's intro is great... and then I died at the platforming sections further in. I haven't been able to get past boss five since.

BUCKY O'HARE
screenshot

I was tricked by the first levels into thinking that this would be about shooting dudes. It's really all about the instant death traps. I appreciated the high frequency of these traps, but they're almost all unrelated to each other -- mastering one trap won't help you in the next one. Konami provided infinite continues and frequent checkpoints not because they were feeling generous, but because it would be almost impossible to make progress without them.

The final stage is really sinister. You're escaping from a self-destructing fortress, and desperate toads on the ground jump and hang onto your ship, hoping to escape with you. These freeloaders weigh down your ship and impair maneuverability, so you have to crush them into the walls to regain full control. Holy shit, Konami!

JOURNEY TO SILIUS
screenshot

Run-and-gun. Some input glitches make gameplay more aggravating than it needs to be: the turning around and kneeling animations stop the jump command from working -- only for a tiny moment, but it's enough to mess up.

Fast enemy shots are everywhere, and you have a very small window of opportunity to dodge them. In some cases, you have to shoot at enemies before they've even appeared on the screen, or dodge traps you can't yet see during a long fall.

You're frozen in place after you defeat a boss, and any stray bullet can kill you before the level transition is finished. AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRGH

I'm surprised that some people consider it a lost classic.

MOON CRYSTAL (Famicom)

Sort of a hybrid of Prince of Persia and the average NES/Famicom platformer. Animation is (relatively) fluid, and most actions, like turning and attacking, have a delay built into them. But when you jump, everything is instant and snappy!

The bosses can be fought in two different ways: rush in with full health and stabstabstab, or try to fight them as the designers (might have) intended. To do the latter, you have to be very quick, and learn how to bypass the Prince of Persia delays. It's awful but very funny at the same time.

A BOY AND HIS BLOB

METAL STORM
screenshot

Only played a few minutes, but holy cow. Fingers crossed that it stays excellent in the later stages.

ADVENTURE ISLAND (Wonder Boy variant)
screenshot

After dying a few times in the third stage, I decided I like this one.