The first in the long line of the popular Castlevania series. It wowed people on arrival with its first rate horror atmosphere, excellent presentation, and memorable music. The game play whilst occasionally frustrating (damn you medusa heads!) is very fun, unique and addictive.

Capcom with yet another quality Disney release. Though the game play of this platformer is far from unique, Capcom bring the high quality of polish to the game that they are known for, with many of the aspects of game play honed to perfection.

When I was a kid, in my eyes this was as good as sports games could get, humiliate your friends by scoring loads, then beat the hell outta' their players just to rub it in! The game play is fast and responsive and you feel that important level of control needed for a good sports game experience.

Anyone who wants a fast action packed challenge on NES need look no further than this. The game play is excellent, and very rewarding, mainly due to the versatile move set which, when mastered, allows you to cling to walls and climb with ease. also of note is how Ninja Gaiden increased the bar where video game presentation is concerned, with it's in depth storyline and and high quality for the time cut scenes.

A clever NES puzzle game which is a little bit reminiscent of the Adventures of Lolo series, here you can turn the enemies into blocks of ice and then push them around to form bridges with the aim to collect all of the "dream bags" in the stage.

What more can you ask of a good shoot-em-up other than fast, fluid controls, lots of action, impressive visuals and great power-ups? all of these things Gun Nac manages to deliver in spades.

Shatterhand is a great action game which is not only very well designed, but has some really well done art direction, a cool and unique (and corny) premise, and a clever mix and match power-up system which is interesting and adds some more depth.

Here we have yet another classic game from Natsume, though unlike their previously mentioned Shatterhand, its much easier here to see where Natsume were taking their inspiration from in this obvious Ninja Gaiden derivative. I'd imagine its "shameless clone" labeling is most likely one of the main reasons why many people dismiss it without giving it a proper chance, it's a very fun, fast, fluid, action packed game with a very impressive soundtrack, and an all important two player co-operative feature. All good reasons why it deserves to be on this list.

Rygar is an open world adventure game similar to games such as Faxanadu, and Metroid, its a very good game but has one big fault many of its peers lacked, namely no kind of save feature, a feature that a game of this scope very much needs.

On release this was one of the stand out puzzle games on the C64, the game starts off simple, with you just needing to collect the gems in each level without getting crushed, but quickly expands its core idea to include a big emphasis on leading the monsters contained in the stages into traps to bury them under falling rocks. Commendably, for the NES port this classic has had a complete graphics overhaul which looks absolutely fantastic.

Amazingly for a game reportedly created by one person alone, Super Turrican contains some of the most impressive use of the NES out there, great graphics and music, and impressive boss fights abound. Unlike the SNES game of the same name, this Super Turrican is less of an original game, and more of a remix of the original home computer title, with some elements included from Turrican 2 (such as unlimited gyroscope). Unfortunately many of the levels are very cut down here, some bosses are missing, and most lamentably losing a life gets you put back to the start of a level. However the multiple excellent additions such as a run feature, and new rapid fire gun, coupled with the now simpler, more linear level designs, help to create a faster, more action packed experience that feels very different, but equally excellent to the original.

This was the beginning of Capcom's insane quest to bring out as many Mega Man games as possible on NES in as short amount of time as they could. A more ambitious game than it's predecessors it contained some very notable additions such as the new excellent and useful skid move added to the controls, as well as more effort put into a storyline with new characters such as Proto Man and Rush making their first ever appearances.

Has to be one of the more original concepts for a platform game from the period. This sequel to Bubble Bobble (not that you'd be able to tell its a sequel from the game play or style) has you creating rainbows which can be used to climb upwards of kill the enemies. Very Unique

Another great game in the Gradius series this time with bigger set-pieces and more ambitious level designs than before. After careful thought I've decided to place this one lower than Life Force, as I feel that the lack of the 2-player co-op, coupled with some slightly more frustrating level designs makes this just slightly the weaker of these two classics games.

It may not be a real Mario game (this was actually a redesigned unrelated game originally) but it's still a pretty fun, solid platformer, and it sure as hell beats having this instead of the real Super Mario Bros 2 released in Japan (which sucked) it does lack that certain Mario feel though.

Faxanadu is a platforming adventure game which is an offshoot of the Xanadu series (the title being a combination of Famicom and Xanadu) its very well put together and has a pretty nice and unique style of its own created by its earthy colour use.

Archon is a pretty difficult game to explain, its kind of like a cross between Chess and top down shooters, having you move your pieces around a board in a chess style, but taking full control when a battle occurs. It shouldn't really work, but somehow really does perfectly.

Definitely has to be the premier traditional into-the-screen racing game on the NES, it scales and moves pretty smoothly, the illusion of speed is there and the music in the game is also first rate.

Don't let the slightly iffy graphics dissuade you from trying this game, this is one of the pinnacle platform-shooters on the NES, it has the fantastic game play mechanic of allowing you to switch between standing on the ceiling or floor, and all the levels are very cleverly designed to capitalize on this feature, for instance you'll find spike hazards only passable by traveling on the ceiling, and boss fights where the only way to dodge the enemy is to switch back and forth between ground and ceiling.

Another great game from Sunsoft, one of the most underrated of the classic NES developers. Batman feels a little similar to Ninja Gaiden at first, but when it gets going it really starts to stand-out and differentiate itself. Its wall jump move forms the basis of the level design, having you often carefully bouncing back and forth through the levels.