When Fabio was still relevant, he used to appear on video game covers

There was once a time when all a game needed to be successful was a catchy name, and Fabio on the front cover. Ok, so it wasn't until Wizards & Warriors II until Fabio was introduced, but still. FABIO! Developed by Rare and published by Acclaim, the game is an action platformer in which the player takes control of Kuros the knight.

Who wants to touch my Life Force?

Life Force is actually an NES port of arcade game Salamander, which is a spin off to Gradius. A side-scrolling shooter with power ups,  Life Force was my first look at what is known as the bullet-hell shooter genre. Playable in 2-player, the game is one heck of a time with a friend.

Was Ninja Gaiden hard, or am I just really bad at games?

There's no denying that video games of the late 80s and early 90s on the whole were much more difficult than they are today. It may just be because I was young at the time, or maybe I'm just bad at games, but there are titles in my NES library that I STILL haven't beaten. Not because I haven't had time to beat them, but because I can't beat them. They are just too hard....too hard without a Game Genie. Ninja  Gaiden is one of those games.

Gargoyle's Quest II: a game about shooting fireballs and sticking to walls

One of the last game I ever played on my NES was Gargoyle's Quest II after acquiring it from a local pawn shop. While the game doesn't do anything remarkably groundbreaking, on the surface it is a basic get from point A to point B platformer, it does contain fun RPG elements that will keep you coming back for more.

Double Dragon isn't just the Chinese restaurant down the road, it was once a fantastic video game series!

When beat 'em ups were king, there weren't many better out there than Double Dragon. A good beat 'em up was akin to what the first person shooter genre is today. There really isn't anything like a good couch co-op game, and one of the best in the business was most certainly Double Dragon. The games were so popular, they even spawned a live action movie!

Hate to break it to you, but Metal Gear didn't originate with Sony OR Nintendo

Fact. The  Metal Gear series did not start on the Playstation. In truth, the game didn't start on a Nintendo console either, it actually was first released for the MSX2 computer that was popular in Japan and parts of Europe. The NES version of the game was drastically different from the MSX2 original, and actually wasn't developed by Hideo Kojima at all. Kojima has been very outspoken about his disappointment in the title, and even goes as far as saying that the care that he put in the original title just wasn't present in the NES version.

How tough were games in the late 80's? Well, how many NES controllers did I manage to break...hmmm

Aside from Nintendo, Capcom was really the bell of the ball in the 8-bit era. Just look at the franchises they brought to the table in the 80's and early 90's. You have Mega Man, Ghosts'n Goblins, Bionic Commando, and a little game not many have heard of, Section Z. If you haven't heard of Section Z, you're missing out. It was, and still is, a pretty great side-scrolling space shoot-'em-up that was originally released as an arcade coin-op, and was later ported to the NES.

On the NES there was no Call of Duty, there was Heavy Barrel

One of my absolute favorite co-op experiences to be found on the NES would have to be Heavy Barrel developed by the late Data East. The game is actually an arcade port of a game of the same name, and it is addicting as all get out. Basic premise: you're a red dude. If you have an extra controller and a friend, they are the blue dude. Red dude and blue dude team up to kill all the grey dudes. As it should be.

Remember when there weren't 25 million Mega Man titles and the series was actually good?

Capcom and Nintendo. The two video game giants have had a long relationship, starting way back on the NES. One of, if not the most popular game franchise on the NES for Capcom was the Mega Man line of games, and no Mega Man title is more special to me than Mega Man II. If forced to play the game with   a blindfold on with only my toes, I could probably beat at least three of the robot masters, not joke. As I've stated before, the only other game on the NES that I have put more time into would be Castlevania, so I know both games like the back of my hand.

Don't judge me. I've never exactly beaten Legacy of the Wizard, but it still was one heck of ride.

Legacy of the Wizard is unfortunately one of those games that I never got around to beating (read: too hard so I never picked it back up). That doesn't discount the fact that the game has a lot going on for it. First of all, the game was one of the first of it's kind in that it was a non-linear and completely open world.  This was pretty unprecedented for the time, even though in today's post GTA world that's nothing new. Each playable character had different attributes such as Lyll jumping ability and Xemn being the character with the highest attack power. Remember password systems? Yeah, Legacy of the Wizard had one of those.

Man, I really wish I could play Castlevania for the first time again

My first experience with Castlevania was actually in my daycare before I even reached grade school. La Petite Academy, the good old days. In retrospect, it probably wasn't a good idea to let a bunch of four and five year olds play a game such as Castlevania, but hey, it actually helped me become the gamer I am today. After all, it was after playing the NES for hours on end at daycare that made me beg my parents to get me a console that year for Christmas.

Startropics is probably one Nintendo franchise that you have never heard of

I don't know of many games that have you soaking the manual (or at least an included letter found in it) in water to continue on in the game, but out of all of them that I know of (which is only one, incidentally), Startropics is the best. Nintendo doesn't release many games like Startropics any more nowadays. Puzzles, fun story, interesting characters...Startropics has it all. When the game was re-released on the Virtual Console, I jumped all over it because there really hasn't been an experience like it from Nintendo since.

Man, that "Final" Fantasy sure doesn't look to have a finale anytime soon, does it?

The legend of Final Fantasy goes like this: Square was in financial trouble at the time of the games release in 1987, and had the game not sold well, the company would have been forced to declare bankruptcy. In truth, Hironobu Sakaguchi tells the tale a little differently.

The name ‘Final Fantasy’ was a display of my feeling that if this didn’t sell, I was going to quit the games industry and go back to university. I’d have had to repeat a year, so I wouldn’t have had any friends – it really was a ‘final’ situation.”

Nintentunes: Micky Mouse Club Edition

Back in my day, when we had to walk to school in the snow up hill BOTH WAYS, licensed games used to be good. Not like this game is actually playable good, but I want to play this game until I master it good. This is especially true when it comes to Disney properties of the late 80's/ early 90's, and this is majorly because Capcom had their hands in the creation of the games.