NES

Ghosts 'N Goblins

Let's face it, Ghosts and Goblins defies criticism. Not only is it fun and addicting, but it's spawned many fine sequels, including Maximo for the PS2. You play as an armored knight that can fire projectiles forward, backward, and straight up. Zombies and other creatures pour out of the woodwork as you forge through varied stages that include a graveyard, a burning village, mountains, and caverns. This is pure side-scrolling fun. The graphics provide plenty of variety, and the excellent background music plays a heroic refrain (much like the Genesis version). If there's one obvious complaint, that is that the game is too freakin' hard! The stages are short and you get unlimited continues, but it's still extremely difficult to make progress.

A great piece of NES history and a great early effort by the boys at Capcom. The game was ported from the arcade and would later spawn a sequel, Ghouls 'n' Ghosts for the Sega Genesis and the SNES version, Super Ghouls 'n' Ghosts which would later see a release on the Game Boy Advance. A wicked game which despite the immense difficulty and other distractions, plays out to be a nice game to test out whether or not your one of the best NES gamers.