NintendoLegend.com’s Five Fine NES Series Reminder: The following choices are in no particular order, and do not reflect a “best of” list, but merely a summarized list of examples per category on the Nintendo Entertainment System. In this case, Five Fine NES Genre-Bending Games.
Genre distinctions are an important aspect of video games, for many reasons diverse and intangible: A varied offering enables fans of different gaming personalities to consistently find titles they enjoy, firm separations allow a more cohesive conversation to emerge among fans of the segment, and reviewers are given a more robust context through which to judge different selections against each other, among other reasoning. This was even true for the 8-bit Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) console, but such categorical segregation could be difficult at times, considering the genre-twisting examples below.
The Guardian Legend
Imagine Crystalis and Gradius put together. That is the easiest way to try and describe how seamlessly Guardian Legend blends two genres, yet does not do it justice. This is a video game that has overhead adventure portions, but also has shoot-‘em-up gameplay stages – not a meld of the two, but two entirely separate branches of mechanics, each that likely could have self-sufficiently been developed into its own cartridge. This must have been an amazing game to rent, back in the pre-Internet days of little information and missing instructional manuals: Shooter fans would have been pumped to be dropped into a cockpit right away, only to later embark on an epic sword-swingin’ quest; meanwhile, many other games may have tragically stopped playing this game prematurely if they disliked or could not get past the initial shmup level. What an amazing hybrid.
Metal Gear
The Metal Gear franchise would later blossom into a blockbuster, and even in 64 bits or more be among the pioneering names to encourage an emphasis on stealth in gameplay. Fewer games did so in the 8-bit console era, with notable exceptions such as Rescue: The Embassy Mission being few and far between. On the NES, Metal Gear was a title that featured a soldier protagonist, yet often trying to sneak around rather than mindlessly blast everything in sight; the view was a bird’s-eye overhead perspective, with screen-by-screen exploration, yet was decidedly not an “adventure” cart; and any attempt to just generically categorize Metal Gear as an “action” video game is just shallow, shortsighted, and unfair to its deeper legacy.
Solomon’s Key
When gamers hear the term “platformer,” it is almost inevitable that such classics as Super Mario Bros. and Sonic the Hedgehog will spring to mind, or perhaps even the legendary run-‘n’-gun variants like Contra and Mega Man. A protagonist character running back and forth on the screen, jumping onto different platforms, defeating enemies and dodging hazards? That description would sound like a definitive platformer, but then when said game is 50 levels long, features block manipulation, and requires the player to mentally develop strategies to solve on-screen challenges, the dividing line between “platformer” and “puzzler” grows murky and blurry.
Rampage
Quick: What genre does Rampage belong to? This is a classic arcade port, a game that made its way onto several consoles, and sporting iconic imagery that is still quite recognizable. Yet it is not quite a beat-‘em-up, not quite a puzzle game, and arguably not quite a true platformer either. Players control a monster who systematically must destroy all buildings on the screen in order to advance. Sometimes, such high-score titles are dismissed as in the rather broad “arcade game” genre, but Rampage would seem to be a bit more of a fleshed-out title that deserves better designation. Even if one is content to call it “platformer,” fans of that genre would likely frown and raise their eyebrows at such labeling. Perhaps tellingly, GameFAQs currently labels the NES iteration in the “General” subcategory under “Action.” How specific of them, eh?
Legend of Zelda
Over 25 years later, gamers still argue as to whether this qualifies as a role-playing game. Need I say more? Not really, but it is truly a testament to this title’s uniqueness and landmark status that in a quarter-century many attempts to categorize it left people disappointed. Even though earlier games, such as the aptly named Adventure cartridge for Atari 2600, were earlier examples of overhead adventure game genre, Legend of Zelda is often held up as the flagship title that made such other examples like Crystalis possible. By the way, the RPG label does not work here, just so you know.
Honorable mentions – Taboo: The Sixth Sense, Toobin’, Battletoads & Double Dragon, Sunday Funday, Legend of Zelda: The Adventures of Link.