Nothing makes me happier than getting an order of old NES games from Missouri, especially when many of them are complete in the box. Growing up with the NES, this brings back so much nostalgia. It’s such a fun order, and I get to test every single game.
The Table of Contents
My Top Picks from This Order
This order includes some of my favorite games.
Burger Time: I never owned this one as a kid. But if you grew up in the Midwest, there was a restaurant called Maid-Rite. It was an inexpensive place to grab food when I was young, and besides their famous loose meat sandwich, they had an arcade cabinet of Burger Time. Waiting for food was never a bad thing when I could pump quarters into that machine.
Double Dragon II is another one that jumps out at me. The first Double Dragon on the NES was a disappointment — it wasn't a two-player game like the arcade version. Double Dragon II was the first time the NES
finally got two-player right, which is exactly why this title sticks in my memory.
Friday the 13th: I never did beat this game. It was always a random rental pick for me. I was a big fan of the Friday the 13th movies as a kid, so playing the game was a natural choice. Marble Madness was another popular rental back then. Not an overly hard game once you figure out how to control your marble.
My wife was a big fan of Kid Icarus. I actually never played it until after I opened this business. She spotted it one day and told me all about her hidden love for that title. That was news to me.
Complete in the Box — And Then Some
These games came in complete in their original boxes. Well, most of them are complete a few are missing their manuals. But for boxed games this old, the condition is wonderful.
The rarest game in this order is Bonk's Adventure, which ranks as the 6th rarest officially licensed NES game on our list. Not something you see walk through the door every day.
And then there's Arkanoid, complete with the Vaus controller. That's the part that really got me. I can probably count on one hand the number of times I've received that controller over the last 10 years.
Arkanoid always reminded me of Breakout on the Atari 2600, and that controller makes moving around in the game so much easier than a standard d-pad. Getting a complete copy with the controller is a genuine find.
Here are all the boxed titles from this order:
- Arkanoid (with Vaus Controller)
- Bionic Commando
- Blaster Master
- Bonk's Adventure
- Burgertime
- Castlevania III: Dracula's Curse
- Cobra Triangle
- Contra
- Donkey Kong 3
- Double Dragon II: The Revenge
- Final Fantasy
- Friday the 13th
- Hogan's Alley
- Kid Icarus
- Life Force
Major League Baseball- Marble Madness
- Metal Gear
- River City Ransom
- Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Arcade Game
- Tennis
- The Legend of Zelda
- Ultima: Exodus
- Zelda II: The Adventure of Link
The Loose Cartridges
A few games came in as cartridge only, which is perfectly fine. At The Old School Game Vault, our pricing reflects loose cartridge condition for games like these.
I was never a big fan of anything past the original Donkey Kong. I was pretty good on the ColecoVision version back in the day, but 2 and 3 never grabbed me the same way. Mega Man 2 is the highlight loose cart here. When we tested this order, I tried to get through Quick Man's stage, and that wasn't pretty. I completely forgot how to survive that level.
Life Force came in loose as well. It's a solid NES shmup just never my personal favorite of the genre.
Loose cart titles from this order:
- Bubble Bobble
- Ninja Gaiden II: The Dark Sword of Chaos
- Life Force
- Mega Man 2
We buy old NES games just like these, boxed or loose. If you have a collection sitting in a closet, we'd love to take a look.
