Ten Oddball Nintendo Franchises
Posted by J. Matthew Zoss at 12:07 PM Feb 08, 2010
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No video game company is as successful as Nintendo at creating memorable gaming franchises. Nintendo's cornerstone franchises are bigger than just games - even people who've never played a video game in their lives know the names Mario, Zelda, Donkey Kong and Wii Sports.But not every franchise that Nintendo has published has become a household name. Many were successful enough, but simply didn't have the magic to keep going. Others may have been too strange to find an audience. These ten games and franchises are some of Nintendo's lesser-know titles, all games that aren't likely to ever see another sequel. Each entry on this list was published by Nintendo in the US and appear in roughly chronological order.
To The Earth (NES)
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A Nintendo Zapper light gun game, To The Earth has you flying through space and shooting down enemy ships, asteroids and other hazards as you make your way back to Earth. Considered one of the hardest Zapper games, its difficulty may have been why it didn't take off. But just look at those graphics!
Barker Bill's Trick Shooting (NES)
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Another Zapper game, Barker Bill's Trick Shooting was a strange property for Nintendo. Based on one the first network cartoon shows ever, Barker Bill's Trick Shooting had four different game modes: Balloon Saloon, Flying Saucers, Window Panes and Fun Follies. I think I know why this one didn't take off: Released in 1990, this game is based a cartoon from 1952.
Battle Clash (SNES)
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This is the final Zapper game on the list, I promise. Battle Clash was actually for the Zapper's SNES replacement, the Super Scope 6. Battle Clash was pretty standard from a gameplay perspective - you shot giant robots, and it did well enough to get a sequel called Metal Combat: Falcon's Revenge. A couple things make this a goofy game in my mind. First, the robots are battling in a competition called "Battle Game" to become the leader of the world. That's how we should choose political leaders! Second, in Japan this game was called Space Bazooka. Awesome.
Uniracers
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It's a unicycle racing game. Need I say more? How about this? The developer of this game, DMA Design, now goes by a different name: Rockstar North. Yes, this is a unicycle racing game from the team that brings you the Grand Theft Auto games.
NBA Courtside (N64/GameCube)
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There's nothing particularly strange about any of the three NBA Courtside games themselves. Featuring Kobe Bryant, these titles were completely competent 5-on-5 basketball titles. They're much more strange in retrospect. There was a time when Nintendo made straight up basketball games with licensed players, going head to head with publishers like EA and 2K Sports. I think it's a safe bet to say that we won't see any more sports games from Nintendo that don't star Mario or Miis.
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Comments
I can honestly say i have never played any of these games.
Posted 02/08/2010 at 04:19:09 PMUniracers is an awesome game.
Posted 02/08/2010 at 07:10:40 PMI played and loved both Custom Robo and Geist. Might have been because I was ten, but I seriously loved Geist.
Posted 02/08/2010 at 07:28:17 PMAnd Custom Robo actually had 2 games make it to the US I believe, one on the Gamecube, the other on the DS (Custom Robo Arena)
I've played several of these. Doshin the Giant would be another one as well as Telero Boxer for Virtual boy... in fact anything for virtual boy.
Posted 02/08/2010 at 07:37:16 PMWhat about Killer 7? Definitely the strangest game I've ever played, which is why I love it so.
Posted 02/08/2010 at 07:41:09 PMStartropics came to mind when "Oddball Nintendo Games" showed up as the title, and i'm disappointed it didn't make the cut. It's like Zelda designed for American kids, and the whole thing is just littered with references to other Nintendo games. For example, if you beat the first one, you'll find out that the thing you were trying to save the entire game were Tetrominoes.
Posted 02/08/2010 at 08:00:31 PM@Karl. Doshin The Giant definitely would have made the list if I was including non-US games. And Virtual Boy just seemed too easy!
@Skamando. Killer 7 is indeed weird, but was published by Capcom, not Nintendo.
Posted 02/08/2010 at 08:02:17 PMThe SNES light gun was simply called the "Super Scope". The game packaged with it was "Super Scope 6" due to the six mini games on the cart.
Posted 02/08/2010 at 08:12:58 PMUNIRACERS was AWESOME! I PLAYED THE HELL OUT OF IT ON SNES!
Posted 02/08/2010 at 08:44:13 PMIs it a good thing that I never played any of those games?
Posted 02/08/2010 at 09:28:05 PMUniracers was awesome i agree, it was one of the better SNES games.
Posted 02/08/2010 at 09:48:59 PMThis is a pretty good list. I've played DDR Mario Mix once, played Custom Robo a lot, and own Odama, which I don't have the microphone for because I didn't know it needed one.
I would definitely not call Custom Robo oddball. It's a really good RPG style game. It works that you go around and you follow a story while you have robot fights in arenas. The cool part is that there are a TON of items to customize your robot with.
I have to say that Custom Robo has nothing to do with Pokemon. There's no resemblance to it in any way, other than the fact that they're both RPGs.
Posted 02/08/2010 at 10:33:17 PMI had completely forgotten Uniracers. I need to find and replay it now.
Posted 02/08/2010 at 10:39:23 PMyou can tell rockstar made uniracers - some disgruntled programmer inserted about 3 dozen curse words into the code. don't believe me? go to any rom site, crack open the rom file, and search for common curse words.
rockstar: making even unicycles filthy.
Posted 02/08/2010 at 11:01:27 PMUniracers is amazing
Posted 02/09/2010 at 12:05:49 AMYeah all these games are pretty cool! I've played most of them. Believe it or not, you can play them online in your browser at this NES ROMs Section. It uses a Java emulator and works pretty well on modern computers.
Posted 02/09/2010 at 01:41:17 AMUniracers was an awesome game. It is odd being it is the only one of it's type. I still have that game and played it last year some time. I have to setup my SNES.
Posted 02/10/2010 at 05:31:41 AMIt's been a while since I fired up my NES. I was a big fan of Mike Tyson's Punch Out and Zelda!
We just wrote a post on the history of a few gaming console logos: http://www.mycorporatelogo.com/blog/2010/03/gaming-console-logos/. Check it out.
Posted 03/03/2010 at 05:11:29 PMThe only game I ever owned out of the bunch was "To the Earth" for the NES and yes it was difficult. Never mind playing it properly, it was a challenge even if you put the lightgun up to the TV and played that way. The reason being that objects flew at very high speeds making them hard to hit. They also did a LOT of damage in later levels.
Posted 03/08/2010 at 03:14:20 AM