Nintendo World Championships: NES Edition is a nifty little title that fills a specific but enjoyable niche. Though there isn’t an enormous amount of content for a more casual player, hardcore NES fans and leaderboard-climbers will have an excellent time with Nintendo World Championships.
Credit: Nintendo
Nintendo World Championships: NES Edition
Developer: Nintendo EPD & indieszero
Price: $40
Platforms: Nintendo Switch (reviewed)
MonsterVine was provided with a Switch code for review
Given I was born in 1996, I wasn’t actually alive when the original Nintendo World Championships took place in 1990. Still, the concept of performing certain feats in classic Nintendo titles is a timelessly appealing one, so I was interested in checking out Nintendo World Championships: NES Edition. It’s exactly what it says it is, which means this game is a dream come true for hardcore players and a short but neat experience for the more casual.
There’s a solid variety of NES games from which the many challenges of Nintendo World Championships are made. Alongside obvious picks like Super Mario Bros. and Kirby’s Adventure, titles like Ice Climbers and Balloon Fighter are represented with creative and exciting tasks. I think it would have been fun to include a couple of creative tasks with Nintendo’s NES RPGs like Mother or Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon and the Blade of Light, but what’s here is still impressive enough.
Credit: Nintendo
The way these tasks are laid out in the main Speedrun Mode makes it easy to switch between all of the different games and tasks so that you tire of each aesthetic less quickly and can take on any subsequent challenge at will. Beating your own personal best times can be a lot of fun, but online is where this game truly shines.
“You can try as many times as you want to improve your time, creating an exciting and replayable mode that promotes fierce competition.“
Additionally, I do wish there was a one-button way to restart a challenge in Speedrun mode. Granted, it only takes a couple of button presses to quit and restart if you’ve botched one, but given the whole game is based on speed and reflexes, it’d be ideal to have a near-instantaneous way to reset when desired.
Credit: Nintendo
The two online modes of Nintendo World Championships: NES Edition are a blast, as they provide the main hook of competing in a championship against others. The World Championship mode tasks you with achieving the best times you can on a pre-selected number of stages from Speedrun mode. People from around the world can all participate in this same gauntlet during its limited time, after which the top percentage of players are rewarded. You can try as many times as you want to improve your time, creating an exciting and replayable mode that promotes fierce competition.
Then there’s Survival mode. In a manner akin to Nintendo’s Super Mario Bros. 35 or Arika’s Tetris 99, you perform select objectives in real-time alongside several other players, with everyone’s screens being lined up together. As the rounds go on, more and more people are eliminated until only one winner remains. This was one of my favorite parts of Nintendo World Championships: NES Edition, as it’s the most blood-pumping mode that feels remarkably rewarding to win as well as quick and easy to jump back into upon losing.
Credit: Nintendo
It’s worth noting that there’s not a ton of content if online competition isn’t your thing. You can potentially clear most or all of the challenges with an A-rank or higher within five to ten hours, with your only non-online incentives to play further being beating your times and unlocking more player icons. Given it’s not a full-price game, this isn’t really a dealbreaker, but those who prefer to play games by themselves or who don’t especially care for leaderboards likely won’t get as many hours out of this one as others.
The Final Word
Nintendo World Championships: NES Edition will heavily appeal to a specific group of players, but it’s a very enjoyable title for the unique experience it provides. Casual players will likely not find as much to do here, but those who are raring to clash with others in iconic NES games are in for a treat.
MonsterVine Rating: 4 out of 5 – Good
