It’s hard to get excited for most black box NES games. The majority of them were made before Nintendo hit its creative stride with games like Mario, Zelda and Metroid. The concept of these games may be as simple as Baseball, Golf or Pin Ball, but it’s impressive how well they’ve held up over the years. In the case of Excitebike, it has quite a bit of depth
At face value, it is a simple side-scrolling racing game. You avoid obstacles and other racers by moving up and down on the track. Pressing B activates a boost that, if used too much, can overheat your engine.
Frequently, there are ramps and hills you have to jump off of. This is where Excitebike shines. Jumping off one of these ramps pivots your bike backwards. You can land at this angle, but you’ll see a drop in your momentum when you hit the dirt again. Leveling your bike off with the ground will let you maintain your speed. It’s a basic mechanic that goes a long way as you’ll have to tilt your bike to land on slanted terrain or raise the front wheel to drive over bumps without falling over.
It’s impressive how much a small control option can change the entire game, but it’s not worth going out of your way to check out. If you do happen to have a copy laying around and feel some strange desire to put it in, it’s not a total waste of time. Just don’t expect much.
(Header Image Source: Nathan Altice)
