This Old Neon Forum

Welcome to the #BGE2020 Elimination Round of 512!

Each game is seeded based on its performance in the two opening rounds of pools. Every game in the Upper Bracket has defeated multiple other games in 1-on-1 polls to get to this point. These are still the best of the best.

Polls are updated weekly, typically on Sunday or Monday. Check back throughout the week to make sure you don't miss a vote!

HOW TO VOTE

This is easy. You only get one vote per poll. The game with the most votes wins. In the event of a tie, the higher seed advances, so don't get complacent!

Faxanadu was among my top five favorite NES games along with Willow, Golgo 13: Top Secret Episode, Dragon Warrior 2, and Castlevania III: Dracula’s Curse. Just a great adventure game. Gorgeous to play too and with catchy music.

Faxanadu is a great adventure game. Nice variety of creepy unique worlds, unlike anything we saw in other fantasy games at the time. Creepy little elves. Great music. A lot of people don't know this game is technically distantly related to all those Legend of Heroes games like Trails in the Sky and Trails of Cold Steel.

Donkey Kong '94 is good - one of the better GB games and one of the few I double-dipped on VC for - but Faxanadu is great. I've never actually beaten it though - I got as far as the enemies that hit the whole screen but gave up there on my last play. Wish we'd gotten actual save games like the Famicom version did.

Share, I'm curious how you'd compare Willow to Faxanadu. I picked up Willow a few months ago and hadn't played it in years. I remembered it being good but haven't had the chance to really dive in yet. It looks so far like it's more Faxanadu than Zelda, but maybe the game will still open up further and I'll have to start taking notes / drawing maps.

Niahak wrote: ↑18 Apr 2023 13:22 Share, I'm curious how you'd compare Willow to Faxanadu. I picked up Willow a few months ago and hadn't played it in years. I remembered it being good but haven't had the chance to really dive in yet. It looks so far like it's more Faxanadu than Zelda, but maybe the game will still open up further and I'll have to start taking notes / drawing maps.

Willow may be my very favorite NES game but it’s tough to say. It obviously isn’t a side scroller like Faxanadu and is more Zelda-like in how the story advances. I also always liked how you actually get stronger throughout the game, which isn’t Zelda-like and if Faxanadu included leveling up I don’t remember it. So Willow is more like an action RPG adventure game…there’s more talking and stuff than you see in Faxanadu, too.

I never did draw a map for Willow or took notes. My tenacity alone helped me to figure out how to advance the story as some requirements seem a little arbitrary. Stuff like you must talk to so-and-so with x item in your possession after you enter and then leave a certain cave. I’m making stuff up but you get the idea. I was a kid when I played it so I overcame those riddles with blunt force tenacity.

Sharecrow wrote: ↑18 Apr 2023 13:35 Willow may be my very favorite NES game but it’s tough to say. It obviously isn’t a side scroller like Faxanadu and is more Zelda-like in how the story advances. I also always liked how you actually get stronger throughout the game, which isn’t Zelda-like and if Faxanadu included leveling up I don’t remember it. So Willow is more like an action RPG adventure game…there’s more talking and stuff than you see in Faxanadu, too.

I never did draw a map for Willow or took notes. My tenacity alone helped me to figure out how to advance the story as some requirements seem a little arbitrary. Stuff like you must talk to so-and-so with x item in your possession after you enter and then leave a certain cave. I’m making stuff up but you get the idea. I was a kid when I played it so I overcame those riddles with blunt force tenacity.

Cool! That's roughly what I remember (mostly "find the item and bring it here" puzzles) so I'll look forward to when I can really dive in. Hopefully within the next year or two... the shift to playing games 15-30 minutes at a time makes it hard to go back to older physical games.