Category: Video

Lab Work – Play Ice Climber Now

NES – Ice Climber, Famous Titles and more. Let’s cover NES titles, walk-throughs, play-throughs and even a little 80’s NES Lore

Do you remember Kong Fan? Rampage? Gyromite? How about Ice Climber? Play Ice Climber online now! I remember the pain of never being good at the game. The games were epic for ’85/’86 and I recall it like it was yesterday. My childhood friend owned the game console with a few games, including Ice Climber. We had the NES console, which it was epic. I think we had the following game cartridges, Super Mario, Baseball, Excitebike, and Duck Hunt. The Legend of Zelda was a secondary purchase that I remember vividly, the golden cartridge was top-notch marketing.

NES Titles, Walk-throughs and Play-Throughs

If you want to watch more NES content, play-throughs and/or walk-throughs, my goto content creators for archived video content are @worldoflongplay, @lordkayoss, and @nintendoComplete. The point here is that content, video ‘gaming’ in my childhood was spars. the neighborhoods kid had very few games, which means time on the console/game was limited. This meant the main focus was single player or limited two player games, most of the time with extremely lopsided outcomes when it came to head-to-head competition or gaming.

Imagine passing controllers passed back-and-forth for another try.  I don’t think it would have made a difference anyway. The key was to rent, borrow, or  purchase the game of choice and earn your stripes. I was terrible at the game, but it was awesome, reminiscent of those games above, the Donkey Kong or Rampage, with bottom-up racing games. Races included ice, stone obstacles, bears, birds, and other creatures. Awesome!

Other NES Titles

Let’s continue with more NES titles, including both favorites and rarities. Ice Climber and Gyromite were part of the original series of around 17 games released on the US Nintendo Entertainment System. Don’t quote me on the total number of games released in the original US lineup, but here is what I’ve gathered – Duck Hunt*, Gyromite, 10-Yard Fight(a football, game I’ve never played), Baseball**, Clu CLu Land, Donkey Kong Jr., Excitebike**, Golf*, Hogan’s Alley, Ice Climber**, Kung Fu**, Mach Rider, Pinball, Stack Up, Tennis, Wild Gunman and Wrecking Crew. Some of my favorites are marked with an (*) or double asterisk  (**) based on my total playtime, enjoyment, and overall player experience. 

Again, take this as it is. It’s been along time (30 years or more) since this article was written and the original gameplay. Many of the games I don’t remember or only played for a few hours. The games are simply included in the original Nintendo US offering. To answer your question, Ice Climber was awesome, Excitebike and Kung Fu were also great.

Gyromite and ROB (Robot Operting Buddy)

Moreover, Gyromite was a fun but incredibly challenging for an adolescent. Gyromite is a side-view puzzle game, featuring a quirky old professor/scienctist who jumps around while avoiding pipes and critters. It’s worth noting that Gyromite also involved the R.O.B., a unique accessory for the NES. The US NES Console was released with Gyromite and R.O.B., an automated player accessory for cooperative play. This was an innovative move by Nintendo, although R.O.B. was short-lived as an accessory.  

For context, there was the NES Blaster/Zapper, Powerpad, Powerglove, and game-specific controllers like the laser scope and Max pad. For more information on those accessories,  Gaming History101 does a much better job covering them. Kudos to them, as I was only familiar with about 60% of the items listed – U-Force, Laser-Scope and R.O.B. being the most notable.  Returning to Gyromite/R.O.B., the game was linear, morning right-to-left and up-and-down, with a cool robot accessory called R.O.B. that could help open pipes in the case of Gyromite.

The Wrap Up

Duck Hunt was unique. It came with a blaster, officially called the Zapper (I remember it being grey), which was a cool idea. Clu Clu Land was tough from what I remember, similar to Alex The Kidd (a Sega Console game, if I recall correctly. If not, please look it up for context).

Anyhow, getting back on track, let’s conclude the article with Ice Climber. Ice Climber was a fantastic game, one of the original titles on the NES console. Players control characters who jump, climb, and use a mallet to make their way to the top of vertical boards. They must fight off bears, bee-like bugs, Yeti (bigfoot-like creatures), birds, and more. In my opinion, out of the 17 original games on the NES console, Ice Climber was one of the best, offering 2-player fun and a challenging difficulty level, especially for young players in 1985-86. In future posts, I will discuss Nintendo controllers and accessories such as the  Power Glove, Power Mat, Game Genie, R.O.B, NES Light Gun and more. Cheers.