For those following along, this will be the fourth NES game I’ve profiled. Those games are, in order:
Tecmo Super Bowl
Mega Man 2
Super Mario Bros. 2
Punch-Out!!
That feels about right, to be honest. While Punch-Out!! might in some ways be the most impressive of that group when it comes to its intuitive, responsive play control or its huge, bright graphics, it’s also in many ways the simplest of the bunch.
Memorize a pattern, be quick with your inputs, wash, rinse, repeat.
That lack of variety works for and against the game. You could call it the purest of the four, but you could also call it the least interesting of the four.
For the purposes of this exercise, let’s lean into pure, shall we?
Punch-Out!!
Genre: Sports
Released: 1987
Platform: NES
No. 17 on Nintendo Power’s Top 200