Top 3 World Hardest Games For Old Consoles

Video games are usually designed to test our skills at handling certain tasks and in order to keep the player interested and the gameplay exhilarating, it generally gets harder as you make progress through the game. That has always been the basic formula for creating a video game but as time has progressed, games nowadays are relatively easier due to the addition of constant check points and the ability to save the game at any time.

However, some games completely defy this general formula for difficulty and take things to a whole new sadistic level, urging you to throw your controllers at the screen in fits of rage only to pick them up back again to show that you have what it takes to beat the game. These games are meant to be played and beaten by only the hardest of the hardcore gamers and constantly subject you to cheap deaths, long password codes and thoughts of smashing your controllers.

So, get ready and man up for the top three world hardest games for old consoles of an era gone by.

World Hardest Games #1. Battletoads (Nintendo Entertainment System)

Battletoads can be considered the ultimate and the purest form of evil incarnate in the world of video games. The games comes from a time when developer Rare actually made games that catered to the gaming market, and possibly some of the world hardest games ever made, instead of games consisting of cute animals that are for casual gamers and small children.

I selected Battletoads as one of the world hardest games and for good reason. This game from the 90s is a cross between beat-’em-ups and platformers that approached Double Dragon territory took a difficulty level that only goes up to 10 and cranked it up to 12, a testament to that is the fact that the game is almost impossible to be beaten on single player mode due to the sheer amount of enemies on the screen, and taking on the game and beating it in single player mode was considered a task fit only for the gods. If that wasn’t enough, the game allowed the players in co-op mode to attack each other for some hellishly asinine reason. Even more, you would be returned to the start of the level even if one of the players died.

One of the worst part in the games was the infamous speed level called the Volkmire’s Inferno level, which cranked up the difficulty so high that it was nearly impossible to beat on the first try or the 99th try for that matter and the only strategy left after that was to resort to trial and error progression.

Battletoads was responsible for making the best of friends into enemies as you eventually wound up hitting your co-op partner in the frenzy which was generally followed by retaliation, and usually ended up in a fight between the two players. The game did not even offer any passwords, which was a norm for the era, or save features and you only got three continues, making this one of world hardest games of all time.

World Hardest Games #2. Ghosts’n Goblins (The entire series)

Yes, the title is correct. This entire series of games is harder than bricks encased in adamantium. Every bit of this game is difficult as hell, and if that is not enough and you do manage to finish the game by some divine miracle, you’re told it was all a facade by the devil and you get to repeat the games all over from the beginning with, wait for it, a higher difficulty(!) to reach the true ending.

Capcom really took sadism to new heights with this series, making little children cry when they lost their continues for the 100th time in a row. That is what makes the Ghosts’n Goblins series one of the world hardest games. Deaths in the games are plentiful and tough to keep track of, and you will die before you can finish the phrase: Huh, what happened there?

Just one session of playing the games will make you wish that you were on the side of the undead monsters that roam through the world of this insane series of hard games.

World Hardest Games #3. Contra (Nintendo Entertainment System)

When you’re talking about the world hardest games, the conversation is never complete without Contra coming up somewhere. The game was responsible for giving children nightmares as almost no one was able to beat it at the time. It was also popular for making the Konami Code famous, even though it had been used it previous games by the developer.

This should be warning enough to stay away when a game is responsible for popularizing cheat codes in home consoles, but the game was so darn good and fun even when you were getting your ass kicked that people kept coming back to it. Almost anyone could beat it with the Konami Code, which gave you 30 lives right off the bat, and doing it with a second player, but finishing the game solo without the code is still considered one of the hardest tasks in the gaming world. Making it through the action-packed areas of Contra on only three lives was and is the ultimate test of a true gamer.

If the one-hit deaths don’t get you, the constantly moving game screen will definitely do that job. Strap your self in tight before taking on this difficulty goliath!

Conclusion

Every game on the list of world hardest games is going to push you to the limit and test every skill in your gaming arsenal. Just make sure to insure your gaming equipment before you take on any of these retro classics.

Have you tried any of these games? Do you know of any other old-school and older generation titles that should be on this list? Let us know your feedback and comments in the section below.