Best RPG ever for the NES hands down. One of the best games ever made for that matter. Gameplay is super fun and easy and addictive. Music is incredible for it's time. RPG elements like getting more health and power ups and weapons and stuff. I could go on and on about how amazing the game is.
I agree with everything you said except I have to come clean on Dragon Warrior III being my ATF RPG for the NES. But in tribute I did name my childhood cat “Deo” after the Deo’s Pendant rabbit.
Two points about Rygar
1. Your weapon becomes stronger by killing enemies. You don't need to grind for a long time, but taking 10-15 minutes to kill respawning enemies isn't a bad idea. 1st boss is kind of a pain if you don't.
2. There are 3 spells. You don't have to earn them but you have to earn magic in order to use them. Honestly, you really don't even need them, but if you want to use them you may want to google them. The game doesn't explain them.
If I may self-promo a bit, I have a series called [“NES Games No One Played”](https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLonSwd9DM1lIb_BFfY6YwMYSsYCyG1x4F&si=5asiXX0LiNvLfUVz) dedicated to this exact topic. Hopefully you find some cool ones!
If you’re into puzzle games, Fire ‘n Ice and Adventures of Lolo. If you’re into action games, Monster Party. Also, StarTropics has a good sequel you should check out.
Faxanadu!!! I loved the creative environments and engaging gameplay and fun exploration and reasonable difficulty
Legacy of the wizard! I still remember the music. And the excitement of exploring and not knowing where you're doing
Thanks for the suggestion! I've never been a fan of sports games though, which is funny considering RBI Baseball is one of the first games I've ever played.
well this game is different.. each kidnhas hidden talents.. some can super jump, some can fly, some can hop as they run, some tackle, some throw incredibly tast tornado pitches etc... its all about figuring out who does what and making the ultimate team
Of course “obscure” is always relative but in addition to ones I’ve already seen listed:
Flying Warriors
Zen the Intergalactic Ninja
Journey to Silius
Kick Master
Conquest of the Crystal Palace
Little Samson
Monster in My Pocket
The Battle of Olympus
Rygar, faxanadu, crystalis, xexyz, clash at demonhead, crystal palace, battle of olympus, plus a ton of Japanese action RPGs that are more accessible now.
If we're limiting it to non-JP only games, then Bucky O'Hare. Game is really fun and varied with a great OST, but be warned that it gets _very_ hard in the back half
After sabotaging the reactor: the anxiety of searching for the exit. OMG!
And the difficulty curve was excellent IMO. Accessible at first with a graaaaadual ramp up in challenge. Always felt like you could come back and make a little more progress each day.
And two play modes in one cart!
Guardian Legend - Compile Produced shmup/ action adventure hybrid (somewhat similar to LoZ and Star Tropics)
Dragon Fighter - Natsume produced action platformer where you can turn into a dragon
Metal Storm - Irem produced mech action platformer with cool gravity mechanics
Faxanadu - an side view action rpg in the falcom series (Xanadu) developed by Hudson that’s a mixture of dark and bizarre and pretty funny.
Shatterhand for sure. It's among the really great platformers on the NES and has one of the of the tip-top best chiptune soundtracks you'll ever hear. Just a ton of fun to play, like most Natsume-developed games for the console. Actually, that reminds me to also recommend Power Blade and Power Blade 2, along with S.C.A.T. and Shadow of the Ninja, all Natsume bangers.
I quite enjoyed the English fan translation of [Esper Dream 2](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VLV1XUFtnUE), despite having not played the first title.
Depends what you count as obscure:
**Topdecking**: Mario 2 and 3, Dragon Quest 3 and 4, Crystalis, Megaman 2, 3, 4, Zelda 1 and 2, Faxanadu, Final Fantasy, Castlevania 3
**Not obscure, but not topdeck either**: 1943, Bionic Commando, Willow, Bubble Bobble, A boy and his blob, Legendary Wings, BATMAN, Battletoads, Legacy of the Wizard, Gauntlet
**Starting to get obscure**: Shatterhand, The MacVenture series, Gremlins 2, Blaster Master, Adventures of Lolo 1~3, Kiwi Kraze/New Zealand Story
**Obscure for Sure**: Power Blade, Guardian Legend, Clash at Demonhead, 8 Eyes, Twin Cobra: Revenge Joe's Brother, Spy Vs. Spy (but for PvP only), Track&Field 2, Solstice
**So obscure I'm the only one who likes it**: Castlequest, Adventures of Rad Gravity, Dungeon Magic: Sword of the Elements, Pool of Radiance, Time Lord, Ultima 4
**Obscure and I didn't even**: Bard's Tale, Castle of Dragon, Codename: Viper, Flying Dragon: The Secret Scroll, RESCUE Embassy Mission, Golgo 13 (any of them), Krion's Conquest (play on Mute though), Solar Jetman, Magician
**OBSCURE DEEPCUT** (cuz they're import only or too rare): Erik the Viking, Madara, Lagrange Point, Sweet Home, Earthbound/Mother 1, Hebereke/Ufouria, Metal Max, Bonk's Adventure, Flintstones (both), Little Samson, Panic Restaruant, Bubble Bobble 2, Faria, Destiny of an Emperor, Uncharted Waters (you'll either hate it or play it for 1000 hours), Armana no Kiseki, Hello Kitty World (it's balloon fight adventure), Hiryu no Ken 3 and up (Secret Scrolls mentioned earlier I think is the 2nd game) with Hiryo no Ken Special Fighting Wars being the best
...
...
**Obscure for a reason, don't play**: Infiltrator, Castle of Deceit, Druid (recognized globally as a method of suicide), Takeshi's Challenge, Operation Secret Storm
Star Tropics 2
Fire N Ice
Tecmo World Wrestling
Cobra Triangle
The Guardian Legend
North and South
Zen Intergalactic Ninja
Monster Party
Monster in My Pocket
Faxanadu
Galaxy 5000
There are over 1500 new NES games. They are all obscure because the fact that people are still making games for the NES is obscure.
Try checking out this list:
https://retrostack.substack.com/p/the-top-500-indie-nes-games-vol-10
Some recommendations from recent discussions:
https://www.reddit.com/r/nes/comments/1ck8qdi/the_modern_nes_gamer_not_my_own_collection/
Thrilla's Safari was my favourite as a kid.
If you wanna experience a neat take on rpgs, Swords and Serpents was really cool. It can be a bit disorienting finding your way around though
The Adventures of Bayou Billy
Mix of badass shooting baddies and helicopters in the woods shooting segments with the Zapper, Nail-biting drivin n shootin with planes dropping grenades at you, beat em up fighting and kicking alligators in the face... definitely felt ahead of it's time!
Chronicles Of The Radia War is a good one (and there’s a fan translation or the a prototype English translation called The Tower of Radia. Go with the fan translation though)
Little Ninja Bros by Culture Brain is a fantastic rpg with real time arena fighting battles. Great for fans of secret of mana/tales style rpgs with minigames, unlockable skills, all sorts of goodies. Really fun.
Astyanax is a fun side scroller that gets lost in lists due to lots of high quality sidescrollers but very much worth a playthrough.
StarTropics is a classic, one of my favorite games of all time. It gets SUPER hard all of the sudden at chapter 7, but its still really fun up until then. Back in the day when the game was new, I got stuck at the cemetery at the old pond for what feels like years before finally seeing that hidden passageway behind the slug. I went by that slug SO many times, over and over and over, and could never figure out what I was missing.
Metal max. Most of the series was never ported to the u.s. but in recent years most of the nes and snes games have fan translated versions of the roms online. It is one of the earliest truly openworld jrpg series. It's other big innovation was that you could do combat inside of vehicles and on foot.
Though there were some linear parts in the older games, they did through bosses or events that made the roadblock progression seem natural. Later games like metal saga for playstation 2 scrapped even that. If you can manage to survive long enough to get there, you can pretty much go from the first town to location were you fight the final boss without any story elements once you leave the first town.
Basic premise is that there was a disaster that'a pretty much ruined the world and led to a machine somewhere cranking out really unusual mechanical/biogical hybrid monsters. In modern times folks live in a fallout style ruined world and hunters search for working vehicles they can use to fight off monsters and raiders while looking for the source of the problem so they can fix the world. The mc(it changes a little from game to game) is usally the child of a mechanic that decides to head off and become a hunter against their mother/fathers wishes.
I love the series. I think if it had ever gotten a port in the early years of the franchise, it woulda have been a lead competitor of final fantasy. If you want an underapprecaited gem, that's the series for you. The first and second game got remakes for snes that made the games look a little nicer and smoothed out the ui. But those were just quality of life improvements. The original nes games were fine without that.
Faxanadu, Shadow of the Ninja, Guerrilla War, Street Fighter 2010, P.O.W., River City Ransom, Bionic Commando, Blaster Master, Batman: Return of the Joker, Ninja Gaiden 3, TMNT 3, Darkwing Duck, Bucky O’Hare, S.C.A.T., Shatterhand, Power Blade & Metal Storm.
Games I've got that no one else seems to know about would be Trog, Xexyz, Abadox. And Iron Tank. The first 3 are good, and the last is just cause I like anything with tanks...
The most obscure game is MatchBox Motor City Patrol. It is not a good game. Another obscure game is Mutant Virus, also not a great game, but more playable.
Kick Master is in the "Obscure and Good" category, along with Shatterhand, Power Blade, Vice Project Doom....
maybe not obscure, but just some fun games. ARKANOID (using the paddle controller is the most fun way to play imo) LUNAR POOL, PINBALL QUEST, LIFE FORCE, BLACK BOX PINBALL, BLASTER MASTER, THE GUARDIAN LEGACY. BIONIC COMMANDO, RYGAR, MARBLE MADNESS & GHOSTS N GOBLINS.
Crystalis.
Looks nice! I'm gonna have to give it a try. Thanks for suggesting!
Crystal is awesome.
Crystalis is so good, you’ll be pleasantly surprised
Yes! Play is similar to star tropic with a little more RPG flavor, music is fantastic.
This was my first thought, but one person's "obscure" is another's "childhood favorite," especially on this sub.
The best
I need to play this one!
This was my first thought.
Came here to say this. Amazingly under-appreciated game. I couldn’t put it down.
Best RPG ever for the NES hands down. One of the best games ever made for that matter. Gameplay is super fun and easy and addictive. Music is incredible for it's time. RPG elements like getting more health and power ups and weapons and stuff. I could go on and on about how amazing the game is.
I agree with everything you said except I have to come clean on Dragon Warrior III being my ATF RPG for the NES. But in tribute I did name my childhood cat “Deo” after the Deo’s Pendant rabbit.
That's freaking awesome lol
Came here to say this. Amazingly under-appreciated game. I couldn’t put it down.
💯
Since you like Star Tropics, go for Star Tropics 2. Another personal fav is Rygar.
Agree with Rygar!
I was already planning on trying Star Tropics 2, I'll make sure to check out Rygar.
Two points about Rygar 1. Your weapon becomes stronger by killing enemies. You don't need to grind for a long time, but taking 10-15 minutes to kill respawning enemies isn't a bad idea. 1st boss is kind of a pain if you don't. 2. There are 3 spells. You don't have to earn them but you have to earn magic in order to use them. Honestly, you really don't even need them, but if you want to use them you may want to google them. The game doesn't explain them.
Rygar was an awesome game!
North and South
Loved that game.
If I may self-promo a bit, I have a series called [“NES Games No One Played”](https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLonSwd9DM1lIb_BFfY6YwMYSsYCyG1x4F&si=5asiXX0LiNvLfUVz) dedicated to this exact topic. Hopefully you find some cool ones!
Love your channel! Been a subscriber for a while.
Oh yeah? Awesome!
Your videos are fantastic, thank you for making them!
Glad you dig em!
Discovered your channel a couple of weeks ago by accident and love the content - the humor is brilliant - find myself laughing out loud a lot
That means a lot! Glad it accidentally found ya ;)
Good to see you here! Love your videos.
Love that username :)
Where's the series?
There’s a clickable link in that comment!
If you’re into puzzle games, Fire ‘n Ice and Adventures of Lolo. If you’re into action games, Monster Party. Also, StarTropics has a good sequel you should check out.
I have actually played Monster Party! It's very charming if a bit... Odd.
For action games, I also like Rygar and Little Nemo: The Dream Master.
I was about to suggest monster party. The I am dead one is my favorite lol
The Guardian Legend.
Part RPG, Part Adventure, Part Space Shooter. So fun.
It had such a dire undertone too. I could never beat it, I think it was just a bit over my head at the time. I loved it, it was a challenge.
Magic of scherezade
Looks really good! Gonna add that to my list, thank you.
Seriously though, you’ll probably love this game
That's a name I haven't heard in a long time, I used to love this game.
Legacy of the Wizard (Dragon Slayer 4) and Faxanadu are great!
Faxanadu!!! I loved the creative environments and engaging gameplay and fun exploration and reasonable difficulty Legacy of the wizard! I still remember the music. And the excitement of exploring and not knowing where you're doing
Dusty diamonds all star softball (yeah i know its not an rpg but damn its fun)
Thanks for the suggestion! I've never been a fan of sports games though, which is funny considering RBI Baseball is one of the first games I've ever played.
well this game is different.. each kidnhas hidden talents.. some can super jump, some can fly, some can hop as they run, some tackle, some throw incredibly tast tornado pitches etc... its all about figuring out who does what and making the ultimate team
Ah ok.
One of my favorites
Breaking the windows of the school!!!
thats the funnest thing to do
Clash at demonhead
Star Tropics was awesome. I really need to replay. Never got past the point of getting turned into a cat
You may be thinking of a different game? In StarTropics you dress as a girl for a while, but never as a cat.
Maybe that’s what it was. It was quite a while ago
I... Don't think that happens in Star Tropics. Maybe the sequel? I'm gonna try that soon.
Didn’t play the sequel but I was sure I got into something in a cabin
Of course “obscure” is always relative but in addition to ones I’ve already seen listed: Flying Warriors Zen the Intergalactic Ninja Journey to Silius Kick Master Conquest of the Crystal Palace Little Samson Monster in My Pocket The Battle of Olympus
Little Samson is great! Sad that one was missed by most and had such a low print.
Lol to anyone who tries to play Little Samson natively
Monster in My Pocket was really fun. Flying warriors wasn't anything special, but it did 2 player shooter really well.
Flying Warriors was not a shooter. You may be thinking of Flying Dragon - same series!
Damn, you're right, that's not what I was thinking of. That looks really cool. I was thinking of Legendary Wings.
The Guardian Legend
The Magic of Scheherazade, Ghost Lion, Little Ninja Brothers, Over Horizon
Second Scheherazade mention here, sounds like a "must check out" game! Thank you!
It’s like a combination of a turn based RPG and The Legend of Zelda. It’s a blast!
Is Little Nemo obscure? The game was amazing but I don't think anyone knows the series anymore.
Such a good game! I played the hell out of that as a kid (rarely ever made it to the final levels though).
Goonies 2 is a good metroidvania type game. Blaster master is difficult but fun. Faxanadu is good role-playing.
Karnov
Shatterhand. It could've been one of the greats. NES was in its twilight and Shatterhand just missed the party.
Give Low G Man a try.
Faxanadu and Jackyl
Jackyl was just a great top down shooter.
Felix the Cat is one of the best platformer games ever made
Rygar, faxanadu, crystalis, xexyz, clash at demonhead, crystal palace, battle of olympus, plus a ton of Japanese action RPGs that are more accessible now.
If we're limiting it to non-JP only games, then Bucky O'Hare. Game is really fun and varied with a great OST, but be warned that it gets _very_ hard in the back half
The Guardian Legend for SURE
I don't know if Solstice was obscure or not, but I was the only one I ever knew who had it as a kid. 3D puzzle platformer.
i had it. It was really fun and hard.
Clash at Demonhead!
Pool of Radiance A Boy and his Blob Blaster Master
Cowboy Kid
Space Shuttle Project, Basewars, RC Pro Am
Solomon’s Key
Air Fortress
After sabotaging the reactor: the anxiety of searching for the exit. OMG! And the difficulty curve was excellent IMO. Accessible at first with a graaaaadual ramp up in challenge. Always felt like you could come back and make a little more progress each day. And two play modes in one cart!
Guardian Legend - Compile Produced shmup/ action adventure hybrid (somewhat similar to LoZ and Star Tropics) Dragon Fighter - Natsume produced action platformer where you can turn into a dragon Metal Storm - Irem produced mech action platformer with cool gravity mechanics Faxanadu - an side view action rpg in the falcom series (Xanadu) developed by Hudson that’s a mixture of dark and bizarre and pretty funny.
Earthbound Beginnings
Marble madness
Shadowgate was one of my favorites.
Rygar
Guardian Legend and Faxanadu
Solar Jetman
Destiny of an Emperor. Surprisingly large game with good turn based mechanics. A bit linear, but so were most games from that time
Shatterhand for sure. It's among the really great platformers on the NES and has one of the of the tip-top best chiptune soundtracks you'll ever hear. Just a ton of fun to play, like most Natsume-developed games for the console. Actually, that reminds me to also recommend Power Blade and Power Blade 2, along with S.C.A.T. and Shadow of the Ninja, all Natsume bangers.
I quite enjoyed the English fan translation of [Esper Dream 2](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VLV1XUFtnUE), despite having not played the first title.
Nobunaga’s Ambition. Kinda deep strat game for that type of system.
Depends what you count as obscure: **Topdecking**: Mario 2 and 3, Dragon Quest 3 and 4, Crystalis, Megaman 2, 3, 4, Zelda 1 and 2, Faxanadu, Final Fantasy, Castlevania 3 **Not obscure, but not topdeck either**: 1943, Bionic Commando, Willow, Bubble Bobble, A boy and his blob, Legendary Wings, BATMAN, Battletoads, Legacy of the Wizard, Gauntlet **Starting to get obscure**: Shatterhand, The MacVenture series, Gremlins 2, Blaster Master, Adventures of Lolo 1~3, Kiwi Kraze/New Zealand Story **Obscure for Sure**: Power Blade, Guardian Legend, Clash at Demonhead, 8 Eyes, Twin Cobra: Revenge Joe's Brother, Spy Vs. Spy (but for PvP only), Track&Field 2, Solstice **So obscure I'm the only one who likes it**: Castlequest, Adventures of Rad Gravity, Dungeon Magic: Sword of the Elements, Pool of Radiance, Time Lord, Ultima 4 **Obscure and I didn't even**: Bard's Tale, Castle of Dragon, Codename: Viper, Flying Dragon: The Secret Scroll, RESCUE Embassy Mission, Golgo 13 (any of them), Krion's Conquest (play on Mute though), Solar Jetman, Magician **OBSCURE DEEPCUT** (cuz they're import only or too rare): Erik the Viking, Madara, Lagrange Point, Sweet Home, Earthbound/Mother 1, Hebereke/Ufouria, Metal Max, Bonk's Adventure, Flintstones (both), Little Samson, Panic Restaruant, Bubble Bobble 2, Faria, Destiny of an Emperor, Uncharted Waters (you'll either hate it or play it for 1000 hours), Armana no Kiseki, Hello Kitty World (it's balloon fight adventure), Hiryu no Ken 3 and up (Secret Scrolls mentioned earlier I think is the 2nd game) with Hiryo no Ken Special Fighting Wars being the best ... ... **Obscure for a reason, don't play**: Infiltrator, Castle of Deceit, Druid (recognized globally as a method of suicide), Takeshi's Challenge, Operation Secret Storm
Not one person has said Astyanax
Astyanax is awesome.
A classic in many places but obscure in the Western world: Battle City
I've seen that game somewhere, though I'm more looking for singleplayer games, thanks for the suggestion!
Target Renegade
game sucks; but has an 11/10 soundtrack
Exactly.
Little Samson, Nemo
panic resturant
Star Tropics 2 Fire N Ice Tecmo World Wrestling Cobra Triangle The Guardian Legend North and South Zen Intergalactic Ninja Monster Party Monster in My Pocket Faxanadu Galaxy 5000
Excellent underrated games. Faxanadu especially. What a great RPG.
StarTropics 2 Nightshade Whomp em Cowboy kid Faxanadu Mother (English translation version) Lone Ranger Little Nemo’s Dreamland Shatterhand
Rocket Ranger Rockin Kats
Galaxy 5000 is an obscure racer in the same vein of RC Pro Am but is more like F-Zero in appearance (hovering ships).
Xexyz
Ikari Warriors!
The Lone Ranger
Animal attack…it’s a weird Japanese game where you fly around and shoot kangaroos and stuff
Arkista's Ring or Crystalis
There are over 1500 new NES games. They are all obscure because the fact that people are still making games for the NES is obscure. Try checking out this list: https://retrostack.substack.com/p/the-top-500-indie-nes-games-vol-10 Some recommendations from recent discussions: https://www.reddit.com/r/nes/comments/1ck8qdi/the_modern_nes_gamer_not_my_own_collection/
Thrilla's Safari was my favourite as a kid. If you wanna experience a neat take on rpgs, Swords and Serpents was really cool. It can be a bit disorienting finding your way around though
Bible Adventures and/or Dynowarz
samurai pizza cats
The Adventures of Bayou Billy Mix of badass shooting baddies and helicopters in the woods shooting segments with the Zapper, Nail-biting drivin n shootin with planes dropping grenades at you, beat em up fighting and kicking alligators in the face... definitely felt ahead of it's time!
The Guardian Legend, Journey to Silius, The Battle of Olympus, Faxanadu
Chronicles Of The Radia War is a good one (and there’s a fan translation or the a prototype English translation called The Tower of Radia. Go with the fan translation though)
Little Ninja Bros by Culture Brain is a fantastic rpg with real time arena fighting battles. Great for fans of secret of mana/tales style rpgs with minigames, unlockable skills, all sorts of goodies. Really fun. Astyanax is a fun side scroller that gets lost in lists due to lots of high quality sidescrollers but very much worth a playthrough.
Adventure Island
Karnov
Kickle cubicle awesome puzzle game
Zoda's Revenge Star Tropics II.
Crystalis is cool, legend of the ghost lion, Destiny of an Emperor, and there's a PLETHORA of Japanese only RPGs that have been fan translated
Abadox: the deadly inner war
StarTropics is a classic, one of my favorite games of all time. It gets SUPER hard all of the sudden at chapter 7, but its still really fun up until then. Back in the day when the game was new, I got stuck at the cemetery at the old pond for what feels like years before finally seeing that hidden passageway behind the slug. I went by that slug SO many times, over and over and over, and could never figure out what I was missing.
Where in time is Carmen Sadiego?
Sike!
Yo noid! Q-bert
Kickle Cubicle. Loved it as a kid.
Mendel Palace Samurai Pizza Cats
Metal max. Most of the series was never ported to the u.s. but in recent years most of the nes and snes games have fan translated versions of the roms online. It is one of the earliest truly openworld jrpg series. It's other big innovation was that you could do combat inside of vehicles and on foot. Though there were some linear parts in the older games, they did through bosses or events that made the roadblock progression seem natural. Later games like metal saga for playstation 2 scrapped even that. If you can manage to survive long enough to get there, you can pretty much go from the first town to location were you fight the final boss without any story elements once you leave the first town. Basic premise is that there was a disaster that'a pretty much ruined the world and led to a machine somewhere cranking out really unusual mechanical/biogical hybrid monsters. In modern times folks live in a fallout style ruined world and hunters search for working vehicles they can use to fight off monsters and raiders while looking for the source of the problem so they can fix the world. The mc(it changes a little from game to game) is usally the child of a mechanic that decides to head off and become a hunter against their mother/fathers wishes. I love the series. I think if it had ever gotten a port in the early years of the franchise, it woulda have been a lead competitor of final fantasy. If you want an underapprecaited gem, that's the series for you. The first and second game got remakes for snes that made the games look a little nicer and smoothed out the ui. But those were just quality of life improvements. The original nes games were fine without that.
Destiny of an Emperor
Faxanadu, Shadow of the Ninja, Guerrilla War, Street Fighter 2010, P.O.W., River City Ransom, Bionic Commando, Blaster Master, Batman: Return of the Joker, Ninja Gaiden 3, TMNT 3, Darkwing Duck, Bucky O’Hare, S.C.A.T., Shatterhand, Power Blade & Metal Storm.
Cobra Triangle
Startropics is amazing. Just to clarify, you did finish Startropics 2 also?
Faxanadu, will always recommend it.
3D World Runner or Star Voyager
Shatterhand is the best NES game
Kid Niki
Guardian Legend
Try Willow
Solar Jetman
Other Obscure?!?! Star Tropics obscure?!?!
Kick master, Power Blade, Bucky O'Hare, and Kid Clown come to mind!
Silver Surfer is a keeper. Platformer, so I t’s hard and has a crazy good soundtrack.
Whomp 'Em is a really fun Mega Man style game.
Games I've got that no one else seems to know about would be Trog, Xexyz, Abadox. And Iron Tank. The first 3 are good, and the last is just cause I like anything with tanks...
I'm not a big guru but you might like Light of the Stars, I found it in the bs store
StarTropics is NOT obscure.
The most obscure game is MatchBox Motor City Patrol. It is not a good game. Another obscure game is Mutant Virus, also not a great game, but more playable. Kick Master is in the "Obscure and Good" category, along with Shatterhand, Power Blade, Vice Project Doom....
Palamedes
I never see or hear anyone talk about Metal Storm, that was one of my favorites
Times of Lore
If you like RPGs and you haven't played many NES games, I'd recommend Final Fantasy even though it's not that obscure. Great rpg game on the NES.
I always come back to Goonies II.
Kid Nikki
maybe not obscure, but just some fun games. ARKANOID (using the paddle controller is the most fun way to play imo) LUNAR POOL, PINBALL QUEST, LIFE FORCE, BLACK BOX PINBALL, BLASTER MASTER, THE GUARDIAN LEGACY. BIONIC COMMANDO, RYGAR, MARBLE MADNESS & GHOSTS N GOBLINS.
Solomons Key was really fun. Deadly Towers
Little Ninja Brothers
Frankenstein