Five Weird Unlicensed Nintendo Games

One of the many things that killed Atari was a flood of games crapped out by everybody from Activision to Quaker Oats. And when Nintendo brought back the video game industry, they were going to make damn sure that nobody was going to do that, so they hot-wired a chip right into the console to block out unlicensed cartridges.

Of course, this stopped precisely no one. Atari themselves even had the testicular fortitude to steal the lockout chip’s code and reverse engineer it showing an unusual dedication to what amounted to being colossally unethical and inflicting their own fate on their competitor. Thus, unlicensed games hit the market pretty much the microsecond people realized you could make money with them.

Since all of these lists pretty much all break down into five categories, we thought we’d save you some time and break them out. Behold, the Obscure Classic, the Porn for the Lonely, the Pathetic Franchise Attempt, Hot Spicy Racism, and the Bible Banger.

Obscure Classic: The Adventures of Captain Comic

You may be wondering just what the hell “The Adventures of Captain Comic” even is, and we don’t blame you. For those not up on their classic computer gaming history, Captain Comic was one of the first action side-scrollers on computers, so he’s a spiritual father to Duke Nukem. Also his real father: that was one of the plot points in “Duke Nukem Forever”. Honest.

Anyway, the game’s writer and sole programmer, Michael Denio, had this to say in the game’s manual:

“The Adventures of Captain Comic started out as an experiment to test the viability of two theories, the first as to whether a real arcade type game can be done on a standard IBM PC with an EGA card, and secondly, given the first can be done, if it is possible to make any money doing it. Well, I’ve come to a conclusion on the second point, but I’ll let you judge the first point for yourself.”

The conclusion on the second point was probably “Hell no”, since Denio seems never to have made any money writing video games (although it did get him a Wikipedia entry). But before he quit to write floor plan software, he ported his innovative classic to the NES… illegally, thanks to the company Color Dreams.

But, according to Denio, it actually sold a few copies, so good for him!

Porn for the Lonely: Peek-a-Boo Poker

No matter how often we see it, whether it’s Custer’s Revenge or Bubble Bath Babes, or those really, really creepy Sega CD games where a woman strips in Full Motion Video!, we just don’t get video game nudity, either the people creating it or the people, those very sad few, who actually buy this crap. Even in the ’80s, when your choices were videos rented from the back room with the curtain over the door or magazines that came in black plastic, those still had to be better options than pixelated boobs.

Nonetheless, pixelated boobs did exist on the Nintendo Entertainment System, and Peek-a-Boo Poker tried to show them off in all their jagged unarousing glory. It’s pretty much as bad as you expect; a poker game that if you play it often enough, you see naked women.

We’ve got to wonder…who even bought this stuff? Who even programmed it? Who looks at the NES and thinks “You know, what this could use is some softcore!” And what were they smoking? Oh, wait, snorting. This WAS the ’80s.

Pathetic Franchise Attempt: Action 52 and the Cheetahmen

The Action 52 is famous for being the biggest ripoff in gaming, costing $200 for 52 games, most of which were crap programmed on an Atari by college students. It was literally inspired by a pirated NES cart from Taiwan that the developer figured he could top. But there’s one turd in the sewer with a slightly better level of polish: the Cheetahmen.

If you were a kid between, say, 1988 and 1992, there was nothing more awesome than anthropomorphic martial artists. We’re pretty sure the entire reason there are so many furries all over the Internet today is thanks to the fact that we all grew up on a steady diet of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and the relentless march of idiotic knockoffs. But no attempt to cash in on the success of a bastardized underground comic was quite as hilariously pathetic as The Cheetahmen.

The Cheetahmen was all sorts of stupid. They were named after Greek gods, except for Aries, who was named after an astrological symbol because whoever wrote the game was pounding Mad Dog 20/20 by the case. The game itself is horribly, horribly busted. The sequel, which was found in a warehouse in the mid-’90s, is even worse.

What was really sad was that this was supposed to be the start of a media empire. They were going to take these characters to the limit; toys, movies, all of it. You know, because copying a popular concept always leads to incredible riches. Just ask the creators of the Silverhawks.

The Bible Banger: Spiritual Warfare

Spiritual Warfare is a game about throwing fruit at demons in order to free a town. I mean, come on, how ridiculous…is…

Actually, now that we think about it, that’s no more insane or goofy than any other Nintendo game.

Just like the video game porn, though, we wonder what anybody was thinking with this. Crappy Zelda knockoffs weren’t going to convert anybody, except possibly to the Mega Drive. And the concept is about as different from secular games as the Olsen twins are from each other. Why not just hand your future fundamentalist leaders the real Zelda, and be happy?

Hot Spicy Racism: Master Chu and the Drunkard Hu

You knew it was coming. With an article like this, it’s always coming. And here it is, a steaming dose of hot spicy racism!

OK, so maybe we’re exaggerating a little, but this is about two kung-fu masters fighting Shiva, you know, one of the really good, positive gods in Hinduism to free their village, so it’s either written by an Asian guy who really hates India, or a white guy who learned everything he knows about the entire Asian continent from kung-fu movies and chicken tikki massala.

Beyond the ridiculous plot, it’s pretty standard run n’ gun fare. But, just…Shiva, guys? Seriously? Want to maybe follow that up with a game where you kill nuns?

Oh wait, Rockstar beat you to it.

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