Nintendo consoles are home to some of gaming's best-known franchises, but – like any successful platform – they've also played host to obscure and questionable releases, too. For every Legend of Zelda and Metroid, there are countless other also-ran releases which nobody remembers.
Except us, that is, and perhaps you – if you feel up to taking on the challenge, that is? We've picked 15 reasonably obscure Nintendo releases from the past and challenge you with guessing them correctly – how well do you know your box artwork?
Comments 135
These are very obscure games
@PickledKong64 Yeah the thumbnail made it look like it was gonna be popular indie games.
I SCORED 7 OUT OF 15. There's no prize is there?
I got 7 out of 15 too.
9 out of 15 for me, think it's pretty easy to spot what's N64 and after but find it difficult with anything prior to that, box art used to be all over the place in a good way.
Edit: Forgot to add Lost Magic is a great game, never see anyone talk about it but I had a lot of fun playing it around the time it came out.
8-15, super duper.
8 out 15
Not bad
It threw me off for a few seconds that you put "GC" for Gamecube instead of "GCN". I was reading it in my head as "Gameboy Color" even though that would be "GBC".
11/15, I was doing well until the last third of the quiz.
Love Kwirk! Had that, the marble one, and the terrible Monster Party game (it was too difficult).
9/15 based entirely on the style of artwork.
8/15. Didn’t know any of them, so that score is more based on process of elimination. “That art style screams N64...” etc
11/15 not bad at all. Cool to see Clash At Demonhead, love the game and love the Scott Pilgrim comics.
That was a bit harder than I thought
Got 13 correct, but had to guess some. The art style often gives a hint of the era it came from.
7/15, which I figure means that the graphic designers of these games did a pretty good job, because they were all total effing guesses.
11/15. Legit knew 7 of them and could figure some of them out by eliminating the other options. Some guessing too.
13/15 not bad not bad.
7 guesses out of 15. Some of the artwork gave a clue to the generation the game belongs to.
12/15 I should have known better on Kwirk
Can I lie and say I did well?
13/15, my idea of what the boxart looked like allowed me to eliminate a lot of the options knowing what system it was probably on
Six out of fifteen. Hooray!
I think I want to play Tank! Tank! Tank! now.
5/15 I have never even heard of most of these games, this was a really obscure list.
5/15 - Got the first one due to the cards in the box art, Got two more games due to actually knowing them, and the other two were guesses.
@Kriven I bought Monster Party as a kid (based on the box) and regretted it. I probably didn’t appreciate its strangeness, but it was too difficult. Revisiting it today, I still find it too difficult.
I got 7 right, but have only played 2 of them. Metal Arms is indeed a lost treasure (and I'm pretty sure I still have it in the attic with my Gamecube). Crystalis was pretty dope, too. The other 5 I got were complete shots in the dark.
Kwirk! ❤️❤️❤️😍😍😍
No, I have nothing more to say. Or okay... Tough questions!
@Damo NES Crystalis is also on NSO, right?
Great quiz! Thanks.
I got 9 out of 15.
Although it was more from process of elimination + lucky guessing than actually....knowing many of these games.
12/15 I knew all of the pre wii games.
@nessisonett Same
@Drangor You are incorrect with your math. Each question has a 1/4 chance of getting it correct and there are fifteen questions so you have a a (1/4)^15 chance of getting them all correct assuming you were guessing.
Guessed on most of them but still managed to get 9/15.
I got 10. I feel like I should be ashamed for having so much obscure video game knowledge 😄
@JasmineDragon The Crystalis art for the NES original was way better, even if it didn’t look like the character:
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/9/9b/Crystalisboxart.jpg/220px-Crystalisboxart.jpg
... to be fair, the GBC one doesn’t look much like the character either. That GBC art is pretty bad.
10/15. Some consoles have very distinct styles (such as the weird 3D N64 ones).
Hell yeah, 11/15. Better than average...?
12/15 Best Quiz so far.
Some great underrated games in there.
4 out 15 😂😂. And the only one I was kind of certain of was "Tank! Tank! Tank!"
9 out of 15 and honestly guessed all but 3 of those as they are obscure.
I literally got 0/15. Welp, there goes my last brain cell
7 out of 15. I recognized most of them, but I didn't know from what. Ha.
Yikes! Only ones I got right were ones I guessed at. Some of these were even games I've played through. In my defense, I mostly got my games used with the labels have rubbed off.
@james_squared This guy maths. One of the few things I remember from Advanced Higher Maths 😅
11 out of 15, so not too shabby. A few did educated guesses because I knew the covers of some of the answers were Not the picture.
Good quiz.
10/15, choked near the end.
3/15. Oofity oof.
6 out of 15, and they were guesses! Xx
12/15 for me. I should've gone with my gut on Dokapon Kingdom! Knew that one, but convinced myself to put the wrong answer somehow lol
9 out of 15... and from those 9 games I only know 5, the rest was based what the cover showed.
It certainly shows that I was a Sega kid; I was right on 6 of 15. I'll see myself out.
8 out of 15. The post N64 stuff was easier to guess, but these were mostly obscure games.
11 out of 15. I ran into some hiccups in the middle, but am otherwise happy with my score.
14 / 15! I got about 3 from process of elimination lol. And that Vertical Force / Star Soldier one was very clever. (I got 2020 baseball wrong) (It helps I used to sell them lol)
I scored 12, but I only missed Tuff E Nuff because the NA box is very different.
6. Worst I've done on any of these. I think I've got at most, 2 wrong before.
I got 12/15 mostly by process of elimination knowing the art of the other games in the list. The only ones I 100% knew were Kwirk for GameBoy that I used to have and completely forgot about its existence and also Crystalis for GBA which is a game I have been in love with basically all my life. A greatly under-appreciated action RPG in my opinion.
11/15 but it was a process of elimination. Super obscure.
I had so many of these games, what a time trip!
I'm gonna be honest...I didant have a clue on any of these and so I guessed them all..ended up with 7 out of 15!lol
9/15. Not bad at all.
13 out of 15
Missed Urban Yeti and Vertical Force
11/15 not bad better then I thought
2/15 Embarrassing.
8/15. Not too good.
6/15 and the ones I got right were lucky guesses
@chardir same. I guessed every one.
For me 5 out of 15
Metal Arms!!!
8/15, not bad. While I think Nintendo's doing NSO wrong, it is neat having an insight into more obscure games of the past.
I got a ten out of 12 and I haven't played any out these!
Tank! Tank! Tank! is the only one I own.
I got 9/15, but I only knew about 3, the rest were guesses based of of the art style and whether or not it matched with the era of the consoles listed.
Considering I guessed on EVERY SINGLE ONE, I’d say 5/15 is pretty good.
I got 8, but this quiz felt like a bait & switch compared to the title and the pictures.
It's not very fun trying to guess what Tomato game something is... Quizzes should be tricky, but everytime you get a wrong answer you go "ah yes of course" not "how was I supposed to know that"
I got 9. I knew none of these but tried to base it on the platforms and the artwork style.
6/15
Generally only knew 3 as well!!
@Drangor No problem. It looks like you were trying to calculate the expected value by guessing. EV = 15 x 25% = 3.75.
Lots. The clue was on the boxes.
@Shard1 Same score, 13/15, with a lot of guessing as well.
Man! The Crystalis one got me! I only remembered the box art for the NES version
https://images.google.com will help you!
That was fun. And that last game Tank Tank Tank was kinda cool at the time, but, I don't know why they'd put something like that out without online multiplayer.
(and I scored a 10 out of 15)
I love Flying Dragon. Still have my copy of it too. Win!
11/15, happy with that as it was tough. Good quiz.
14/15...missed the last one.
"Can you name these third-party Nintendo games from just their box art?" No. No, I can't!!!!
8/15, better than I thought. The key is matching the art style with the console and its era, not trying to guess based on the title.
9 out of 15. I'm not gonna lie, most of it was down to luck and judging the age of the artwork.
On a side note, that Tank! Tank! Tank! one looks awesome. I never picked it up, but now I'm tempted...
10 out of 15 ain’t half bad.
8 out of 15 without knowing any of these games. I defied the odds.
14 out of 15!
Get in there!
8/15
Come on, Tank Tank tank cover looks like a gc/wii era cover, not wiiu...
I surprised myself. 12 out of 15. Should have been 13 out of 15, but I doubted myself and changed one of my answers from a correct answer to an incorrect one.
These quiz’s are quite fun.
@SepticLemon Impressive. Which one did you miss?
10/15. Interestingly, there were about four I managed to guess based on art style. I looked at the aesthetics and matched them with the appropriate console of that same era. Neat-O!
@Tandy255 Urban Yeti.
A lot of these are terrible games which I never heard of so I only got a few correct.
I only got 6 right but that was pretty fun! 5 of those were lucky guesses!!! The only one I actually knew was Monster Party! (Gawd I hate that game!!!)
4 out of 15... A little worse than I expected!
10/15. Mainly from looking at the art style and gleaning what era of console it might be from.
14/15, with a couple of educated guesses that went my way!
4/15 but then I am drunk so am quite pleased
If I came back tomorrow sober I might get 5!
4/15 Better then expected but I suck
7/15. I did not know a single one of these games. My correct answers were purely logic guesses based on it not being a titles I know and knowing the style of box art for different generations, or pure, dumb luck.
7/15 Better than I've done on most of these.
@Damo I believe there is an error on the question with Street Fighter 2020 for NES. I'm pretty sure the game was actually titled Street Fighter 2010.
I only got 5! ...(extra content).
Multiple choice absolutely helped.
I only guessed Flying Dragon correct because it looks like N64 graphics.
(though that didn't work for Vertical Force)
I only guessed Tuff E Nuff because the other two Jaleco games had far more memey bad boxart.
But Kwirk did appear in the FDS and PCE versions of Puzzle Boy(s). And Acclaim also put him in the one season of Video Power that was like a knockoff of Captain N.
(the other season of Video Power was a gameshow, with a host that seemed like he was FAR too excited. Especially when the bonus round, when the kids get to live their dream of going to the game store and taking all they want, guy just starts pulling the games off their suits to tally up what they won. )
11/15, not bad!
(No, NL, I don't have anything else to say)
9 out of 15 for me
I chose poorly, also I really miss Metal Arms it truly was a classic!
7 out of 15 , i guessed most of them.
I literally guessed on all of them and got 10 right. Got the first 9 right somehow then the bottom fell out.
12/15 - 2 were a case of mistaken identity (Monster Party, Basewars) and I'm not that great at Virtual Boy games for #10. Admittedly, #'s 2-4 I had to do process of elimination, but I was relieved that the rest of them weren't so bad. I'm upset at missing Basewars because I actually rented that out back in the day. It was an Ultra (Konami) title, iirc.
@Damo For Tuff-E-Nuff "And we should probably apologise to our North American readers, as we've used the European (and Japanese) artwork here. Sorry."
You're darn right you should!
@TheDanslator I thought, "Hey, it's Dead Dance! I own that!...wait, what's the NA version called again?" I recently played through Game Tengoku CruisinMix Special, with the bad box art Tuff E Nuff scrolling in the background of one of the stages, and that's what clicked.
11/15
I don't know half of these games, I just guessed it by details on cover and art style (for example, early 3D art on cover was clearly something from N64 era). Still, the quiz got pretty tricky near final.
And thank you for reminding me about Crystalis. NES version is an underrated gem and I should finish it.
I recognized some also made logical guess and impress I got 11 out of 15 right.
These quizzes are a lot of fun! Keep ‘em coming
12 out of 15
Could have been 13 if I paid better attention.
I do enjoy these quizzes as well. It gets the ole synapses working again with crusty memories. Not only do I remember Kwirk, I remember he was a member of The Power Team cartoon on Video Power GUITAR RIFF
6 out of 15 by basically guessing and trying to match the art style and quality to the console
10 out of 15. Considering I guessed on nearly half of them not bad. Base Wars, Vertical Force, and Tank!Tank!Tank! were easy as I own them.
I wish there could be a new Metal Arms game. It’s just fantastic.
@EdwardElric But...there's only 2 indie games in the article pic. Wargroove (by Chucklefish) and A Boy and His Blob for the Wii with most of the cover chopped off in the top right (by WayForward but published by Majesco, so technically it can go either way).
@Knuckles Good spot! You get an extra point.
@Damo It's one of those games I've been wanting to play since... haha, pretty sure it was in 2010, maybe 2011. I wouldn't have put it beyond Capcom to develop a game titled Street Fighter 2020, but I did a double take when I saw the game title.
Thanks for the extra point!
Kwirk!!!! What a mediocre yet ridiculously nostalgic game. As far as I can remember I was able to clear every stage except for the last one or two, which was infuriating as a child. Also, I have a weird memory of having a conversation with my older brother where I said I would feel obligated to buy a sequel to any game I owned, and he was like "even Kwirk: the Chilled Tomato?" Good thing I never found out about the sequel as a kid because not being able to play it it would have driven me to madness.
Way too hard. I own Metal Arms and Lost Magic, the other 2 I got were guesses. Tank tank tank and has 0 tanks in the picture was why I elected for Option B. I'm guessing that like the pushsquare one it has a lot of JAP only games, as well. Go easier next time!
10/15. I feel shame.
Got a 2/10. Sigh :/
7/15. Got all I knew right and all I didn't knew wrong.
My favourites are from the Wii era: Kororinpa 2 and Dokapon Kingdom!
11/15. Choked on Vertical Force and Cyber Stadium. I'm ashamed of myself.
10/15
My lack of social interaction has finally paid off!
10/15
Not too shabby...
Only 8, I had to guess a lot.
5 out of 15... quite surprising as I've never heard or seen any of these games. These are some obscure games right here.
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