New Excitebike

Excitebike is classic NES fun. The simple, reactive controls allow for optimal racing efficiency, as the player zips through track after track, sometimes colliding with huge barriers, or cutting off foes and sending them faces first into the dirt. It does, however, come rife with some awfully frustrating inconsistencies and ambiguities, which shall be discussed.

The game is ridiculously addictive. Even after coming in 22nd place you'll still want to try again. It's easy to get frustrated by the game's seemingly intense desire on making you suffer terribly, but lying underneath rests a truly enjoyable racing game, that proves video games don't need to have flashy graphics or complex AI to actually be fun. Sure, there are other racing games out there today, hundreds of them. This one may not necessarily be better than the recent stuff, but it's unique, addictive, and demonstrates what gaming is really about.