Nintendo’s 2024 releases have been a real blast from the past. From Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door to Luigi’s Mansion 2 HD, we’re getting the full nostalgia treatment for the late lifecycle Nintendo Switch. I’m fine with that, especially when old experiences are repackaged and presented in a new way like with Nintendo World Championships: NES Edition. If you’re a fan of the retro titles from the early days of Nintendo, there’s a lot to love here, even if there was a little room to expand the final offering.

In Nintendo World Championships: NES Edition, more than 150 challenging moments from 13 classic NES games are broken into tiny speed-running challenges. Some of these challenges are as simple as picking up the Master Sword in The Legend of Zelda, and others are more challenging like defeating bosses in Metroid. Let me be clear: You are not playing the full NES titles included in Nintendo World Championships: NES Edition, but rather playing moments from them and seeking to complete the challenge as quickly as possible.

Two things keep Nintendo World Championships: NES Edition from being remarkable. Firstly, while you’re able to climb the leaderboards in weekly challenges provided by Nintendo, there are no world leaderboards for each challenge that you can view. You can’t even view your friends’ scores. Seems odd for a game with “World Championships” in the title, no? Secondly, if you were to fall to your death in 1-1 of Super Mario Bros., the game simply rewinds you to right before the death instead of ending the run.

The rewind feature is more annoying than truly frustrating because it doesn’t quite mean that your run is flawless. The lack of a leaderboard, either between friends or globally, is downright baffling to me. The Super Mario Maker games were able to host leaderboards for creators and players. How do we not have it for a game all about speed running? Minus these two issues, I think the experience of playing Nintendo World Championships: NES Edition is a joy.

Some have complained online that the full games should be included here, or that titles that are not all that fun to play in general should have been excluded from the 13-game lineup. Nintendo never made it seem like the full games would be included, and they’ve been forthright in what would be here, so I don’t have any issues with these points. Could a better lineup that included the full NES titles have improved what is already a fun offering? Sure, but we could play the hypothetical game all day.

For younger gamers who never lived through the NES days, these games might not hold a huge weight. For people who began gaming in the NES days, or folks like me who simply appreciate the history of Nintendo, these bite-sized challenges are a lot of fun. It’s incredible that so many people are still familiar with the original Super Mario Bros. in 2024, especially the famous 1-1 level that is heavily featured here. It’s even more impressive that Nintendo has once again tricked us into playing Ice Climbers.

All in all, speed-running fans or NES fanatics will enjoy their time with Nintendo World Championships: NES Edition. If nostalgia for these titles, or the smaller challenge formula, doesn’t appeal to you, then this might be one to skip. For those interested, however, Nintendo has once again nailed 90% of a concept and left 10% out in a way that has become a little too familiar for Nintendo’s projects.

A Nintendo Switch review copy of Nintendo World Championships: NES Edition was provided by Nintendo for the purposes of this review.

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Nintendo World Championships: NES Edition

$29.99

8.5

Score

8.5/10

Pros

• Fun challenges that put a twist on iconic Nintendo games
• A great excuse to revisit some of the most famous video games of all-time
• Really addicting gameplay if you love hitting the high score

Cons

• No world leaderboards is a huge oversight
• No full games included, but Nintendo told you there wouldn't be!