It's time we look at the golden age of gaming, back to a time when children would crowd around a TV screen and get frustrated at how tough Ninja Gaiden and Mega Man were. Many developers and publishers were hoping to try and recreate the widespread success of the original Super Mario Bros. throughout the mid-to-late 1980s. As a result, many of the earlier platforming games of the NES library simply tried replicating the Super Mario formula. Some were decent, and some where horrible. Luckily, developers started refining their trade over the years, learning to enhance what worked and eliminate what didn't in order to provide some quality platforming experiences. Now, it’s time we look back at the best of the best when it comes to jumping around on the Nintendo Entertainment System.

We know that a lot of your favorite platformers probably aren't on here, but just remember that we tried to only take one game per franchise. Otherwise, we'd just have a bunch of Super Mario, Castlevania, Mega Man and Ninja Gaiden games on the list, and we'd be excluding far too many games. Just because Mega Man #Whatever isn't on this list doesn't mean we forgot about it. Honorable mentions have to go to Battletoads, Bucky O'Hare, Kid Icarus, Goonies 2, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Karnov, Chip 'N Dale Rescue Rangers, Adventure Island I-II, Bubble Bobble, Super Contra, Street Fighter 2010, Little Nemo: The Dream Master, Shake Rattle 'N Roll along with the other Super Mario Bros., Mega Man, Castlevania and Ninja Gaiden games we didn’t include. You better do the Konami Code and line your jumps just right, because it’s time we start hopping through the 10 Best NES Platformers.

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