Nintendo World Championship NES Edition review: Esports for older people

The four Mario games lend themselves relatively well to speedrunning, due to their predictability and repetition, but otherwise the games are very diverse. For example, Zelda and Zelda II focus on tense combat, while Metroid is all about managing your jumps. Kirby's Adventure is a great game clearly designed for slow, carefree play, and it frustratingly serves as a speedrun challenge. Meanwhile, some of the games included (Mirror of the Gods, Ice Climbers, Balloon Fight) are so cumbersome or random that I've had to give up on my goal of getting an A rank or better in every game. For now.

These Switch-compatible NES controllers are pricey, but they feel just like the 1980s originals. Credit: Tim Biggs

Additionally, the Joy-Con controllers that come with the Switch console are a poor substitute for the ultra-precise NES pad, which some people will find problematic. If you want larger buttons and preferably a D-pad, the official Pro Controller is a good option, but your best bet is Nintendo's own NES controllers, which sell for $90 a pair.

Another offline option is Party Mode, where up to eight people can compete simultaneously on one TV, choosing any challenge in the game or playing a curated playlist one after the other.

I've had a lot of fun playing this mode with other retro fans. I gave it to a group of 4-7 year olds on a playdate and they all loved it. The group has the option to practice each round first, and the scoring is balanced out so that you can be good at one game and bad at another. But you never know how many times you'll be able to play it without getting bored, and it's not as much fun if there's one person in the group who's much better than the others.

Taking on the world

The remaining two modes are all about online competition, but since this is a Nintendo game, it's a bit different than other online competitive games.

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First, you'll need to set up a profile you'll be proud of – we love its kitschy feel. As you keep playing, you'll unlock pixel-rich profile pictures and trophy pins to attach to your profile. You'll also get to choose one of dozens of hype tags and your favorite game. Nintendo has a list of hundreds of NES and (Japanese) Famicom games, so your favorite games are here.

A different challenge will be introduced each week, and in the World Championship, all you have to do is pick one and submit your best score. You can try as many times as you like throughout the week. You'll then watch a ceremony revealing your placement in the overall competition, and how you performed against other players based on your birth year.

As you'd expect, the competition at the top is extremely stiff. At the first World Championships, the challenge was to complete the first level of Super Mario Bros. The overall winner's time was 21.11 seconds, but my personal best was only 0.05 seconds slower, putting me in 363rd place. You can watch a replay of the winner's race, but it's a little too late at the time to get any hints.

The other competitive mode is Survival, which simulates a three-round knockout tournament. The game downloads seven runs completed by other players from around the world and you compete against them as if they were all playing at the same time. This is a very fun mode with an element of luck; you'll be paired with different people and the order of events will change each time. If your weakest event comes first, your chances are higher as you can move on if you finish fourth.

Room for improvement

With all this cheerful fanfare and having fun competing in the first week, I can't help but wonder how this package could be made more appealing and fulfilling. Why can't I see how people on my friends list did in the various challenges and compete with them directly? Shouldn't there be a permanent leaderboard with replays for each mission so I can learn from the best players? Wouldn't it make sense to have daily challenges in addition to the weekly challenges? On a more philosophical level, the game would obviously benefit from widening the pool to include some games not originally published by Nintendo. Tetris, Mega Man, and Castlevania come to mind.

The game's integration with Nintendo's wider paid subscription service also doesn't seem right to me: the game costs $50, and you need a $30 annual subscription to access the online mode (playing through each challenge yourself maximizes the fun of the online mode).

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The full versions of the 13 NES games aren't included with Nintendo World Championships, but they are included in Nintendo Switch Online via the downloadable NES app, meaning what you get here is a $50 speedrunning mode for the games you've already paid for, with no guarantee as to how long the online competition will last.

Still, I look forward to revisiting the challenges each week and conquering each championship, and if nothing else, the friendly support of the challenges will be a better way to introduce new people to these games than simply starting from scratch.

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