A not so remembered game that means a lot to you.
Saying you played one of the top rated or top selling games on a given system as a kid is nothing too interesting; they tended to be top rated and selling for a reason. What we are here today to discuss is those games that you played because it was, say, the only thing you had, the only thing when visiting grandparents or just something you really latched onto. On a related note then in programming it is noted everybody programs well in their first language and usually spends all their time trying to make a new one behave like that, something similar is noted in games where mechanics of their earliest titles or those they spent time with inform how they feel about things going forward (why else do you think every indie platformer a few years back was a homage to NES Super Mario Brothers? Do you not imagine almost everything will be influenced by Minecraft before long when the 12 year olds of 2010 are now getting their first jobs in the game industry?).
My fondness for Talespin on the NES has been noted a few times before on the site, however as that is a Disney property made by Capcom (who also did most Disney things on the NES and most in turn are held up as outright classics) that does not play here. On the other hand
Stealth ATF for the NES
Not my first "3d" flight sim, Elite arguably being that one, but as the NES was my first console I could exclusively monopolise (the Commodore 64 actually came after for me) and this was one of the handful of games I had for it then it has informed a lot of how I approach flight sims, also now what I recognise as an early case of GPS syndrome as I would often follow the radar more than the screen itself (though real fighter pilots do that I am told).
Turbo Racing for the NES (Al Unser Jr.'s Turbo Racing in the US is something I just learned)
What would today be considered a by the numbers racer made by those paragons of quality, that being Data East, on the NES was equally one of the few NES titles I had. Light stats upgrades (today would be dubbed RPG elements), a little balance the turbo vs straight racing mechanic, some hills in the level, memories of a sore thumb from holding A for so long on the NES pad... barring the NES bit then if you said that I would think you were describing Road Rash, which was a far more influential series for me, but Turbo Racing never the less holds a place in my gaming makeup.
Despite it being several years since playing both of those, maybe decades since I played them an awful lot, I apparently could whistle the theme tunes/in mission tunes too. Can I do that for the last few games I reviewed? No.
What then are one or two of your fondly (or perhaps not so fondly) remembered games that, even on a site like this, you would be lucky to get more than a few people say "oh I remember that"? Why did you end up with them and did they cause you to either expect things in later games or avoid such things in the future?
We are accepting stupidly rare in your region; if basketball was your thing in Europe and you owned one of the 5 imported versions of a game that today litters the shelves of second hand game shops up and down the US then we will allow it. It need not be NES or older; if you only started gaming 5 years ago with a hand me down DS then feel free to share that too.
JM 
