Play Battletoads (Japan) Online

Game Overview

Battletoads on NES is basically what happens when someone took the Saturday morning cartoon energy of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and cranked it up to 11. You play as these weirdly jacked toads (not frogs—the game makes that very clear) punching, kicking, and occasionally riding turbo-speed hoverbikes through levels that get brutally hard way too fast.

The first stage tricks you into thinking it's just a standard beat-em-up, but by level 2 you're dodging instant-death obstacles while the screen scrolls way too fast. The Dark Queen's goons look like rejected He-Man villains, which somehow makes it even better. Just don't throw your controller when the infamous turbo tunnel shows up.

It's ridiculous, punishing, and still weirdly charming decades later.