Play Swamp Thing Online

Swamp Thing came out for the NES in 1992, developed by Imagineering Inc. It was part of that wave of licensed games trying to cash in on a property, and it feels very much of its time. You control the Swamp Thing himself, moving through a side-scrolling world filled with monsters and environmental hazards.

You navigate the character screen by screen, punching and kicking your way through various enemies like mutated creatures and armed soldiers. The main goal is to rescue your friend, Abby, by fighting through these linear stages. A couple of mechanics stand out: you can find temporary power-ups that change your attack, like a vine whip, and certain sections have you swimming through murky water, which controls about as well as you'd expect. The pacing is slow, and the difficulty is unforgiving, with awkward jumps and cheap enemy placements. It feels like a slog most of the time, but there's a strange, clunky charm to pushing through it.