Even though you get unlimited continues, Wizards and Warriors 2 is a pretty tough game, mostly because Kuros starts out pretty weak, and the powerups are hidden in pretty obscure places. But, you can give yourself an early advantage.

Just go to the Password Entry screen and put in what I like to call "Q with a bunch of Ks"

Once that's in, you get plopped into the first stage with a shield, a helmet, 10 keys

and a full compliment of spells

Plus, the password is super-easy to remember. How could you go wrong?

Rockin' Kats isn't really that tough, but it does have its moments that are slightly frustrating.

But you can give yourself an advantage.

Any time you want, you can pause the game

Then hold Down on the control pad + A + B, and while holding those, press Start to unpause. Done right, you'll be rewarded

With six lives and a full life meter!

I was able to do this a half-dozen times in the course of the stage, so you can go nuts doing it as often as you like.

Just be aware that if you have more than six lives, they'll roll back to six when you do this trick.

But odds are that won't bother you too much.

Hudson Hawk is a pretty terrible game, but if you absolutely must play it, you might as well have an advantage.

So, go to the title screen

And then press

Up, Up, Left, Left, Right, Left, Down, Select

Done right, the screen will flash grey momentarily

Then you'll have as many chances as you need to try and go through the game.

Make no mistake, Solomon's Key hates you. The game is long, difficult, and unforgiving.

But, if you're a glutton for punishment, at the game over screen, where you get your GDV

If you hold Up + A + B, you can continue your game

Prolonging the experience.

Just make sure you have a few extra controllers on hand, some of them might sail across the room in frustration.

In Double Dragon's Mission 3, you will eventually come across a pair of green Abobos. They're kind of tough, since you have less room to maneuver than normal.

But you can use that to your advantage.

If you can back Abobo up so that his back is touching the wall on the left

And give him a jumpkick to the face, he'll fall through the wall!

Saving you precious life-points.

Life Force is the sequel to Gradius, so you might assume that our old friend the Konami Code would also work with this game.

And you'd be right.

Normally, you start the game with three ships.

But, if you go to the title screen.

Put in the famous button sequence

Up, Up, Down, Down, Left, Right, Left, Right, B, A

And then begin your game, you'll have increased your fleet tenfold

And if you have two players, hit Select before Starting your game to give both of you the battalion of ships.

And good luck! You'll need it!

I played Vegas Dream a lot, but never really got what you might call 'good' at it. So I like to use various tests to check out all of the content that I might have missed.

If you start a new game

And then press

Up, Down, Right, Left, Up, Down, Right, Left, A, B, A, B, B

At the Game Select screen, you'll hear a noise. Then you've got several options at your disposal.

Hold A + B and press Start to enter Message Test Mode

Move the cursor to Blackjack, hold A and press Start to see the ending

Move the cursor to Roulette, hold A and press Start to play the Last Chance Slot Machine

Move the cursor to Slot Machine, hold A and press Start to check out a Face Test

Move the cursor to Keno, hold A and press Start to check out the Sound Test

You'll have to reset the game and to the code again once you get into one of these modes if you want to try out the other ones.

In Super Mario Bros. 2 if you pause the game

Then press Up + A + B on controller 2, then unpause, your life is over.

And you might be thinking to yourself, "That's stupid, why would I want to do that?"

Well, let's suppose that you were playing stage 5-2 (the one where you have to ride an Albatoss or Beezo across a giant pit)

And at the end you're feeling silly and you run and jump up on the Mask Gate before it opens.

And just like that, you're stuck in a wall.

There are only two ways out, sacrificing one of your extra lives or resetting your NES.

Guess which one I recommend?

At the beginning of your round of Marble Madness, you have two choices for control, 90° and 45°.

But what do the choices mean?

Turns out they're referring to the orientation of your controller. 90° is the standard way you'd hold it, with the cross pad looking like a plus sign.

45° means that you rotate the controller slightly so that the cross pad looks more like an X. The idea is that since you'll be making lots of diagonal movements in the game, it'd be easier to hit one arrow than two.

But I never could make the 45° control work very well, so I stick with 90°.

On the very last stage of Mega Man 2, after you've fought Wily for the first time, you come across his last line of defense: some brown dripping fluid in a narrow corridor. Doesn't sound too scary, I know, but they're kind of tough to avoid.

Or are they?

When you first start the stage, you fall down a pretty long shaft.

If you hold down the Right arrow immediately, you'll work your way over to the right side

And once you land, you can start going to the right. You'll be so far over to the side of the screen that the drips won't have time to fall on your head.

Unless of course you double-back and go to the left for some reason. So I wouldn't recommend that.