Submitted 11 hours ago by ceiron@europe.pub to retrogaming@lemmy.world
I have an old Raspberry Pi 1 (!) still going strong with Batocera Linux running NES, SNES and Mega Drive (Genesis) emulators.
I’m looking for easy multiplayer games that can be played with a 5yo. Non violent and ideally co-op, bonus points if somewhat educational.
Super Mario World, Battletoads
Bubble Bobble is one of my favourite retro multiplayer games since it has both players playing simultaneously (not each take a turn/hand off the controller) but might still be a bit difficult for a 5 year old 🤔
Nah. I played the crap outta Bubble Bobble around that age. Some of my best early memories involve playing Bubble Bobble on NES with my parents after dinner every night. Had all the level codes jotted down on a sheet of notebook paper, including all the lettered levels.
This is a great idea. I was also just thinking of using cheats to enable invincibility for player 2, that way they can save you and not worry about dying.
If Bubble Bobble fits; Snow Bros, TumblePop, Puzzle Bobble or Super Pang may work too.
I played the shit out of bubble bobble as a 3 year old. It has passwords for saves, which was tricky because none of me and the other neighborhood kids could read. It’s a great game, though.
There’s one level like a third of the way through that baffled us for weeks. Still hard, as an adult. Good fun, though. Lots of “go go go go get it go go go oooh no dang.” moments.
I’m double on the Bubble Bobble! A core memory for me is playing that game with my brother for hours on end!
Magical Quest 2 & 3 are very good for that. They already know the characters, and the games are beautiful and pretty good gameplay-wise.
You play together and if the child loses all his/her lives, he/she can steal yours. For difficult sections or bosses, you can do it alone.
There are new costumes regularly so the child wants to continue to discover the next costume, and its associated powers.
Magical Quest 2 is easier than 3, so I think it’s better to start with this one. You can either play as Mickey or Minnie.
In Magical Quest 3, you can either play as Mickey or Donald. Donald is meant to be played by the child because his gameplay is a bit different (with his soldier costume which is wooden barrel, preventing him to sink while Mickey has a silver armor which kills him if he goes into water with it). It’s not that difficult to play as Mickey (my nephew did not want to play as Donald and we had no major issues).
Hard to beat Super Mario Brothers. I tried other classics, bunch of arcade games, but my son never liked them. Ms. Pac-Man might work. The big hit with us was Wii sports.
Wii sports is retro…
cries
Nearly as old as Super Mario Bros. at release.
TMNT Turtles in Time on SNES. Its a fun game and kids can button mash, and turtles are still relevant today. Puzzle games like tetris can be good for using the brain. There were a ton of puzzle games in the snes era, like bust a move (puzzle bobble), yoshi’s cookie, puyo puyo (kirby’s avalanche), and many more.
I would mostly avoid NES because it looks really dated, aside from a handful of the real classics like Super Mario Bros 1 & 3.
Those beat em ups are a great way to spend time together. As long as you can keep continuing, you barely need to pay attention and it gives you something to talk about.
Goof Troop, for SNES.
Kirby Superstar (SNES) is great for this, I play it with my 5-year-old. The second player plays as the “helper” character, and when they die, Kirby can create them again. It effectively plays like a “buddy mode.” That game is also one of my all-time favorites just for what it is, so I’m a bit biased.
“Toejam and Earl: Panic on Funkotron” (Genesis) has a very well designed “little kid mode” in the options, and it’s still really fun.
from a sega childhood my top:
My kid loved to play toejam with me
These are great! All with little to no violence, too.
I will say, Micromachines needs more patience than some 5 year olds will have, since the controls and speed aren’t very forgiving until learned.
You both can play Goof Troop. It’s a Co-op game with Goofy and Max as protagonists, it’s very funny.
World of Illusion (Genesis)
Balloon Fight (NES)
Fun-N-Games (Genesis/Megadrive) is mostly single player, but has many mini games accessibile to young gamers.
Sonic the Hedgehog 2. Little one can be Tails and play coop.
Mega Bomberman (Megadrive)and Super Mega Bomberman (SNES) both have multiplayer mode where players can team up against bots, and the bots have adjustable difficultly (different bot skins have different AI).
I was going to recommend Bomberman. Super Bomberman 4 on SNES in particular is very fun, you can grab not only bombs but opponents too, and there are cool mounts with special powers. A bit chaotic in some arenas, but the classics are still there of you want them, and then when everyone gets better ot wants a quick laugh, you can go for the crazier ones.
Oh, and sorry for so many responses, but I figure that posting these separately will let the votes give you some idea where to start.
The votes I’ve seen so far very much reflect the order I would try these games out with a five year old gamer.
It’s single player, but too good to miss: “Richard Scary’s Busy Town” (Genesis) is a fantastic open ended set of mini-games that are fun and accessibible to almost all skill levels of gamer.
Ms. Pac-Man (Genesis) is fully co-op throughout, and has adjustable difficulty by choosing smaller maps.
Dashin’ Desperados (Genesis/Mega Drive) is a racing platformer, where the adult can control the difficultly by slowing down or backtracking.
Mortal Kombat is pretty tame I hear.
( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
Super Baseball Simulator (SNES) is competitive, but can be really chill if the adult player throws easy pitches, and the super powers are hilarious.
Battle City Battle City
Super Dodge Ball!
A GREAT game to play with kids is called “Stacking”. Looks like there’s a Linux version so you might be able to get it running on the Pi:
en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stacking_(video_game)
PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, Windows, OS X, Linux
The gag is this…
You play the smallest of a set of Russian nesting dolls and you want to re-unite with your family.
In order to do that you have to solve a bunch of puzzles in a world filled with other Russian nesting dolls.
You can jump into any doll one size larger than you, and you can jump out to be one size smaller.
Each doll has a specific skill or ability, so by swapping bodies, you use the various skills to solve the puzzles.
The challenge is, you might find one that has the right skill, but you’re too small to jump into them, so you have to find the right chain of dolls to size up and size down to do what you need to do.
Trailer:
Turtles in time
Super Mario by far IMO, basically all of the games.
5yo is probably still too young to understand Zelda.
I’m still too young to understand Zelda 2, and I played it when it came out!
City Connection, Bugs Bunny’s Crazy Castle. While neither are co-op my mom and took turns playing crazy castle on the nes when I was a kid and we beat it. Core memory right there.
I think Tetris or Doctor Mario had 2 player modes but I’m not sure.
Does Sonic Spinball on the Genesis have multiplayer?
Does Sonic Spinball on the Genesis have multiplayer?
Technically yes, but it’s old arcade style “pass the controller, it is player 2’s turn” - so not really.
Not that I recall re: Spinball, but hot damn i loved that game
Wai Wai World 2 on Famicom emulator. Don’t need to know any Japanese to play and it has great cartoony sprites.
Bubble Bobble (NES) is great two player, though you’re competing
Buster Bros (PsOne, and probably others) probably one of my top 5 co-op games of all time
Micro Mages (retro despite being released in 2019 because it plays on original NES hardware) probably top co-op of all time for me
There’s quite a bit more but have various degrees of violence so won’t recommend those (Contra, Heavy Barrel, Silk Worm, Jackal, Life Force, etc)
Are you committed to using the R.Pi1? You could emulate on your computer or phone (connected to the TV) to have way more options.
How adept is your little one with games? My 4 year old loves any and all Mario games. He plays sitting on my lap. I celebrate his successes and he passes me the controller when he gets to a section too difficult for him.
kokesh@lemmy.world 1 hour ago
Gta 1.