Duck Hunt

Duck Hunt is the game that sold the Zapper, and for a whole generation of players it was the first thing they ever did with a games console. A dog flushes ducks out of the grass, you shoot with the light gun, and the dog fetches the ones you hit.

It is only three modes, and the differences matter more than they look. Game A sends one duck up at a time, Game B sends two, and both cap you at three misses per round across ten rounds. Game C drops the ducks entirely and hands you clay pigeons, which travel faster and straight - it is the pure aiming test, and it is the mode that trained players for Hogan's Alley. The dog is the reason the game is remembered: he grins when you miss, and the sequence plays out every time, which turned a simple accuracy trial into one of the most quoted pieces of 8-bit comedy. In 1990 it became the pack-in game in the NES Action Set alongside Super Mario Bros., which is why almost everyone who owned the console owned this cartridge.

• ▸Three modes - one duck, two ducks, and clay pigeons
• ▸Three-miss limit per round across ten rounds
• ▸The laughing dog, whose animation made the game a shared memory
• ▸Included with the 1990 NES Action Set alongside Super Mario Bros.