The Uncanny X-Men, sometimes referred to as Marvel's X-Men, is an action video game developed and published by LJN exclusively for the NES in 1989. It is a licensed game for an exclusively North American market based on the series of X-Men comics of the same name by Marvel Comics. The lineup of characters in the game is very close to those appearing in X-Men: Pryde of the X-Men, the only animated incarnation of the X-Men existing prior to the X-Men animated series on Fox.
Gameplay
The object is to use several X-Men characters, each with special powers, to complete a series of missions. The powers of each character come in handy on particular missions. The game allows for either one or two players. The playable characters available are Wolverine, Cyclops, Storm, Colossus, Nightcrawler and Iceman.
Each character has an unlimited attack (either a punch or some type of projectile) and a special move that uses their energy and would kill the character if it was used up too much. The game required the player to fight their way to the boss in each stage, sometimes requiring the collection of items such as keys. After the boss is defeated, the player has to quickly fight their way back to the beginning of the level before a bomb goes off. There are five missions: "Practice", "Future City Street Fight", "Search And Destroy The Robot Factory", "Subterranean Confrontation" and "Battle Through A Living Starship".
Reception
The game is considered by many to be poorly designed and unfairly difficult. One of the game's criticisms is that the player is forced to choose one of two directions in which to chase the boss. If the player guesses wrong, they have to fight their way to the beginning again and head the other way. Adding to the game's frustration was the fact that the final level could only be accessed with a secret code, which is never hinted at in the game nor in the manual, but rather is merely discreetly printed on the game cartridge's label.
Source: Wikipedia, "The Uncanny X-Men (video game)", available under the CC-BY-SA License.