Stranger Things has been one of Netflix’s biggest shows since the first season released almost a decade ago. Now, today marks the end of the year and the release of the series finale of the show. The show has been a massive hit thanks to great characters and it being seen as a loving tribute to the 1980s culture. With a show being focused on kids in the 80s, one element of culture that has always been highlighted was gaming for. The mid to late 1980s saw the revival and start of the modern video game industry in the US following the crash of 1983. Mostly due to the release of the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) in 1985, Sega’s Master System console in 1986, and then Sega’s followup Genesis console to end the decade. With that, as Stranger Things comes to a close, let’s look at some of the gaming references made throughout the show’s final season.
Dungeons & Dragons
Starting off first isn’t necessarily a video game, but the game that probably defined the 1980s the most with Dungeons & Dragons. While first released in the 1974, the classic Tabletop RPG exploded in popularity in the 1980s and saw numerous revisions throughout the decade which even saw the formal release of the game’s Second Edition in 1989. The game ended up becoming so popular that it even got wrapped up into the moral panic of the decade where overly zealous parents believed the game promoted things such as satanism and witchcraft. As it pertains to the show, the Season 5 premiere sees Mike talks to Holly about the character he made for the game and even makes her a character so she can play along too. Luckily, none of the characters parents seem to fall into the aforementioned over zealousness and having negative reactions to their kids playing the game.
Ghosts ‘n Goblins
The next entry on our list comes thanks to the new character Derek Turnbow who is an avid video game fan in the show. In Episode 3 of the season, we see Derek playing the game Ghosts ‘n Goblins on his NES. This kid is crazy as Ghosts ‘n Goblins is notoriously known for how difficult of a game it is. People nowadays complain about the difficulty of Soulslikes, but even that genre doesn’t compare to how Ghosts ‘n Goblins was at the time and even if you still revisit it today. You can only get hit twice before you die, numerous enemies attack you constantly, poor maneuverability, and you have to deal with the controls of a game on the NES. Classic games are known for having inflated difficulty as games were much shorter back then, but Ghosts ‘n Goblins was on a completely different level, and even over 40 years after it first released on the NES it is still known as one of the hardest games of all time.
Hang-On
Another one appearing on the list thanks to Derek is the arcade game Hang-On. Again, in Episode 3, Derek has the Hang-On arcade machine in his room. Hang-On is an arcade motorcycle racing game where players race computer controlled opponents, and is one of the first arcade games to use 16-bit graphics. This is a big step up from the 8-bit graphics that games had prior or on the main home console the NES at the time. The game was made by Sega and was released in July 1985 which predates their entry into the home console market a few months later in that same year. The game saw massive success in both Japan and The United States upon its release and in the following years. What really caught my eye about this game was that it was developed by Yu Suzuki who would later go on to create the beloved Shenmue franchise for Sega about a decade later.
Duck Hunt
Finally, a short line in the penultimate episode of the season and series overall brings us our final entry on the list with Duck Hunt. Steve Harrington doesn’t have the real life experience of using a gun. However, to explain why he is still able to shoot so well they mention that he is an expert at Duck Hunt. If you were around at the time or have had access to an NES and its actual game cartridges since, you would know Duck Hunt is one of the console’s seminal games. First, it was one of the launch games on the NES. However, most people probably remember it from it being bundled in the same cartridge as the original Super Mario Bros. as a pack in game with the NES itself along with the light gun peripheral. Duck Hunt itself is the defining light gun game, and will be the first game many think of when reminiscing on the NES. The game is very simple of just using the light gun to shoot ducks, but also so memorable due to the cheeky dog you have in the game that laughs at you when the ducks get away from you. He’s even so iconic that he became a playable character in Super Smash Bros. when the fourth entry in that series released in 2014 on Wii U and Nintendo 3DS. Finally, people could get their revenge on the dog that laughed at them so much when they were kids.