Rare may be one of the longest-running and most beloved developers ever. If you were a child of the ’90s and early 2000s then you likely have fond memories of most of their games. They were behind Killer Instinct and the iconic Donkey Kong Country trilogy on the Super Nintendo. They followed that up by making classic N64 games like Banjo-Kazooie, Goldeneye 64, Perfect Dark, and Conker’s Bad Fur Day. Even in recent years they made Sea Of Thieves, which started off rough but has evolved into a pretty fun pirate experience.
So naturally, Rare would be the first developer you’d go to to make a NES game where you play as Freddy Krueger… Well actually no that sounds insane. But it almost happened.
Who Wouldn’t Want To Be A Burned Up Nightmare Man?
Back in the late ’80s, Rare was just a small, fledgling developer working out of England. They were known for making titles like Wizards & Warriors and California Games. They also had made several licensed tie-in games like Who Framed Roger Rabbit, and a surprising amount of adaptations of game shows like Wheel Of Fortune and Jeopardy.
Rare tended to work with the publisher LJN. For anyone who grew up in this era, that name was what you saw before you played something awful. They were the purveyors of truly terrible games based on popular movies. That includes lackluster titles like The Karate Kid, Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure, Back To The Future, and the aforementioned Who Framed Roger Rabbit. They were also behind all of the horrendous NES and SNES WWE games, which explains why there wasn’t a good wrestling game until the AKI Corporation started making them for the N64.
A Nightmare On Elm Street released in 1990 and revolved around the events of A Nightmare On Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors. The goal was to collect all of Mr. Krueger’s bones so you could destroy them and kill the sweater-wearing menace once and for all. There was also a sleep meter that was constantly ticking down. Once empty, it would send you into the Dream World where Freddy could attack you. Thankfully, you could acquire special powers that would allow you to fight him off and escape the nightmares.
But that was the version that came out. Rare’s original vision was a much darker and more violent version of the game that was announced in 1988. In that title, you would get to play as Freddy Krueger. You would travel through the Dream World to stalk your teenage prey and take those dumb kids out one by one. Up until 1989, this was the game that showed up in advertisements. It even made appearances in issues of Nintendo Power.
That would have been a far more interesting title. However, when you consider the kid-friendly nature of Nintendo at the time, a game about murdering teens as a scarred, demonic serial killer probably wouldn’t have gotten the Nintendo Seal Of Approval. And that’s probably why it became a game about fighting Freddy as opposed to a Freddy simulator.
No one has come out to confirm it, but the general feeling is that LJN wasn’t a company known for taking risks. So a game where you play as the villain wouldn’t have sounded as financially viable to them as a game where you’re a standard, bland good guy. That’s likely why it was changed so dramatically.
What A Horrible Dream That Could Have Been
It’s doubtful that a game where you played as Freddy Krueger would have been any better than the one we ended up getting. But it would have at least been a fascinating curiosity. Especially since there aren’t many NES games starring serial killers. Instead, we wound up with the lame and forgettable version of A Nightmare On Elm Street. A game that’s on the same level of quality as the abysmal Friday The 13th game for the NES (which, coincidentally, was also published by LJN.)
Rare soon got out of the LJN business, which ended up being a good move for everyone. They started working directly with Nintendo and were then bought out by Microsoft. That led them down the road to creating some of the most memorable games of all time (they also made Grabbed By The Ghoulies, but let’s forget about that one.)
LJN’s reputation for making appalling games caught up to them, and they were acquired by another terrible game making company, Acclaim. However, the LJN brand made a surprising comeback in 2018 when it started making action figures for popular independent wrestlers The Young Bucks. Could this mean a return to video games in the not so distant future? Well, 2020 seems to get weirder and weirder with every passing moment, so anything can happen.
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