As the iconic song goes – “Life is like a hurricane, here in Duckburg!” And the video game lived up to that excitement when DuckTales arrived on the Nintendo Entertainment System on September 14, 1989.

Based on the popular cartoon of the same name, DuckTales put players in control of Scrooge McDuck as he traveled throughout the world, hunting treasure and trying to outsmart his nefarious rival, Flintheart Glomgold. Scrooge travels to five different locations in search of their greatest treasure – the Amazon, the Himalayas, Transylvania, Africa, and the Moon. The player was able to play these five levels in any order; once each is cleared, Scrooge must return to Transylvania in order to battle Dracula Duck, Magica DeSpell and Flintheart himself for the final treasure.

In controlling Scrooge, players could use his cane in a number of ways, such a swinging it to attack enemies or to break open certain objects. He can also use his cane in a manner similar to a pogo stick in order to jump up to higher platforms. In each level, Scrooge can find diamonds and other jewels to increase his wealth – this can impact the ending, as finishing the game with more than $10 million results in the best possible ending, while a bad ending is reached if the game ends with $0 in Scrooge’s bank account.

DuckTales was developed by Capcom, with much of the team being carried over from the company’s Mega Man project, including producer Tokuro Fujiwara and character designer Keiji Inafune. The game was Capcom’s first officially licensed product developed.

The game was a significant commercial success when it released, eventually selling 1.67 million units on the NES – and another 1.43 million when it was ported to the Game Boy a few years later, making it the best-selling Capcom game on either platform. The gameplay was considered challenging but not impossible, and the music especially saw a lot of praise, with the Moon’s theme often being called one of the best-pieces of music ever composed for an NES game. The theme continues to be referenced today in other DuckTales media, with the revival show using it as Della Duck’s lullaby in the episode “Whatever Happened to Della Duck?”

A remake of the game, DuckTales: Remastered, released in 2013, developed by WayForward. In addition to full overhauls of the graphics and music, the game also used the voice acting talents of the actors from the original cartoon.