'This things I believe': WEEKEND's favorite Simpsons video games

Though it's taken nearly two decades for the Simpson family to hit the big screen, Springfield's favorite family has had a strong presence in the world of video gaming since the days of the NES. Unfortunately, there is an unmistakable cone of suckiness surrounding most of these games. Still, the following three games are perfectly cromulent pieces of Simpsons software.\n3. "The Simpsons: Bartman meets Radioactive Man" (NES, 1992) -- Time has not been kind to early Simpsons games. This is not the best NES game, or even in the top 100, but of the three Simpsons games released on the NES (the others being "Bart vs. The Space Mutants" and "Bart vs. The World), it is the most fun. Released late in the console's life cycle, the graphics and sound were actually pretty decent for their time, and though it was definitely difficult, it wasn't as frustrating as the other two games. "Up and at them!"\n2. "The Simpsons" (Arcade, 1991) -- Who doesn't have fond memories of this game? Nearly every mall, Pizza Hut and hotel has had this at one time or another, and I've spent a good $100 over the years playing it. To this day, it's still fun as hell to help the Simpsons rescue Maggie from Mr. Smithers. Sure, tons of games were released at the time that played exactly like it, but only this one let you fight a bear as Homer Simpson. It's a real shame it has never been ported to consoles. Whoever owns the rights, please bring this to Xbox Live Arcade and the Playstation Store!\n1. "The Simpsons Hit & Run" (2003, Xbox, PS2, GCN) -- Who knew it was so easy to make a good Simpsons game? Just take Grand Theft Auto and insert the Simpsons into it. While it won't win any points for originality, "Hit & Run" does get credit for being the first (and to date only) game to really get the humor of the show, with references to tons of episodes made up to this point and appearances by nearly every notable character. Hell, this isn't just the best Simpsons game ever made, it's better than the past five years of the show.