A pile of crap today, but it was a gem back in the day.
Sure, the game looks, plays, and sounds like crap today (I still have the original cartridge - as well as the arcade emulator) but the game brought me so much joy in my earlier years (I turn 30 in 14 days at the time of this writing). Even the digitized "I'm Bad" is laughably horrible but back then it was magic!
With probably one of the most 80's cliche video game plots to date (the president has been kidnapped by ninjas! Oh noses!!), horrible flicker and slowdown issues, it's amazing this game captivated me back in the day. But hey, I was 10.
Bad Dudes is a typical side scrolling beat-em-up from its era. You walk from left to right (sometimes the opposite), platform, punch and kick ninjas with a small arsenal of moves, and pick up the occasional weapon (nunchaku's, shuriken, etc). Most, if not all, stages feature a boss, from the opening stage boss Karnov (another Data East game), to the giant..whatever that is at the end of the forest level.
The entire game can be completed in about 25-30 minutes once you get the hang of things, and if my memory serves me, there is a typo at the end of the game saying "congratulation", instead of "congratulations". Seriously? The developers didn't catch this?
Overall it was an enjoyable game back in the day and I'm glad I still have the original cartridge. For NES cartridge collectors, Bad Dudes shouldn't be a game you should search high and low for and the game play hasn't aged well like it has with, say, Bionic Commando (which is still fun to play through to this day), but if you were a an arcade dweller in the 80's and remember bad dudes, it might bring a smile to your face to go back in time and rescue the president from those damn ninjas.