Rosenau is part of a growing community who are ditching contemporary video games and picking up the consoles from their childhood, or even before their time. And gen Z gamers are following suit, with 24% owning a retro console, according to research by Pringles.
One thing about many early games is that they’re difficult. I haven’t a clue how someone can get through Super Ghost n’ Goblins or Battletoads. I had a game genie just so I can see the parts of a game that I would never be able to on my own.
You answered your own question. You just cheated, or you played it over and over and over until you got really good/lucky.
You have to realize, a lot of the early stuff came off the backs of arcade titles that were designed to be played repeatedly with little progression aside a number that went up.
There is a YouTube series call debunking game difficulty (or something like that), it provides guide on some hard retro games, one of the episode is on ghost and goblin