Great text and so many memories associated with the NES, or rather the Famicom.
In Poland, in the 90s we had a copy of the Famicom, which was called "Pegasus". In those days it was hard to find an original NES in Poland, especially since Nintendo had no official distributor.
I finished "Super Mario Bros", played "Contra", "Excitebike" and many others. Thank you for reminding me of "Donkey Kong Jr.", I finished that game too, or rather loop it, as it had no end. :) I think that game had 4 levels and then it all started again. We would rescue our dad and give "evil" Mario a kick in the ass. :)
Thank you for your comment, that's right, that game created a loop and started over again. I did not know that in Poland did not have a distributor at least had the opportunity to play these games.
We are fortunate to have played at that time. A piece of history in the world of video games.