I found Bartman Meets Radioactive Man in Game Gear to be terribly difficult, mostly because of the controls. I think I got to the 3rd or 4th world once, but it was a struggle.
When I was a kid, some piece of computer hardware came with some game demos. There was one called Taskmaker. It was not good graphically, but I really enjoyed it. It allowed access to three areas, I think. I played so much that I was able to beef up my character significantly. I was eventually given the full game. I played it so much. I tried bribing all of the NPCs to see what they’d say/do. There was a text box where you could type spells into. The normal progression of the game didn’t really give you many of them, but bestowing stuff to NPCs was one way to learn some.
Anyway, I found an abandonware version of it a while back and installed it on an old Mac virtual desktop. It still holds much of the same magic for me. I don’t have time to bribe every NPCs now, but I remember a lot, and google helps me with the rest.
I’m 40 now. If I have to wait until I’m 50 for CA to feel like it is good enough for release, I’m fine with that. SDV was and still is a beautiful game that I will come back to regularly, like Terraria. Just good fun.