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Maybe I overlooked it, but I didn’t see any mention of Jade Empire yet. This is one of the master pieces from Biowares golden age. The setting and story are wonderful and they aced the characters and how you interact with them.
And Diablo II is also still a master piece of action RPG. The flow in playing it is masterfully done.
Gen X here. Arriving late to the thread but I think I have something to say about this. I’ll try to keep the list short, as it could go really long if I added everything that deserves to be mentioned. Games that were genre-defining for me:
- Gradius/Nemesis (this saga defines what a good shoot 'em up should look like, noteworthy title being Nemesis 2 for the MSX)
- Double Dragon (original arcade version, as it was never correctly ported to any other platform due to home consoles being too weak at the time, this is the beat 'em up game you must play)
- Shadow Dancer (for the Genesis/Mega Drive, the best title in the Shinobi series, has great graphics, music and gameplay)
- Bionic Commando (for the GameBoy, there’s just something special about this game that was never truly replicated)
- Super Mario World (the Super NES title is 16-bit platformer perfection, the interaction between sprites is just what you expect it to be)
- Ninja Warriors Again (for the SNES, is just a fun, very well-made beat 'em up)
- Street Fighter Alpha 2 Gold (a.k.a. Street Fighter Zero 2 Alpha, this is 2D fighting perfection, simply put)
- Castlevania: Circle of the Moon (the series’ debut on the Game Boy Advance was also one of the best games ever made for the console, arguably the very best 2D title in the series)
- Doom (the game that made Boomers get interested in video games for better or worse, requires no further introduction)
- Ōkami (this one has been re-released for every platform since its original PS2 version and if you play it you’ll understand why)
- Castlevania: Curse of Darkness (hands down the best 3D Castlevania title ever created, criminally not ported to newer consoles)
- Resident Evil Zero (probably the best fixed-camera title in the series, also sets a good basis for playing the next ones afterwards)
- Resident Evil 4 (the original, not the remake, arguably one of the best video games ever made, also first “action” title in the series)
Anything that comes after that is probably not “old” enough for me.
Many of the old Sierra and Dynamix adventure games are great. Kings Quest IV through VII are probably the ones that hold up best. The adventures of Willy Beamish, Heart of China, Police Quest and Space Quest.
I’ll recommend games to younger gamers but the graphics look like shit compared to today’s games.
Unreal
Unreal Tournament (if you can find others to play with you)
Duke Nukem 3D
Sid Meyer’s Civilization (the original one put out by Microprose. No DLC. Just one complete game.)
Doom
Quake
Might & Magic (yes there is no “Heroes” in the title)
Baldur’s Gate (The very first one)
King’s Quest
Simon the Sorcerer
MDK (Murder Death Kill)
Orcs vs Humans (when Blizzard were not a corrupt asshole of a company)
MDK was hilarious and a great game too. I have played it recently and thought it still held up pretty well!
If Little Big Planet for the PS3 and PS4 ever get a proper sequel or remaster, or the Restitched developers ever actually put out that spiritual successor it would be a no-brainer. It was a magical game series for me that was not only very fun to play but also inspired creative and logical thinking with the intricate community level maker tools built into the game. Especially LBP2 with its logic gate and microchip implementations. When I took real engineering classes I was familiar with many high level concepts just because I screwed around with them in a video game as a child. Crazy.
It was also a very cute and well done aesthetic. The gorgeous background enviroments and the little sack boy character you play as. The vibrant collection of music. It was very unique.
Portal
Surprised to only see this mentioned a couple of times in here. This and the sequel are probably the two games I would recommend everyone play, gamers and non-gamers alike. They’re just that good and easy to get into from a controls perspective.
Most likely because we people >30 don’t see it as an older game. =D
If I’m going to recommend old games, it’ll be mostly games from the age of Intel Pentium 3, before all this newfangled multi core stuff they’re up to these days. Anything that comes after that is someone else’s to go to bat to. Heck I was playing Doom for a few years at a cousin’s house before we had our family computer in 98
Conker Bad Fur Day (live and reloaded)
Halo 1,2 3
Mass Effect Trilogy
Guitar Hero/Rockband
Battlefield Bad Company 1/2
Castle Crashers
THPS 1/2/3 THUG 1/2
THUG pro, for modded perfection.
SNES era RPGs like Final Fantasy, Lufia, Chrono Trigger, Secret of Mana, Star Ocean, etc. And once you’re done, move on to the equally worthy roster of PlayStation 1 era RPGs.
Fatal Frame(s), Silent Hill 1-4, and I agree with the top comment with Katamari. I don’t think I’ve ever frowned playing that game. Also, Sonic the Hedgehog.
Spyro the dragon 1-3
This is what I played as a teenager that still hold up in my eye.
X-wing alliance
Age of Mythology
Strongholds Crusaders
Rise of Nations
Midtown madness
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Tournament Fighters
Diablo
Starcraft and Broodwar
Super Street fighter II turbo
Super Mario World
Kirby All star
Heroes of might and magic 3
Age of Wonders
I set X-Wing Alliance up for my 13 year old son some time ago. He absolutely loved it.
“You had games likes this back in the dark ages?!”
This will probably get buried but I got a few of em for ya.
Syndicate Wars: Game was mind blowing for the time it was released.
Black and White 1/2: I know, more Peter Molyneaux. Everything else has been mentioned.
Jade Cocoon 1: Not 2. One was extremely unique and you won’t find another game like it. It’s the coolest monster merging game I’ve seen and has an endless dungeon.
Dungeon Crawl Stone Soup: It’s old but not old. Went open source and has been developed over some time by the community. It’s much more newbie friendly these days.
Warlords Battlecry 3: Holy cow the races, persistent hero progression in an RTS. It’s age shows though.
That’s all I can pull of the top of my head right now that I haven’t seen mentioned, though I didn’t skim every single comment.
Edit: Just remembered Tyrian existed. Oldschool Schmup that had a good SP campaign and multiplayer.
Mmm syndicate wars.
Is Black and White still in copyright hell?
Seems like it.
Need for Speed Underground 2 was a great game. Not sure how much nostalgia ia in there but it just felt good for a racer.
Bloons TD holds a special place in my heart and so does Runescape.
I know I am old and you don’t have to call me it but F Zero was my first forway into racing.
I loved F-Zero on the SNES and an old game called PoD: Planet of Death on the family PC.
I sure hope you get your sequel eventually. I only ever played the super smash stage.
Look up a top 25 list for the SNES and play every one of them
Yea well ever since they did a huge crackedown on emulation. No thanks other wise I would download the shit out of them.
Well, if you can afford it, the SNES classic has most of the stuff worth playing, with a couple of curiosities thrown in.
Believe it or not and I am showing my age but still own an SNES . And that was the last system I have ever bought.
NoIntro Romsets on Archive.org for roms.
4chan’s Emulation General thread wiki for emulators etc.
They only care as far as going after large targets running rom sites (archive is much more than that, so they skirt by) and emulation of modern consoles (they go after the devs). They will never go after an individual just direct downloading and emulating shit.
Age of Empires II
The remaster is one of the few remasters that are not just a rip-off.
The C&C remasters also did an excellent job
