I'll be picking and poking at this over the next while, and it's not in any particular order, unless otherwise mentioned. As it turns out, I have a hard time placing games from these last two generations on this list, so this is more of a history lesson. These aren't necessarily the best games ever made, these are my personal favorites across the years.
Unquestionably my favourite game of all time, and sparked an obsession with the Metal Gear series that continues to this day.
A strong contender for first, if not placed against MGS. The original translation and story were incomprehensible, but it was pure gameplay with this one. Outside of MMOs, my most time spent with any single game ever.
A classic, plain and simple. Needs no explanation.
While probably not the best entry in the series, that might go to either HM64 or BTN, this sparked another love affair. A series with terrible translation and sometimes even game breaking glitches, but the core gameplay scratches some very deep itch in my soul.
Really the only NES game I played a lot as a kid. Most games were too sophisticated for me at that age.
A timeless classic, yet to be replicated, still fresh and fun as hell to this day. I could never even come close to beating this game as a kid, but that sure didn't stop me from trying.
The game that brought me into the world of Gameboy. Blasphemy sure, but my first portable was a Gameboy Color, and the amount of hours I sunk into this game is incredible. Back in my day, me and my schoolmates grinded the Elite 4 endlessly to get those magical lv100's to pound each other with.
At the risk of duplicate entries, this deserves a special mention, as the game I spent the most time involved with, but not necessarily playing. This game is responsible for bringing me fully into the realm of message boards, where teams and movesets were discussed and evaluated. Probably spent more time with the theory of this one than actually playing it.
Gives FFT a run for it's money as most played. If you combine all the time my friends played it too, it would definitely win. We would spend countless hours painfully combing my father's CD collection for rare monsters, manually recording each result for later retrieval. I still have notebooks full of nothing but lists of discs and monsters. That's to say nothing of the time we each spent raising our own selections, then pitting them against each other.
An almost unknown Enix RPG. Fuelled partially by my giant robot obsession, the level of customization for your individual bots was very deep, but the game itself was difficult almost to the point of impossibility. The story made absolutely no sense. We still played the hell out of it.
A game I was never fortunate enough to actually own, but had on almost permanent rental for a very long time. Just a great strategy/RPG.
The best of the Phantasy Star series, and an absolutely amazing RPG from start to finish. Great story, great characters, and (for the time) amazing graphics and sound.
Another game that's hard as nails, but it had robots, and a surprising amount of depth and customization. Basically a side scrolling beat em up, with only three buttons and a D-pad you could rip of an enemy's arm, throw it at him, pick him up and then slam him into the ground. Then you backflipped and crouch blocked to avoid his buddy, stood up and ripped off his torso, and absorbed his health into your own. Finally you picked up his legs and replaced yours with them. Awesome.
A game that has aged very poorly, but was still a lot of fun to play with a friend beside you.
What may be seen as the beginning of the end by some, this was certainly one of my favourite entries in the series. But I also collected the Sonic comic books for a long time, and still have my Sonic and Tails plushies, so I was a bit of a fanboy back then.
Probably only played this one so much because of it's absurdity. Is still sadistic fun to shoot an enemy until he's on his knees begging for his life, then pop him one last time in the face to finish the job.
What ever happened to space combat sims? Lucasarts needs to get off their ass and at least do some playable Steam releases of these games, if not revive the license entirely.
Silly fun. Back before the age of the internet, just stumbling through puzzles sometimes taking weeks or months to figure out.
Another Lucasarts classic that desperately needs some attention. A great adventure game.
Perhaps not the best adventure game ever made, but maybe the most atmospheric. The Dig still has one of the most mysterious and fascinating aliens worlds I've ever played around in.
PC classic. Used to turn off the ingame music and listen to MIDI music I had downloaded. Yes, back before MP3s kids. Would also leave the game on overnight so I could rack up billions of virtual dollars to pimp out my town.
Specifically the SNES version. Another great simulation game. That spider was effin scary as a kid though, gave me a few nightmares.
Basically SimCity on an alien planet. Great music, which I found out later was a lot of royalty free classical tunes. Probably fueled some of my musical interest in later years. That Mario Paint mouse sure served me well.
A sidescroller with RPG elements. Kill enemies and eat meat to get EVO points and evolve your creature's various attributes. Lots of grinding, lots of fun.
Might get a lot of hate, but the first RPG I truly spent a lot of time with. Enough that I beat every Weapon legitimately, and cross breeded a full stable of Gold Chocobos. Maxxed the in game timer on this one. Wish I could put that much time into one game nowadays.
PSX version specifically. Robot obsession once again, but had a fun combat system to beat your friends up with.
Another unknown Enix classic. I had a long history with this one. I remember renting it once and loving it, but later could not remember the name of the game. Got lucky one day at a flea market, picked it up extremely cheap. Hack and slash RPG fun.
SNES version. A relatively simple side scrolling beat em up, but each robot ninja had a variety of interesting moves and abilities. Actually dressed up as the big blue guy (known in game simply as 'Ninja') for Halloween a couple years.
The first in what became a long series of fighting games that continues to this day. What really drew me in was the mode where you collected various new weapons with different attributes.
Another game that only truly shined with a second player. First Playstation game I owned, but a great way to start.
Wins strictly for multiplayer. During highschool, on lunch breaks my friends and I would walk the ten minutes to my house and play for nearly an hour, every day, before heading back. Almost unlimited customization kept things fresh for a long, long time.
Another lunchtime multiplayer hit. Really the only two reasons my N64 wasn't in a closet somewhere.
Terrible translation, but the draw of building a massive army of characters and watching your castle slowly expand as you got them was the real meat. Even managed to have a deep and interesting story, despite the mangled engrish.
Jammin!
Another game that needs almost no explanation. Still a rock solid RTS to this day.
Never really could get into D2, but certainly played a lot of this on BNet.
Lots of multiplayer fun. And that's direct connection multiplayer, "Don't pick up the phone!" screechy dialup multiplayer.
Really the first Megaman game I really got into. Lots of secrets and powerups. Can full clear this one in a sitting now.
Badass ninja action. Great music. Cool, surreal stages. What more could you want.
They coined the term "survival horror", but this was an adventure game with guns. Finding items and doing puzzles, it disguised itself as an action game, but deep down all it lacked was a mouse and dialogue trees.
What's there to say. Another SNES bombshell.
Probably the most depressing game I've ever played. Still, an interesting combat mechanic and stories that really sucked you in.
I was hopelessly addicted to this game for a long, long time. Still in the era of dialup internet. Me and a good friend would have sleepovers, and I had two active phone lines at the time, so we had two dreamcasts, two TVs, in adjacent rooms. Grinding the night away.
