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Ranking the Nintendo Console Libraries

by guip1408

My favorite Nintendo Consoles based ONLY on their library of Games, focusing on their most well-known games. Not including Virtual Console, but including, to some extent, remasters and such.

I compared the consoles in 5 categories (each category stands for 1 point):

  1. Variety: How complete was the library of the console? How many types of games it had? More of a quantity over quality. (I know it might be an advantage for newer consoles, but it's a factor still)
  2. Exclusives: How was the exclusives lineup?
  3. Must Play: How many unparallel games did the console have? How many masterpieces?
  4. Main Genres: Which console had better RPG, better Action-Adventure, better Platformer? More of quality over quantity.
  5. Innovation: NOT THE CONSOLE ITSELF, how innovative were its games.

If there's some sort of tie in a category or an overall number, the older console has the edge.

Showing 1-10 of 12 items

Super Nintendo Entertainment System

1. Super Nintendo Entertainment System

43 points The best overall console, with the most/best must-play games.

Nintendo Switch

2. Nintendo Switch

36 points The most variety of games and it came out already having two masterpieces in its first year.

Nintendo 64

3. Nintendo 64

35 points Not huge on variety, but one of the strongest exclusive/must-play lineups Nintendo has ever had.

Wii

4. Wii

35 points A well-balanced console with tons of innovation and a couple of extraordinary hits.

Wii U

5. Wii U

31 points An underrated console that it's boosted by Breath of the Wild's late arrival and innovative first party games like Super Mario Maker and Splatoon.

Nintendo Entertainment System

6. Nintendo Entertainment System

30 points The NES was obviously the hardest to compare, being so revolutionary and having some phenomenal exclusives, but it's a beloved console that moved the gaming industry.

Game Boy Advance

7. Game Boy Advance

30 points The variety and overall quality of its library were way ahead of its time, for a handheld console.

Nintendo 3DS

8. Nintendo 3DS

29 points Another console that I think ended up being underrated but had some of the best entries in some familiar series, and some of the best remasters Nintendo ever put out.

Nintendo DS

9. Nintendo DS

20 points I always felt the DS was really good at what it did, which was: Having a bunch of games and using a new screen. But lacked great exclusives and more groundbreaking games.

GameCube

10. GameCube

19 points Even tho the GameCube doesn't have the greatest exclusives or an insane amount of games, it did start a number of new things for Nintendo and open wider the door for outside games that Nintendo usually worked with.

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