My Top 115 Favorite Video Games (20-16)

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20. Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (Genesis)

One day back in 199-something, my brother and I were playing a game that we’d rented (a frequent occurrence back then), when suddenly the news came that Sonic the Hedgehog 2 had arrived in the mail. “Forget this crap!” I remember one of us saying as we yanked that poor, forgotten rental out of our Sega Genesis. Sonic 2 was here and it took precedence over everything else. Sonic the Hedgehog 2 followed up the original classic with a bigger, faster, prettier game, and while these things don’t always mean a better game, in this case they did. The Sonic sequel cut each zone down to two acts insuring that no one theme would ever drag, its levels are better designed around Sonic’s speedy momentum-based platforming, its visuals are more vibrant and colorful, its soundtrack is arguably even more amazing, and it introduced Sonic’s signature spin-dash and sidekick Miles “Tails” Prower, and co-op play along with him. In addition, the iconic Super Sonic made his debut here, and while I’ll likely never unlock him the legit way, cheats have allowed me to experience what a fun hidden extra Sonic’s powered-up form is. The memories with Sonic 2 are too many to count. Memories of trying to get through the game on my own as a kid and many more of fumbling around as Tails while my brother played as Sonic. Every zone, every boss, every section of every level has a story: the terror of the polluted water in Chemical Plant Zone Act 2, the secret base at the bottom of Casino Night Zone, getting stuck on those damn nuts and bolts in Metropolis Zone. Sonic 2 is an anthem of my childhood, it’s a part of me, and I always make sure to set aside some time to run through it and its two Genesis counterparts every year or so. Where once upon a time, the harrowing final boss fights were a nightmare rarely glimpsed, now I can get through the game in just over an hour.

19. Dragon Quest VIII: Journey of the Cursed King (PS2)

Dragon Quest VIII is the quintessential traditional JRPG and one of the most finely-crafted and polished games I’ve ever played. There’s a “classic appeal” to this game, an old-school approach to fantasy perfected that I really dig: exploring pastoral countryside, traversing quaint little villages and talking to townsfolk at the local inn, exploring a cave with torch in hand, finding treasure, battling monsters…there’s a true sense of old-fashioned adventure in Journey of the Cursed King. The world in DQVIII is vast, and this was the first RPG I played where I wasn’t some little avatar running around a world map but where every inch of the actual world was explorable, up close and personal. It all looks and sounds so lovely too, with a colorful semi cel-shaded aesthetic and probably my favorite use of live orchestrated music in a game with its astoundingly beautiful score. This is also another refreshingly narratively straightforward JRPG, and this works well combined with the rest of the game’s clean, simplified approach. What makes the story truly come to life though is the lively characters and superb voice acting. The colorful cast of Dragon Quest VIII is brimming with personality and this is definitely one of the funniest and most charming games I’ve ever played. DQVIII also features traditional, yet refined mechanics and its battle system is one of my favorites in the genre for its purity and accessibility. It can be quite a retro challenge at times, but Dragon Quest VIII is simply an RPG masterwork and was the perfect adventure to completely immerse myself in during winter break after receiving it on Christmas morning in 2005, playing until the wee hours of the morning every night.

18. Half-Life 2 (PC)

My favorite games have a way of sticking with me, of taking up residence in my consciousness and every so often signaling their presence. A particular noise, a certain location, even a smell can trigger a memory, an association with a cherished experience. Half-Life 2 is one of these games, and also like many of my favorite games, it is entwined with a very particular time in my life; in this case, my first semester of college and the week leading up to it. Even with so many distractions around me, there are few games that have immersed me as entirely as Half-Life 2. There is a lonely and absorbing atmosphere to this game that I can’t adequately describe, but it left its mark on me. I think of Half-Life 2 when I drive through city tunnels or when I find myself in a grungy stairwell; when I hear certain sounds, I think of headcrabs and Combine sirens and other sound effects from the game; tall towers occasionally make the Combine Citadel pop into my head. Half-Life 2 is also one of those games that just never seemed to end, but this could partly be because of the long period of time I stretched the experience out over. Regardless, I journeyed through the bowels of City 17, rode a hovercraft, escaped a horrible village filled with parasite-infested zombies, explored a vast coastline, crept through dark tunnels and creepy sewers, and still Gordon Freeman’s journey just kept on going. I fondly recall the night I finally reached the end of the game, sitting at my computer in the dark with my giant headphones on in my freshman-year dorm room as my roommate slept. I just couldn’t believe it was over. Darn, Half-Life 2 is so good, wouldn’t it be great if they made anoth-oh…oh yeah.

17. Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater/Subsistence (PS2)

Never have I seen a work balance extreme campiness with powerful emotional drama as beautifully as Hideo Kojima’s masterpiece, Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater. The game design in MGS3 is impeccable and much more open-ended than previous Metal Gear games, with the jungle setting offering a variety of ways to sneak around and introducing interesting new survival mechanics as well. The boss fights are, as always, incredible, but Snake Eater truly contains some of the very best in the series, including the brilliant sniper duel with The End, a patient, drawn-out affair that takes place across a gigantic multi-area battlefield. MGS3 also features a relatively grounded narrative that focuses on the fascinating relationship between Snake (aka Big Boss) and his mentor, The Boss, who is one of my favorite characters in all of video games. The finale of Snake Eater is absolutely stunning, but I won’t say any more than that on the subject. Much of what makes Snake Eater so special is in the details, such as the absurd antics of a young Revolver Ocelet and the infamous ladder scene, and just all of the ingenious Easter eggs and secrets that I don’t want to spoil. I enjoyed Snake Eater so much that after first playing through the original version on a borrowed copy, I immediately bought the Subsistence version and replayed the whole game again with the new free-form camera angle that improved version provided and never once did I feel bored or fatigued. And just listen to that glorious theme song.

16. Metroid Prime (GameCube)

Along with Metroid Fusion, Prime was my introduction to Metroid back at Christmas in 2002. Metroid Prime was unlike anything I’d ever played before, and to be honest it kind of stressed me out. It’s hard to really explain why, but I felt somewhat overwhelmed by this game. I struggle with various anxiety-based issues, Obsessive Compulsive Disorder being chief among them, and these issues can often be detrimental to my enjoyment of video games. When it comes to my initial Metroid Prime experience, it was something about the dense, detailed, oppressive nature of the game, my inexperience with first-person shooters (which technically Prime is not, but obviously it shares certain elements with the genre), and the scanning mechanic that brought about this stress. Scanning is an aspect of the Prime series that I have always had a love/hate relationship with because I love the concept but it’s a nightmare for my Obsessive Compulsive self because I need to scan everything. Ultimately, I think it all just came down to how detail-oriented Prime is. Even with my anxiety though, I still immensely enjoyed Metroid Prime, and revisiting it via the Metroid Prime: Trilogy compilation for the Wii in 2009 after having so much experience with the rest of the Metroid series and the other Prime games allowed me to fully appreciate this incredible game without so many hang-ups. Long-winded preamble aside, Metroid Prime is astounding. Every fiber of this experience is crafted with the express purpose of immersing the player in a rich atmosphere that literally steams and dampens their screen. The stunning art direction, the attention to detail in the HUD (aka Samus’s visor), the detailed lore and creature biology accessed by scanning, the mesmerizing musical score…Prime is scarily good. In fact, I can’t think of a single thing I’d fault the game for, not even the late game artifact-collecting mission as I tend to like that kind of thing. Metroid Prime is a sterling example of how to translate an established 2D video game series into a bold new 3D world, and even with its new first-person perspective, I would even say it is probably the most faithful example of such that I can think of, even more so than Mario and Zelda’s initial 3D translations.

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Stay tuned for #15-11!

My Top 115 Favorite Video Games (25-21)

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25. Kirby’s Dream Land 2 (Game Boy)

Kirby’s Dream Land 2 released during a time when a sequel to a game that I loved wasn’t an expected or familiar occurrence to me, so when I learned that there was a second Kirby’s Dream Land? Hoo boy! Dream Land 2 is just as important to me as the original, if not more so. This sequel is basically an expanded, much more robust version of the first Dream Land and it remains one of the most important games of my childhood. I loved all the varied worlds, seeking out the mysterious Rainbow Drops, and finally reaching the true finale. One of the big reasons why I really connected with Dream Land 2 was the new animal friends that Kirby could team up with. Not only am I someone who has always had an affinity with animals, but there’s a real sense of adventure and friendship here, and there’s an epic feeling as the game draws to a close. Besides the new animal buddies, Dream Land 2 also featured copy abilities, unlike the first game, and since the only other Kirby game I had played was that first game (and not Kirby’s Adventure, where copy powers were introduced), I actually played all the way up to the penultimate world without having any idea this was an aspect of the game. After getting stuck and having to consult the manual, my whole world changed when I learned of Kirby’s then relatively new ability and it only made this game that much more incredible to me. Dream Land 2 is also notable for introducing my favorite villain in the Kirby series, the enigmatic Dark Matter, and kicking off a three-game saga that would continue in Kirby’s Dream Land 3 and conclude in Kirby 64. I was so fascinated by this strange new villainous force that I basically included a rip-off of it in a short story that I wrote in the third grade. Finally reaching the true final boss of Dream Land 2 felt triumphant on its own, but it would be years before I finally succeeded and saw the true ending of this extremely special game.

24. Super Mario Land 2: Six Golden Coins (Game Boy)

From Kirby to Mario, it should be clear if you’ve been following this list just how special the Game Boy and its games are to me, and how formative and crucial they were in my video game history. Game Boy was my go-to game device as a kid and I perhaps have more fond childhood memories with it and its games than any of the consoles. Super Mario Land 2 is emblematic of this time in my life. This game is my childhood in a tiny gray cartridge, and while I’ve been saying that I have three earliest gaming memories that were very formative for me (one more still to come), I probably should have said four, as this game is definitely mixed up in that time period. I feel like I must have played Six Golden Coins for several years and I brought it with me everywhere: in the car, on vacations, to the beach, to friends’ houses, etc. It influenced my imagination in countless ways, prompting me to dream up my own “zones” in the same spirit as those in the game and draw out maps on napkins. It’s more than just nostalgia though. I described my admiration for the Game Boy era of Nintendo eccentricity when talking about Wario Land II and Wario Land and Super Mario Land 2 is one of the quintessential examples of this imaginative spirit. There is no Mushroom Kingdom. There is no Bowser. There is no pandering nostalgia-bait. There is no goddamn desert land. There is Mario’s messed-up bizarro twin, Wario in his debut appearance, there is a carrot that grants Mario bunny ears, and one of the worlds is a gigantic mechanical statue of Mario where you fight the three little pigs in Lego land (this statement is 100% accurate, I assure you). One of my favorite things about this game is these creative worlds and the great sense of progression and detail that each one presents. Another world is Tree Zone, where Mario explores a gigantic tree starting at the roots, ventures into its sap-filled interior, and climbs up into its branches to explore a giant beehive and bird’s nest. It’s all a far-cry from the bland regurgitated environments Mario so frequently tromps through today and I can’t think of a better reminder of the wonderful creativity and variety that Mario once displayed in each and every new special adventure of his than Super Mario Land 2: Six Golden Coins. Also, just to set the record straight: Mario in space? This game did it first. Sorry, Galaxy.

23. Metroid Prime 2: Echoes (GameCube)

Metroid Prime 2 definitely seems to be the underdog of the Prime trilogy, and that’s a shame because it’s an exceptional experience. Prime 2 is probably one of the creepiest titles in the Metroid series and also one of the most creative in my eyes. It has this very oppressive, harrowing atmosphere, and it really feels like, as Samus, you’re stranded on a twisted, hostile alien world. As I’ve discussed before, the whole “light and dark world” motif has been done to death when it comes to Nintendo games, but Echoes’ take on the concept at least feels inspired. I love how the very air of Dark Aether is corrosive as it really adds a great deal of tension to this eerie other world, and makes it really feel like a place you don’t want to be in. Dark Samus was also introduced in this one, and she (or it) is one of my favorite takes on the whole “dark doppelganger” cliché; she’s creepy, powerful, and she wants you dead (and she also has a badass theme). What chiefly comes to my mind about Echoes though is its richly-realized locales, which all stand out sharply in my memory, such as the rain-soaked Torvus Bog with its subterranean secrets and the beautiful, Tron-esque Sanctuary Fortress, which is definitely one of the most stand-out locations in the series. Retro Studios’ knack for creating believable, immersive alien worlds really shines in Echoes, and I felt completely absorbed in the flora, fauna, and terrain of Aether. As I may or may not talk about next time, the original Metroid Prime was initially a bit of a mixed experience for me, so in a way Echoes feels like my Metroid game; I was familiar with the Prime formula at this point, and it allowed me to get immediately sucked into this game and to quickly fall in love with it.

22. Super Mario Sunshine (GameCube)

Oh Sunshine, you underappreciated, underplayed gem. I was so excited for this game and remember pouring over every new screenshot and detail that would emerge in the latest issue of EGM. When it finally released in the US in late August of 2002, I spent every remaining minute of my summer vacation playing it and continued doing so as I entered my freshman year of high school. Like the Game Boy, the GameCube was a special time of experimentation and unbridled creativity from Nintendo; a time when they focused on doing interesting things with the games themselves rather than with the controller you use to interact with them. Super Mario Sunshine is one of many examples of this creativity. It’s not the revolution that Super Mario 64 was or the grand crowd-pleaser that the Galaxy games are, but it’s sort of like the “Majora’s Mask” of the Super Mario series; a bold, creative follow-up to an immensely well-regarded and important game that feels more low-key and intimate in its own way. It won’t appeal to everyone, but those who recognize its magic will surely fall in love with it.  One of the things that makes Sunshine so special is the connected, detailed world of Isle Delfino. Being able to gaze into the distance and see other locations and how everything connects lends a sense of cohesion to the experience that I really love, and this great sense of place is strengthened by a potent atmosphere that takes the theme of a tropical vacation and fleshes it out to its limits with a variety of memorable locations, including a peaceful village resting in the hills, an offshore amusement park, and an eerie haunted hotel on a beautiful twilit beach. There are less “levels” than in other 3D Super Mario games, but Sunshine focuses more on building a world than linear challenges, and there is a great emphasis on quality over quantity as each area is densely packed with little details, including the central hub of Delfino Plaza. The result is a Super Mario game that feels less like a series of levels and more like a Mario RPG in 3D platformer form. There’s a great sense of context in Sunshine and this applies to its much-maligned narrative as well. While the game’s voice acting may be a source of great derision today (and largely for good reason), I still appreciate the effort put into framing an adventure that was more than just “Bowser kidnaps Peach” and back in 2002 I was just amazed that a Super Mario game had voice acting and such a relatively fleshed-out storyline.

There is just something so joyous and lively and “feel-good” about Super Mario Sunshine. I could go on about the incredibly fluid mechanics, which are probably the best of all the 3D Super Mario games, the jubilant sound design and soundtrack, the bright and luscious visuals, and those amazing water effects, but simply put Super Mario Sunshine truly is unique in this series and easily one of my Mario favorites.

21. Golden Sun and Golden Sun: The Lost Age (Game Boy Advance)

Similar to Sonic the Hedgehog 3 and Sonic and Knuckles, Golden Sun and Golden Sun: The Lost Age are merely two halves of the same big adventure, originally intended to be one large game but split up due to hardware limitations and developer ambitions. Funnily enough, Golden Sun was recommended to me by a random stranger I was chatting with in a random chat room at the dawn of the internet age, and it then became my first Game Boy Advance game along with Sonic Advance. I thank that person (whoever they are and wherever they are now) because they were right: Golden Sun is fantastic. It is pretty much my ideal RPG: a traditional battle system with a large, explorable, interesting world, with unique psychic powers called “Psynergy” that are used in puzzle-solving and combat mixed in for good measure. The gorgeous sprite-based visuals also have to be seen to be believed and these are easily some of the prettiest GBA games around, featuring visually-stunning and over-the-top summons and magic attacks. The “Golden Sun” portion of this two-part journey is certainly great, but in a way it sort of feels like a prologue to The Lost Age, which is where the experience really takes off, opening up the great world of Weyard and featuring multiple continents, islands, intricately-detailed villages, complex dungeons, and a vast ocean to explore. The Golden Sun saga also takes a different tone from most JRPGs and features a refreshingly easy-to-follow and not overly complicated narrative, but the narrative structure is nonetheless very interesting. There are basically two central groups that set off on a journey at the start of the first game, each with opposing goals, and in Golden Sun you play as one side and in The Lost Age you switch perspectives and play as the other. The situation in the game then is not a straightforward “good vs. evil” tale as in many RPGs, but that’s all I’ll say about it. In addition, if you play both games (which you obviously should), you can transfer your characters from Golden Sun into The Lost Age, an element that comes into play as The Lost Age goes on. Of course, it wouldn’t be one of my favorite games of all time if the soundtrack wasn’t amazing, and the Golden Sun/The Lost Age OST is really something quite different. The music has a very signature sound and a certain style that I find very unique, and it ranges from peaceful and relaxing with many of the town themes to downright inspirational when it comes to the world map and traveling themes.

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Only twenty games left? Yup! #20-16 is next!

My Top 115 Favorite Video Games (80-76)

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80. Metroid: Zero Mission (Game Boy Advance)

The original Metroid for NES has not aged well. In concept, it’s brilliant and revolutionary for its time and it still has an eerie atmosphere of isolation to this day, but refilling one’s health and missiles after dying is such an egregious chore and the copy-and-paste level design makes things not only extremely confusing (in a bad way) but also just rather dull a lot of the time. Enter Zero Mission, an excellent remake that addresses these issues as well as gives the game a visual makeover and an interesting extra chapter after the finale. What Zero Mission may lack in terms of the original’s stark atmosphere, it makes up for by being a much more playable and well-designed experience.

79. Metroid Prime 3: Corruption (Wii)

Prime 3 is my least favorite of the trilogy but it’s still a worthy Metroid experience. While I prefer sinking my space bounty hunter boots into one, intricately-detailed world, I still appreciate that Corruption switches things up by having Samus be able to jump into her ship and explore multiple planets. The game is gorgeous for a Wii game (once again, Retro Studios is an exceptional talent when it comes to art direction and world-building) and each environment that Samus visits is distinct. Corruption also sees one of the best uses of the Wii’s motion controls with simple and fluid point and shoot mechanics and I even get a kick out of the gimmicky stuff as well, such as turning the Wii remote to turn levers and so on. The game also features some pretty decent voice acting, though I personally still prefer my Metroid more isolated and quiet than this; still, the game knows when to shut up and chatty bits are mostly few and far between. Corruption is a satisfying end to the stellar Prime trilogy; it’s just unfortunate that at this present time it is also, sadly, at nearly ten years old the last great original Metroid game we’ve gotten.

78. Portal (PC)

If you’ve never played Portal, stop reading and go play it. I won’t outright spoil anything major here, but if you’ve somehow missed this game and haven’t been in the loop in regards to nerd culture in the last ten years or so, this is definitely a game best experienced blind. Portal is an unassuming masterpiece. Originally packed into The Orange Box, it begins as a rather straightforward puzzle game, albeit one with a really neat mechanical hook, as the player moves from test chamber to test chamber solving increasingly difficult puzzles with the portal gun as a robotic voice on the intercom blandly guides them on. It’s rare that a game is as genius on as many levels as Portal is, because as brilliant as the game’s central portal mechanic is, what ultimately makes the experience so memorable is how it fools players into thinking it is just a series of puzzles…until that dull intercom guide starts talking about android hell and promises of cake, and you start to question, “Wait, what did she just say?”. Furthermore, enterprising players might use the portal gun creatively to sneak behind a wall and land themselves in a part of the facility they aren’t supposed to be in, where they’ll likely find mad scrawls and implications that “the cake is a lie”. No one expected the writing and the narrative to overshadow the unique mechanics in Portal, and no one expected the unmistakable mark that the game would leave on popular culture. Portal is one of a very small number of games that I can’t personally find a single fault in, and if you somehow haven’t played it (and ignored my earlier suggestion and are still reading this), please do yourself a favor and change that.

77. Super Mario World 2: Yoshi’s Island (SNES)

Yoshi’s Island is a wonderful game made with love and care and effort. I could point to its disparate elements: its gorgeous art-style that hasn’t aged a day, its small but unforgettable soundtrack, and its imaginative level designs and bosses…but ultimately this game just has a certain feeling about it that I can’t quite describe. When I think of Yoshi’s Island, I often think of the cave levels. The sparkling rocks, the waterfalls in the distance, maybe some mist pervading the scene, little ghost creatures carrying lanterns, giant mushrooms and little munching plant monsters, and above all else that absolutely enchanting music. There’s just nothing else quite like it. I distinctly remember how appealing this game’s box-art and overall look was to me as a kid, and how much I really wanted to play it. I remember playing it at a friend’s house once, but I unfortunately didn’t experience Yoshi’s Island in full until the Game Boy Advance port, though I now own and have completed the original and superior version as well, don’t worry.

76. Sonic Colors (Wii)

The game that brought Sonic back into my life. Don’t get me wrong, I’d still been consistently replaying the classic Genesis games over the years, but when it came to actively following the Sonic series, I’d largely tuned out after one disappointing and poorly received game after the next was churned out. I hesitated for a while but I eventually took the plunge again with Colors after positive reviews and seeing what simply looked like an overall very solid game. I’m so glad I did because this game made me remember why I fell in love with Sonic as a kid. It has flaws, such as its obnoxious writing and stiff 3D control (most of the game plays from a 2D perspective, which fares better control-wise), but its creative and beautiful worlds like Planet Wisp and Aquarium Park, its wonderful and catchy soundtrack, and its layered level designs all brought to mind the 2D Genesis games that I grew up with, and yet the game still felt very fresh as well. With the Wisp power-ups, Sonic Team also finally found a gimmick in this one that supplemented Sonic’s core gameplay in a positive way instead of divided it or bogged it down. In short, I was a Sonic fan again, for better and for worse (and with the recently announced Sonic Mania, right now I’m happily leaning more towards “for better”).

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The games continue next time with #75-71!