Super Metroid because it’s amazing, and Castlevania Symphony of the Night for the same reason. I may be biased because those are two of my favorites ever but I swear they legit hold up.
As someone who didn’t play them back in the day, I feel like SotN holds up but Super Metroid doesn’t. Just as another opinion. I couldn’t really get into metroid fusion either. To me it feels like the moment-to-moment action gameplay is too clunky in the early metroid games I’ve played, even if the exploration element is neat. I did enjoy playing SotN for the first time a couple of years ago though. It’s been a while since I played either, so they’re not totally fresh in my memory - I guess it’s possible that I’m just more forgiving of clunky melee combat than clunky shooting.
Tangentially related, always amuses me how “metroidvania” has become the genre name, when originally it was just a way that reviewers poked fun at the big change between SotN and earlier castlevanias. They were like “this isn’t what I expect from a castlevania, it’s a great game but maybe they should have named it metroidvania”, and the name stuck. Another odd fact about that terminology is that according to interviews, the SotN designer never played metroid - they were inspired by the non-linear exploration with different routes opened up by items/upgrades in Zelda games (although obviously adding that to castlevania’s platformer gameplay makes it more closely resemble metroid). So it should probably be considered a zeldavania.
Ummm do not know who would disagree with you about Super Metriod but that is my go to game when I am sick of the stupid shit that is being pushed out today.
Don’t miss out on Mario Vs. Donkey Kong (GBA, with a recent Switch remake). It’s the psuedo-sequel. The sequels to it though are completely different gameplay styles, unfortunately.
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.
The Bard’s Tale - Hilarious, and I am a sucker for anything that involves summoning a squad to fight for me.
Psychonauts - Absolutely delightful. Just cute, funny, weird and imaginative. The platforming itself is good, though it gets really hard towards the end.
Eternal Darkness - By far my favorite horror game. None of the terrible controls, bad cameras, or bullet sponge enemies beating you with a wet noodle to give the impression of danger. Just a lovecraftian horror story full of great atmosphere and character, with the twist that as your character’s sanity meter goes down, shit gets weird, and sometimes breaks the fourth wall.
Skies of Arcadia - I cannot stress enough just how much I love this game. Sky pirates flying between floating islands in endless sky during an age of adventure and exploration.
The Zelda Series - The original is still worth playing, but you’ll want to look up the map that it came with. A link to the past is beloved, but Link’s Awakening is the real nostalgic one for me (I have the switch remake and haven’t had a chance to try it yet). I still think Ocarina of Time holds up, but I understand that many disagree. Majora’s Mask is great in many ways, but it is a game that works best when you have a lot of time to explore and discover things on your own, and as a grown ass adult with a Job and responsibilities, I had trouble going back to it and not just looking stuff up in a guide, which diminishes things… I also don’t have time to list my thoughts on the entire series.
KOTOR 1 & 2 - Pretty much what I wish every new iteration of Star Wars would aspire to be. The second one is a bit more uneven, as it had a vision that was truly inspired, but was forced out on an extremely rushed time frame, so a lot of things got cut, and even the restoration mods can’t add everything back in. (Also, Dragon Age Origins, as long as we’re talking classic Bioware)
Star Wars Republic Commando - A great FPS with a squad that actually knows how to do their jobs, and which does a good job of showing the clone wars from the perspective of a soldier. (Honorable mention to Jedi Outcast and Jedi Academy which are still the best Jedi based action games but which had some technical issues the last time I tried to play them)
Castlevania Circle of the Moon - Everyone talks about Symphony of the Night, and I won’t argue with them, but my all time favorite in the series has to be Circle of the Moon. Refined Castelvania gameplay with a unique magic system that is simple but satisfying.
Punchout (with or without Mike Tyson) - The original is a classic and it holds up surprisingly well.
Halo 1, 2, 3 ODST, and Reach - They each hold up in their own unique way. The first one is immersive and is extremely well polished mechanically. The second has a stronger story and adds the bonus of being able to swap weapons with teammates (give them the scoped weapons, keep them alive, live or die as a unit), the third has awesome mechanics but weaker storytelling, ODST is Halo 3 Band of Brothers Edition, and Halo Reach actually tells the best story while taking the gameplay back to its roots.
Cursed Halo - It’s Halo 1, but completely insane. It manages to actually be fun while also being completely ridiculous.
Rollercoaster Tycoon. Super chill game, you just manage amusement parks and build rollercoasters. Openrct2 is an updated engine for it, which supports modern high resolution screens, but requires a copy of the game for the art assets.
Doing my best to make progress in tears of the kingdom but it’s just so big. Also, recently got helldivers and I’ve been enjoying it when it doesn’t crash constantly
Still playing Alan Wake 2 and it stays an amazing game. I’d think I’m close on ending the game though. Spoiler tagging just in case
Tap for spoilerI already nearly finished Saga’s storyline, all I have to do is the ending story for her. However currently busy with Alan’s story side before finishing Saga’s.
I abandoned Hogwarts Legacy because after 4 hours, I found it immensely dull. The story is boring, the gameplay is boring and didn’t find the exploration satisfying.
Well this whole area is mostly based on deceit. Like if they claim they MAY do something they will absolutely do it all the time, if they claim they aren’t getting anything from it, it just means they aren’t getting anything directly, but indirectly instead, or from a different involved party. I also like the message at the top of the page: “Under certain circumstances, you have rights under data protection laws in relation to your personal data.”. Under some circumstances you have rights. Which is weirdly accurate. Because in most circumstances, they will just sh*t on data protection rights. Which is also evident by everything being opt-out, rather than opt-in. And then, most likely, even when you disable everything, data will still flow somewhere. Then again, it’s an industry-wide problem. Not specific to Jagex.
one of my favorite games of all time: Prince of Persia 1989 (1990 on PC). it’s a “cinematic platformer” where the animations take priority over responsiveness.
once you get the hang of it, it’s incredible what Jordan Mechner could fit into a ~1MB game controlled with just 5 keys. the realistic platforming and sword fights were unlike anything I’d seen. still impresses me to this day.
it’s kind of notorious for being a hard game you have to finish in an hour, but I think it’s a must play. I always felt like it was one of those zero-fat games. no filler, no repetition without a curveball thrown in every now and then.
flashback and blackthorne were two more in the genre that i really really enjoyed before 3d games came along and ruined the momentum of the genre. other people will suggest another world (aka out of this world) but that one, while iconic and unique, will feel more antiquated by today’s standards and works more like a puzzle than the rest.
There are entire genres that I think in many ways have passed younger gamers by.
Point and click adventures were the biggest thing in the world at one point. The classics are the Lucas Arts entries, like Indiana Jones and The Fate of Atlantis, The Dig (both based on unused Spielberg pitches), the Monkey Island games, Full Throttle, Day of The Tentacle and Loom. You’ve also got Myst and Riven (Riven being the far superior of the two), and my personal favourite, The Longest Journey, which has an absolutely stellar story and really compelling protagonist with a lot of depth to her. Also, positive queer representation in a nineties game, holy shit.
The next lost nineties genre is the space sim. The kings of the genre were Wing Commander and X-Wing/Tie Fighter. Then you’ve got Privateer and later Freelancer. For the Wing Commander games read a summary of 1 and 2, then jump in with 3, the first to feature FMV with Mark Hamill as the player character (genuinely an excellent performance too, he took the role really seriously and saw it as every bit as important a scifi property as Star Wars). John Rhys Davies (Gimli) and Malcolm McDowell also make appearances.
And of course, the classic nineties FPS, a genre that feels very, very different from modern FPS games, though there have been some good attempts to recreate it. You know Doom, and Wolfenstein 3D (the latter does not hold up; the former absolutely does), but also check out Heretic, Hexen, Rise of The Triad, and most importantly, IMO, the Marathon games. These were the precedessors of the Halo series, and they combined really solid action with a genuinely amazing story. It’s the kind of big, high concept that you rarely get in movies, TV shows and games, with a world that the writers clearly put a tonne of thought into, and some characters who will stick with you long after the game is over.
Finally, some stuff that doesn’t really fit any of the above. Crusader: No Remorse and Crusader: No Regret are isometric action shooters with some fun storytelling and LOTS of explosions. If you get them on GOG be sure to download and read all the supplementary material, it really fleshes out the world and the characters. System Shock probably doesn’t even need mentioning with the recent remake, but the originals truly hold up, especially with the UI and controls polish Nightdive added. Syndicate and Syndicate Wars are very hard to explain, but they’re really fun (That said, I’ll give an even stronger recommendation to their modern spiritual successor, Satellite Reign, which deepened the gameplay significantly while still retaining all of the spirit).
There’s plenty more, obviously, but that’s what immediately comes to mind as worth checking out.
Oh yeah, the Crusader games were fun. They probably also aged well. OK, their controls are really annoying and weird, and you kind of have to “cheat” a bit in that game at some points (e.g. by shooting an enemy outside of the screen, so it can’t shoot back, otherwise some situations are really hard). But yeah, fun games, great action, many explosions and mayhem. And since it’s isometric 2D graphics there’s nothing really bad about them either. Except maybe for resolution or aspect issues. Also good sound/music.
There’s a lot of great stuff here, I’m going to add morrowind but seriously, mod it, I love the game but it’s definitely of its time, controls aren’t terrible (a bit alien but workable) but the combat didn’t age well, all dice rolls so while it looks like you should connect it’s all chance. Game itself gives the player a lot of freedom of choice, tons of ways to play it too.
I’ve heard so too, definitely more stable. I have vanilla Morrowind pretty modded up but seems solid. Seen I heart vanilla mentioned a lot for a vanilla friendly experience, just some qol and fixes, there’s some very large lists as well.
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