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.
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.
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
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.
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.
The older Bomberman games, the Metal Slug games from the Neo Geo, Gunbird, King of Fighters 2002, Final Fantasy games like II (PSP is the most complete version), VI and Mystic Quest, コテ・DE・メクール (a PC-98 game), the first Shantae, modern homebrews like Tanglewood, Nyx - The Paradox Relic, Augury Red Code and Micro Mages, Mega Race, Kunio-Tachi no Banka (rebranded as River City Girls 0 in its recent release, and has an option to play with untouched dialogues), Wonder Boy in Monster World, Castlevania: Symphony of the Night, Phoenotopia (Adobe Flash version).
Commander Keen - Goodbye galaxy. Completely different but it’s right up there with Zelda for SNES.
Museum Madness - insanely creative and supremely educational game with an abssssurd amount of content for the time that must have taken ages to build. It’s the basics of major educational subjects so most would (hopefully) be review but it’s well done and the path to learn each piece and sub-ppieces requires constantly rejiggering your mind. Also a great way to teach modern kids how damn persistent you had to be to figure something out.
Oregon Trail
Where in the ______ is Carmen San Diego
Scorched Earth
SNES- super Street fighter 2 turbo, NBA jam TE, Ken Gruffy baseball, Zelda link to the past, supermarioworld, Earthworm Jim
N64- Mario kart 64, Mario golf, Goldeneye, 1080 snowboarding, blitz NFL, Gretsky 3d hockey, DK Country GTA2 - top down view and sound effects were fantastic.
Worms Armageddon. Like comparing Doom to Pong, this for me was the ultimate level of what started with Pong/cannon fodder/scorched earth. It took all that and made it hilarious and graphic and incredibly memorable. Easy to learn, difficult to master, top 5 party game ever.
Warcraft 2 is hard to go back to because of some of the QOL improvements war3 introduced but the sound board from war 2 may never be outdone.
Tribes online was one of the first mostly open world team based team fps I played. Some of the vehicle mechanics were clunky but many games never even bothered to try to implement such features before or since.
Diablo II - years of my life. Obligatory fuck Duriel
Unreal Tournament 2004 - weapon selection, play style and map variety options with bots that weren’t great but much better than what had preceded them. Graphics were incredible at the time and for me still look good on some levels.
Max Payne - the time slowing feature, consistent and well done noir theme and feel and an enjoyable narrative make it one that even though I only played through twice I remember 20 years later.
You might enjoy crpgaddict, a blog that is playing through every computer roleplaying game in chronological order, providing scores for each one on various metrics. The reason I bring him up is that he doesn’t rate on a curve, or give things marks for being “good for its time” - if pool of radiance scores higher than skyrim, it’s not because it was influential or good for its time, but because he thinks it’s outright better regardless of age (just an example - I’m not saying he would actually rate those two games that way, and he has not rated skyrim). There are early 80s games that he remembers fondly and had a huge impact on the industry that he rates as like 23/100 or whatever, because the scale leaves room for the Witcher 3.
It takes a long time to get through all those games, so he’s currently up to the early 90s, having updated his blog regularly for over a decade. But his list of highest rated games might be a good place to start.
Oh, and while we’re talking about old-ish RPGs that would score well on his scale, I might as well mention Morrowind and the Baldur’s Gate series (before 3, obviously), which he won’t reach for a long time but has been known to hold up as solid examples of the genre. Personally I still think Baldur’s Gate 2 is great. I’m also a big fan of the quest for glory series, which crpgaddict has rated, but might not make his list of top scoring RPGs, because they’re a hybrid adventure/RPG, so not all of their strengths appear on a scale designed for pure RPGs.
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