Puyo Puyo Chronicle, the last good installment in the series, don't @ me. I'd like Sega to make a proper new game, but they're clearly never ever ever ever gonna do that, so the next best thing they could do is port a good one. What I need most is a game that's on all major platforms with crossplay.
Any of the classic era Tales games. Destiny DC/2 both finally got fantranslations, but Namco keeps teasing that they want to bring over the games the west never got. Eventually. Someday. Maybe. Hopefully by the time I finish the rest of my JRPG backlog.
Re: Super Metroid, it's a short enough game that even if a remake does happen, I'd say it's worth playing the original now and then playing the remake too whenever one happens. Though I'm also hard-pressed to see what a remake could bring to the table honestly, it's pretty much perfect as-is. Not like 1 and 2 which have aged horribly and needed a complete overhaul. I think I'd be concerned if they tried to mess with it.
I'd also add Mario 64's use of a controllable third person camera - all the games @Agent_Karyo mentioned are first person, and I don't think movement in those types of games is at all comparable. The camera was the key point to making a 3D platformer even possible at all, and it immediately became vital to many other genres too.
I know that by today's standards that camera is known for being rather antiquated, but it was revolutionary for its time. One detail I think deserves more credit is how they tried to anthropomorphize the camera as Lakitu to introduce it to players.
Most of the games I play are so niche that 'matchmaking' simply consists of whoever's available. Or sometimes it even requires pinging people on Discord.
Puyo Puyo 20th Anniversary. They took the best competitive puzzle game ever made and added a ton of goodies to make it the best package deal. 20 variant game modes, 24 character stories, a comprehensive set of tutorials, a devilish set of chain challenges, and a final challenge where you play against max level CPU while it's allowed to cheat.
It's a tragedy this game was never released in the west, and I can rant for hours about Sega has criminally neglected the series with the half-assed slop they put out now because they know that crossovers will sell better than the main series ever will.
Puyo Puyo 20th Anniversary. They took the best competitive puzzle game ever made and added a ton of goodies to make it the best package deal. 20 variant game modes, 24 character stories, a comprehensive set of tutorials, a devilish set of chain challenges, and a final challenge where you play against max level CPU while it's allowed to cheat.
It's a tragedy this game was never released in the west, and I can rant for hours about Sega has criminally neglected the series with the half-assed slop they put out now because they know that crossovers will sell better than the main series ever will.
The character that leaves and rejoins the party is not permanently missable. It might be tricky to figure out how to get them back, but there's no fail state.
You can and should do the first playthrough blind. Save the guide for NG+.
There is an optional party member that you can either recruit or fight based on which dialogue option you pick. You'll know it when you see it though, so it's easy to make the right choice.
There are 12 endings (13 in DS and subsequent rereleases). You can easily see all of them in just two playthroughs. Theoretically you could even do them all on the first playthrough, but it's much easier to do in NG+.
The only caveat is that you have to see them in order, you can't backtrack if you miss one, which is why I recommend starting with the final and true ending on your first playthrough, then do all the others on NG+. NG+ makes it pretty easy to speed through things as well, your second playthrough will be much shorter.