ILX'S 100 GREATEST VIDEO GAMES EVER

http://www.lemon64.com/games/screenshots/full/pirates_02.gif

God, looking at screenshots of this game I can hear the sound of my C64's disc drive whirring and humming as it prepared to display the next exciting screen. It's like putting my ear to a seashell.

endless nostalgia available here.

I liked the Sim-ish language

-- Doctor Casino, Sunday, 4 May 2008 21:03 (2 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

Chooban!

#19: Super Metroid (1994)
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/e/e4/Smetroidbox.jpg
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/7/73/Super_Metroid_Inventory_Screen.png
Developer:Nintendo R&D1
Publisher:Nintendo
Original format:SNES
Highest position:#2, abanana

C64's disc drive

bourgeoisie

Pirates was an awesome almagamation of earlier games: Taipan, Swashbuckler, etc.

Mega Man 2 was the best of the series. Great design & music.

http://listverse.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/11/mega-man.jpg

and if you did like the music, dig this.

so far, i've played 57 of these...i'm not sure how i should feel about that.

#18: Super Mario 64 (1996)
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/6/6a/Super_Mario_64_box_cover.jpg
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/7/7d/N64_Super_Mario_64_whomp_fortress.jpg
Developer:Nintendo EAD
Publisher:Nintendo
Original format:Nintendo 64
Highest position:#5, Thomas

Hey, cool, I had Super Metroid as #19 on my ballot! It's a great game, but I would say much less replayable than Symphony of the Night, and considerably more linear. Also the battery or whatever is fucked up in mine and so it erases saves more often than it keeps them.

WOAH expected Mario 64 much higher!

Mario 64 = possibly the only case in which a genre was invented, perfected, and then finished in a single game. You really don't need any other 3D platformers besides this - the controls are brilliant, the worlds are varied, there's tons to do, and really just moving around in this game is a joy. "Yah! Yahooey! YIPPEEEEEEE!"

I mean, seriously, the sound of Mario's feet running around in this game is better, by itself, than like half the games on this list.

i would have voted for wesnoth.

jon have you played fantasy wars? it's brutal

yea, I'm surprised to see Metroid & Mario 64 do so poorly.

xpost no!

#17: Championship Manager/Football Manager series (1992-)
http://www.sigames.com/graphics/images/40.gif
http://i4.photobucket.com/albums/y148/Juror8/70.jpg
Developer:Sports Interactive
Publisher:Sega
Original format:PC
Highest position:#1, Dom Passantino, Louis Jagger

…and the UK/US divide arrives!

Also, it's amazing how good that game looks on the N64 - it set the bar really really high and almost no other games for the system achieved the same sense of richness. Most N64 games were bright but blocky, with only a handful really achieving a look that wouldn't easily be called "dated."

Man, somebody should have nominated Blast Corps.

TS: the ghoulish dude on the championship manager cover, versus Kool-Aid Madden busting through a chalkboard.

It is totally a mystery that US sports just don't have management games in a meaningful way - like, why not?

super spreadsheet simulator more like

best scramble is the vectrex edition. true.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IpYOy2qp9OI

Fantasy Wars is basically Wesnoth with fancy graphics, except that all the reviews of it were like "huh wtf I played this for a week and couldn't get past level four". A++ would download again.

Vectrex Scramble seems better coz it's about the only game on that system with more than 5 mins play value.

It is totally a mystery that US sports just don't have management games in a meaningful way - like, why not?

-- Gravel Puzzleworth, Sunday, 4 May 2008 21:37 (1 minute ago) Bookmark Link

Isn't there some baseball management game from the 80s or so that still has data packs produced for it today?

I grow increasingly fearful that Duck Tales, Rygar, Commander Keen and Last Ninja are not going to make it.

"the only game on that system with more than 5 mins play value"

also mostly true. though i played mine storm and web warp a lot too.

I'm still holding out hope for Daley Thompson's Decathlon.

xp

no pi-man, no credibility?

Pi-man is the source of many nightmares for me. Creepy looking bastard.

#16: Metal Gear Solid (1998)
http://www.megghy.com/immagini/Psx/FICHE%20M/COVERS/Metal_Gear_Solid_Pal.jpg
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/2/25/MGS_screen_psx.jpg
Developer:Konami
Publisher:Konami
Original format:PlayStation
Highest position:#4, Jordan Cohen, Will M, lamp

pi-man, the answer http://www.worldofspectrum.org/hardware/answer.htm

Pi-man, and his phallic nose, should have been in Metal Gear Solid.

Pi-man was good coz you'd get a song on the other side of the tape:

*faux-reggae* "Meet de pi-man, the meaty pie man" *faux-reggae*

I think Megaman 2 also benefited from the long life of the NES while being one of the first games that really showed off the total potential of the system (big enemies etc)

I have no idea where this list is going.

#15: Super Mario Bros. 3 (1988)
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/6/6c/Smb3.jpg
http://www.ryansgoblog.com/images/mariobros3_skyland.jpg
Developer:Nintendo EAD
Publisher:Nintendo
Original format:NES
Highest position:#1, Thomas

^^^had a feeling this would be number one

i had the mario allstars version, great game

14 games left, I predict three will receive cries of "that's too high", two will get "that's too low", and... there's clusterfuck when numbers five and six get read out.

Fucking rules.

http://www.digitpress.com/archives/seanbaby/toughest.htm

SMB3 would have been a really easy #1 to rally around, for people my age anyway. 2D platforming has simply never been surpassed - Mario World is visually richer and probably bigger as a game, but it has less charming discoveries, less real variety. The range of transformation suits is a huge part of this game's charm, methinks. And the weird secret stuff! The whistle, the treasure ship, the white mushroom house!

...and yes, the SHOE. (I don't even need to open that link to know where it leads us.)

I'm looking at the ballot I sent in and I'm starting to regret certain placements and omissions. Like...why didn't I put Mario 3 on there AT ALL? I think it was because I felt bad because I already had 1, 2, world and galaxy on there, and it felt ridiculous having 5 mario platformers on a top 30 list. But shit - everyone knows Mario 3 is a top 5 game.

Mario 3 would've been my number 1 vote if I'd remembered to vote. It's like the platonic ideal of a classic platform game: great gameplay, fun design, the character develops with the new suits yet he's easy to handle, lots of cool worlds to explore, plus some warps, shortcuts, and hidden levels to spice it up.

(several x-posts)

#14: Super Mario Bros. (1985)
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/0/0e/Super_Mario_Bros_box.jpg
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/5/50/NES_Super_Mario_Bros.png
Developer:Nintendo EAD
Publisher:Nintendo
Original format:NES
Highest position:#2, Zach Scott

Super Mario 3 = Neu! 2
Super Mario World = Neu! 75

Super Mario Bros = Neu!

http://tasvideos.org/SuperMarioBrosTricks.html

Wow, that's really funny to me - the original game didn't even make my ballot. I mean, I played it like crazy like everybody else, but for me it was rendered utterly irrelevant when #3 dropped.

No way, the original's still great fun. On days where I've accomplished absolutely nothing of worth, busting it out and beating World 8-3 still feels like a real achievement.