The new issue of Australia’s Official Nintendo Magazine wants to find out your favourite ever Nintendo games. I thought you might be interested in my selection.
They’re not talking about just Nintendo developed games either – any game released on a Nintendo console or handheld is eligible.
You can email your top 10 to the mag now. They’ll tally up the votes and publish your Top 50 Nintendo Games of All Time in an upcoming issue.
I thought I’d have a go, so here – after literally minutes of thought – is my personal top 10. Feel free to debate my choices and list your own in the comments below.
1. Metroid Prime Trilogy (Wii)
Metroid Prime alone would be enough to take the top spot here. But this collection – assuming you can still find it – is simply astounding value.
2. Super Metroid (SNES)
Okay, guilty as charged: I’m a Metroid fanboy.
3. Super Mario Kart (SNES)
Still the best in the series, thanks to its adherence to tight racing lines and an even tighter battle mode.
4. Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time (Gamecube)
Sure, it’s a multi-format game, but I played it on Cube and that’s all that matters here.
5. Beyond Good & Evil (Gamecube)
Ditto, above. It helped that the Cube version was the best.
6. Mario Tennis (N64)
Brilliant as both a competitive multiplayer game and as a (drunken) party game. Later iterations seemed to forget about the former.
7. Super Monkey Ball (Gamecube)
Another brilliant party game, yet also a superb single-player experience in its own right.
8. Phoenix Wright (DS)
Can’t really separate the various instalments, so let’s cheat and vote for the whole lot.
9. WarioWare: Touched (DS)
Tempted to cheat again here, but Touched is the obvious stand-out in a consistently inventive series. It remains my go-to game for any overseas flight.
10. The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask (N64)
I think it’s partly due to franchise fatigue, but Majora’s Mask has become my favourite Zelda because it was, well… different.
I could probably go ahead and list an entire top 50, but I’ll pause there. And then add Flashback (SNES), Micro Machines (N64), Super Mario World (SNES), Skies of Arcadia (Gamecube), De Blob (Wii), The House of the Dead: Overkill (Wii), Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia (DS), Super Mario 64 (N64), The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past (SNES), Animal Crossing (Gamecube), Etrian Odyssey (DS) and Advance Wars (GBA) as runners-up.
What’s in your top 10?
warcroft
Tuesday, March 2, 2010 at 9:17 AMActual Nintendo games Id have to say my number one is Super Mario 64.
I cant do a top ten list. The ADHD in me doesnt have the time.
But for any game Ive played on a Nintendo system. . . Resident Evil 4 on the Game Cube is the best for me.
David Wildgoose
Tuesday, March 2, 2010 at 11:24 AMI’m curious as to how one manages to play something like Super Mario 64 with ADHD…
Andrew
Tuesday, March 2, 2010 at 9:18 AM1. Secret of evermore
2. Megaman X
3. Super Metroid
4. Chrono trigger
5. Final fantasy 6
6. Goldeneye
7. Illusion of time
8. Ocarina of time
9. Super Mario 64
10. Perfect dark
Rex
Tuesday, March 2, 2010 at 1:13 PM+1. Secret of Evermore was a great game.
Naytan
Wednesday, March 3, 2010 at 10:05 AM+1 for Illusion of Time, also great.
Andrew
Tuesday, March 2, 2010 at 9:22 AMThe only thing I didn’t like about Super Mario Kart is that whenever i was playing against someone else we would both either just hold onto our red shell for a guaranteed balloon hit or wait to get that ghost thing that steals the other guys item.
David Wildgoose
Tuesday, March 2, 2010 at 11:27 AMA good SMK player can dodge red shells.
Oh, and yeah, the ghosts were an awesome piece of balance, bringing a nice element of risk if you chose to hang onto an item to use at a later moment… you might end up losing it altogether.
Andrew
Tuesday, March 2, 2010 at 12:04 PMFrom this list the best game on here is probably Super Metroid, it’s not my personal fav, but it’s the best. I’ve spent more time playing that game than I have all the others combined. I actually couldn’t finish it for like 2 years because I was stuck at that part where you need to use a powerbomb in the glass tunnel in Maridia. This was before the days of any online guides….
Anyway I haven’t played it in a while, so maybe that’s something to do, one thing I do like to do is watch Metroid speed runs, these guys on youtube are amazing, they do use tools to help them but it’s still impressive.
check it out
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ewgBGXFR8A
It should be voted best Nintendo game ever, but I’m guessing it will go to some garbage in the wii
Daniel Barter
Tuesday, March 2, 2010 at 9:48 AM1. Pokemon Silver
2. Pokemon Crystal
3. Pokemon Gold
4. Pokemon Yellow
5. Pokemon Platinum
6. Pokemon Emerald
7. Pokemon Diamond
8. Pokemon Sapphire
9. Pokemon LeafGreen
There’s only 9 spots filled because presumably Pokemon SoulSilver will slide up into spot 1 or 2 within a few weeks… :3
David Wildgoose
Tuesday, March 2, 2010 at 11:28 AMI do not understand this list.
lexielab
Tuesday, March 2, 2010 at 11:38 AMI have to agree with DW on this – aren’t all Pokemon games more or less exactly the same? You could give this criticism to a lot of Nintendo series, but they still evolve in terms of graphics, controls, presentation etc even if not in actual gameplay.
Steve
Tuesday, March 2, 2010 at 3:19 PMThere have been fairly significant improvements if you look across the whole franchise, but they’ve usually been implemented incrementally from one to the next.
I do wholeheartedly endorse the inclusion of Pokemon in the list – I maintain that the games are some of the best RPGs for Nintendo’s handhelds, or indeed any system – but this list simply makes no sense. Each pair is the same game; i.e. Gold = Silver, Diamond = Pearl. Yes, there are different Pokemon available and (superficial) story differences, but for all intents and purposes they are the same game and in no way warrant being separated in ranking.
Matt
Tuesday, March 2, 2010 at 9:52 AM1. Chrono Trigger
2. Super Metroid
3. Ocarina of Time
4. Secret of Mana
5. Metroid Prime trilogy
6. Link to the Past
7. Mario Kart
8. Metroid 2
9. Secret of Evermore
10. Metroid
Unicron
Tuesday, March 2, 2010 at 10:05 AMPretty ordinary list there David. Each to there own though. (never could understand the obsession with the Metroid games)
1. Resident Evil 4 Wii
2. Zelda MM
3. Zelda WW
4. Zelda OOT
5. Zelda TP
6. Paper Mario TYD
7. Eternal Darkness
8. Super Mario World
9. Donkey Kong Country 1,2 & 3
10 Blast Corps.
David Wildgoose
Tuesday, March 2, 2010 at 11:20 AMGood call with Eternal Darkness and Blast Corps was loads of fun.
But Twilight Princess? Really? Thousand Year Door better than the original Paper Mario? Really?
And of course the presence of the very average Donkey Kong Country renders the entire list void. Seriously there were at least ten platformers just on the SNES that were better than that.
Unicron
Tuesday, March 2, 2010 at 12:15 PMOUCH!!! Fine, i’ll swap DKC for Ducktales on NES.
Thousand year door is bigger and better in my opinion. Just spent 60 hours on it in the last 2 weeks. But have just started on the original. And Twilight does have it’s moments but i was sold on everything Zelda on the 19/12/98.
Faybl3
Tuesday, March 2, 2010 at 10:11 AM1. Link’s awakening
2. Metroid Trilogy
3. Okami
4. Fire Emblem Shadow Dragon
5. Zelda Twilight
6. Conker
7. Re4
8. Pokemon Gold
9. Super Mario 64
10. And last Eledees, just cause I love game physics
Renee Oflynn
Tuesday, March 2, 2010 at 10:29 AM1. Super Mario bros. 2
2. Super Mario bros.
3. Super Mario bros. 3
3. Super Mario world
4. Muramasa. The Demon Blade
5. Tetris
6. Chrono Trigger
7. The World ends with you
8. Metroid Prime Trilogy
9. Pokemon (any, they’re almost all the same anyway)
10. Resident Evil 4
these are just ones I can think of right now. I’m sure it’d be easy to make a top 50 list =P
lcb
Tuesday, March 2, 2010 at 11:04 AMmetroid prime trilogy is three fucking games in one, what the hell kotaku.
David Wildgoose
Tuesday, March 2, 2010 at 11:23 AMI know you’re being facetious, but man, what three fucking awesome games they are.
Gene Venables
Tuesday, March 2, 2010 at 11:10 AM1) Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask
2) Mario Kart
3) Resident Evil (Gamecube)
4) Mario Golf: Toadstool tour (Gamecube)
5) Mario Golf: Advance Tour (GBA)
6) Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga (GBA)
7) Super Monkey Ball
8) Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of time
9) Tingle’s Rosy Rupeeland (DS)
10) Tetris DS
Mark Duval
Tuesday, March 2, 2010 at 11:29 AM1) Super Mario Bros 3 (NES)
2) The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past (SNES)
3) Secret of Mana (SNES)
4) Super Mario World (SNES)
5) Animal Crossing (Gamecube)
6) Illusion of Time (SNES)
7) Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga (GBA)
8) Secret of Evermore (SNES)
9) Donkey Kong Country (SNES)
10)Megaman 2 (NES)
Chris Guerin
Tuesday, March 2, 2010 at 11:41 AM1) Goldeneye 007 (SNES)
2) Super Smash Brothers (N64)
3) Super Mario Kart (SNES)
4) Contra 4 (DS)
5) Super Mario World (SNES)
6) New Super Mario World (DS)
7) Super Mario 64 (N64)
8) Donkey Kong Country (SNES)
9) F-Zero (SNES)
10)Street Fighter (SNES)
Aaron Clement
Tuesday, March 2, 2010 at 11:47 AM1) Super Metroid (SNES)
Epic sprawling affair that I find myself digging my SNES out to play every once in a while. You’d think we would’ve gotten a DS-make of it by now?
2) Super Mario Kart (SNES)
Original and the best. Controls felt tighter and more refined, but more importantly NO BLUE SHELLS.
3) Super Mario World (SNES)
Still my favourite Mario of the lot. Lots to do, challenging & has Yoshi!
4) Star Wars: Rogue Squadron 2 (Gamecube)
My first Gamecube game and one I spent many, many hours with. Looked amazing on big TVs & really had that epic Star Wars feel to it. I’ll also admit to being a massive Star Wars fan right here.
5) Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening (Gameboy)
Picked this up when it was released and for some reason have kept going back to it over & over. Was also the first (and only) game I ever played enough that I actually managed to ‘perfect’ it & not get hit once during a playthrough.
6) Lylat Wars/Star Fox 64 (Gamecube)
More of the original, but ramped up. This alongside Rogue Squadron were definitely 2 of the finest space shooters on the GC.
7) Street Fighter 2 (SNES)
Arcade quality graphics & tight controls, but more importantly multiplayer was hell of a lot of fun when mates were over. One that my mates & I lost a lot of hours beating up each other over & over.
8) Mega-Man 2 (NES)
Bigger, harder but fun. My favourite MM from the 8-Bit days.
9) Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (NES)
Sure the game’s terrible, has almost nothing to do with the Ninja Turtles and is unflinchingly difficult, but I still have fond memories of playing it over & over for hours on end.
10) Super Star Wars/ESB/ROTJ (SNES)
Cheating slightly by listing all 3 in one hit, but given they were some of the best (and hardest) platforming games the SNES had to offer, were ‘NES hard’, then topped off with gorgeous animation & John William’s epic soundtrack. How could you go wrong?
lexielab
Tuesday, March 2, 2010 at 11:55 AMI really dislike ranking games, it feels disloyal to them and my memories somehow. But these games would feature:
Animal Crossing DS
This is the game in my life that I’ve sunk the most hours into (even disregarding the occasional time-travelling). Hell, I had a flower breeding scheme going for a while. There’s something relaxing about spending a couple of hours chatting to Bob about food.
Eternal Darkness
We had our cousins over one day and retired to a dark room to play this game. My mum came in from time to time with a knock to let us know dinner was ready etc. As the knocking was spoiling the atmosphere, we told her to stop. So she did – and later burst into the room without warning. Caught up in the atmosphere of the game, we all jumped at least 10cm off the couch. I don’t think there were any screams – we kept some dignity.
This game also gets kudos for the time we were playing it and the sound failed on the tv. It took so long to realise it wasn’t the game messing with us.
Timesplitters 2
We had so much crazy multiplayer fun on this game. We picked bots/characters based on the quality of their screaming and then went to town with flamethrowers. When we feeling bored, we attacked bots (armed only with fire extinguishers) with bricks. It had just the right amount of sadism to be satisfying.
Aaron Clement
Tuesday, March 2, 2010 at 12:13 PMI don’t think of myself in this case ranking 10 games as ‘favourite to less favourite’, but rather listing 10 Nintendo games that I enjoyed above all others.
lexielab
Tuesday, March 2, 2010 at 1:12 PMAh, but what about the 11th game? Or another 2-3 games that are left out because there are only 10 places. I’ve got nothing against other people ranking or grouping games, just that I prefer to do things in a looser way.
Though it feels ridiculous to admit feelings of disloyalty by ranking games.
Cylan
Tuesday, March 2, 2010 at 12:07 PMI have to say that Eternal Darkness for gamecube is one of my all time favourites
PlasmaDavid
Tuesday, March 2, 2010 at 12:07 PMThe lack of Ocarina love pains PlasmaDavid.
Indeed, I’d rate MM a better game, but OoT pretty much timelessly takes #1 because of the combination of greatness and firstness (ZOFMG ZELDA 3D) the same way Metroid Prime does.
Al Christie
Tuesday, March 2, 2010 at 12:49 PMViewtiful Joe
Ocarina of time- predictable but it is soooh good.
Pikmin 2
Tetris
Super Mario Kart
Metroid Prime 2 – just like star wars: 2 best, 1 2nd best, 3 least best (not worst).
Donkey Kong Country
Boktai 2: Solar Boy Django
Goldeneye
Advance Wars DS
Al Christie
Tuesday, March 2, 2010 at 12:58 PMactually kill DKC and put in Okami. My only wii game is a port, sob.
Too hard to make a top 10 list, no space for minish cap, RE4 or SF2!!
Dmag87
Tuesday, March 2, 2010 at 1:23 PM1. Metroid Prime
2. Resident Evil 4
3. Legend of Zelda OoT
4. Legend of Zelda Majora’s Mask
5. Mario 64
6. Conkers Bad Fur Day
7. Pokemon Yellow
8. Super Smash Bros Melee
9. Super Mario Bros.
10. Banjo Kazooie
Luke
Tuesday, March 2, 2010 at 1:39 PMI suppose my top 6 would be.
Super Mario 64 (N64)
Goldeneye (N64)
Sega Bass Fishing (Wii)
Mario Kart Wii (Wii)
Mario Kart 64 (N64)
Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire (N64)
I can think of any more.
Brooke Heinz
Tuesday, March 2, 2010 at 4:20 PMTop 5 (recent times):
1. Apollo Justice: Ace attorney (DS)
2.Animal Crossing (wii and DS)
3.Mario Kart (Wii)
4. WarioWare Touched and Smooth Moves (DS and Wii)
5. Wiis sports resort (Wii)
Reasons: (Note: I am quite young)
1. Funny
2. Addicting, spent many hours gathering bells for a forged painting
3. Better than the N64 version
4. Quick games
5. I couldnt think of any others
Scruffy
Tuesday, March 2, 2010 at 4:25 PM1. Metroid Prime Trilogy
2. Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time
3. Super Metroid
4. Terranigma
5. Perfect Dark
6. Super Mario Bros. 3
7. Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past
8. Beyond Good and Evil
9. Resident Evil 4
10. Advance Wars: Dark Conflict
N
Tuesday, March 2, 2010 at 7:38 PMfavourites:
Lylat Wars (N64)
Super Mario 64 (N64)
Mario Kart (N64)
Wave Race 64 (N64)
GoldenEye (N64)
Perfect Dark (N64)
Resident Evil Gamecube (zero, remake, 4)
Viewtiful Joe (GCN)
Metroid Prime (GCN)
New Super Mario Bros (DS)
That’s all i can think of. So that’s more than 10, but Dave cheated too by including entire Metroid Prime, Phoenix Wright and Wario ware series.
Adrian Verna
Tuesday, March 2, 2010 at 8:02 PM1. Mario Galaxy
2. Chrono Trigger
3. Donkey Kong Country
4. Final Fantasy IV
5. Punch-Out!! Wii
6. Megaman 2
7. Super Mario RPG
8. Super Smash Bros Brawl
9. LoZ Spirit Tracks
10. Metroid Prime Trilogy
Eleven and twelve would be Guitar Hero: World Tour and The World Ends With You