My absolute favourite discovery last year. The physics system is extremely complex due to how the mc moves in a constant velocity yet her fishing hook has a momentum system of sorts. I love experimenting with all the different doors for new routes but practicing the speedrun route is my personal favourite. The sheer quality of the pre-rendered images, the pixel precision for stage manuevers at times, and of course the ability to record and play back the player's best runs through stages is mind boggling for an indie game on the SNES which was much harder to program for than the Sega Genesis. Absolute masterpiece of a game

Went through the entirety of this with a friend and our shitty voice acting really helped this playthrough stand out in my memory. A great atmosphere and story, Silver Case is my new favourite visual novel for sure

Found out about this game through Kanye West, ended up getting so addicted I spent 15 hours straight 1ccing it. Later found out it was based on a tokusatsu I watched in the Japanese version which is funny cus even in that version there are zero (0) connections to the original toku lol

It's fucking Puyo on SNES

Worst game ever made I loved every second of it. My favourite part was how Angelus' ultimate attack had a vine boom sound effect. Who could ever forget her iconic line "We're going to be talking about the HUMANS" VOOM

This came preloaded on my Retroid Pocket 2 and it was labelled "Electro Sperm" lmfao. I was not expecting one of the deepest beat em up systems of all time. This really walked so Guardian Heroes could run

Giant mecha Bomberman shoots down an idol. hella based. Another addictive 1cc

Another shmup I got oddly addicted to. The hidden 1ups, revised magic system in terms of loadout and stock, and remixed boss fights to be more manageable overall while making sweet work of the SNES' hardware make it my favourite Cotton game hands down. A fun 1cc for sure

Finally completed every Metal Gear game hell yeah

I will fan translate this game soon, promise

I heard this was one of the first VNs with a gay route so naturally i was curious about it and hey, the male love interest is actually super likable which is surprising since these options usually feel pretty tacked on to me. The PC-98 aesthetic hits different as well; Meet N Fuck Games OST been real quiet since True Love title theme dropped

Holy fuck

Why is this shit actually pretty creepy

First saw this game while watching Hi Score Girl but finally happened upon the SNES rom this year. Shocked at how avant garde this weird puzzle game is. Very hard mode was a sick clear due to the sheer luck I got on my first successful run

One of the earliest JRPGs to take place in modern times. Sega knocked it out of the park with this tokusatsu-styled classic

Nice seeing so many more homages to classic Kikaider characters as well as an epilogue for what Hakaider has been doing after the events of the movie. It's really strange seeing a lightgun game try to be a dungeon crawler simultaneously but it kinda works and the story fucking slaps

Best single player in the franchise for the sheer amount of varied levels imo

Tough ass game that doesn't hold your hand at all. glad it was finally finished and rereleased, I needed something to fill that 3 Wonders itch

Panzer Dragoon but it's a tokusatsu game with really shitty Engrish LOVE IT

HOLY SHIT THAT SOUNDTRACK

PAL players really have the audacity to complain they got nothing and only NA got good exclusive localizations, huh?

why dat ending so sad doe for fr

why dat ending so sad doe for fr

The Pyramid Head boss fight is funny as fuck. I really thought his weak point would be his fleshy torso instead of the giant metal helmet but ok game lmao

This game is not real

Overhated as hell by people who never played it. This can actually be emulated pretty well in MAME by setting frameskip to around 5. Love how visceral Hanzo's specials are

Super fun with 2 players tbh

Not much of a Tetris game and not much of an Attack game but holy shit that Bowser fight had me on edge

More Metal Slug 2, but that's not a bad thing I suppose lol

I miss FMV games like this :(

Gotta love the glove

Right about now, it's time to rock with the biggity Buck Bumble
Right about now, it's time to rock with the biggity Buck Bumble
Bump to the bump to the bump to the bass
bump to the bump to the Bumble
Bump to the bump to the bump to the bass
bump to the bump to the Bumble

Multiplayer is funny as hell

I burst into uncontrollable laughter when John McClane kicked a random woman in the face and the camera angles went full dramatic anime battle

Ranked this low because I failed miserably in a speedrun race

Altered Beast meets Konami X-Men meets all my lunch money cus damn this game is tough

kinda stylish ngl

Got a real newgrounds flash game vibe from this silly eurojank classic

It was dece

It kinda felt like playing out an episode of the show I guess. Not a Power Rangers fan (Super Sentai or bust) but the mecha levels made it worth the playthrough for the finishers alone. The last game on this list I would consider unambiguously good to at least a degree

This and everything below it (except the very bottom pick) is where I would consider games I played this year to be notably flawed but still have plenty of positive qualities too. Moonwalker is extremely repetitive but it has a funny style to it, I just wish Thriller played in the Graveyard level (yes I'm still pissed)

Apparently this game was made by Strider 1's director as a giant middle finger to Capcom and the allegorical story really says it all in some places. I like to believe the false god is meant to be Inafune. Oh yeah, this is like Strider 2 for me; intense action but the level design leaves a lot to be desired

The 2nd Strider clone on this list damn. In terms of combat options it surpasses Strider but it's simply not balanced well which results in one of the easiest games on the SNES and the aesthetic doesn't measure up either

Really slow paced but it was an interesting cross of Contra and Turrican in several ways. Fun but only with a friend to shoot the shit with, single player is kinda dreadful

In some ways the gameplay is more refined than Zombies Ate My Neighbours but in other ways it's more of a chore to play and the aesthetic is vastly less charming

A bit slow paced for me to consider it a Turtles in Time killer but it's alright ig lol

ok this game is technically better designed than MMPR but it really needed to have mechs

The only game I played last year I would consider outright bad. The level design has one of the few instances where I would declare outright fake difficulty due to enemies spawning where the player cannot dodge them no matter what. Even then I like some ideas this game presents such as the ability to henshin whenever, or the ability to alter stats whenever the player feels like it