The most polished game I have ever played and the greatest example of a game series growing up with its audience. The physics, game flow, world details, and aesthetic are perfected from the beginning of the series which is impressive in its own right. Everything to like about the classic MM games is back and improved 10 fold. Mega Man X does not need tools like Rush or item #2, he has evolved beyond the need for them with his wall climbing skills and armour upgrades. Every weapon is useful in some way and even has an upgraded version. There are subtle world details (such as the Utoboros head being the scrap metal in Flame Mammoth's stage) helping the world feel lived and connected, to say nothing about different maverick weapons causing unique reactions on bosses or stages changed depending on the boss order tackled. An influence on countless indie games and future Capcom works for good reason.

An underdog hit story of a small team of developers who left Konami to take a huge risk on an unknown IP that would compete with the likes of the more established Contra. Gunstar Heroes proved to be a great success in pushing the limits of the Genesis' hardware and setting the standard for run n guns to come while helping Treasure get their foot out the door. From then on they would constantly flip genre and game design on its head. The Seven Force fight is unparalleled.

Perhaps the most important metroidvania of all time and a great symbol of how a game can be more than the sum of its parts. The mixing of hand drawn art, pixel art, 3D models and so forth may seem to clash at first glance, and the gameplay on paper may be completely broken, but everything simply combines together into a one of a kind climb through a castle that perfectly embodies the title of a creature of Chaos.

I always point to this as a story that could only exist in video games. The game psychoanalyzing the player based on which items they examine, how often they heal, how they treat their AI partner, and so forth is all worked into the narrative and gameplay simultaneously in a way that can only be described as lightning in a bottle. Not to mention Pyramid Head is a truly iconic monster.

An unsung hero in the west, Seiken Densetsu 3 perfectly embodies Squaresoft's golden years with the most ambitious RPG to date. Thousands of different party combinations are possible which determine major plot points and characters will even view each other differently depending on whether they share the same party. Truly some of the greatest use of mode 7 ever as well; riding on a turtle's back has never been so breathtaking. As for the sound design, I heavily rec reading about the making of the Mana series music to see just how insane the use of sampling was.

This game is a crowdpleaser for just about everybody. There's an arcade mode for 1cc enthusiasts and a story mode that morbidly parodies the average journey to "clearing" a shmup while perfectly incorporating RPG elements to help sell the player on how they are truly the earth's final hope.

A grand gathering of some of the greatest minds in the industry; Mitsuda, Toriyama, Hori, and so forth all combined their genius into a genre-defining game to this day. New game+, combination attacks, multiple world maps, characters who switch sides rather than remaining on one side of a battlefield, and more are all packed into a mere couple MB of ROM. It's truly stunning how much replay value is in this perfectly paced JRPG that endless creators would borrow from. Love or hate the localization, it also serves with FF6 as one of if not the most famous scripts to take liberties with the original Japanese story as well.

This action-platformer perfectly contextualized so much of its action with the use of anime cutscenes all the way back in the NES era. The sheer amount of physics quirks and challenging segments make it a fan favourite among speedrunners for good reasons and my mind is blown seeing accomplishments such as the game being beaten damageless for the first time after roughly 3 decades. Ninja gaming just wouldn't be the same without Hayabusa.

My favourite indie game of all time. The sheer depth and breadth of this game leave adversaries in its dust as the constant movement of Kawase mixed with the momentum of her fishing rod allow for a one of a kind experience, featuring pre-rendered backgrounds that can put some ps1 games to shame. There's even a rewind feature where the player can record and playback 16(!) of their best runs, all on a SNES cart made by an indie studio. Bravo.

A game where genre has no meaning. None but Parasite Eve can claim to have mixed survival horror, action RPG, turn-based RPG, roguelike, cinematic game and even quiz game elements into such a one of a kind experience that ultimately stands as more than the sum of its parts. Tied with Silent Hill 1 for the best sound design I've heard in a game as well thanks to clever details like the sewer water sounding like slowed down human screaming or the FMVs seamlessly continuing to play music from directly prior gameplay segments.