batenjan
Was one of my favorite games as a kid, but after revisiting it... Woof. Messy controls aside, the level design is such a drag to actually play. Gorgeous looking, and an insanely good 11/10 soundtrack, but unfortunately its almost unplayable by today's standards. Just listen to the soundtrack on youtube.
Mario 64 star road, with the multiplayer hack added, is legitimately one of the most fun experiences I've ever had with a videogame. I'll admit some things are reallllly broken (the camera, all cannons) but it made it honestly even more fun, I belly-laughed almost every session. It might just be my favorite mario game.
1993
this game fucks. Seven force was, at the time, the best boss I'd ever fought in my entire life, and it's still up there. My friend and I also would boot up this game just to play the dice maze over and over again
I love the NES rygar so so much. I was so hype to get to play a new rygar in 2008. This game is fucking worse than shit, even when i was 17 or whatever i hated this shitty fucking game lol. Yet I still played it through its entirety, cuz i had nothing better to do.
1999
the mechanics of driving in this game are so wack but once you learn them it feels good as hell. Super weird game but really deep and so fun to master
2019
greatest puzzle game of all time, for free. Later game levels took my family sitting together like 15-30 minutes to understand, so we can only really do one level at a time, but thats incredible that a puzzle can do that. It basically asks you to learn a new mechanic and understand the nittiest grittiest of how it works over and over again. The solutions often feel like "theres no way THIS is what I have to do right?" but it is.
2016
I think this game is hella slept on. There were a lot of complaints that the pet is impossible to get to do what you want, but those people fail to realize that's part of the experience. If you let yourself be immersed in the world of the game, and treat trico like she has a mind of her own, and that you have to 'build trust' and understand how she thinks, it makes it an extremely emotional experience.
2008
I don't think theres ever been a more successful 'new old-school' game ever made. It nails exactly what makes classic megaman good, and even as a hardcore classic megaman fan i think 9 is by a long shot the best one. Everything is cleaned up, bullshit removed, and at peak performance. The music is GOAT, the pixel art is GOAT, its a fucking masterpiece
1998
One of the craziest videogame experiences there is. A walking simulator 20 years ahead of its time. Truly "interactive art" and not at all a "video game". I think this game succeeds gloriously at what it sets out to do, and is unlike anything else. Except the walking SFX are too fucking loud. 10/10 easy
1987
TLDR; Shit is great. If you love metroidvanias i 1000% encourage experiencing it, but don't be afraid to pull up a guide.
My experience is pretty biased, because this was my first experience with a metroidvania, and my first experience with a game that wasn't just "go from left to right". The fact that you have no idea what's going on and there are sections where the gameplay totally changes to top down was mindblowing at the time. I can't possibly separate the experience of playing this game from the experience of sitting with my Dad, leaving the NES on for a whole day, reading him instructions from a little green book of NES SECRETS that felt like solving a treasure map.
Does it still hold up? I think the atmosphere of the game absolutely still does - the music is great, there's a huge sense of mystery with the wise men rooms and so forth, but I definitely think it's so incredibly obtuse that you're guaranteed to get lost and stuck and quit playing unless you have some amount of guide or are super persistent. So def not for everyone. But I think its remarkably deep, with cool RPG elements and magic abilities and dope environments and enemy designs that still feel unique.
My experience is pretty biased, because this was my first experience with a metroidvania, and my first experience with a game that wasn't just "go from left to right". The fact that you have no idea what's going on and there are sections where the gameplay totally changes to top down was mindblowing at the time. I can't possibly separate the experience of playing this game from the experience of sitting with my Dad, leaving the NES on for a whole day, reading him instructions from a little green book of NES SECRETS that felt like solving a treasure map.
Does it still hold up? I think the atmosphere of the game absolutely still does - the music is great, there's a huge sense of mystery with the wise men rooms and so forth, but I definitely think it's so incredibly obtuse that you're guaranteed to get lost and stuck and quit playing unless you have some amount of guide or are super persistent. So def not for everyone. But I think its remarkably deep, with cool RPG elements and magic abilities and dope environments and enemy designs that still feel unique.