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Shining Force 3. Mostly cause it's marooned on the Saturn but it's so friggin good.

Guardian Heroes was an outstanding RPG beat 'em up on Sega Saturn. It had

• a two player co-op storyline with branching choices to get alternate endings

• unlockable characters for a 6-player arena mode

• incredibly unique characters to unlock, spellcasting with ➡️⬅️⬆️⬇️ input

• and a kick ass soundtrack.

Nothing has really scratched the same itch since (yes, I'm aware there's a sequel, but it's terrible).

Honestly, Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective.

The remaster got some attention, but it still feels pretty niche for a game made by the Ace Attorney guy. I never felt like it got its "moment" in the same way as, say, Blue Prince.

And yet, from the moment the 15-year-old announcement trailer dropped, I knew it was going to be in "top 5 of all time" territory for me. 😍

During lockdown I played ECHO, which had been in my backlog for a few years after a stray recommendation I saw on MetaFilter. It was a surprisingly tight integration of beautiful and intriguing environmental/UI/sound design, gorgeous music, compelling yet minimalist storytelling (and voice acting), and a really strong gameplay loop of stealth, puzzle-solving, and the occasional panicky run-and-gun. Imagine my surprise when I read up on it after and learned it only sold a few thousand copies!

I strongly recommend playing it blind, but this trailer gives a good overview of the style and mechanics.

Urban Terror

One of my favorite games is a hidden gem that I never see people mention. It's called Out of Space and it's a couch co-op game similar to Overcooked with two major differences, it's less frenetic so you can play it to chill out, and it's procedurally generated so you have lots of replayability. For me and my wife it's the perfect game of "let's play a round of something", yet I never see it mentioned anywhere.

Perfect Dark. I didn't have a sibling to play with, so I am eternally grateful to Rare for making computer-controlled bots in the multiplayer mode.

I used to play the shit out of The Specialist, a HL1 mp mod.

Also while most were hooked on Twisted Metal my brother and I loved Vigilante 8.

Definitely Star Wars: Galactic Battlegrounds, an RTS in the Star Wars universe that uses the Age of Empires 2 engine and has very similar gameplay.

Hi-Fi Rush deserves way more recognition! Both story and gameplay are perfect. DMC meets DDR!

Just a great time all around once you get into the flow of things.

Space Station Silicone Valley

The Void by Ice-Pick Lodge, the makers of Pathologic.

This game taught me that actions have consequences and that I should be more humble and think twice about the environment before exploiting it like I'm playing a game.

Yes, it's that kind of game.

Thing Thing series

Pocket Tanks

Black Ice

Back in the day I really enjoyed ONI.

_edit: _ some gameplay footage.

The Fatal Frame series (maybe the second one here and there) and Kunitsu-Gami. The second one surprised me since it's relatively new, but I thought it was a great surprise. I loved the hell out of that game.

The Witness. It might have had its moment but it feels like it's probably pretty forgotten at this point. It's a first person puzzle game where you're on an island ... and it's not Myst, Riven, or ... that other game that was a puzzle game where you were on an island? At least as far into it as I've played, it's pretty low stakes and there's very little in the way of videos or audio narration. It's spooky but in bright daylight. There's quite a lot of game there, too.

Star Tropics for the NES.

GUNZ The Duel - man that was just so much fun. Online guns and swords gladiator style battles in the most neat stages. I remember an old mansion with broken staircases and balconies, a train station with freight cargo all over the place, an actual roman colosseum, a beach with a grounded ship ashore.

Some people could do this thing called K-style or butterfly style where you slash your sword against walls or other objects which made you lift off the ground, and switch between your gun to shoot as you do so - it was a neat trick which I learned but definitely did not master.

So much fun though.

Squarez Deluxe.

I've been on a one-man promotion spree of that game for almost 20 years

It is now freeware, it's available on DOSBox, and it is the best shape-packing game ever made - you cannot even debate me once you try it.

There's a bunch on the PS1 that got lost in the mix.

Ape Escape was really fun and novel, it was the first mandatory dual-stick release, and it did initially sell really well! It got two sequels on the PS2 but then drifted into spin-offs and party games. It's been two decades since the last proper installment.

Tomba! is delightful nonsense, a 2D adventure platformer that presented non-linear quests and tight controls. It's a cult-classic and the digital Special Edition on PS5 looks like it was done well.

Now for something truly forgotten: Running Wild. It's a kart racer but instead of karts it's a bunch of furries in a footrace. The announcer yells a lot, some of the character designs are lazy stereotypes, the graphics are muddy, but the track design is solid and it really feels fast when you get going. Very rewarding to learn the best lines and get into a clean flow.

Balloon Fight. Amazing game with great controls.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utopia_(1981_video_game)

An old game that never really took off, Orbz.

I was one of the best players in the world while it lasted.

Simple little game, you're a ball and you throw yourself at stars. The more you hit in a row without missing, the better your combo and score.

Essentially pong, but you play the ball, and it's on a landscape rather than somewhere you fall off and die.

I made a few levels for it.

Another was Triptych, which my friends and I called jelly tetris. Imagine tetris but the bits are springy and bounce a bit. It was a blast. Both were commercial games available on Linux at the time, early 2000s.

Flashback.
I played it on SNES, but it was on a few consoles. I heard they are making a sequel so that's cool. It's science fiction with flavours of total recall, they live, and running man. I just really enjoyed the prince of Persia style gameplay but cyberpunk.

Parasite Eve
More specifically number 2, because the first one never officially came to pal regions. It's like resident evil but SciFi/body horror. The third game was shit because they lost the rights to the novel it was originally based on. If there's any game sequel that I wish for it would be a proper PE3.

Fahrenheit/ Indigo Prophecy, an early David Cage/ Quantic Dream game from the same people who made Heavy Rain, Beyond: Two Souls, and Detroit: Become Human

I haven't played it in forever so I'm not sure how well it holds up (if at all) and I also have a love/hate relationship with it.

It has one of the single worst/ cheap levels of any game I have ever played*, and in the very last level the story really shits the bed. On the other hand it was doing things at the time that I still haven't seen in other games. (I haven't gotten around to playing his other games so he might be doing similar things in them). In terms of attempting to evolve the way stories are told in games it was truly groundbreaking and unique for its time.

I still have fond memories of playing it despite it's flaws. I'd say it's worth playing for anyone interested in a older game that does some really interesting things from a story telling perspective and/or people who are fans of the later games and are curious to see where it started. As long as you can make it through the QTE level with your sanity intact and are prepared for the story to get stupid right at the end- it's worth a playthrough imo

*Even though I hate the level, the concept behind it is actually pretty cool. A malevolent force tries to kill the player character by throwing his apartment at him. The problem is it's a 4 1/2 minute QTE sequence that requires precise timing and you can't mess up even one time or you have to start the entire thing over from the beginning. You also have plenty of time to wonder why the force never varies it's strategy of throwing one object at a time. Good idea, terrible execution.

Full Throttle.

I have good memories of LAN parties playing a game called DEFCON which is basically the Thermonuclear War game from the 80s movie Wargames. The game itself is fairly basic but was a blast to play with a group and I am a sucker for the retro vector atheistics.

Didn't see Receiver 2 mentioned, so I'll give it a shoutout! Really interesting game, and as far as I know the only one with such deep shooting mechanics. Unfortunately the sale had ended a couple days ago, so it's back to its normal price, but even then I'd heavily recommend it!

I think I'd have to say La-Mulana.