Just little brief opinions on older games:
1. Super Mario Bros - this game is surprisingly still alright to play. It is, IMO, like Dragon Warrior 1, a game that - while outdated - I’ll always appreciate as one of the most influential games of all time. But there’s something to be said about the intuitive design of this game; it might still be one of the best intros to video-gaming for people.
2. Legend of Zelda - frustrating as hell. The mechanic I hate the most is losing your sword beams with a half a heart of damage - I find it to be an almost essential feature in some areas. Also the speed of enemies makes some areas of the game insane. Difficulty spikes can be crazy. Although, I appreciate the open-world approach.
3. Super Mario Bros 2 - was a surprisingly fun play through. Much shorter and easier than I recall.
4. Legend of Zelda 2: The Adventure of Link - much more to my liking than the first one. It was a grander scale adventure and while some may describe this as an RPG, I’d say it’s still an adventure with simple RPG mechanics. I found the difficulty in the game more manageable than Zelda 1 as the gameplay is far less chaotic. I did abuse exploits (particularly the not finish dungeons until the end to max out the final level-ups without grinding to hell and back); but most of the parts that traditionally frustrate people - like Death Mountain - are, IMO, not nearly as difficult as their reputation; there are little timing tricks you can get good at, and also it’s fine to muscle through it.
5. Super Mario Bros 3 - I play this one regularly, and IMO is still a brilliant game to this day. It’s like the Isaac Asimov short story collection of platformers, each level feels unique and tells an interesting story. The game also has the most epic scale adventure feel of the 2D Mario’s.
6. Super Mario World - while undoubtedly prettier, and cool because of the Yoshi addition and hidden secrets, felt like a decline from Mario 3 in level design, pacing, variety, and scale. It’s still easily one of the best Mario games and one of the best platformers of all time; and while it does beat Mario 3 in some areas, there’s no question which one satisfies me more. Aside from not being as well paced as Mario 3, the difficulty balancing feels lopsided, with the hardest levels being around the middle of the game, and the later levels being comparatively easy. The game also features a lot of filler, levels that feel like redos of other levels in the game.
7. Legend of Zelda: Link to the Past - superb pacing, superb design. And while the game is shockingly short (I literally finished it from start to finish while lying in bed trying to sleep one night), it’s no punishment to simply put the game back on for a second round if you haven’t had enough. The pacing of this game is fantastic and nothing feels like a blocker (I’ll get to that soon in later Zelda games). It’s entertaining and satisfying all the way through, and is IMO sits with Mario 3 as one of the best Nintendo catalogue games I’ve mentioned so far - the S-tier, so to speak.
8. Super Mario 64 - while I appreciate this game’s place in video game history, I put it down after only three levels as I was getting frustrated by how long it took to do everything, and fighting the camera was a major problem. This game did NOT age well.
9. Ocarina of Time - this game is still mostly fun, but a lot of bad design choices (that I was blind to before) begin with this game: the silly stealth quests being a big one, and another thing that did NOT translate well from 2D to 3D was the “find the key” stuff which usually took far longer than I’d like. This game is still a lot of fun to play, as many of the things wrong with 3D Zelda that began here were not as severe as they were in later games. Overall, this game has a lot of charm, but Breath of the Wild’s release really exposed a lot of the flaws of Ocarina of Time by being the first 3D Zelda to actually fix them. Ocarina of Time is the first Zelda where the dungeons felt far too long: particularly following The Forest Temple. Oh yeah, on the blocker part, this is the first Zelda game that had them IMO, parts of the game too vague to pass without some kind of guide. Usually it’s a key or Switch hidden in some corner of the dungeon, maybe even hidden under scraps that you need to bomb (I recall one such area in the Shadow Temple). Anyway, Ocarina of Time has far fewer blockers than Majora’s Mask, Wind Waker, Twilight Princess, and Skyward Sword and it was finally fixed in Breath of the Wild - the first 3D Zelda to feature no progression blockers.
10. Majora’s Mask - A game with a creative concept ruined by really bad dungeon design. The platforming issues this game has are akin to Mario 64. Lining up the camera to execute a move just right. This game was a lot worse and a lot slower than I remember. And sadly, it tarnishes some of the most interesting conceptual design ever put into a video game. Also, the towns in this game are perhaps even more interesting than Ocarina of Time; at least as interesting. I like the scheduling of activities and the ability to go back and change history; that stuff is all great - but also all ruined by sloppy dungeon design.
11. Mario Sunshine - Just no. This game doesn’t fix any issues Mario 64 had, it only adds to them. The game lacks the “main series” feeling of pretty much all other Mario games. Like many GameCube titles, the game felt like an inadequate follow-up to the N64 generation. There are not many levels in this game, and they are also repetitive and uninteresting. This game, IMO, has no redeeming qualities, and is the FF9 of Mario games: unambitious design, slow and uninteresting experience, and an inexplicably dedicated fanbase.
11. Celda - The game was both MUCH larger and smaller than Ocarina of Time all at once. It had more towns, which I liked, but they were mostly uninteresting. The game is really slow to move from place to place, and IMO aged worse than Ocarina of Time. dungeon design was long and boring, and suffered HEAVILY from the find the key complex. I think this is the game where I first began to notice a new problem: find the puzzle. As the vagueness of Zelda games increased, so to did the vagueness of what exactly was a puzzle. And unfortunately, it’s not like Zelda 1 where if you fail to burn the tree, you miss bonus treasure - in this game if you fail to burn the tree, you don’t get to progress with the game. Some positives, though, are that this is the game where monster design actually picked up quite a lot - the enemies are much more lively than they were in past Zeldas. In a way, this game is akin to Link to the Past in that regard with enemies feeling like they had personality again - notice I repeated myself on the one good element I found in this game? Unlike Sunshine (and FF9), though, I can understand the dedicated fanbase this has despite my strong distaste for the game. My biggest issue is that the game has a huge map despite being small.
12. Twilight Princess - Pretty much all the problems of Wind Waker except the game is more massive in terms of content variety. But bad dungeon design is RAMPANT in this game. There is not one dungeon I like in this game. The towns are even less inspired than Wind Waker. I found myself going back and forth to FAQs all the time to figure out how to proceed; that’s because the find-the-key and find-the-puzzle stuff is worse in this game than any other to date. The game is slow even getting you into a dungeon, with several of them requiring the collection of 20+ Moon Tears to access. I appreciate the darker tone, but I don’t like the shallow feeling of the game - to me it’s like the Hitchcock film Psycho - I appreciate much of what it did, but it ultimately feels shallow compared to much of the rest of the body of his work. This game has less of a dedicated following, but it often ranks in the 2-3 area on peoples list of best Zelda games list. The game was criticized for the shallow use of motion control, but I actually enjoyed it. Luckily, this game was the worst of the progression blockers, it only gets better from here.
13. Super Mario Galaxy - I consider this the first modern mainline Nintendo game. Level design was very well paced. Camera issues gone. Controls were superb. Game is of epic scale not seen in the series outside of Mario 3. Levels all feel very unique. The addition of gravity mechanics and IR collection mechanics worked out fantastically. The game is polished like a gemstone. One of the best things is the addition of a compelling story that is not intrusive to the gameplay (I didn’t cover Paper Mario, but intrusive story was a big issue in those games). Everything is snappy and perfectly paced. Also, unlike past 3D Mario games, this one does A TON to entertain, whether it be the story, the roads exploring the galaxy, or the mechanics of the levels. This game came at a time when Nintendo was nailing it with creating new and original experiences - and this one reinvented a classic experience into something far better than what they’d done before. All prior Mario games, IMO, pale in comparison.
14. Super Mario Galaxy 2 - imagine part 1 with even better level design, but not as compelling a story, and not as compelling of an overall framework for exploring the worlds. It’s still, IMO the second best overall Mario experience and for those only looking at specific levels, arguably the better of the two.
15. Skyward Sword - a much more straightforward experience than past Zelda games. The most advanced use of motion controls... and ultimately the game that led me to conclude that simplistic motion controls were both more fun and more satisfying. Recalibration ruined what was arguably the best 3D Zelda experience to date. Adding collectables and a really interesting town (Skyloft) helped a huge amount. The art style is also the best in the series up to that point. Unfortunately, it doesn’t escape the blockers, although it avoided them more than any other Zelda game since Ocarina of Time. It did get rid of some of the more annoying stuff, though.
I’ll end it here, because Mario 3D World is still too new to me, and I am still playing Breath of the Wild. But, as a short overview:
• Super Mario Odyssey is objectively great, but somehow falls below Super Mario 3D World in terms of fun factor, despite being objectively better in about every single way - I’m thinking it is the low challenge of the game. It’s my fourth favourite, but I understand those who say this is their favourite platformer ever... they didn’t play Super Mario Galaxy =P
• Super Mario 3D World is the one no one gave a fair shot because of its multiplayer incorporation and the more straightforward level design, but it’s actually loads of fun.
• Breath of the Wild probably exceeds Mario Galaxy as a saviour of a franchise - and it is largely because of the massive scale and ambition, and the feeling that this world was finely crafted. To me, playing Breath of the Wild literally ruined every single Zelda game for me outside of Link to the Past. I actually used to rank Link to the Past lower than other Zeldas because it was a much smaller game, now I realize the sheer quality of the experience is more important than the much longer play times of 3D Zeldas. Breath of the Wild somehow manages to be MUCH bigger than other 3D Zeldas and yet so much more quickly paced, it always feels there’s something new to do, when on your way to one objective you complete a ton of small stuff on the side - it’s easy to get sidetracked... and in Breath of the Wild, that’s not a problem, it’s the point. Unlike GTA3, getting side-tracked isn’t a delay of progress, it’s progressing in a different direction, you can literally finish most of the rest of the game before picking up that task you got sidetracked from (or skip it altogether).
My overall list of what I consider the S-tier of Nintendo games goes something like this (and roughly ranked in this order):
1. Breath of the a Wild
2. Super Mario Galaxy 1
3. Super Mario Galaxy 2
4. Legend of Zelda: Link to the Past
5. Super Mario Bros 3 (although, it’s probably a tie with Link to the Past)
A Tier includes
1. Super Mario World
2. Super Mario 3D Land
3. Ocarina of Time
4. Super Mario Odyssey
5. Super Mario Bros
And I don’t care to rank the rest... except for my least favourites: they’re Super Mario Sunshine and (gasp) Zelda 1!
Except, unlike Mario Sunshine I forgive Zelda 1.
Most surprisingly enjoyable game I’d say is Zelda 2, since this is generally hated, but the flaws are over-exaggerated in how much they effect the experience.
Outside the scope of this post, but not really deserving of its own post, I also played through the original NES Metroid, very slow paced game I found, but thanks to save-states to bypass the HP refilling grind, I loved it - basically, for those who don’t remember, you have to kill dozens and dozens of enemies without getting hit in order to get HP and missile refill power ups, this can take a very long time (I am talking like 20+ minutes) so I adapted by save stating before each area, if I lost too much HP I’d reset and try again. This sped the game up substantially.
1. Super Mario Bros - this game is surprisingly still alright to play. It is, IMO, like Dragon Warrior 1, a game that - while outdated - I’ll always appreciate as one of the most influential games of all time. But there’s something to be said about the intuitive design of this game; it might still be one of the best intros to video-gaming for people.
2. Legend of Zelda - frustrating as hell. The mechanic I hate the most is losing your sword beams with a half a heart of damage - I find it to be an almost essential feature in some areas. Also the speed of enemies makes some areas of the game insane. Difficulty spikes can be crazy. Although, I appreciate the open-world approach.
3. Super Mario Bros 2 - was a surprisingly fun play through. Much shorter and easier than I recall.
4. Legend of Zelda 2: The Adventure of Link - much more to my liking than the first one. It was a grander scale adventure and while some may describe this as an RPG, I’d say it’s still an adventure with simple RPG mechanics. I found the difficulty in the game more manageable than Zelda 1 as the gameplay is far less chaotic. I did abuse exploits (particularly the not finish dungeons until the end to max out the final level-ups without grinding to hell and back); but most of the parts that traditionally frustrate people - like Death Mountain - are, IMO, not nearly as difficult as their reputation; there are little timing tricks you can get good at, and also it’s fine to muscle through it.
5. Super Mario Bros 3 - I play this one regularly, and IMO is still a brilliant game to this day. It’s like the Isaac Asimov short story collection of platformers, each level feels unique and tells an interesting story. The game also has the most epic scale adventure feel of the 2D Mario’s.
6. Super Mario World - while undoubtedly prettier, and cool because of the Yoshi addition and hidden secrets, felt like a decline from Mario 3 in level design, pacing, variety, and scale. It’s still easily one of the best Mario games and one of the best platformers of all time; and while it does beat Mario 3 in some areas, there’s no question which one satisfies me more. Aside from not being as well paced as Mario 3, the difficulty balancing feels lopsided, with the hardest levels being around the middle of the game, and the later levels being comparatively easy. The game also features a lot of filler, levels that feel like redos of other levels in the game.
7. Legend of Zelda: Link to the Past - superb pacing, superb design. And while the game is shockingly short (I literally finished it from start to finish while lying in bed trying to sleep one night), it’s no punishment to simply put the game back on for a second round if you haven’t had enough. The pacing of this game is fantastic and nothing feels like a blocker (I’ll get to that soon in later Zelda games). It’s entertaining and satisfying all the way through, and is IMO sits with Mario 3 as one of the best Nintendo catalogue games I’ve mentioned so far - the S-tier, so to speak.
8. Super Mario 64 - while I appreciate this game’s place in video game history, I put it down after only three levels as I was getting frustrated by how long it took to do everything, and fighting the camera was a major problem. This game did NOT age well.
9. Ocarina of Time - this game is still mostly fun, but a lot of bad design choices (that I was blind to before) begin with this game: the silly stealth quests being a big one, and another thing that did NOT translate well from 2D to 3D was the “find the key” stuff which usually took far longer than I’d like. This game is still a lot of fun to play, as many of the things wrong with 3D Zelda that began here were not as severe as they were in later games. Overall, this game has a lot of charm, but Breath of the Wild’s release really exposed a lot of the flaws of Ocarina of Time by being the first 3D Zelda to actually fix them. Ocarina of Time is the first Zelda where the dungeons felt far too long: particularly following The Forest Temple. Oh yeah, on the blocker part, this is the first Zelda game that had them IMO, parts of the game too vague to pass without some kind of guide. Usually it’s a key or Switch hidden in some corner of the dungeon, maybe even hidden under scraps that you need to bomb (I recall one such area in the Shadow Temple). Anyway, Ocarina of Time has far fewer blockers than Majora’s Mask, Wind Waker, Twilight Princess, and Skyward Sword and it was finally fixed in Breath of the Wild - the first 3D Zelda to feature no progression blockers.
10. Majora’s Mask - A game with a creative concept ruined by really bad dungeon design. The platforming issues this game has are akin to Mario 64. Lining up the camera to execute a move just right. This game was a lot worse and a lot slower than I remember. And sadly, it tarnishes some of the most interesting conceptual design ever put into a video game. Also, the towns in this game are perhaps even more interesting than Ocarina of Time; at least as interesting. I like the scheduling of activities and the ability to go back and change history; that stuff is all great - but also all ruined by sloppy dungeon design.
11. Mario Sunshine - Just no. This game doesn’t fix any issues Mario 64 had, it only adds to them. The game lacks the “main series” feeling of pretty much all other Mario games. Like many GameCube titles, the game felt like an inadequate follow-up to the N64 generation. There are not many levels in this game, and they are also repetitive and uninteresting. This game, IMO, has no redeeming qualities, and is the FF9 of Mario games: unambitious design, slow and uninteresting experience, and an inexplicably dedicated fanbase.
11. Celda - The game was both MUCH larger and smaller than Ocarina of Time all at once. It had more towns, which I liked, but they were mostly uninteresting. The game is really slow to move from place to place, and IMO aged worse than Ocarina of Time. dungeon design was long and boring, and suffered HEAVILY from the find the key complex. I think this is the game where I first began to notice a new problem: find the puzzle. As the vagueness of Zelda games increased, so to did the vagueness of what exactly was a puzzle. And unfortunately, it’s not like Zelda 1 where if you fail to burn the tree, you miss bonus treasure - in this game if you fail to burn the tree, you don’t get to progress with the game. Some positives, though, are that this is the game where monster design actually picked up quite a lot - the enemies are much more lively than they were in past Zeldas. In a way, this game is akin to Link to the Past in that regard with enemies feeling like they had personality again - notice I repeated myself on the one good element I found in this game? Unlike Sunshine (and FF9), though, I can understand the dedicated fanbase this has despite my strong distaste for the game. My biggest issue is that the game has a huge map despite being small.
12. Twilight Princess - Pretty much all the problems of Wind Waker except the game is more massive in terms of content variety. But bad dungeon design is RAMPANT in this game. There is not one dungeon I like in this game. The towns are even less inspired than Wind Waker. I found myself going back and forth to FAQs all the time to figure out how to proceed; that’s because the find-the-key and find-the-puzzle stuff is worse in this game than any other to date. The game is slow even getting you into a dungeon, with several of them requiring the collection of 20+ Moon Tears to access. I appreciate the darker tone, but I don’t like the shallow feeling of the game - to me it’s like the Hitchcock film Psycho - I appreciate much of what it did, but it ultimately feels shallow compared to much of the rest of the body of his work. This game has less of a dedicated following, but it often ranks in the 2-3 area on peoples list of best Zelda games list. The game was criticized for the shallow use of motion control, but I actually enjoyed it. Luckily, this game was the worst of the progression blockers, it only gets better from here.
13. Super Mario Galaxy - I consider this the first modern mainline Nintendo game. Level design was very well paced. Camera issues gone. Controls were superb. Game is of epic scale not seen in the series outside of Mario 3. Levels all feel very unique. The addition of gravity mechanics and IR collection mechanics worked out fantastically. The game is polished like a gemstone. One of the best things is the addition of a compelling story that is not intrusive to the gameplay (I didn’t cover Paper Mario, but intrusive story was a big issue in those games). Everything is snappy and perfectly paced. Also, unlike past 3D Mario games, this one does A TON to entertain, whether it be the story, the roads exploring the galaxy, or the mechanics of the levels. This game came at a time when Nintendo was nailing it with creating new and original experiences - and this one reinvented a classic experience into something far better than what they’d done before. All prior Mario games, IMO, pale in comparison.
14. Super Mario Galaxy 2 - imagine part 1 with even better level design, but not as compelling a story, and not as compelling of an overall framework for exploring the worlds. It’s still, IMO the second best overall Mario experience and for those only looking at specific levels, arguably the better of the two.
15. Skyward Sword - a much more straightforward experience than past Zelda games. The most advanced use of motion controls... and ultimately the game that led me to conclude that simplistic motion controls were both more fun and more satisfying. Recalibration ruined what was arguably the best 3D Zelda experience to date. Adding collectables and a really interesting town (Skyloft) helped a huge amount. The art style is also the best in the series up to that point. Unfortunately, it doesn’t escape the blockers, although it avoided them more than any other Zelda game since Ocarina of Time. It did get rid of some of the more annoying stuff, though.
I’ll end it here, because Mario 3D World is still too new to me, and I am still playing Breath of the Wild. But, as a short overview:
• Super Mario Odyssey is objectively great, but somehow falls below Super Mario 3D World in terms of fun factor, despite being objectively better in about every single way - I’m thinking it is the low challenge of the game. It’s my fourth favourite, but I understand those who say this is their favourite platformer ever... they didn’t play Super Mario Galaxy =P
• Super Mario 3D World is the one no one gave a fair shot because of its multiplayer incorporation and the more straightforward level design, but it’s actually loads of fun.
• Breath of the Wild probably exceeds Mario Galaxy as a saviour of a franchise - and it is largely because of the massive scale and ambition, and the feeling that this world was finely crafted. To me, playing Breath of the Wild literally ruined every single Zelda game for me outside of Link to the Past. I actually used to rank Link to the Past lower than other Zeldas because it was a much smaller game, now I realize the sheer quality of the experience is more important than the much longer play times of 3D Zeldas. Breath of the Wild somehow manages to be MUCH bigger than other 3D Zeldas and yet so much more quickly paced, it always feels there’s something new to do, when on your way to one objective you complete a ton of small stuff on the side - it’s easy to get sidetracked... and in Breath of the Wild, that’s not a problem, it’s the point. Unlike GTA3, getting side-tracked isn’t a delay of progress, it’s progressing in a different direction, you can literally finish most of the rest of the game before picking up that task you got sidetracked from (or skip it altogether).
My overall list of what I consider the S-tier of Nintendo games goes something like this (and roughly ranked in this order):
1. Breath of the a Wild
2. Super Mario Galaxy 1
3. Super Mario Galaxy 2
4. Legend of Zelda: Link to the Past
5. Super Mario Bros 3 (although, it’s probably a tie with Link to the Past)
A Tier includes
1. Super Mario World
2. Super Mario 3D Land
3. Ocarina of Time
4. Super Mario Odyssey
5. Super Mario Bros
And I don’t care to rank the rest... except for my least favourites: they’re Super Mario Sunshine and (gasp) Zelda 1!
Except, unlike Mario Sunshine I forgive Zelda 1.
Most surprisingly enjoyable game I’d say is Zelda 2, since this is generally hated, but the flaws are over-exaggerated in how much they effect the experience.
Outside the scope of this post, but not really deserving of its own post, I also played through the original NES Metroid, very slow paced game I found, but thanks to save-states to bypass the HP refilling grind, I loved it - basically, for those who don’t remember, you have to kill dozens and dozens of enemies without getting hit in order to get HP and missile refill power ups, this can take a very long time (I am talking like 20+ minutes) so I adapted by save stating before each area, if I lost too much HP I’d reset and try again. This sped the game up substantially.
