miracle dinner's top 15 games

[Jackie Frost]

i liked @Alex95 's top 150 so i'm doing my own, based on personal opinion

(edit: this list is no longer accurate as of me playing mario & luigi: partners in time which would definitely now be in my top 15 games)

Spoiler: #15

Super Mario 64
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sunshine left me dissappointed after i ventured back in time to visit the pre-galaxy 3d marios, so i was kinda worried that 64 would dissappoint me to and omg was i glad to find out that was not the case. whilst i don't enjoy it extremely much, super mario 64 felt like a true prequel to galaxy 1 that i'd been looking for. i may never have played the nds version, but i liked playing the n64 version.

it's satisfying to find secrets and to get stars, as the game is significantly more challenging to me than either of the galaxies. the open world style was in some ways refreshing, and it's impressive how about 15 worlds and 120 stars were fitted into this. and getting the caps was especially satisfying once you got to use them in the courses, and the wing cap in particular was very fun to use. overall it's a pretty good 3d platformer even today, and it has that nice nintendo polish as you'd expect, although i kind of feel the moveset was outdated - groundpounds taking too long, the victory pose whenever he did a backflip rather than feeling smooth, turning not feeling tight enough, wallkicks only having a few frames where you could do them before just bumping off.

that being said, i do have gripes about the open world style and all. i'm fine with having secrets but i guess my gripe is that the whole game is dependent on it: there's few places where you just get along with a 3d platform challenge and too much of the game is just looking for stuff - given how hard the secrets are to find makes it worse also. but it was especially painful cause, for example, i didn't pick up on the whole light thing: so the whole wing cap was inaccessible until i learned it from the internet. but now i know it, it becomes trivial to get on every subsequent playthrough. now of course that's not an issue unique to sm64 but it feels especially prominent in this game given how dependent it is on secrets. i prefer having many more courses and only having a few stars per course, as was in galaxy.

Pros	Cons
feels like a classic whilst simultaneously holding up suprisingly well for a game of its age	overall not a huge fan of the style of level design
decent music	controls/physics/moveset needs some work
secrets feel satisfying to get
wing cap is fun to use

Spoiler: #14

Super Mario 3D Land
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whilst the game doesn't live up to 3d world, which i played first, 3d land had a lot of fun content to it. it's very similar to its sequel, so we cover some of that stuff later. but it was cool, and the tanooki suit was fun even though it was kinda broken. the 3d effect was useful but tbh not totally gamechanging, so it's fine to play in 2d. i enjoyed the galaxy references such as the cosmic clones and the athletic theme, which by the way is a great track dating to smb3. the boomerang suit was pretty dope as well. the game has so many levels it feels almost infinite, and the star coins were fun even if way too easy on the most part

Pros	Cons
Solid 3d platforming gameplay ft. cool powerups	Too easy
Good music	Graphics on 3ds suffer a little bit, despite the 3d effect
Plenty of levels	even in proportion to the game's difficulty, the tanooki suit is hella broken

Spoiler: #13

Mario Party 9
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whilst i concede this is mainly nostalgia talking, mario party 9 will always hold a special place in my heart. i would spend hours with the nostalgia squad: daisy, birdo, koopa, and yoshi and do free play endlessly. the minigames are really fun and make great use of the wiimote's abilities, although a few were frustrating e.g. being too based on luck. as for the board mechanics, they were creative and cool too but the things that would make you lose half your mini stars due to luck alone... no thanks

Pros	Cons
nostaliga	some minigames are based on luck rather than skill
music	board mechanics are poorly balanced
pretty good graphics and artystle for a wii game
fun minigames

Spoiler: #12

Donkey Kong Country Returns / 3D

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i've only just started playing the 3ds enhanced port of this game but i used to play the wii one all the time

it's a solidly great platformer with tight controls and the levels were always great. it took me ages to get through it all as a child, and there was so much challenge postgame. i loved the diorama and puzzle unlocking, and the golden temple was a huge deal for me back then which it was really satisfying to finally achieve at age 13.

Pros	Cons
great controls and moveset	you can't use diddy kong in single player
plenty of levels all with great design, as well as additional challenges
3ds version has an easy mode
music
nostalgia
multiplayer

Spoiler: #11

LEGO Indiana Jones 2: The Adventure Continues
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an underrated title if you ask me, i have a huge history with this game. i'd enjoy the stories and hub worlds yes, but the thing which i really loved was the level builder. back then, i didn't have mario maker or minecraft, so this was the biggest creative tool i had. i loved using the different elements to make something new each time and mastering the mechanics to be creative. despite having six themes to choose from, the temple of doom was always my favourite movie, so i mainly used that theme to build levels, whilst using the mountain cave secret level from the temple of doom hub to farm coins. people complain about the lack of online sharing but tbh idc that much, it was still epic. the rest of the game is great too.

Pros	Cons
massive nostalgia	combat is too easy and simple, including vehicular combat
level builder is pretty cool	game as a whole can kinda get repetitive
good music
hub worlds and secret levels are pretty nice
cutscenes are pretty funny
creative use of character abilities
like the structure of the story levels

 

[Jackie Frost]

Spoiler: #10

Super Mario 3D World​

while 3d world did not quite live up to what i had hoped nintendo would do with the wii u coming of galaxy 2, it's still a game i enjoy very much in its own right. it managed to build upon 3d land in almost every way - keeping the fun platforming and having levels that have so much more character and drama, better graphics and music, and more original bosses. the cat suit was cool, and i also appreciated that they kept the tanooki suit. another great thing about this game is the characters - although super paper mario in my opinion did this better, i nonetheless am a fan of the ability to use multiple different characters - in this game, mario, luigi, peach, toad, and rosalina to get various cool abilities - i main peach because the floating is most helpful. the green stars felt more creative here than in 3d land, and the captain toad levels were a fun change of pace.

Pros	Cons
Solid gameplay mechanics	Still a bit on the easy side (at least for any%)
many controller options
Character switching
nice powerups
very good level design (and quite a lot of them too)
great ost
incredible graphics

Spoiler: #9

Super Mario Maker​

i may never have played the switch or 3ds versions of this game, but the wii u version is a really awesome thing to me. i've always been a creative gamer, as i liked minecraft and lij2's level builder, and whilst i guess this game technically isn't as powerful as the former it's still a really neat and easy way of making 2d mario levels, which i really enjoy doing given my creative tastes and my love of nsmbw as a child (hence nsmbu is my favourite style). and the mystery mushroom is so cool. although this version is much improved on by the switch and by comparison is missing a lot of things it shouldn't be, such as slopes and some powerups, it's still got a lot of things to play around with plus four game styles, six locations, and cool customisations like wings, feeding mushrooms, enemy stacking, clown cars, lakitu clouds, and yeah it's a pretty powerful tool.

Pros	Cons
intuitive and easy level builder with plenty of available elements	some things missing
potent level sharing features	plenty of bad levels out there
nostaliga for nsmbw	rip comments
good music	unnecessary limits on number of levels that can be uploaded by one user
nsmbu style has great graphics

Spoiler: #8

Super Mario Galaxy 2​

while super mario galaxy 2 was not my first mario game, i'd say it was the first i really loved. it was my first real 3d platformer and it went far beyond nsmbds and mkw before it and it was just amazing. almost everything about this game is crafted to perfection, except for one small thing that will become apparent in a moment. the powerups are great, the music is incredible, i have massive nostalgia for the game, and yeah.

Pros	Cons
amazing music	wii holds the graphics back a bit
controls feel amazing	motion controls shouldn't be compulsorary for fluzzard and the star ball
loads of cool gameplay stuff
good graphics/art style
huge nostalgia
plenty of levels, almost all well designed
can get pretty challenging (in a good way)

Spoiler: #7

Super Mario Galaxy​

even though i did play galaxy 2 first, i did eventually decide that i prefer galaxy 1. as a game, they're nearly identical, and as such, both excellent, and despite missing yoshi and all when i came round to this one it was still cool to have like the red star and the ice flower and more to the point a whole host of worlds that i hadn't explored before, with gameplay content almost on par with its sequel.

but the thing that really made me put this one higher is because it FEELS more powerful: it makes itself stand out as mario galaxy not just any old mario game. it has more epic atmospheres and all which galaxy 2 can't quite compare to. and the story. this has easily my favourite story in a video game outside of the mario rpgs, the opening was epic, the cycle of life and the black hole and the lumas, and above all rosalina's backstory, and she actually went on to become one of my favourite mario characters.

Pros	Cons
good story	a bit too easy
striking atmospheres	wii holds graphics back a bit
great controls and gameplay	motion controls shouldn't be compulsory for the ray and the star ball (also this time need it for menus)
lots of cool levels
music
a pleasant amount of nonlinearity
good graphics/art style
nostaliga

Spoiler: #6

Minecraft​

my second favourite game of all time for three years and probably my favourite when it comes down to gameplay alone, minecraft is just truly amazing. it defied my expectations on just how powerful it is and i was SO happy to finally have it and i'll never forget my first few experiences of playing this game and yeah.

main reasons i love it is just because the experience of being a survivalist in a world where you can do anything, and be really progressive and just work at your own pace. the game doesn't make my adventure, i make it myself. and i can choose all sorts of cool challenges, with or without mods, to spice it up, though i do admittedly find the gameplay a little repetitive at times.

creative mode is a bunch of fun too although i don't play it as often - it's fun to make your own stuff just like it was in lij2 and smm but here it's more powerful than ever. i've never made a REALLY impressive thing, but i've still had a lot of fun being creative.

though i don't play minecraft quite as much these days, i still have a lot of fun with it and i'm smiling just thinking about the time i first played this on x360 and enjoyed it for real (as technically my first experience was on a friend's phone which... i didn't enjoy), and all the fun in the years after.

wait, you say, how can a game with such amazing gameplay and a ton of nostalgia be beaten not only by one but by FIVE different games!?!... well, you'll see

Pros	Cons
creative mode is an incredibly powerful tool to be... creative	survival mode can get a little repetitive/boring/tedious at times
survival mode is a really interesting challenge	bugs
game can be varied in a lot of ways	performance problems, especially on java
continuously developing for 11 years and unlikely to stop anytime soon	x360 version has several limitations, and got discontinued eventually
java edition provides access to past versions	commands and redstone are a bit complicated
redstone is unbelievable whatever mode you're playing	sneaking for long times with keyboard controls sucks
good music
lots of nostalgia
can look incredible graphically if modified (above image taken in optifine 1.7.10 with mr. meep's shaders)
amazing community and youtube content surrounding the game
excellent multiplayer and content sharing
bedrock edition supports touch, keyboard, AND controller
easy to apply mods
bedrock server minigames are so good

 

[Jackie Frost]

Spoiler: #5

Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga​

i anticipated this game pretty intensely from the get go and it lived up to my expectations: i got to see a lot more of fawful, one of my favourite characters of all time, it had a great story, my favourite part being

Spoiler

cackletta possessing bowser

but there were other good things too, the world had so much power and atmosphere, the music was awesome, and i guess i liked the visual style, although the gba graphics are definitely restrictive. oh and didi mention the dialogue? i loved that so much.

i think my main problem with the game has to be its battle system (unpopular opinion maybe?). i guess it was alright at times, but i basically didn't level up very much, which meant i couldn't defeat the progressively harder enemies, so that continued in a cycle and made the game way too hard on my first playthrough (in contrast to this game frequently being seen as too easy). so i was basically scrambling to have enough coins to have enough items to defeat the bosses, and yeah that wasn't much fun. on my second (and thus far incomplete, as i got sidetracked by other games and i've only owned superstar saga for less than a year) playthrough i did try to fight enemies more to make things more manageble, but that ended up being pretty tedious.

Pros	Cons
cool story	overall not that big on the combat
good characters	gba holds the graphics back
amazing dialogue
great music
awesome atmospheres
field gameplay, level design, and objectives were pretty good
nice artstyle

Spoiler: #4

Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story
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one thing i didn't mention earlier is that i loved superstar saga a lot because it reminded me of its sequel: bowser's inside story. bis was by far my first m&l game (i still have yet to play pit, dt, pj, and the remakes but i'd like to play all of them) and one of two marpgs i grew up with and whilst it wasn't my favourite, i still had a huge deal of fun with this. i guess i didn't appreciate it fully until i was older. i couldn't beat the final boss as a child despite how hard i tried, but i won age 15 when i just thought why not pick it up and got to experience the ending for the first time. that was magical and i remembered i love this game

in my opinion the game builds on superstar saga positively in most ways, better story, better characters, more fawful, maybe better dialogue, better graphics, maybe better music, better field gameplay and it had these cool minigames that made great use of the ds hardware that the gba didn't have. the battle system was alright here and fixed some of the things i didn't like in superstar saga (e.g. it's easier to get away with avoiding enemies, unless you plan on the x bosses which are optional) but i still suffered some of the same problems (e.g. a lack of strategy: just spam powerful attacks and occasionally use items if hp and/or sp get low). obviously i'm a fan of bowser and how he was presented here and the gameplay stuff you could do with him such as the giant battles were also epic

Pros	Cons
big nostalgia	i still feel the combat could be better
great music	ds graphics aren't ideal
good story
good characters
excellent dialogue
thoroughly great field gameplay, level design, and objectives
awesome minigames
bowser drastically improves gameplay

Spoiler: #3

Paper Mario​

since i have beat mario party 9 the other day, this is the only game on this list which i've not beaten (i've finished chapter 5 but am currently stuck on the bit where you need the seeds.) but i'm enjoying my first playthrough a huge deal. it has a pretty solid story, it's got plenty of cool chapters with awesome worlds and characters, it has a good ost, it has an overall great charm, and it's battle system actually holds up pretty well. plus, the field gameplay really isn't bad, and the level design is suprisingly good throughout (well until i got to the seeds bit, i hope it gets back on track.) my gripes are fairly few, i guess that the battle system does need some work and my main complaint about the combat would be that the timing for action commands feels really off to me, like i cannot for the life of me do a power bounce when it should be easy and yet other things feel trivial, sometimes i feel i guarded too early but did it, other times i could swear i nailed the timing but apparently failed. also using the spin dash as fast transport isn't my ideal, since there's a pause where you can't move for a second after finishing it, and you cant change direction whilst dashing, so you have to repeatedly press z to make straight fast movements rather than just holding a button (or pressing to toggle) for smooth quick movement.

Pros	Cons
great story	battle system needs improvement, especially action commands
good characters	spin dash isn't ideal method of quick movement
good dialogue	dated graphics
good music
chapters have cool worlds
great battle system
great level design
overall great charm

Spoiler: #2

Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door​

even discounting the price of the gamecube console, controller, and memory card, i played over 60 gbp to pay this game.

and i regret nothing.

the game is incredibly good to me, its story is really awesome, i love the epic backstory so much, the individual chapter plots are frankly mind blowing, it's got emotional moments, it's got a whole host of amazing characters, it's got probably my favourite battle system out of any video game i've played (i do have a few small problems, such as the fact that it does still kinda have the spam your most powerful attacks etc. some partners are more op than others, and superguarding is just kinda the thing where it's completely timing a button press, so you're almost inevitably going to fail sometimes, which means things like impossible mode aren't actually that fun, but overall, the positives far outweigh the negatives) it has pretty solid field gameplay (although the level design could be a let down at times), it's got a godly ost, it has such a great artstlye, the dialogue is so well written, even in the year and a half i've owned the game i already have nostalgia for it and i see myself keeping that nostalgia for as long as i live. basically the game took everything that i liked about pm64 (do note though i played this one first) and made it better.

Pros	Cons
divine story	level design could be bad in places (e.g. general white quest)
masterfully crafted characters	a few minor gripes with the battle system
magnificent dialogue
awesome artstyle
beautiful music
great worlds
excellent battle system overall

Spoiler: #1!

Super Paper Mario​

The difficult thing is to find poetry, spirituality, in this dimension. To recreate, if not beauty, then aesthetic dimension in things like this, in trash itself. Because that is the true love of the world. What is love? Love is not idealization. Every true lover knows that if you really love a woman or a man, that you don't idealize him or her. Love means you accept a person with all his failures, stupidities, ugly points, and nonetheless the person is absolute for you, everything that makes life worth living. You see perfection in imperfection itself. And that's how we should learn to love the world.

- Slavoj Zizek, (Source)

Pros	Cons
the story is a gift from heaven	level design could be bad in some places, and overall could be better
the characters are good in a way beyond words, especially the villains	too easy, especially the boss fights
the ost is just so beautiful	character/pixl switching was a minor annoyance
cool artstyle	needs more replay value
really unique and creative gameplay, especially the flip ability	don't have a dash option until carrie/dashell
the worlds feel incredibly magical, and the overall atmosphere of the whole multiverse being at stake is so powerful
lots of cool references e.g. francis' posters, smb1 level remixes
nostalgia of gargantuan proportions
fun minigames
good sidequests
the catch cards were pretty cool
the game as a whole is such a masterpiece in a way few games can even come close to; i just love it so much