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Bobby's Top Video Games: 10-6
By Bobby Bokista - 04.03.03
10. The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past
1992 - Super Nintendo
 This game ranks so high because of its fun-factor. It can be played over and over because it is simple but challenging enough to provide a high replay value. The game isn't that long (can be beat in one all nighter as I learned when I was just a kid). It also takes the first Zelda's great design and updates it for Nintendo's newest system. The graphics are colorful and detailed, the world is the perfect size for easy travel, the enemies aren't too difficult, the array of items presented could not have been better, and the story was pretty good too. Link is a very "Hero and the Quest" character to has to overcome obstacles, is given things to help him on the way, and eventually confronts his fate in a situation in which he has to use his ingenuity to get through it all. (Tell me if I'm reading too much into it.)
I remember my first time on top of Death Mountain and seeing those poor guys who had been transformed in the Dark World because they didn't have the Moon Pearl. I remember spending hours exploring the cliffs of Death Mountain once I got the hookshot. I was super creeped out by the hands that dropped from the ceilings in some of the dungeons. Dashing around Hyrule collecting pieces of hearts and pieces of the Triforce never ceases to amuse me.
 I think it's a lot better than Ocarina of Time because world is more navigable. Sure I enjoy running around on Epona or whooping out my Ocarina and getting transported across the world, but walking anywhere was a bitch. This was not an issue in LttP. Not having fully immersive worlds also is an advantage in the replay value and fun-factor of LttP. It's reassuring to know that getting though an area will not be extremely difficult and that seeing everything minimizes the frustrations I experienced with OoT. But these are just details.
The real important thing here is that Zelda has always been a fun and successful franchise and it seems that it will continue to be in the future. As I write this I await my copy of The Wind Waker, which was sent to my house instead of my dorm in a shipping mix up. (Thanks EBGames.com for making me spend 6 shipping bucks to send the game somewhere where I can't get it.)
May the Way of the Hero Lead To the Triforce.
9. Earthbound
1995 - Super Nintendo
Anyone who has played Earthbound can attest to the fact that it takes the genre of RPG and puts one of the best spins on it ever. Earthbound is the reason I got hooked on the Internet in the way I did. I started my Internet days in 4th grade doing crappy AOL things, nothing big. It was this way for a long time. Chat rooms, crappy websites, and IMs… But in the end of 9th grade I got hooked on my first ever real "community" website: Starmen.net which is the Earthbound resource on the Internet. The community features a couple thousand members who have all come together for the reason of Earthbound. Lots of video game sites have huge followings... but this one is a behemoth. If it weren't for the game the site wouldn't have flourished, so let's take a look at it and figure out why this game is so great.
The Setting: The towns of a modern world and some more exotic locations. Onett, Twoson, Threed, Fourside are just a few of the places your gang will travel along the way. Anyone who plays this game will tell you how cool Moonside (the reverse Fourside) area is or about kickin' back in Summers in the Stoic Café.
The Gang: Ness, Paula, Jeff, Poo are four kids brought together by some mysterious force for the same purpose. Each brings their own flavour to the group. Ness attacks with a baseball bat and has some cool magic, Paula will kick the crap out of you with a frying pan and tear you apart with some fire, freeze, and thunder magic, while Jeff is inclined to fire a fuckin' bottle rocket in your face and Poo will use crazy magic (like Starstorm).
The Purpose: A meteor has crash landed in Ness's hometown causing weird shit to go down. Your pesky neighbor causes a bit of trouble and the chain of events starts. A little bee named Buzz-Buzz helps you kick a Starman's ass but gets his own ass handed to him by your neighbors mother. On his death bed the bee gives you a "Sound Stone" to collect the tunes of various Sanctuary locations in order to fix all that has gone wrong.
The Style: Comedy and sappy adventure rolled into one beautiful package. The array of people you will meet along the way will remind you of people you know in real life. The fun and simple world they live in will make you wish you could leave your hectic lifestyle and join them. Items like Brain-Food Lunch or a good ol' fashioned Hamburger will cause you to realize how trite "cures" and "potions" are. SMAAAAAAASH!!! becomes one of the greatest sounds for the player (when you get a critical hit).
The Battles: Random encounters suck… so the designers at Ape Studios decided to use all on screen enemies. And depending on how strong you are and how you approach an enemy you may get a sneak attack in or even an instant victory! Instant victory is probably the coolest thing in the world. Why the hell fight when you know you're just gonna kick their ass anyway? Also, the "auto" fight command is very cool. The Rolling HP Counter that J talked about is another brilliant idea which adds dynamic to the strategy behind quite a few of the game's enemies.
I picked up my copy the first time I ever went to a Best Buy. It was on a bottom shelf because the box was too big to fit in the normal racks (since it came with a strategy guide) and was discounted. Best 10 dollars I've ever spent. I doubt anything could be more worth it.
8. Donkey Kong Country
1994 - Super Nintendo
 Another platform game done right. Great graphics, killer music, fantastic play control, loveable characters, and a kooky storyline all come together in Rareware's first hit for the Super Nintendo. The monkey family stars in this game in his first positive role. Cranky Kong, DK's monkey-dad was the original Donkey Kong that used to break buildings and steal chicks. But CK has settled down in the jungle with his son, Donkey Kong. The premise of the game? Kremlings have stolen DK's horde of bananas and Diddy Kong (his little neighbor) and he's pissed. In the first level DK will find Diddy and together they will travel through 8 areas to get to King R. Kool (the head of the banana snatching operation) and get DK's horde back.
Donkey Kong and Diddy must trek through Kongo Jungle, Monkey Mines, Vine Valley,
Gorrila Glacier, Kremkroc Industries Inc., Chimp Caverns, and Gangplank Galleon. My personal favorite levels are Orangutan Gang, Tree Top Town, and Blackout Basement. Along the route our monkey buddies can look for some help from a few animal friends like Rambi the Rhino, Enguarde the Swordfish, Winky the Frog, and Expresso the Ostrich. Funky Kong can fly you around in this awesome barrel-plane and you can just "jump into Candy's barrel" to save your game (not like that has any sort of sexual connotations at all).
 I love the play control of the game. Cart-wheel double jumping makes getting to those hard to reach places really fun. It also makes the levels more fun. Now I'm not particularly fond of the animal friends that help you out along the way… except maybe Squaks the parrot that holds a lantern over your some dark places… but that's about it. Enguarde makes swimming faster, Winky sucks straight up, Expresso just makes it easier to fly quickly through the stage and Rambi can bust shit. Nobody can be as cool as the Diddy-DK pair. I still don't understand why DK is friends with this seemingly 10 year old kid, though… something almost creepy about that. But not creepier than Dixie Kong in DKC2… she freaks me out.
7. Super Mario Bros. 3
1990 - Nintendo Entertainment System
There are a few games in the history of video games that belong on every top 10 list there is. This is one of those games. Think to yourself, "if I could only have one NES game what would it be?" and more often than not the answer will be Super Mario Bros. 3. Why is this? What is it about this game that makes it loved by so many people? I'll tell you.
 To say that Super Mario Bros. 2 was a disappointment may be going a bit to far… but it's not quite what people wanted from a Mario game. It's hard to remember the period when SMB 2 was out but SMB 3 had not yet been released. When you think about this period you realize that there have only been two platform Mario games released. It was totally possible for Nintendo to make the decision that Mario jumping on things wasn't as cool as Mario picking up things and every game from there-on-out could have been like SMB 2. Sure Japan had the Lost Levels… but that was only a small factor.
It was Super Mario Bros. 3 that said, "this is how Mario games should be remembered in the future,"  and decided to use the SMB 1 and Lost Levels format of game play. SMB 3 also made the game less linear by allowing you to travel around each land on the map screen and enter the levels that way. While you couldn't travel back to different worlds after you had beaten them like you could in Super Mario World for SNES, you did have more freedom than most platform games gave at the time.
The various worlds of SMB 3 are what give the game most of it's character. Whether your favorite is World 4 - Giant Land, World 7 - Pipe Land (you'd be crazy to like this one), World 5 - Sky Land, or whatever, each choice has numerous qualities to back it up. I personally love Sky Land for three reasons: Tanooki suits, Kuribo shoes, and the tower
level to take you between the ground and the clouds in the land.
Some people would argue that as far as the game itself goes, Super Mario World is a better game, but it is lacking the nostalgic quality that SMB 3 provides. Like all the other writers have mentioned… it was featured in the movie The Wizard three months before the release of the game. This gave consumers three months to drool over what would become the best selling game of all time. In 1999 the Guinness Book of World Records estimated SMB 3 sales at over 15 Million copies worldwide. I'd like to point out: that's sick. My roommate and one of his friends used to play SMB 3 quite often near the beginning of the year, trying to beat it as quickly as possible with getting as many lives as possible… but that god damned airship in World 8 was always in the way. My infinite kudos to them, though, for trying at least like twice a week. I suggest you go dust off your NES and use the blow trick in the bottom of your SMB 3 cart as soon as you finish reading the articles and then tell your friends about the website and send us money.
6. Gran Turismo 3 A-Spec
2001 - Sony Playstation 2
 This game kicks so much ass. It's one of my top five favorite games of all times for a multitude of reasons, which I will get to shortly. I've never played any game for as many hours as GT3. My family can attest to this, since I began playing it at our beach house in Jersey which only has two TVs and only one was PS2able (the TV in the living room of a two bedroom, one floor house). That summer of 2001 we had purchased a "30 dollars for 30 rentals over the period of 30 days" thing from Blockbuster where we got one rental a day. This Blockbuster was a good twenty five minutes from our beach house, so every day we made the trek out there. I rented GT3 one day to test it out… and then rented it every fifth day. At night I would play from about 11:00 till 3 or 4 in the morning. Then I'd play at various half hour intervals during the day. I kept this up for about 6 weeks or so. Then I played it all the time when I got home. Then when school started I played a lot more. The strangest part: I never liked racing games before.
My friend Tiger, my best friend since like 2nd grade, loved the pervious Gran Trusimos because he is a car fanatic. He'd tell me about all the hours he spent playing them and I didn't think much of it. The graphics were crappy and it was too difficult for me to learn while just messing around. With the release of GT3 and the fact that I finally owned a Playstation, I decided that the graphics were cool and cars are fun so I'd give it a shot. This is when I got hooked. I owe it all to Tiger… or should I say I blame him for ruining my life.
I got hooked because I thought of it as an RPG (my favorite genre of games). Instead of being a character that goes around fighting enemies and bosses in a weird world you are a car going around and climbing to the top of the racing circuit. Instead of getting better weapons I get new cars. Instead of getting power ups and items I get turbo systems and carbon driveshafts. I win money and buy upgrades and race more competitive cars and more laps. It's a never ending cycle… and I love every second of it.
Once you learn how to drive the controls are impressive. The cars handle differently depending on their drivetrains, what you've done to modify it, and according to the car itself. The detail on the cars are impressive and the number of company's Polyphony Digital got the license to is amazing. Drive Toyotas, Mitsubishis, Fords, Opals, BMWs, VWs, Audis, and more and more. Tired of racing the normal circuit? Just get your Rally License and run around the rally tracks for a while. Looking for a good time killer? Race the Endurance League and survive 2 hours straight of driving.
The beautiful scenery and sweet soundtrack make the driving more enjoyable. Goldfinger - 99 Red Balloons, Grand Theft Audio - As Good As It Gets, Lenny Kravitz - Are You Gonna Go My Way, Jimi Hendrix - Stone Free, Judas Priest - Turbo Lover and other songs provide the polyphony while the digital is dished out with real courses like Laguna Seca and Toyko Route 246, which is the road outside of the Sony Computer Entertainment HQs in Japan. A href="http://www.scei.co.jp/ps/r246/rm/r246.ram/" Check out this video (RA) to see the actual streets the race course were based on.
Is there anything I've missed? Oh yeah: car damage. GT3 does not have car damage in it, unlike the game before it. The original rumour was that this was because it would take too much to make it look realistic. The real answer, as I later learned, is that the various car companies were not interested in having these very realistic cars getting the shit kicked out of them… bad marketing strategy, ya know? I suggest you give this game a try at least once to see what it's all about. Drive a Nissan Skyline or a Dodge Viper or an Opal Astra Touring car. But if you get addicted, don't say I didn't warn you.
And with that said... next comes the ones you've all been waiting for. Unless of course you have some strange affinity for items 20-16 on any list... for which I say go seek some help.
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