The SNES Rankings - Finished!

[Splain | 2,571]

Lots of memories with Mario RPG as a kid. One of my first RPGs ever. I think every RPG I've played since, I hit the A button during attacks just in case.

[Sumez | 2,967]

Lots of enviable stories about "playing this game as a kid". It's funny, because Mario RPG was like the holy import grail in the sense that you couldn't just buy the game and slap it in an import adapter, and region modded consoles refused to play it too, since it's one of the few games that'll still be rejected to play if the lockout chip is just flat out disabled.

As a kid I'd read about the game, because magazines of course still had the gall to do coverage of it even though no one could play it. In the gaming landscape of 1996 it sounded like such a crazy and impropable thing, I just had to play it.

Even when SNES emulation became a thing, it was one of the games that still wasn't properly supported because of the way it relies on the SA1 chip, used by few other really noteworthy games.

When I eventually had my SNES (properly) modded many years later (nowadays, 5 or 6 years doesn't seem like a lot, but when you're a kid it is), Mario RPG was one of the first games I imported, alongside two other games that I imagine will be at least in the top four.
And man does the game live up to the hype it had managed to build up in my mind, it's just such an oddball endearing story that goes in direction the Mario universe had never done before or since, and the isometric overworld exploration is still today more engaging for me than what they managed to pull off in either the Mario & Luigi or Paper Mario series.

[RH | 4,915]

Ok, I think this is a "good" RPG, but not great.  But to be fair, I didn't first play this until a few years ago and I had also played through Paper Mario beforehand.

I'm not shaming this position because I did enjoy it but as a seasoned RPGer who was an adult and just wanted to go back and play a praiseworthy title, I wanted to experience it.

However, you can't go back and play a game as if you were a child, no matter how hard you try.  If I had nostalgia for this, I'd probably see it as a top 10 title too, but since I didn't I just felt it was "ok".  A worthwhile experience but one I don't have to go back too.

I hate to say it but I think this probably falls in the same category as movies like The Goonies and The Princess Bride--if you saw it as a kid, it's amazing and it holds up today.  If you saw it as an adult, you can kind of appreciate it for what it was, but since you missed it in your childhood, it's just alright.  Well, that's what I've been told by people that have watched both of those films in their adulthoods.

I'm not saying it's a bad pick, especially if it was your introduction to RPGs.  Man, if this was my first RPG, it'd probably be in my top 3.  But it's not. I might put it in a top 100 list, though and it might even break the top 50.  Maybe.

Edited September 30, 2022 by RH

[Red | 437]

So, I've been thinking about starting another RPG.  I've been playing a lot of PlayStation lately, but I've played most of the better PS1 RPGs already and wanted to try something new.  This thread got me thinking about Earthbound again and that maybe it was finally time for me to give it a try.  I dug it out last night and played for a bit.  It's not really grabbing me, but I'll keep at it.  It seems like something I could get into.  Also pulled out Contra III, another game I never really gave a chance.  Played it a bit and it seemed like it could be really fun, but I was a bit tired by that time for such an action-packed game.  I'll surely play some more in the coming days.

Aside from these two, I think there's a good chance I've played all the remaining games in the top ten.  I know I've played five for sure.  I think I know the other two, but it's possible I haven't been paying close enough attention and that they've already been ranked.  If they wind up being games I haven't played, I think I'll make an effort to try them as well.  I haven't posted in this topic much and haven't read through every entry of the rankings, but I have enjoyed skimming through every update.

[Reed Rothchild | 9,547]

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#7

[Dr. Morbis | 2,089]

Mega Man X is a great game, but as someone who grew up with the NES titles, he just doesn't look "right" to me.  I don't know what it is, but it's almost as if they were trying to make him appeal to small children in a cool way (kind of like what Sega did with Sonic) while on the NES they were just trying to draw a robot.  And what's with those giant bell-bottoms?!?

As for gameplay, yeah if you take away all the NES titles, the first X game is far and away the best Mega Man game of all time...

[Daniel_Doyce | 475]

@Reed Rothchild How are you going to fit Liberty and Death and Romance of the 3 Kingdom 2 into the top 6?

[Tanooki | 4,936]

Lofty, but after reading it I kind of agree, at least I do as much as why you feel that way.

I always had a love/hate with the game, more so the franchise I guess.  I didn't like them making it hard as ever but making him a mega gimp having to go back into stages just to get a life bar and armor parts just so you can handle I guess *normal* damage as it was from the 8bit era.  It was always clunky going in, going back out in and stuff, it's like a SOTN try-hard but executed very wrongly.  Outside of that the cool additions, smart new robot designs (masters) and even the SF2 nod is cool.  I always had kept MMX, recently got MMX2 in a MMX3 shell(dunno the circumstance on that one) but whatever, it's decent too.

[Reed Rothchild | 9,547]

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#6

[Splain | 2,571]

I never had a NES, so when I finally picked up a used SNES and SMW+All Stars, I was in Mario Utopia for a long time. I was so glad this compilation existed.

[Dr. Morbis | 2,089]

When you wrote this:

1 hour ago, Reed Rothchild said:

So what do you get when you combine three great titles(and one good one) into a package deal? You get a damn fine Super Nintendo game. One that may just be the greatest value in the history of video games,

I was remembering back to the time about fifteen years ago when I picked up the Super Mario All-Stars & Super Mario World combo cart and I was thinking the same thing: this may just be the greatest value in the history of video games.  I paid like thirty dollars for five of my most favourite games of all time.  literally hundreds and hundreds of hours of quality play time.  How do you top a compilation like that?

[Andy_Bogomil | 815]

Yeah mixed feeling about this one being in the top 10 as you touched on in your write-up about being a compilation.

[Sumez | 2,967]

I do agree that if you're ranking a compilation against non-compilation games, you should prioritize its quality over its quantity. But even Super Mario Bros. 3 alone is enough to secure it a top 10 in the SNES library. Absolute 9/10 game!

Edited October 1, 2022 by Sumez

[a3quit4s | 4,103]

SMB3 best game on SNES hahaha

[rdrunner | 422]

Interesting way of thinking on Mario All Stars.  In a world where I no longer own (and could never get) an NES, this may actually be a fair position.  Better still for people who never played these games on the NES first.

For me personally though, I usually ignore compilations and remakes when I rank games.  Whether the content came from NES, arcade, or any other platform, I find that it's simply not an apples to apples comparison when games are from different eras.

The only reason I even own a copy of All Stars is for The Lost Levels.  Otherwise, I prefer the original versions of all 3 NES Mario games.

I could say the same things about Tetris & Dr. Mario, Ninja Gaiden Trilogy, Arcade's Greatest Hits, Ms. Pac-Man, or even one of my personal arcade favorites, Mr. Do.

I do make some exceptions to this depending on how different the games play compared to their originals, but the above examples I gave are mostly just straight up ports.

That said, the goal here is to rank every SNES game ever released, including compilations, so here we are.  Decent spot.

[Tanooki | 4,936]

I started reading the latest one last night, fell asleep after reading SMB1.  To call SMB2 a not-Mario game is a boring played out fiction that just needs to stop.  It started as an alpha for a Mario game engine for vertical play, FujiTV came in wanting a game in a hurry for Dream Machine 1987, so they tooled that alpha up to their game Doki Doki Panic.  That's the reality, the reality even when asked has been said by Miyamoto and others years ago.  SO fed up with that game being trolled as the black sheep, SMB2j the kaizo level abuse game is the black sheep.  SMB2 (USA) brought us many things that rolled straight into being included in SMB3 both moves and characters that have existed since.

I get the mixed feelings placing largely(outside Japan) a package of graphically updated re-runs in the top10, but it's not about being a re-run it's about the quality of the game, it meets the praise.

Also, why not ** that thing and include the half year in production pack-in only SMAS+Mario World combo cart?  Why choose?  HAVE BOTH.

[Reed Rothchild | 9,547]

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#5

[Andy_Bogomil | 815]

Nice... thought it would be top 3 for sure on your list. Definitely an awesome game with a lot of nostalgia for me. Great game! One of my favourite Mario games despite the brokenness of the Cape.

[guillavoie | 1,210]

Now, please, tell me that you still have that homemade drawing of the overworld map?

[Reed Rothchild | 9,547]

13 minutes ago, guillavoie said:

Now, please, tell me that you still have that homemade drawing of the overworld map?

I'm really hoping it turns up.

[Dr. Morbis | 2,089]

SMW would be like #2 on the SNES for me, especially considering every SNES player ever has played it and it has such broad appeal with literally all types of gamers, but I understand that in the retro-collector world of 2022, we see things in different shades than they actually are, and nowadays the SNES is "that console with all those great RPG's"  So I'll forgive you for putting SMW at #5 since you've gotta leave slots for those darn epics...

[Reed Rothchild | 9,547]

I've actually owned all of the top 5 since the 90s, and their order has been static 

[Dr. Morbis | 2,089]

16 minutes ago, Reed Rothchild said:

I've actually owned all of the top 5 since the 90s, and their order has been static 

Fair enough.  It just seems that the SNES is the RPG console nowadays, but there are so many other good games.  Hopefully you didn't put the big two RPG's at #1 & #2, but they're both amazing games so if RPG's are your thing, then so be it.

What's funny to me is that of all the types of gamers that are out there, it seems the RPG and strategy style of gamers (like me) are the ones that ended up being hardcore nerdy collectors, while all those dudes playing action games like Madden and Sonic and NHL back in the day are mostly nowhere to be seen in the retro gaming community...

[Sumez | 2,967]

That's a really odd context to throw Sonic into

[Tanooki | 4,936]

Huh wow, Super Mario World just creeps into the bottom of the Top 5, I'm just a little surprised there.  I mean I get it a little, for years it was like required play being the pack-in outside of the utterly basic no-game set until they started doing the random other pack-ins.

I do like the idea there of the breakdown of the vital games.  SMB1 and 3 are gimmes, so is 64 and I remember despite being I guess 18 or 19 at the time hogging when no one was around the kiosk at stores to meddle with the game.  It was a must have day one, no one before and few and sadly super far between ever could match the solid camera, control, and pivot to see things they did so masterfully in that game.  Super Mario World really was like the 4th horseman of the mario-pocalypse of the franchise, nothing has match those titles since.  Some are weak like sunshine and its legit problems, others play solid homage and in ways surpass with Galaxy, but really nothing overall tops those 4.

I don't see comparing SMW to that game, Sonic...the first one was junk compared, not a junk game but lacking which the sequel polished up well.  Don't get me wrong I do like the first two and a couple random others as well.

I know I shouldn't and I'm not going to read back through the rest, but I'm thinking that what's left is Zelda, oddly Chrono Trigger, Final Fantasy III, and ...Super Metroid?  Should be interesting to see how this plays out.