180: NFL Blitz 2000
System: PS1
The original NFL Blitz was this great game. It had that XTREME 90s attitude. It took the stuff you liked about Mutant League Football, but got the license from the NFL.
NFL Blitz 2000 is the perfect version of that game. It's the last football game I enjoyed playing. My brother's and I have some incredible memories of 4th and goal, down by 6, and the game hinged on inches.
I've since played the arcade version much more, but I still think the PS1 controller felt the best for the game. The game still plays well, it just might not look great... you know... blowing like 12 polygon models up on a big screen isn't the best.
179: Crash Bandicoot Warped
System: PS1
I guess today's list has a theme, and that is 90s raditude. It was the height of Bandicoot mania. Sony was running commercials of the mouthy protagonist calling Mario out of Nintendo's headquarters for a street fight.
The platforming never felt great in the first two Bandicoots. Developers still hadn't really figured out platforming in 3D. Some played it safe and did a sort of 3D perspective like Crash. Some played it safer and did a sort of 2.5D thing like Pandemonium or Ironman X/O Manowar. And some just went full in and we were so mesmerized that we ignored how bad it felt, Mario 64 looking at you.
Crash Bandicoot Warped was the peak of the PS1 platforming. Naughty Dog would revamp the platformer on the PS2 and get it completely right, but we had Warped, and it had animals you could ride, attitude, and a solid challenge.
178: Command and Conquer II: Red Alert
System: PC
Rush rush rush rush rush to build that nuke. That was always my strategy. It worked maybe 1 in 6 matches, but when you pulled it off... nothing more satisfying. The explosion would bring your network connection to a crawl, and when things returned to normal, there would be a giant empty hole where your enemies buildings used to be.
Command and Conquer was the third pillar of the RTS genre (Age of Empires and Star Craft being the others) and I felt like largely it was a dad's RPG. I don't mean in that it was meant for older people, but just every dad that had a computer loved Command and Conquer.
177: Micro Machines
System: NES
The Nintendo actually had a few really solid racing games and I couldn't decide which one to have on my list. I had Super Offroad on here at one point, but ultimately Micro Machines won out. There was something that sparked this childlike innocence speeding over pencil bridges across gaps and dodging blocks. Years before Toy Story existed, Micro Machines created that "alive" childhood universe.
You raced cars, boats, and helicopters, and as you win races you collect the Micro Machine to put in your carrying case. The secret was... they ball basically controlled the same, but the environments could change things up. The tabletops gave you precision control, the mud caused you to slide across the the road, and the water ... well the water pretty much felt like the mud.
176: Rocket Knight Adventures
System: Genesis
Platformers were the norm at this time. Everyone wanted their hit mascot platformer. Mario and Sonic were giant piles of money in the form of sprite characters.
Each of these platformers tried to have some sort of gimmick to separate them from the pack. Kid Chameleon had masks you could switch to to have different powers. Toejam and Earl had a funky soundtrack.
And Rock Knight Adventures had a jetpack that allowed you to charge up and bounce off walls and levels were built with this mechanic in mind. You'd jetpack over obstacles and fling your sword at pig knights.
The levels were gorgeous, the sprites were gorgeous, this was just a fun beautiful game. Simple as that.
175: Eternal Darkness
System: Gamecube
Eternal Darkness was one of the most interesting horror game ideas, maybe not packaged the best, but fantastic despite itself.
It played largely like a Resident Evil game, but a little more maneuverable. Find a key, find a tablet, progress to the next area. Oh yeah, and there was time travel.
The ideas that went behind horror, breaking the 4th wall, making you question real life. Was my memory card deleting itself? Did the TV turn off? Did I just see a spider crawl across the screen?
All of this contained on the third place console and never re-released. It's a damn shame. The things they could do with VR. Can you imagine if they made it sound like someone was in the room with you? I mean, physically in the room with you. Only to have you take your VR helmet off, look around, and by the time you slid it back on, you were surrounded by creatures.
174: Dead Rising
System: Xbox 360
Dead Rising sold me on the Xbox 360. I had been leaning PlayStation 3, but I was a broke college kid, so the price of the PS3 kept me away from it. I didn't really feel convicted about any of the new hardware.
Late one night, maybe a week or two before it came out, I watched a preview of Dead Rising on X-Play. I couldn't believe what I was seeing. Hundreds of high-def zombies, surrounding a car with a photographer standing on top of it. I watched the 3 minute trailer and went to Best Buy release day and bought an Xbox 360 and Dead Rising.
I played the game for about five hours and was murdered by a horde of zombies. And then the game restarted and I realized I was at level 6. And then I died again, but this time 10 hours in. And I started the game at level 16.
I realized I had been playing this game all wrong, trying to fight the mechanics instead of use them. Once it clicked, this became my speed run game. I'd run it over and over and over again.
173: Nier
System: PS3
I still can't tell you why I like the original Nier so much cause I will spend the first 10 minutes warning you about the boring combat, the large swaths of open land with nothing to do in them, and the worst fishing mini-game I've ever played.
But there was something meditative about the game. The soundtrack, the repetitive button presses put you into a rhythm to just relax your mind. I loved the NPCs. They all had the brand of weird you get from Zelda NPCs. Just the whole game in general felt a little bit like a David Lynch experiment. And then the ending slapped me upside the face. I didn't see the twist coming.
Nier has been sitting on my shelf for about 8 years now, waiting for a replay in the New Game +.
172: Wolfenstein 3D
System: PC
A floppy disk labeled Wolfenstein 3D sat next to my dad's keys and wallet. He was working 3rd shift with a bunch of IT nerds. Every now and then he would come home with a handful of Genesis games, or a NES cartridge, but something computer related was special.
I didn't know what this was. I didn't know if it was even something I was supposed to be playing. But I knew I had four hours before my dad woke up and I wanted to see what a Wolfenstein was.
After a few times misspelling Wolfenstain in the DOS line, it finally launched and what was presented to me was magical. Nazi killer B.J. Blazkowicz moved around in a 3D space. And it wasn't like those busted ass multimedia experiences like 3D Dinosaur Adventure, this was an honest goodness castle filled with Nazis for me to kill.
I spent hours pressing space bar on every inch of wall, looking for that sweet sweet secret. And then one day, I loaded up a save, found the end of the level, and was introduced to Meca-Hitler.
171: Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker
System: PSP
The crazy bastard did it, a full fledged Metal Gear Solid on a portable. Not only did Kojima and team figure out how to make a full fledged and good Metal Gear game on a portable device, but Sony released arguably the coolest version of the PSP, jungle green.
I had fun sneaking around the guards and doing Metal Gear things, but the most memorable part of this game were the boss fights. You were always playing around with the best combo of weapons to bring in, trying to not call in an air drop if possible. It was a game of chicken, trying to get distance, drop some C4, and then baiting the tank into your trap all while dodging artillery being fired your way.
Being that this game ran on a UMD, there were some gates built so the system didn't self-destruct. Missions were generally limited to 3-5 rooms (large and highly detailed rooms) and there would be a ranking, comicbook style story telling, and a shop between. Peace Walker is woven into the fabric of Metal Gear canon and arguably changed the universe more than any other Metal Gear game.
