Top 5: Jury's Still Out

SMB 2, Wind Waker, LoZII, and Mario Sunshine are all classics, if not on par with games like Super Mario Brothers, Metroid, and Zelda I. I can't vouch for Star Fox adventures.

Compared to the inspired-by-some-kinda-higher-power genius that is Super Mario 64 and Super Mario Galaxy, Super Mario Sunshine is flippin' 'orrible.

B St. C

p.s. I was hoping this was going to be some kind of "unsung" list . . . cos I feel like singing, if ya catch my drift.

Q...Quality of Halo? Ugh.

SMB2, Wind Waker, Sunshine, and Zelda2 were all really great games with some minor issues, but were surpassed by later entries in the series. I still have a special place in my heart for both Wind Waker and Zelda2.

Star Fox Adventures however was awful. That game reminded me why I hate Rare's platformers. The graphics were nice for that generation, but the art style was horrible (Rare's artists must have been stuck in 1985 listening to too much RATT and Dokken), the gameplay was weird (it had really floaty physics), and the game was a mindless collectathon (like nearly all of Rare's platformers). I found it funny that a lot of the sound effects were ripped right out of one of their N64 games, Jet Force Gemini. Some people seem to like it for its bright shiny graphics. But no matter how much you polish a turd, it's still crap.

I liked Star Fox Adventures. Once you get over the fact that it isn't a traditional Star Fox game, it becomes a rather enjoyable Zelda-esque action/adventure game. Unfortunately, it seems like most people who hate on the game will never be able to see it for what it is, and only for what they want it to be :\

I think Wind Waker cemented it's status as a classic as soon as people got their hands on it. Personally, I rank it as one of the weaker Zelda games, simply because the last half of the game is replaced with that silly Tri-Force fetch quest, instead of dungeons.

Mario Sunshine will always be considered a misfire on Nintendo's part, though. It's sandwiched between Mario 64 and Mario Galaxy, two of the arguably greatest games ever made. That alone makes it's flaws stand out like crazy.

SMB2, as mentioned, is a classic thanks to nostalgia and Nintendo incorporating the SMB2 characters into other Mario games.

And Adventures of Link will also always be seen as a misfire by Nintendo.

A good list, except for WindWaker. It certainly was the case, but i think WindWaker's status as "classic" was solidified after Twilight Princess came out, mostly because you could really see WindWaker's virtues if you directly set it against TP (which isn't to say TP was worse, but it certainly had a very different way of doing things than WW)

Hmm... I'll be honest, I've loved every game on this list except Zelda II. Zelda is my favorite series, in fact. The only Zelda game I didn't like, though, was Zelda II. Sorry if I offend anyone; no idea why. I've played through every title in the series, and Zelda II was horrible, IMHO.

I'll "deny" that Halo and God of War were excellent games.

I disagree with what a lot of people here are saying about Super Mario Sunshine. While I agree that Super Mario 64 was better than it, I still think that Sunshine was superior to Galaxy. I felt that Galaxy was too linear with the way that the game always shot you to the next planet, while Sunshine, for the most part, had you find your way to the star by yourself. Not to mention Galaxy was way too easy. I got all 120 stars in no more than 2 months, while I still haven't acquired all of Sunshine's stars yet. Not to mention I also thought that Sunshine's gameplay was better overall. Galaxy's gravity aspect with the round planets was cool and all, but the novelty wore off fast.

God of War was exceptional, but Halo has always been pretty generic.

While star fox adventures is a decent but not remarkable zelda clone, its well executed.My complains about the game are not because of its different genre but due to the sheer amount of repetitive simple tasks that become eventually tedious, the combat system isnt fully satisfying and the story isnt particularly grand. Had it been better planned the game would have certainly overcame the gender gap and became a full scale classic.Is not on league with a game like Okami, so while its good, is not among best ,and therefore cant be a true classic.
The other games simply are decent(like sunshine which had nice visuals and mario 64 physics with a twist) but then againt not big or good enough to be classics.

I'd say the only one on the list I never liked was Zelda II. I still don't care for the game, though I can definitely appreciate some of its qualities. It was the first Zelda game I played, so something about it must have took, otherwise I probably would have never touched the series again.

A little on the fence about Sunshine and Star Fox at first too. Adventures eventually won me over, though still a shame Nintendo had to just paste their Star Fox over what could have been a great original IP. It's really hard to place Sunshine though. I enjoyed the game for the most part (Platforming stages, and just running around doing nothing) but it just felt like more of the same, like it was stuck in 1996. Still a good game, but at the same time we had the original Jak & Daxter and Ratchet & Clank, both of which blew it out of the water.

The Wind Waker has had me since day one though, I loved every minute of it. It's still the most beautiful game ever made, and by far Koji Kondo (and company)'s greatest original score.

SMB2 will always be a great game, but just like Star Fox Adventures, you have to forgive that it isn't its namesake.

Regarding halo.Gameplay wise its somewhat slower paced and completely generic,bringing nothing into the world(perhaps the rechargeable shield function).Command and conquer renegade brought better vehicles interaction years before.On that regard the Unreal series were always superior as well, giving full scale mobility to characters,also years before.
Regarding story, half life came before and had a more interesting story.Decorated as it may be, halo was still about aliens being bad guys.It wasnt a bad story tho, but not breathtaking.On that regard F.E.A.R appealed me more back then.
However the game was amazingly heavy merchandised and advertised, and after all was a great game.Its a microsoft product,with dozens of millions spent on advertising, and those millions paid of.Advertising turns good games into blockbusters.

I agree with all but Zelda II. I've played it several times, but I don't get into it like I do the rest of the series.

Super Mario Sunshine and The Wind Waker remain some of my favourite games because of the bright colours and sunshine that you get. I like Twilight Princess, but it's very dark and playing it puts me in a bad mood.

I liked Star Fox Adventures, probably because it's a very Zelda-like game.

Interesting list.

Star Fox Adventures - Good game, but ultimately forgettable. The fact they shoehorned Star Fox into the game really hurt it IMO. And the puzzles were pretty straightforward and easy, not terribly original. I remember at one point some guy made you run from one spot to another to get an item. It only lasted 2 minutes, but it was so derivative it was embarrassing.

Super Mario Bros. 2 - Great Mario game, just "different" and not as good as Mario 3, World, 64, etc.

Zelda: Wind Waker - Eliminate the endless sailing and the tiresome triforce fetch quest late in the game and I have no issue with this game.

Super Mario Sunshine - This one needed a lot more polishing. The camera was terrible at some points (the fences in the theme park spring to mind). Too many stars revolved around collecting coins (blue ones, red ones, etc.). I did a count once and I think it came out to a good 40-50% of the stars involved collecting coins somehow. Not good. Definitely the weakest of the 3D Mario games.

Zelda 2 - First I love the temple music in Zelda 2. No debate on that. Besides that, the game is just frustrating. It sucks to go through a long temple and get taken out by a blind jump. IIRC, that dragon boss could kill you if you just happened to jump at the wrong moment and it shot fire. Puzzles aren't the name of the game so much as it is exploration and rote memorization for the temples.

I'm a bit of a "Zelda 2" fanboy, and never understood why it turns so many people off. I played it to death back in the NES days, and even taped together sheets of graph paper to make my own poster-sized map of the overworld.

I have all the games on the list and have no real complaints. "Star Fox Adventures" is probably the weakest, but it's not too shabby.

So i was in the camp of being disappointed in Wind Waker's graphics when i first saw the demo but i figured hey its a Zelda game and look kinda like Link to the Past so it cant be that bad. And when i played it i thought the celshading was amazing world was large ect but i didnt like the story or the endless sailing or the fact that it had like what 3-4 dungeons, and its woefully easy difficulty. Only zelda game where i didnt get everything i could before taking on the final boss (excluding Gold Skulltula's or Poes ect) waaayyy to much aimless sailing for that.

Halo is quality? Don't make me laugh
God of War is just... passable, because mashing buttons to decapitate enemies is sort of fun.

I agree with most of the top 5, I haven't played starfox adventures so I can have an opinion about it.

I specially agree with zelda II, It's not my favourite but it's still great, with some memorable bosses and music (the dungeon music is awesome), the only problem that I had with it was that sometimes it was annoying that you can't jump over the enemies or run from them because they are too fast (specially those iron knuckles).

And about Wind waker too, it was amazing, in almost all aspects, except for one fundamental thing for zelda, the puzzles, they were too easy, short and repetitive, I mean, usually puzzles in zelda (at least older ones, WW and TP suffer from the same stuff), are all creative and require a combination of mind and ability, even the gbc puzzles were more elaborated that the ones in WW.

Great list! Looking at all those titles really makes you think twice about what makes a good game and what boosts a game up to the status of great.

SMB2 was always a lot of fun. After putting all those hours into SMB1 back in the day, I for one appreciated the variety in the second game. Playing as Luigi, Toad, Princess Peach, etc. was a kick. Throwing enemies as opposed to stomping them also made for romping fun and a welcome paradigm shift in the Mario universe.

When I think about Super Mario Sunshine and look at several of the levels I can't help but wonder if the game was some sort of early development step for the coming of Super Mario Galaxy. The look of some of the levels, the mechanics/physics of the game, and the style seem an awful lot like Galaxy.

All in all it's hard to pick apart any one Mario game as they're all amazing in and of themselves!

I've never played Star Fox Adventures, but SMB2, The Wind Waker, and SMS are all undeniably classics. As for LoZ2, I don't really like it because of the difficulty, so I'm really not sure what to say about it.

Zelda II and Mario 2 are forever awesome. I always enjoy the black sheeps of game series for some reason. Well, I'm gonna go pull up turnips and toss them at Shy Guys. See ya.

The wind waker is beautiful.

I think a lot of these games problems was that The gamecube was just such a poorly recieved console and therefore couldn't find an audience.

I've only got two beefs related to Star Fox Adventures of completely separate matters: how I think it would have been more appealing if it just wasn't a Star Fox game, and the fact that I'd never been given the chance to try it. I should use this here as a reminder to look into it.

As for the other 4, I love 'em. Mario Sunshine's one of the least frustration Mario games I've played, and I like it better than Mario 64.
I'd also been meaning to check out Yume Koujou Doki Doki Panic. And to finally beat Zelda 2.