Star Tropics for the NES.

The original mass effect trilogy. I know they're very mainstream but no one talks about them anymore and I must have like 5k hours between the 3 games.

Perfect winter break games for just diving in and doing 20 hour long play sessions

The legend of dragoon.

The Adventures of Lolo - a puzzle game on the NES. There were 1 or 2 sequels depending on how you count and they were fun too.

It’s a puzzle game with fairly simple mechanics but surprising complexity and difficulty. I beat both US versions and designed levels for a knockoff but have never met anyone in person that has heard of it.

Dead Head Fred, that game is awesome and sadly forever locked to the PSP. That it has never gotten a console port is nothing short of criminal.

Fahrenheit/ Indigo Prophecy, an early David Cage/ Quantic Dream game from the same people who made Heavy Rain, Beyond: Two Souls, and Detroit: Become Human

I haven't played it in forever so I'm not sure how well it holds up (if at all) and I also have a love/hate relationship with it.

It has one of the single worst/ cheap levels of any game I have ever played*, and in the very last level the story really shits the bed. On the other hand it was doing things at the time that I still haven't seen in other games. (I haven't gotten around to playing his other games so he might be doing similar things in them). In terms of attempting to evolve the way stories are told in games it was truly groundbreaking and unique for its time.

I still have fond memories of playing it despite it's flaws. I'd say it's worth playing for anyone interested in a older game that does some really interesting things from a story telling perspective and/or people who are fans of the later games and are curious to see where it started. As long as you can make it through the QTE level with your sanity intact and are prepared for the story to get stupid right at the end- it's worth a playthrough imo

*Even though I hate the level, the concept behind it is actually pretty cool. A malevolent force tries to kill the player character by throwing his apartment at him. The problem is it's a 4 1/2 minute QTE sequence that requires precise timing and you can't mess up even one time or you have to start the entire thing over from the beginning. You also have plenty of time to wonder why the force never varies it's strategy of throwing one object at a time. Good idea, terrible execution.

Revenge of the Mutant Camels - highlight 1: "Ninety-foot high, neutronium shielded, laser-spitting, death camels". Hightlight 2: Almost 40 years after its first release, in 2021 Jeff Minter fixed a bug on collision detection in the Commodore 64 version.
Impossible Mission - highlight: "Another visitor. Stay a while... stay forever!"
Deuteros - highlight: the way the game world unfolded and opened up
Syndicate - highlight: abusing the Persuadertron
Shadow Hearts - highlight: the Judgement Ring

Perfect Dark. I didn't have a sibling to play with, so I am eternally grateful to Rare for making computer-controlled bots in the multiplayer mode.

Dysmantle.

Casual post apocalyptic survival etc game. It’s also available on consoles, switch and mobile.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/846770/DYSMANTLE/

Outlaws. An early Spaghetti Western themed FPS from LucasArts. After Dark Forces (Retconned by Rogue One) and before DF2:Jedi Knight (the one with the amazibad FMV cut scenes and the best expansion pack ever), it leveraged the 2.5d engine for all it was worth and did a hand-animated slightly Don-Bluth-esque aesthetic that worked perfectly.

Level design was good. Multiplayer was fun, even though if you tried to LAN with an unswitched hub (it was 1998!) player 3 would lag like motherfucker and be relegated to throwing dynamite and praying. Story was straight out of a Tropes-R-Us, but well executed and with good voice acting (including John de Lancie IIRC). The coup de grace was the soundtrack, Clint Bajakian seemed to inhabit Ennio Morricone’s soul, but with leitmotifs to make John Williams proud. It absolutely elevated the game.

Syndicate Wars.

Earthworm Jim

Atomic Robokid (Genesis)

Tempest (Atari 2600 version)

Ghosts and Goblins (NES)

The game where it's a rich guy that sends a trained assassin out onto a island with nothing and hunts him for 24 hours, and if the assassin kills the rich guy he gets his freedom and like $20K.

Rock n Roll Racing (SNES)

Beyond All Reason/Planetary Annihilation

Full Throttle.

Dark messiah of might and magic

Ziggurat.

it's a first person shooter dungeon crawler, the levels and enemies are procedurally generated, sometimes you can get a room with enemies that are one hit kills, then walk into a connecting room with 3 different over powers enemy types coming at you from all directions.

its face paced and fun as fuck to run around killing shit with magic wands and magical guns.

no playthrough is the same.

The Longest Journey. It’s one of the best adventure games ever made, and has one of the best stories in interactive storytelling.

Sacrifice. An old Interplay title where you are a sorcerer in service to a god. You summon armies of creatures and cast world-altering spells using the souls of creatures you’ve sacrificed to your god.

“Whiplash!” Was an old racing sim that had crazy tracks. It had collision damage and in single player mode you could give your teammate commands.

It supported 8 players on a lan in multiplayer. All of this while running from DOS. Looking back it seemed a little ahead of its time. I’ve never encountered anyone in person that knew of this game.

During lockdown I played ECHO, which had been in my backlog for a few years after a stray recommendation I saw on MetaFilter. It was a surprisingly tight integration of beautiful and intriguing environmental/UI/sound design, gorgeous music, compelling yet minimalist storytelling (and voice acting), and a really strong gameplay loop of stealth, puzzle-solving, and the occasional panicky run-and-gun. Imagine my surprise when I read up on it after and learned it only sold a few thousand copies!

I strongly recommend playing it blind, but this trailer gives a good overview of the style and mechanics.

Hi-Fi Rush deserves way more recognition! Both story and gameplay are perfect. DMC meets DDR!

Just a great time all around once you get into the flow of things.