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21. Zombies Ate My Neighbors
Dead Island, Dead Rising, Left 4 Dead nowadays zombie-popping thrill-rides are a dime a dozen, but in the 1990's, chainsaw-toting champions of the living had to actively seek out the walking dead. Into this lamentable death-dearth came the rock-solid partnership of LucasArts and Konami with this ode to horror cinema.
The games brightly colored nightscapes run the gamut of sci-fi/horror scenarios, lovingly rendered in a cartoonish style that nevertheless earned the game a bout with censors on its European release. Which, when you're dealing with the horror genre, really just means your game is on the right track. The game also recognises the blobs need freezing with fire extinguishers. Authenticity like that is what makes Zombies a massive success.
20. Dr Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine
Until Bust-a-Move shot a bubble full of novelty into arcades, Compile's Puyo Puyo series was arguably puzzle gaming's biggest shake-up since the release of the original Tetris. But this original property wouldn't make it to the west until Sega tagged it with a Sonic license and added elements from the then-current Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog cartoon.
But these are merely cosmetic changes: Once you're past the menu screen, this is Puyo Puyo all the way down, with all the fiendish combos and nonstop multiplayer matchups that entails. Single-player mode sees a succession of the Sonic cartoons Badniks line up to school you in correct bean-handling procedure - and school you they will. Until you work out the secret to mega-combo stacking, at which point you can smother their game screen in a metric tonne of transparent beans. Hehehe.
19. Earthworm Jim
So, there's this worm who finds a space suit, which allows him to stand up and shoot enemies with a gun. He decides to use it to save a princess and... well, it really doesn't matter. It's just an excuse to have a jolly side-scrolling adventure where stuff gets blasted and gaps get jumped.
Earthworm Jim's supporting cast were just as weird as its main character. Names like Evil the Cat, Professor Monkey-for-a-Head, Psy-Crow, Bob the Killer Goldfish, Major Mucus, and Queen Slug-for-a-Butt ensured that no character could be forgotten. But it's the game's free-form shooting and platforming that ensure the game remains fresh and relevant, perfecting the formula prototyped by the likes of Cool Spot. 16-bit platformers don't come much better than this.
18. Aladdin
Well, they do come slightly better. Aladdin was a revolution on its release. Sure, even back in the Genesis days, licensed games were a mixed bunch, but Aladdin bucked the trend to create a platformer of astonishing quality - and one that remains exclusive to the Sega machine. It even had clever gameplay references to lines in the movie: You could hop on the backs of camels and watch them spit!
Not only was Sega's Aladdin a fast-paced romp, the graphics and sounds captured the look and music of the movie in exquisite fashion, unlike the comparatively poor SNES game of the same name. Sadly it was too early in gaming's life to have Robin Williams record a voice track, but everything else was spot-on. And the game world is so detailed, a guard's knife can split one of Aladdin's apples in half in mid-air. Just too good.
17. F1
With its speedy Motorola 68000 CPU featuring in periodic advertising pushes, the Genesis was fast and it wanted you to know it. Sega put its money where its blast-processed mouth was with a healthy roster of racing titles on the machine, including several F1 sims for hardcore speed freaks.
Domark's Formula One was not only a prime exemplar of the high-speed gameplay demanded by 1993 motorheads; it also pushed the Genesis hardware to its limits, offering rotation effects and 3D scenery elements that should, by rights, need additional hardware to run. Especially at this speed. There's even a two-player mode, as well as a stripped-back turbo mode for true speed freaks. The latter remains one of the fastest gaming experiences in all of gaming. With all the official tracks and most of the real drivers' names, this is an authentic recreation of the sport from its golden era.
16. Jungle Strike
Desert Strike had courted headlines with open reference to the first Gulf War, and the sequel upped the ante by making the enemies agents both of nuclear-equipped rogue states and the US South American adversaries in the War on Drugs. Just Saying No wasn't an option here, but EA gave you plenty to say yes to instead: a greater range of weaponry, the ability to switch between a variety of vehicles, and a daunting roster of enemy craft with which to engage.
The games large levels, nonlinear mission structure, and resource-conserving strategy elements were all augmented and improved, giving Jungle Strike a clear edge over its predecessor. With the gameplay now finely-tuned and animated cut-scenes adding cinematic drama to the mix, the result stands tall, above even the Strike games on superior hardware.
15. NHL 94
EA's officially licensed NHL game is considered one of the greatest sports games of all time. Indeed, it still has a following to this day! With multiple game modes, including exhibition, Stanley Cup, and a shootout minigame, it's got all the bases covered, even now. Oh, and it showed up in some Kevin Smith movies, too.
NHL '94 introduced several features that elevate it above its already-excellent predecessor. It was a more realistic take on hockey; you could now shoot directly off a pass (dubbed a 'one-timer'), which still feels amazing when it flies into the top corner of the net. With improved sound, team-specific organ songs and wince-inducingly heavy collisions between the players, this is a superb package and arguably the last iteration of the pure, 'EA Hockey' gameplay before the series became needlessly complex.
14. John Madden Football
The term 'game-changer' gets thrown around an awful lot nowadays, but changing the game is exactly what Electronic Arts achieved with its John Madden Football series, which began on home computers in 1988 but truly began to take recognizable form with the 1990 leap to consoles.
The game made two massive leaps forward in the American Football game genre, namely introducing a pseudo-3D perspective (which made it look more realistic than any other sports game available), and its split-screen displays that allowed you to see individual receivers as you decided who should receive your pass. The result was a game that made such an impact on the gaming public's consciousness, the brand became the football game for the next 20+ years. This original 16-bit version remains brilliantly playable as a game in its own right regardless of its age.
13. Road Rash 2
The original Road Rash has a fond place in Sega fans' hearts, but it's Road Rash 2 that's undeniably the pinnacle of the series. The combination of hand-drawn pixel art and skull-crushing violence somehow manages to make the game charming instead of alarming. And this art style has aged much better than the supposedly more realistic digitised characters of Road Rash 3.
There are additions to the formula, such as a chain to swing at your rivals (alongside the return of the big black club of the original), nitrous boosts for the faster bikes and a split-screen two-player mode that really pushed the hardware to its limit. But the best enhancement is the added fallibility of the police. Unlike the original's invincible fuzz, you can knock O'Learly and his cronies off their bikes and zoom away for the win unchallenged. Magnificent.
12. Virtua Racing
Sega's answer to Nintendo's Super FX Chip was the SVP, or 'Sega Virtua Processor. It was only ever used for one game because it cost so much to manufacture. But what a game it is! Virtua Racing's Genesis port somehow managed to replicate the groundbreaking arcade game's three courses, music and full 3D graphics. Wow.
Like so many of AM#2's arcade games, it stands up as a great game despite the now painfully restrictive colour palette, polygon count and frame rate. Somehow it's still an absolute blast to play. It's fast, controls as well as the digital input will allow and offers substantial replay value in terms of time attack fun. There's even a 2-player split screen mode, which is clearly stretching the hardware's abilities to breaking point. But do it, it does. It deserves to be played, but just don't do it on a big screen. Your eyes will hate you.
