Big Red's 10 favorite video games

Note: I think the final five or so on this list could be ranked in anyway possible and I'd be completely fine with that. The top five were pretty quick for me to come up with after that I struggled a little bit. I guess I've always had fun with the games I've played a lot with other people. I play PS2 now, which is fine, but basically I play alone. So I had a hard time putting those games on the list, because while I enjoy playing, I don't have the same memories attached to them as I do one's I played with others growing up.

10. NBA Jam – Nintendo
This was the first game I brought home that I really felt like I was standing in an arcade and playing. It had a ton of catchphrases and a ludicrous pace. Lots of dunking and lots of shooting from half court, but all-in-all it was fun. Plus it had tons of codes to get hidden characters and such. Always something to pop up to keep the interest.

9. Return of the King – PS2
I am not sure that I had really sat down and beat a game, as I did with Return of the King, since the first Mario that came with my first Nintendo. I’ve never been the kind of guy obsessed with beating games; usually I’d get interested in another game or something else about half way through and never really get going again. Return of the Kings made me want to get to the end. I wanted to see the graphics and take on some of the monsters of Middle-Earth. It wasn’t super hard and didn’t get too bogged down with storyline. It was straight to the point fighting.

8. Golden Eye – N64
This is probably the game on this list that I really sucked at. I could play through a lot of the levels alone fine, but put me against some of the wizards of Grant Tower C at NIU and I didn’t stand much of a chance. But nonetheless, it was a fun game where you could shoot at Russians (I think they were Russians) and how often do you get to do that anymore.

7. Madden Football 1994 or 2008 – Sega or PS2
I am cheating a bit here. Not too many people that like sports games could build a video game list without a Madden game one here. This two versions are the one’s I’ve played the most. For its time, the 94 game on Sega made you really think more about football strategy and study formations. By the time, I got around to the 2008 version that part of the game had been taken to a completely different level. They both deserve recognition on this list, but I didn’t want to take up two spots for the same brand of game.

6. Mario 3 - Nintendo
I just liked playing this one. I did want to beat this one, but I wanted to play every level also. I never did get to the end, basically because I didn’t use the cheats, but there was enough levels to keep me entertained for hours. I thought this strongest of the first three Mario adventures and the most in depth. I don’t know why I never bought this game, because I probably rented it a 100 times.

5. Breakout – Atari
We used to play this on the little TV in my kitchen when I was very young. We had the paddle which made breaking through pretty easy, but my siblings and I still spent a ton of time seeing who could go the farthest. Now I spend a lot of late Friday nights early Saturday mornings after work playing the adapted version on one of little battery operated systems that carry a handful of games. It’s a lot harder with joystick, but theirs is something relaxing about trying not out that screen of brightly colored brick, one brick at a time.

4. World Series Baseball ’95 – Sega
This still is the best baseball game that I have played. It didn’t take a super long time to work through 9 innings, unless you were on like easy mode and hit a home run on every at bat. It was good to play against the computer and great to play against a real person. Snake and I spent a lot of hours trying to get our teams through full seasons and seeing who could put up the best stats. My guess if we could find a similar game for a new system and both became independently wealthy, we’d give it another go through a 162 game season. We’re baseball freaks, what can I say.

3. Techmo Super Bowl – Nintendo
People always remember that you could throw the length of the field on this game and how unrealistic that was, but never give this game the credit it’s due. This was the first game really to inject NFL names and stats into it. You could play as your favorite teams and players and work through and entire NFL season. I loved this game. I wanted to take the Bears to the Super Bowl. I wanted to put up huge stats. I spent whole days going through season whether someone was there with me or not. I wish they still made games like this. I still be playing it.

2. NWO Revenge – N64
I read somewhere once that computers might teach kids to learn how to think, but mostly they teach kids how to think like computers. This is applies here, because while subsequent wrestling games that built off this games wrestling style never got the play time from me that this one did. Basically here Snake and I were able to create our on wrestling federation with storylines, pay per views and title scene. All it took was our own ingenuity within the game. Later versions (all WWE games) still had the same easy game play stuff, but the advanced season modes and career modes made our own ingenuity rather pointless. It was easier just to do what the game wanted us too and thus eliminated our need to think for ourselves.

1. Mario Kart – N64
I lived off this game through college like I did dorm food and alcohol. This was a daily thing among a group of us for four years. Not bad for a game with only 16 courses to keep our attention. Again, this game just let you play and it was best played with three others for bragging rights. We even had our own trophy made, a empty handle of Captain Morgan, for the times we’d play a cup or two to determine the room champion. The best part you could play and it’d only take 20 to 30 minutes and then you could be on your way. Which was good because I had a lot of food to eat and booze to drink during those days.

Honorable mention: Duck Hunt - Nintendo, Techmo Basketball - Nintendo, Excite Bike - Nintendo, NHL Hockey 96 - Sega, NFL Blitz - N64, Raw vs. Smackdown 2006 - PS2, March Madness 06 - PS2, X-Men Legends - PS2, No Mercy - N64