Curated playlist
Nintendo games
- Street Fighter Alpha 2Street Fighter Alpha 2 was Japan's top arcade game of 1996. It arrived less than a year after the first Alpha.
- Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire (video game)The Star Wars game Shadows of the Empire starred a hero most fans had never heard of.
- Tomodachi Life: Living the DreamTomodachi Life: Living the Dream, a 2026 social simulation game for the Nintendo Switch, made its first impression through a single trailer. When Nintendo's Japanese account posted that trailer to X, it became one of the company's most…
- The Last StoryThe Last Story began as science fiction until Nintendo rejected the story outright.
- GoldenEye 007GoldenEye 007 started life as a side-scrolling platform game for the Super Nintendo. It finished as a first-person shooter for the Nintendo 64, released in 1997 and built by the British studio Rare. Nintendo published it. The game adapted…
- Final Fantasy IIFinal Fantasy II replaced experience points with stats that grow by use. Its designer felt it went too far.
- Street Fighter IIStreet Fighter II's combos began as a bug that the team chose to keep. It appeared in the car-smashing bonus stage.
- Final Fantasy (video game)Final Fantasy got its name because its creator planned to quit if it failed. Square was also facing bankruptcy in 1987.
- Final Fantasy IVFinal Fantasy IV began with a Formula One race. Hiroyuki Ito saw cars pass at different speeds and got an idea.
- Final Fantasy VIFinal Fantasy VI lets its hero fail to save the world. The story's second half is called the World of Ruin.
- Tomodachi LifeTomodachi Life, a 2013 Nintendo 3DS game, asks its player to do almost nothing except watch. Tiny customizable avatars called Miis live together on an island. They make friends, quarrel, fall in love and ask for small favors, while the…
- Space InvadersSpace Invaders sped up as aliens vanished by accident, and its designer kept the quirk.
- Bravely DefaultThe team behind Bravely Default never expected the 3DS game to leave Japan. It sold a million copies by July 2014.
- Dragon Quest VIIDragon Quest VII: Fragments of the Forgotten Past sold 3.57 million copies in Japan within 17 days of going on sale in 2000. Enix published it for the original PlayStation, as one more entry in a role-playing series that Yuji Horii has…