The Best Console Games of the 1990's

Gaming's come a long way in the past 20 years or so, the 1990's though were where the current video game revolution started and gaming started to be come a mainstream medium, it was no longer a hobby of spotty faced boys in the basement, it had become...acceptable to tell girls we played games, in fact some of them secretly played them too. Though it hadn't come to be the mega-industry it has become in the last few years where things like the Wii, GTA 3 (and the rest) and the Guitar Hero/Rock Band games have taken gaming to a whole new where it's actually almost cool to play games and everyone is joining in from Aunt Patty down the road on Wii Fit, to schools actually hold Guitar Hero tournaments. Video gaming today and the environment it's done is down to the movements of the 1990's. But really what were the best games of the decade?

Starting early on in the decade we saw platform games becoming one of the most popular genres often with a really bright colour display and a rather cartoon appeal to it all, this was probably the genre of the early 1990's and ranged from the excellent titles to the completely terrible ones. Games like Cool Spot showed how badly the genre could be done, though at it's best they were exceptional games keeping players attached to the screen for hours. The major franchises of Nintendo and Sega did battle with Mario and Sonic going head to head for much of the 1990's and the battle that had started with 2D games eventually turned into a 3D competition.

As far as 2D platform games the 3rd Mario game on the NES or the second Sonic game on the Sega Mega Drive (or Genesis as it was known in the US) were heard to beat. They seemed complete master pieces of 2D gaming as they mixed challenging with innovation and then added a large dollop of fun. The other stand out games in the genre was the innovative but devilishly difficult Kid Chameleon on the Mega Drive and the brilliant James Pond series with the 3rd game in that series being a relative masterpiece in depth and things to do and see.

Another gaming genre that had dominated the early days of the 1990's were side scrolling beat 'em ups, a genre that seems to have died in recent years sadly saw some of the best games of the early part of the decade. The idea's were simple you were one of a bunch of good guys (typically 3) and battled you're way through levels against aliens/monsters/thugs trying to save the world/a friend in linear levels that saw your character of choice using their hands and fists (and often a whole lot besides) to complete them. The best game of the genre was arguable Streets of Rage 2, though the whole Streets of Rage series as well as Golden Axe could well lay claim to being the most fun games out there at the time.

As gaming went through the 1990's and the release of much more powerful consoles game about gaming took to the third dimension as Mario 64 extended gaming into the 3rd dimension properly (Sonic 3D was more of an isoperimetrical view point game than a fully 3D game). In fact of the 3D platform games Mario 64 was by far the champion, other came close such as the Banjo-Kazooie games and the Donkey Kong game on the N64 though they couldn't quite replicate the magic of Mario.

The 3D era saw the rise to fame of Lara Croft in what would be the premier adventure series of the decade as the Tomb Raider series seemed to grow and grow though it's hard to pick which was best they graphically improved with each installment. These mixed shooting with platforming and puzzle solving, letting you take the reigns of a virtual Indiana Jones and are still finding success and even evolving now.

First Person Shoot 'ems (FPS) games also became huge, on the back of Wolfenstien and Doom on the PC Goldeneye would be the dominant force on the console market and often be regarded as the perfect PFS game, though it's illegitimate sister was a technically better game (Perfect Dark) you weren't Bond in it. The game was an early example of how good multiplayer games could be and helped gaming be accepted as an activity to do with friends.

A genre that spat in the face of multiplayer games however was the RPG which would often see people playing a single save file for well in excess of 60 hours as they leveled up their characters and explorer huge worlds in games like Final Fantasy 7. Massive time consumers which had become huge hits based on their graphics and relative freedom, the vast array of things to do and the fun with which could be had.
The success of Pokémon on the hand held consoles showed how amazing hand held gaming could be as well whilst the Pokémon franchise became a monster of it's own.

The stealth 'em 'up game play of the Metal Gear Franchise also found it's self in 3D with Metal Gear Solid a game that with Tomb Raider and FF7 helped define the PS for gaming masterpieces. Though arguably the biggest master piece was their monster driving sims in the Gran Tourismo series which for racing simulations were completely unchallenged they wiped the floor with realistic racing games. They showed the true graphical potential of the console (a lot higher than most ever assumed), the ability to hold so much information and the beauty crafted designs with in the games we're something to behold.

Though Nintendo weren't to be out done altogether on the racing side of things they seemed to go with a more fun and kid friendly approach to the genre with Mario Kart and Diddy Kong racing, as well as hover racing classic F Zero X that despite lacking realism showed how much fun racing could be with out caring abut whether your ride height was set incorrectly.

The horror games of the Resident Evil series also set the bad and re-innovated a style of gaming that had no longer scared us. The dark atmospheric feeling the jumpiness of it all was again a d adventure game just with a dark theme but again it was a classic.

Nintendo wasn't to be totally out gunned on the adventure game theme though as adventure-RPG Legend of Zelda games took sword fighting hero Link and placed him into a huge world of his own and allowed him to go collecting things, killing things and fighting. This was for some much more fun than the series numbers game of the Final Fantasy games, though to others it mixed sword fighting with RPG elements and some platforming style parts in one of the most complete games of the decade.