Part 4: Party Time
Mario Party, Mario Golf, Mario Tennis, WWF No Mercy, Super Smash Bros.
One of the best parts about the Nintendo 64 was the inclusion of 4 controller ports, allowing up to 4 friends compete in a variety of different local multiplayer games. Fortunately, there was no shortage of amazing 4-player games. Super Mario and friends had quite a few outings, including the virtual board-game Mario Party where players would compete for the most amount of stars through a series of addictive mini-games. There were also a couple sporty outings too, including Mario Tennis and Mario Golf – which is still one of the most enjoyable golf video games. The N64 was the birth place of the original Smash Bros. experience with Super Smash Bros, this was before every game character and their dog was invited to the battle. And finally, we included the last and most feature-rich WWF game released on the N64, No Mercy. Of course, licensing the classic WWF game would be damn-near impossible, especially since they’ve rebranded to WWE, but one can dream about reliving that glorious classic wrestling game.
Part 5: Hidden Gems
Excitebike 64, Ogre Battle 64, 1080 Snowboarding, Paper Mario, Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire
While naming some of the obvious N64 classics is easy, if Nintendo were to release a N64 Classic, we’d need to see a few of these gems included. Excitebike 64 was a remake of the beloved NES classic Excitebike, and while we’d much prefer Nintendo just make a brand new Excitebike for Switch, we’ll take a re-release of Excitebike 64 on a N64 Classic in the mean time. Ogre Battle 64 was a real-time tactical RPG with a huge cult following. 1080 Snowboarding is an absolute blast of a snowboard title. Paper Mario might not have been Mario’s first RPG adventure, but it was the one that started the popular Paper Mario franchise, which has since seen 5 sequels and a cross-over game. And finally there is Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire, a N64 launch game that featured a unique Star Wars story featuring both 3rd person shooting levels and flying levels set in the beloved Star Wars universe.
Part 6: The Sequels
Banjo-Tooie, Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask, Mario Party 2 & 3, and Turok 2: Seeds of Evil & Turok 3: Shadow of Oblivion
We’ve already mentioned all of these franchises earlier, but some of these sequels were as good, if not better, as the originals. Banjo-Tooie was a direct sequel to Banjo-Kazooie, and featured a number of improvements over the original. Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask gave Link his most bizarre adventure to date and introduced the world to Tingle. Mario Party 2 & 3 continued the madness with new boards, new mini-games, and more broken controllers. And finally, both Turok sequels better utilized the N64 hardware to look and play much better, with less fog, bigger weapons, and more gore!
Part 6: Bonus
Superman: The New Superman Adventures
Okay, so Superman: The New Superman Adventures is often regarded as the worst video game ever made, and with good reason. It’s awful. So, why would we want it included on the N64 Classic? Well, because everyone deserves a chance to say they’ve played one of the worst games ever made!
And that concludes our look at the top 30+ games we want to see included with the Nintendo 64 Classic. At this point, we have no idea if Nintendo has any intention of releasing a Nintendo 64 Classic or if they’ll include N64 games on Nintendo Switch Online. However, we’re confident Nintendo will find some way to celebrate the legacy of the Nintendo 64 at some point during the year. Did you ever own a Nintendo 64? What games would you want to see included on a Nintendo 64 Classic or on Nintendo Switch Online? Let us know in the comments.
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