I NOMINATED SKATE OR DIE 2 BECAUSE OF RAMP MODE i am so good at it. so so good. i make the lady so impressed and i pull secret powerups from off screen. i will play it for everyone at the next meetup and do a showcase of gnarly bails. GOD what a good game
2 Likes
The one that starts with a man fighting a dragon at the top of a volcano.
5 Likes
oh wait is three the one with the fortune telling at the beginning on the gameboy cart? changing my vote
3 Likes
How do I fight kefka and talk to ultros on ffxiv tell me how
ultros is in the hildebrand quest after arr and kefka is part of the omega raid after stormblood
Guess I better get back to leveling. 15 levels of delivery quests around the world while casting stone and only stone started to get old
1 Like
I didn’t see Silent Bomber on any of these lists
4 Likes
This might low key be the meanest thing anyone has said about any game during this whole vote.
4 Likes
I’m also surprised how many criminals voted for Gunstar Heroes over Yume Nikki, and their crimes will not be forgotten
2 Likes
Decided to change my vote to animal crossing.
2 Likes
I’m changing my vote to Yume Nikki because I remembered that you can walk around with poop hair.
4 Likes
video games died with sega, yume nikki is a scrambled picture book. if your game doesn’t have at least two shoot buttons I don’t want nothing with it
3 Likes
same problem, started up both of these games multiple times. these games are dressed up in so much that draws me in, but then I remember “oh right, they play like bullshit with arcane rulesets that requires studying and making a thesis of the manual”.
yet, I’m currently being suckered (again) into giving fft another go, and it’s at least considerably less inexplicably arcane in it’s systems than vs
1 Like
Gonna quickly give some thoughts on my picks since I didn’t last time:
FINAL FANTASY VI
vs.
REZ
I’m sure Rez is great and all, but FFVI is like a Top 5 GOAT for me.
The World of Ruin twist seemed perfectly formulated to appeal to teenage me, and the themes of the main characters weaving into each other in the ending was icing on the cake.
THE LEGEND OF ZELDA: LINK’S AWAKENING
vs.
MIRROR’S EDGE
Link’s Awakening was one of those games I played obsessively over and over for years. I played it enough times that I had to concoct weird alternative narratives in my head like Link being a shifty dude doing drug deals with witches to keep my interest going.
Mirror’s Edge I played through once and forgot about it.
SUPER MARIO 3D LAND
vs.
SKY ODYSSEY
I don’t really know anything about Sky Odyssey, but Mario 3D Land was pretty cool so I’m going with that.
OUTRUN
vs.
FINAL FANTASY TACTICS
I haven’t played FFT, but I played FFTA and it was pretty good although I never finished it. I have a bit of a weird relationship with Tactics / Strategy RPGs where I really want to love them thanks to Shining Force, but in practice I usually end up paralyzed by too many hard decisions and micromanagement.
OutRun on the other hand is all chill vibes, and as a kid I was always thinking about what could possibly be beyond that horizon that we needed to drive to. I think it inspired my childhood backyard game I played with my brother and friend where we imagined the swings were futuristic swing powered cars and we were endlessly racing towards some vague and indistinct goal perpetually over the horizon.
BABA IS YOU
vs.
BUBBLE BOBBLE
My main memory of Bubble Bobble as a kid is owning it on a floppy disc for years before we owned a computer, and when we finally got one I tried it out and it ran incredibly slowly, the music coming out in long droning beeps until I got scared and restarted the computer to find the hard drive was now corrupted. My dad was furious and said it might cost thousands of dollars to fix
Baba is You never corrupted my computer, but it did warp my brain, but in a good way so it gets my vote.
WCW/NWO REVENGE (AKI N64 wrestling representative)
vs.
UMIHARA KAWASE
I never liked wrestling but I remember having a decent amount of fun with the N64 games with my wrestling obsessed friends. I think it maybe almost got me interested in the actual thing? But then I tried watching it and it was stupid. Almost fooled me but not quite, but it still gets my vote.
YUME NIKKI (2004)
vs.
GUNSTAR HEROES
I don’t know much about Yume Nikki, although it seems intriguing. I voted Gunstar though, because even if Dynamite Headdy didn’t make the cut, GH is a pretty solid runner up for Mega Drive Treasures.
DOTA 2
vs.
ELEVATOR ACTION RETURNS
We played Elevator Action Returns at the Aussie SB meetup a few years ago and it was Jadd the Taff all the way. I couldn’t care less about DOTA.
SUPER MARIO BROS.
vs.
ANIMAL CROSSING
I have a few fond memories of Super Mario Bros, but Animal Crossing has a singing dog and lets me put pictures of poop everywhere. I know its all fake but I still feel kind of sad when one of the villagers moves out. Much regret in Wild World when I failed to stop Bill the duck from leaving, and never saw him again.
DRAGON QUEST III
vs.
THE LEGEND OF ZELDA
I haven’t played DQIII but Zelda 1 never really gelled with me and I already voted for one Zelda this round. DQIII is pretty high up on my must play list.
9 Likes
Good thing it has more than two buttons 
2 Likes
this was really tough lol
FINAL FANTASY VI vs REZ
FFVI is a good final fantasy! it’s up there. one of the better ones. i like mog. i think the world of balance half is a more fun game than the world of ruin half, i like FF best when it leans into the driving setpiece-based narrative. WoR is an awesome narrative trick but i felt the loss of momentum hard. zozo is cool, i like when rpg towns are dangerous. i don’t know what else to say that hasn’t been said a million times! aieee!
REZ is cool. it’s a playable sensory experience more than a game. what i’m saying is: it’s fun to play when you’re high. but like, REALLY fun. i appreciate something that’s confidently an aesthetic toy. [joke about vibrator] but seriously i also like that there is a deliberate physical sensation to playing this game, it’s probably the best use of rumble i can think of (not that that’s saying much, what is rumble used for other than “explosion” or “earthquake during a cutscene”)
WINNER: REZ
THE LEGEND OF ZELDA: LINK’S AWAKENING vs MIRROR’S EDGE
LINK’S AWAKENING DX was my first zelda game. i played it on a game boy color kiosk in a walmart. a few weeks later on my 10th birthday i got a copy together with my GBC. i still have both even though the game boy doesn’t work any more. we lived by a river and had a little beach we’d cleared out with a picnic table, and i’d sit at there and play my game boy under the beach umbrella with the music cranked all the way up. when i finished i would pick up my wooden sword and jump across the rocks on the river and run through the woods and chop bushes and be link.
my favorite thing about MIRROR’S EDGE besides the movement is the way it looks. the way they use the color within the sleek future environs to guide you is very smart integration of the aesthetic with the play, and it has some wonderful blue skies. more bright and shiny dystopias please. oh and the movement is incredible, sometimes, when you’re on a roll, and not trying to shoot anyone.
THIS GAME’S WINNER IS: LINK!
SUPER MARIO 3D LAND vs SKY ODYSSEY
i love the toyset-like nature of SM3DLAND (and WORLD). it’s a smart way to translate 2D mario into 3D, it turns it into literally the best isometric platformer i’ve ever played lol. really joyous design, they hearken back to the visual style from SMB3 and it shows in the piece-of-candy design. every level is another lil peanut M&M. M&L? it’s a good game.
i’m trying to challenge myself to honestly rate games in this tournament even if i haven’t played them. like i’d pick a game that produced interesting conversation and had a really singular style over a game i’ve actually played that didn’t seem as special. so this game is really tough for me because it’s an sb favorite i haven’t played, and everyone’s love for it is really endearing and tbh i might even grab a copy because it looks like they’re pretty cheap online? it looks like a cute flight sim. but with no specific attachment to flight sims or experience with the game it’s hard for me to pick SKY ODYSSEY over SM3DLAND, even though i have a feeling i’ll secondguess the choice someday…
WINNER: SUPER MARIO 3D LAND
OUTRUN vs FINAL FANTASY TACTICS
OUTRUN is the game where when you crash your driver and his girlfriend fly out of the car right? hahaha. i love that. yeah outrun is cool as hell, huge SEGA blue skies energy. i think ive only played it like once but i dig it.
ive also barely played FINAL FANTASY TACTICS, though it has the distinction of being a game i’ve read a full LP of and a game i absolutely intend to play through someday. I really, really love the aesthetic – akihiko yoshida is my favorite final fantasy artist, his art looks tailored to being translated into sprite graphics/low-poly textures and it does come through well, characters that manage to look cute and sort of elegantly cool at the same time.
WINNER: FFT
BABA IS YOU vs BUBBLE BOBBLE
BABA IS YOU has a really great hook and look but i haven’t touched it, and im afraid have nothing insightful to say about it.
BUBBLE BOBBLE has a really great hook and look and i have touched it. and it has touched me. bub and bob are sooo cute. i have played much more puzzle bobble tbh so thats where most of my bub and bob affection comes from
WINNER: BUBBLE BOBBLE
WCW/NWO REVENGE vs UMIHARA KAWASE
pro wrestling is a really good example of a pop cultural thing i feel like i get, and can appreciate, and have zero personal attachment to whatsoever. a pro wrestling N64 game like WCW/NWO REVENGE is an even better example
i suck at UMIHARA KAWASE but i really like it. i’m fond of the simple, budget game appearance and the stretch’n’snap of the fishing line is one of the more immediately satisfying game mechanics i can think of. a game ive only played a little of but got a very good impression of.
WINNER: UMIHARA KAWASE
YUME NIKKI vs GUNSTAR HEROES
my favorite horror game despite not really scaring me much anymore. YUME NIKKI for how eerie and unsettling it is somehow manages to be calming at the same time. wandering through the mostly empty dreamworlds is a meditative experience. it is a game that doesnt cry out to be “beaten,” and reveals its most stomach-dropping horror if you do. it’s also my favorite rpgmaker game, and i have a lot of affection for that software
GUNSTAR HEROES is like treasure’s kickass first single, where i might like some of their later songs better and appreciate their more developed sound more, but all the ingredients were there from the start and i can love how raw and confident it is. everyone loves this game already so i felt a hacky simile was appropriate
WINNER:
DISCO ELYSIUM vs SILENT HILL 2
i havent played either of these games. theyre on the list of “games i will love someday” because every single thing about them is My Shit but i gotta abstain
SILENT HILL vs KLONOA DOOR TO PHANTOMILE
ive only played the opening sequence of SILENT HILL but god is it a good opening sequence. also a game to play more of someday. low-poly 3D is a good fit for horror, a real easy way to express “what the hell is that thing” because so often it’s genuinely hard to tell
KLONOA is so freakin cute hes like a cross between miles “tails” prower and felix the cat and the cabbit from tenchi muyo. i played through this whole game in one sitting and it was a real delight. that ending everyone talks about is so cheap and i should hate it but man, it’s too cute. i also played it after the 2nd game so i already knew klonoa goes on to make other magical friends. (i <3 the sequel, it is one of my favorite ps2 games and-- fuck why didn’t i nominate it!!)
WINNER: KLONOA. like not the game, the character. HE’S SO CUTE!! the original version is better than the sequel version, i think the yellow cat eyes are more unique
DOTA 2 vs ELEVATOR ACTION RETURNS
i havent played DOTA 2. looking at screens/videos makes me feel some kind of revulsion. i hate it when game UI is a big screen-filling mass of chat text and character portraits and health/mana bars and item/spell slots, it’s ugly and stressful. i know a few folks here like it and it’s massively popular so i trust there’s something there, but it’s never been a game that attracted me. (btw is this game called Defense of the Ancients 2 or did they seriously just name the sequel after the first game’s acronym.)
ELEVATOR ACTION RETURNS is a fucking cool and fun game. i love the cutaway staging of the levels, it’s one of those game concepts that marries itself perfectly to a distinct look and feel. falls into the zone of “arcade games i dig but have no deeper attachment to” i just think it’s neat
WINNER: ELEVATOR ACTION RETURNS
SUPER MARIO BROS. vs ANIMAL CROSSING
i never took my parents seriously when they criticized how much i love and play videogames. it’s their own damn fault for putting a NES controller in my hands when i was 6 and showing me how to play SUPER MARIO BROS., which ive done many many many times in the 24 years since. all of the 2D mario games mean a lot to me and i think they all have something unique in their favor; the original more than any other except 2j is a game about propulsive forward movement married with precision. it’s a game i could practically run through with my eyes closed.
i bought ANIMAL CROSSING in high school for me and my brother’s shared gamecube, figuring that the cutesy style and slow-paced, gentle, collection-oriented gameplay would be more my speed than his – he’s always been more of a milsim FPS guy. i never upgraded my house past the 1st stage but my bro picked up the game after watching me play and ended up with a huge mansion across the way from my dinky little hovel, loaded with treasures and collected bugs and statues and trinkets. i don’t exactly know why it clicked with him and never did with me. AC in general is a series ive appreciated from afar, i understand the appeal and it’s brought people i care for a lot of joy. i think the “everyone plays animal crossing together in covid” phenomenon is about as sweet a shared gaming experience as any i can think of. and it looks real cute. Isabelle is adorable. maybe if she was in this one i would have given it more of my time
WINNER: THE BROS. SUPER MARIO
OUENDAN/ELITE BEAT AGENTS vs EDF! EDF! EDF!
i’m abstaining from these for the opposite reasons as disco elysium/silent hill 2. i probably won’t play these games and they don’t really appeal to me except on a very surface level. i like the Elite Beat Agents themselves and ive def watched EDF footage and chuckled at EDF! EDF! EDF! but otherwise…
DRAGON QUEST III vs THE LEGEND OF ZELDA
the dragon quest series often gets referenced for its conservatism, which bums me out a little bit because i think people miss the small details that evolve game after game. DRAGON QUEST III sits in a place i really like, developing the open-ended world map exploring from the first 2 but starting to work in the episodic, short vignette based storytelling that becomes the series wheelhouse. Of all the aging grindy jrpgs it’s the one i’ve replayed the most (though tbf it is always via one of the remake versions). the class designs are great, especially the female characters, especially the witch. and the twist endgame is still remarkable!
THE LEGEND OF ZELDA is a game i think i respect more than i enjoy now. it takes a pretty rudimentary look and simple design and, well, makes the first entry in a beloved and millions-selling game series, lol. i think the simplicity is what makes it stay appealing, it distills the “adventurer sim” elements of crpgs into something immediately understandable and lovable. that gold cart was a prize that i never got my hands on – i ended up being a startropics kid instead.
WINNER: DQ3
11 Likes
FF6 was the best game of all time when i was 13. i now find it to be the worst of the “good” ff games. it’s underwritten, relying nearly entirely on the player to fill in the gaps and add the emotional heft necessary to care. on the other hand, its cutscenes are absolute masterpieces of execution, from the huge opera scene to even the smallest conversations, possibly the pinnacle of sprite blocking as a storytelling device.
rez was boring even when i was 13
LA, easy peasy. i don’t think this needs a hard sell–its overworld is pleasurably labyrinthine, its dungeons are “good” at worst, it’s one of the only zelda games to feel like an actual place, and the graphics and music are perfect. It’s got a warm heart and a hard edge.
3d land is the best 3d mario has ever been or ever will be, probably. it makes me feel a lot of things. on the other hand, i hadn’t heard of sky fantasy until this poll started, but I streamed it blind for 4 hours over the weekend and yeah, I’m voting Sky Odyssey. thanks yall
Out Run. i don’t want to get into the failings of FFT here, but i don’t have to because it would lose to Out Run anyway. For one thing, Out Run has the best soundtrack of all time.
Bubble Bobble. BIY’s endless expansion is intoxicating, but BB succeeds by exhausting its design to a degree that has possibly never been done again. It goes harder and deeper than you can possibly expect, while never crossing the line into outright bullshit.
I don’t even know enough about these games to form a sassy offhand opinion, so i abstain.
Not a fan of GH, YN sounds probably good 
haven’t played. they both seem great. abstain.
I haven’t played Silent Hill but fuck Klonoa. boring ass game
i’m not voting for dota, tho i DO feel weird voting for both elevator action returns AND bubble bobble.
This sucks! Super Mario Bros. In addition to whatever everyone else has said for the last 35 years, what always strikes me about SMB is its formal patterns. I love how the first half of the game foreshadows the back half with easymode versions of the same levels. I love how the first, third, and fourth levels of each world are always Ground, Sky, Fortress, and the second is usually something special (underground, swimming)… except when it’s not. I love how the game is cleanly divided into halves, with a difficulty spiike AND formal variance starting with 5-1 (5-1 is the first bullet bill stage, for example, and 5-2 is the first multi-type stage). And then world 8 is just 4 Ground levels in a row. The increasingly broken staircases, the slow introduction of bullet bills, the underwater fire bars of the final fortress–it’s a helluva thing. Sorry Animal Crossing :c
im real bad at playing the games this time around
This hurts, but DQ3. I don’t have the emotional energy to say more.
12 Likes
It’s the Dolph Ziggler of big budget console games.
Late again, but oh my god
2 Likes
just a reminder that there’s a whole loser’s bracket thing so games that lose in a single matchup aren’t entirely out
3 Likes
I initially abstained on the Rez x FF6 matchup (I like Rez but I haven’t played any FF6!) but now I had to vote Rez so it’s a true 50%-50%. any vote can now tip the scales
4 Likes