Hello again! Last week I embarked on a challenge to only play games from a set era for a week, and thanks to all your suggestions I had a blast going through some highlights from '85-'89. If you’re curious about what all I got to you can check out this list of each game and any thoughts I had on them!
I’m now moving on to '90-'94, once again looking for recs! There’s no criteria other than it being something you think is worth checking out. Nothing is too obvious or obscure, and I’m hoping to try an even wider variety of experiences than before. Looking forward to seeing what games you enjoy from this period!
Gonna get ahead of the herd and just say any game released in this era will be a banger. Best 4 years in the history of the medium easily. Close your eyes and dunk your hand in you’ll catch something hot
Checked my list of played games on Backloggd and picked out some, in alphabetical order:
Castlevania III
Clockwork Knight
Cosmo Gang games
Earthbound
Ecco: The Tides of Time (play the first Ecco too, but don’t ditch the sequel)
Final Fantasy VI
Gargoyle’s Quest (with sequels)
Geograph Seal
Gunstar Heroes (every Treasure game, actually, just all of them. Alien Soldier, Dynamite Headdy, Light Crusader, even the Mcdonald’s one)
Landstalker
Mega Man III
Monster World IV (plus Monster World III, why not)
Motor Toon Grand Prix
Outrunners (arcade version)
Pulseman
Puzzle Bobble
Puyo Puyo (plus Puyo Puyo 2)
Quackshot
Ridge Racer
Rocket Knight Adventures
Secret of Monkey Island
Shining in the Darkness
Sonic the Hedgehog (with sequels, especially Sonic CD)
Startropics
The Story of Thor
Tama: Adventurous Ball in Giddy Labyrinth
Virtua Cop
Virtua Fighter
Virtua Racing
Wario’s Woods
OK, so while there are a number of platforms I could pull from for this era, I’m going to limit myself to platforms I’ve actually played things on: SNES, Genesis, TurboGrafx-16, Neo Geo, Game Boy, and Game Gear. Oh, and any relevant CD add-ons. (For my own sake, I’m not including late releases from earlier generations.) I could include home computers, but especially from this era, I don’t know what I could include that wouldn’t be too obvious. I’ll also try to avoid duplicates with other people’s answers. Anyway, on with the show:
Amiga
'Allo 'Allo! Cartoon Fun! I know I’m breaking my own ruleset immediately, but this game was at the top of the MobyGame browser for games between 1990 and 1994, and it was too stereotypically British for me to pass up.
TurboGrafx 16
Gomola Speed. I’d say I’ll stop recommending it once people actually start playing it, but I know I’d keep recommending it regardless.
Wonder Momo, in case you ever wanted to see how video games and theater intersect.
Hani on the Road, for some humorous arcade action.
Somer Assault, for similar reasons to Gomola Speed. A little known TurboGrafx-16 game with interesting ideas about movement and embodiment.
SNES
American Battle Dome. I remember this being mildly interesting.
Famicom Bunko: Hajim- *learns the game was released in 1999, well beyond the cut-off point* Damn it.
Ihatovo Monogatari. OK, I know this game was released in 1993, and its focus on the Miyazawa-esque Japanese countryside anticipates genres that wouldn’t start to take off until the early 21st century.
SOS. Again, we have an SNES game willing to play around with genre, video game or otherwise. This time, though, it’s a cinematic adventure game in which you have to escape a sinking ship. It got a PS1 sequel that nobody likes.
Operation Logic Bomb. Ever wondered what the original Half-Life would look like as an SNES game? Well, this is probably as close as you’re gonna get.
Rocko’s Modern Life: Spunky’s Dangerous Day. This one’s just to fuck with you.
Paladin’s Quest. This one is also to fuck with you. Have fun in Fart Dungeon.
Trampoline Terror. Another game I remember being interesting for just how abstract its imagery was, and how mechanically focused it is in ways that other games tend not to be.
Chiki Chiki Boys. I remember absolutely nothing about this game, but am including it to provide a varied diet.
Granada. Consider this your softball recommendation. I’ll consider it as the hidden gem everybody recommends, and for good reason.
Chakan: The Forever Man. It is an experience. I’ll leave it at that.
McDonald’s Treasure Land Adventure. This is about as accessible as Treasure games are gonna get.
Sorcerer’s Kingdom. Not a standout game by any means, but the snappy, tactically-oriented battle system catches a little attention.
Marvel Land, just to round out this list with another servicable and easy to approach game.
Socket. Imagine if you chucked Sonic into the timestream. Now stop imagining Sonic CD, because this game plays and feels a lot looser and hectic than that.
Battle Golfer Yui. I need another humorous game on the list, and this is the most straightforward way to accomplish that goal.
Sega CD
Shin Megami Tensei. I could recommend any number of other ports of this game, but the Sega CD port has always stood out in my mind for the various idiosyncrasies that never made their way into those other ports. Ever wanted voice acted cutscenes? Because this version has it.
Panic! Scratch that. THIS is the most straightforward way to include a humorous game on the list. It is nothing but audiovisual games - such was the mood back in the day.
Silpheed. Audiovisual spectacle never felt so good.
Vay. No real reason.
Neo Geo
NAM-1975, to give you an idea of how popular media at the time responded to America losing the Vietnam War. Shittily; it responded shittily.
Crossed Swords. Another pretty theatrical game; this time with more pronounced mechanical tension.
Game Gear
GG Aleste, solely because it’s Aleste.
Sonic Triple Trouble. Does this count as a duplicate with @Kiki 's list? Whatever, I’m including it. People say this is the height of Game Gear Sonics, and not having played any of them since the 2000s, I’m inclined to believe them.
Game Boy
Noobow. Japanese food mascot goes on soft adventures, looks cute doing it.
Trip World, solely because this is a video game forum and people would yell at me if I didn’t include it.
Last time I tried to play into the time constraint you were setting for yourself. This time I’m going to try to be selective in an era that is like 85% bangers. I will recommend three games, in no particular order:
As I was looking through games, a theme emerged which is “games that aren’t good, but I like them”
Air Diver (Genesis). A G-LOC style plane game where you also fight big alien spaceships. Difficult.
Captain America and The Avengers (Genesis). This game isn’t good.
B.O.B. (SNES). Looks like a British game, but isn’t!
(looking forward for the 2025 poll, assuming we stick to a 2-year cadence)
My recommendations for this block of years would be (alphabetical by year):
1990
Rise of the Dragon
The Secret of Monkey Island
Star Control II
Ultima VI: The False Prophet
1991
Gods
Lemmings
Monkey Island 2: LeChuck’s Revenge
Sid Meier’s Civilization
1992
Alone in the Dark
Dune II: The Building of a Dynasty
Flashback
Pinball Fantasies
Ultima VII: The Black Gate
1993
Day of the Tentacle
Doom
Syndicate
Ultima Underworld II: Labyrinth of Worlds
1994
Doom II
Master of Magic
System Shock
There’s probably many others, but that is all that comes to mind for now. I wager my suggestions will have little overlap with most of IC, given that I did not have any (current) consoles during these years so did all my gaming on DOS or a friend’s Amiga.
These are all recommendations for things that came out during that time that I also played during that time.
Just gonna list some of my favorite games from that era that are unimpeachable bangers even though they’re all extremely well known.
Final Fantasy V
Final Fantasy VI
Super Mario World
Sonic the Hedgehog 3
Metroid II: Samus Returns
Castlevania: Rondo of Blood
Super Bomberman 2
Zelda: A Link to the Past
Mega Man X
Best racing game on the SNES, great soundtrack as well:
Legend of the mystical ninja
F zero
Dragon Quest V
FF IV
Nobunaga’s Ambition: Lord of Darkness
Demons Crest
Rock n Roll Racing
Act Raiser
Uncharted Waters: New Horizons
Torneko’s Great Adventure
46 Okunen
Alien vs Predator (CPS2)
Battle Mania Daiginjou
Commander Blood
Cosmology of Kyoto
Donkey Kong ’94
Gabriel Knight
Gimmick!
Magical Puzzle Popils
Metal Storm
OutZone
Point Blank
RayForce
Rocket Knight Adv.
Romancing Saga 2
Star Control II
Tempest 2000
The Firemen
Ultima Underworld
Uncharted Waters 2
XCOM
