Nintendo has been around for well over a century and has been an active part of the video game industry since the 1970s. The company’s impact on the realm of interactive entertainment is almost unprecedented, and its consoles and handhelds have played host to some of the most iconic titles of all time.
Nintendo Life has teamed up with our friends over at IGN to create a list of the best 100 Nintendo games of all time. I know what you’re thinking – we already have a list with the same title on the site – but this new list has a slightly different remit.
Firstly, it’s not just our opinions we’re sharing here; we’ve collaborated with IGN’s team of die-hard Nintendo fanatics – including Logan Plant, Simon Cardy, Rebekah Valentine, Dale Driver and even IGN co-founder Peer Schneider himself – to present the definitive rundown of the 100 best games released on Nintendo systems.
It’s worth noting that we’re not solely talking about first-party or Nintendo-published games here, which is what our homegrown list focuses on; in this new list, you’ll find third-party franchises like Final Fantasy and GTA rubbing shoulders with the likes of Mario, Zelda and Metroid.
This is because the list has been expanded to include games that either originated as Nintendo platform exclusives (like Resident Evil 4) or are closely associated with Nintendo hardware (like Super Castlevania IV).
With that out of the way, allow us to count down the 100 best games on Nintendo systems…
More than 20 years on, there’s still nothing quite like Eternal Darkness: Sanity’s Requiem (which, yes, is probably due in part to Nintendo’s now-expired sanity system patent). Not only did it have the temerity to jump between wildly distinct time periods, but it also went to great lengths to mess with your mind should you get spotted by enemies too much. Whether it’s an unsettling noise, a slightly skewed camera angle, or the game straight up simulating a ‘blue screen of death’, it made for one of the most memorable experiences in the horror genre.
The Lovecraftian aesthetic still sings to this very day, and a certain bathtub scene is just as sure to give you the willies now as it did back in 2002. A remarkable game that deserves a second chance in the spotlight.
Ollie Reynolds (Nintendo Life)
A GTA game releasing exclusively (until its later PSP arrival) for a Nintendo handheld seems like an incongruous proposal. But, in 2009 Rockstar gave the DS Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars, a standalone story of Triads and tribulations in GTA 4’s modern Liberty City setting.
This top-down ode to the series’ roots miraculously converted the open-world cinema we’d come to expect, adapting to its handheld confines through smart touchpad mechanics and a stylised, cell-shaded comic-book-like aesthetic to stunning effect.
What could so easily have been a misguided experiment between Rockstar and Nintendo, instead became one of the DS’s most essential games.
Simon Cardy (IGN)
From the days when the word “polygon” was exclusively found in math textbooks comes Nintendo’s 3D evolution of a mainstay arcade genre: the SHMUP.
Taxing the SNES hardware so much, even the Super FX chip included inside the cartridge couldn’t get the action to run even at a targeted 12 frames per second, Star Fox followed the linear stage setups of R-Type and co., but played from a behind-the-ship and first-person perspective.
The “talking” animals are here to remind you that you’re playing a Nintendo game, but in the end, Star Fox is a highly technical and experimental harbinger of the future. Far from being just a tech demo, it’s also a really fun game; however, it challenges players to play again and again to perfect their runs and experiment to discover alternate paths.
Peer Schneider (IGN)
While it’s effectively a re-thread of the original Castlevania, this fourth mainline instalment in the series really does elevate things to an entirely different level of quality.
Sure, Castlevania 3: Dracula’s Curse might be the better game overall, but Super Castlevania IV reimagines Transylvania through a 16-bit lens; the visuals are stunning, with Mode 7 effects adding a new dimension to proceedings, while the music is so good you’d swear it was being streamed from a CD.
Subsequent entries would arguably take the franchise to the next level of brilliance, but one thing is clear: Super Castlevania IV remains a masterpiece.
Damien McFerran (Nintendo Life)
The Nintendo DS became a haven for visual novel fans; an interactive storybook device that could ease you into a deep night’s sleep. 999: Nine Hours, Nine Persons, Nine Doors was far more likely to keep you up all night, however, with its twisted game of life and death.
Chunsoft’s first entry into the Zero Escape series, 999, placed you alongside eight other potential victims inside a sinking cruise liner that tested your puzzle and deduction skills as you unravelled the web woven by a mysterious mastermind. It’s twisted, clever, and a great example of handheld experimentation that the console would become known for.
Simon Cardy (IGN)
Three Houses is a Fire Emblem game that got it all so right, it’s been hard to readjust to the series in its aftermath. You see, Three Houses gives us the turn-based strategy we’re all fiending for, yes, and it does so with style to spare.
However, the real draw here, and the thing that makes this one so worthy of note overall, is the focus and effort that’s been placed on the socialising, customisation, relationships, and all that good stuff that happens between scraps. It’s a game you could quite happily live in for a bit.
PJ O’Reilly (Nintendo Life)
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What does Professor Layton hide under that huge hat? Perhaps, a towering cylindrical head of a shape unlike any other in human history. He’d certainly need one to house a brain big enough to solve all of the puzzles thrown his way over the course of his many DS and 3DS adventures.
A consistent quality of cosiness mixed with Sherlock Holmes-esque yarns can be found across the Layton series, but we’ve gone with The Unwound Future as our pick of the bunch. Its time-travelling tale, full of memorable twists and turns, thrills just as much as solving one of its dozens of conundrums does, satisfying brains of all shapes and sizes to great effect.
Simon Cardy (IGN)
25 years later WWF No Mercy, the THQ-published wrestling game released on the Nintendo 64 is not only still considered to be the pinnacle of the N64 wrestling game boom, but it’s also widely thought of as the greatest wrestling game of all time.
Since its release, it’s been the benchmark for what any wrestling game, with or without the WWE license, has aspired to be. It’s developed a cult-like following, with fans still playing (and modding) No Mercy to this day, updating its 25-year-old roster with modern superstars when the latest 2K game doesn’t live up to its standards.
It’s not often a game still stands strong after a quarter of a century, and it’s even rarer when it’s a sports game. All of this makes WWF No Mercy not only the greatest-ever wrestling game, but perhaps Nintendo’s greatest-ever sports game that doesn’t include Mario.
Dale Driver (IGN)
Best of all the Kirbys is Kirby: Planet Robobot, a truly astonishing little game for the Nintendo 3DS that encapsulates all that is best and beloved about the pink puffball. Robobot has everything: a deep roster of unique and useful copy abilities, colourful and creative levels, an interesting one-off gimmick in the robot armour, silly minigames, and a plot that starts with Kirby taking a nap and ends in a giant galactic battle against a superintelligent, planet-sized being.
In addition to all this, Kirby: Planet Robobot is one of very few games to really make effective use of the Nintendo 3DS’s 3D capabilities. While the game itself takes place on a 2D plane, but features a number of levels that have depth as well as length and look absolutely fantastic with the 3D turned on, as cars drive directly at the player and giant ice cream cones tip over and spill on the camera.
While Kirby has since gained other new copy abilities, minigames, and even his first 3D adventure in the years since, none of them hold a candle in our hearts to Planet Robobot’s breadth, depth, and pure charm.
Rebekah Valentine (IGN)
Apart from Nintendo itself, Rare was the N64’s most important developer, and one place the UK-based studio actually outpaced Nintendo was in the kart racer category.
Mario Kart 64 is an undeniable classic, but Diddy Kong Racing just inches ahead as our pick for the best kart racer on the 64. In addition to chaotic split-screen kart racing, Diddy Kong Racing drove the genre forward with three vehicle types (your friend could be in a plane flying alternate routes during the same race you were in a car!), an adventure mode complete with boss battles, and an amazing soundtrack from Donkey Kong Country composer David Wise.
Plus, it was the first appearance of Banjo and Conker ahead of their solo platformer outings – and it’s the forgotten, cute, family-friendly version of Conker well before he started drinking, smoking, and swearing.
Logan Plant (IGN)
Though it’s been ported and remade several times, none of the more recent versions of The World Ends With You has managed to capture how excellent this game was back when it first released on Nintendo DS.
I could go on all day about what makes it great: the art style, the deep fashion mechanics, its accurate portrayal of Shibuya and Japanese youth culture, its unusual story with multiple wild twists, its incredible cast of characters, the MUSIC, oh my gosh! But maybe the best element of TWEWY that we’ve lost in subsequent editions is its battle system, which made unique and brilliant use of both the system’s dual screen and its touch controls simultaneously with its D-pad to effectively simulate two different characters synchronising their attacks with one another in two different realms.
Combined with a wide variety of “pins” that could be activated with different types of touch attacks, and there was endless room for creativity and growth through multiple playthroughs. Which you definitely wanted to do, if only to hear Calling and Three Seconds Clapping one more time.
Rebekah Valentine (IGN)
After years of being relegated to supporting roles, our little mushroom-headed friend Toad finally got his own game in Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker. Nintendo, over the years, has done a brilliant job of designing games fit and tuned perfectly to the personalities of each of its mascots, and Captain Toad is no exception.
The cute, diorama-like levels proved to be magnificent puzzles for our intrepid explorer to navigate one by one, presenting a slower and cosier pace from other Nintendo challenges, yet still being perfectly, whimsically Nintendo. It’s a shame we never got another one of these.
Rebekah Valentine (IGN)
It is a crime, a CRIME I TELL YOU, that I cannot combine Golden Sun and Golden Sun: The Lost Age into one entry on this list. Alas, I’ll settle for the second part of Camelot’s two-act RPG adventure, as it is ultimately the better half.
Golden Sun was already an absolute feat, with its creative Psynergy and Djinn systems, gorgeous environments and music, and surprisingly robust open world. And you’re telling me that in the sequel they quadrupled the size of that world, added even more Psynergy and Djinn and classes, came up with more banger songs and environments, and opened the second act with a wild party switching twist that would go on to be subverted further in a triumphant march to the final battle?
Golden Sun and The Lost Age are nuts in the best way, The Lost Age even more so, and are among the best GBA games of all time.
Rebekah Valentine (IGN)
Mario has tried his hand at a lot of different sports over the years, but few have had the staying power of golf. Originally driving off on the NES, before approaching the 3D world of the N64, it’s Toadstool Tour on the GameCube where the plumber really nailed the action on the green.
Its sizable roster of characters and compelling courses offered a great round of multiplayer fun for those looking for a more laid-back time away from the hectic rush of Smash Bros. and Mario Kart, and the furious consequences of Mario Party.
Simon Cardy (IGN)
Super Monkey Ball’s brilliance lies in the fact that you’re tilting the stage to roll your monkey around rather than directly moving the character itself, and its table maze concept has never been more finely tuned than in Super Monkey Ball 2.
The 2002 GameCube sequel is stuffed with 140 stages to clear – ranging from fun and simple courses perfect for laughing at the silly monkeys on family game night to downright brutal challenges that’ll make you go bananas as you lose hundreds of lives trying to clear them.
Mastering everything it has to offer is extraordinarily satisfying, and its physics, momentum, and controls are so pinpoint that a study found that surgeons who warm up by playing Super Monkey Ball 2 are more efficient and precise in simulated surgeries compared to surgeons who didn’t play. Video games really can save lives!
Logan Plant (IGN)
Viewtiful Joe practically attacks your eyeballs with its standout art direction and frantically fun combat. It’s unfiltered Hideki Kamiya at an exciting career crossroads, melding his Devil May Cry action with a colourful paintbrush palette that would later evolve into the likes of Okami and The Wonderful 101.
A wholly original side-scroller that threatens to burst out of its purple cube confines if your fingers don’t keep up with its cell-shaded antics, it’s an exciting combo of 2D and 3D platform action that felt fresh in 2003, with an intoxicating style that few have come close to matching since.
It spawned sequels, but none truly reached the heights of the original, which has stood the test of time as one of the GameCube’s very best.
Simon Cardy (IGN)
F-Zero is about cheating death to go faster, and F-Zero GX’s uncompromising difficulty and incredibly high skill ceiling represent the peak of the futuristic racing genre.
Like F-Zero X before it, GX forces you to sacrifice your machine’s health bar to get a boost, resulting in tense risk-reward scenarios that get your blood pumping every time. And if you fall off the track while trying to shave off an extra split second, Lakitu won’t swoop in to save you – you’re dead. You must master GX’s tight mechanics and memorise its radical track designs to even stand half a chance against its toughest CPUs, and you hit a high most video games can’t reach when you finally cross the finish line in first place.
The cold-blooded challenge only works because GX runs perfectly at 60 fps and looks fantastic with strong art direction that rivals the GameCube’s best, like Metroid Prime and Rogue Leader. F-Zero GX is a masterpiece, and probably the most hardcore Nintendo game since the NES.
Logan Plant (IGN)
Ring Fit Adventure is one of the best-selling Nintendo Switch games, thanks largely to a global pandemic making indoor exercise briefly appealing. Unfortunately, like many other exercise programs, most people who started Ring Fit fell off the game before they could discover how much more than just an exercise game it really is.
Ring Fit Adventure is genuinely one of the most unique RPGs of the generation. It has a colourful cast of characters, bolstered by surprisingly good writing, a battle system revolving around your own physical movement, complete with skill trees, elemental weaknesses, and even healing items you can craft through more exercise.
Its soundtrack is straight work-out bangers, too, and gets me teary-eyed whenever I hear it, thinking about the exercise journey I took to beat the game once…twice…three times, oops.
Rebekah Valentine (IGN)
Nearly every moment of Phoenix Wright’s original courtroom adventure is iconic. From Phoenix’s debut trial against Mr. Sahwit (Or should I say… Mr. Did It!) to cross-examining a literal parrot, the first Ace Attorney fully commits to its completely unhinged world and never looks back.
Exposing witnesses’ lies and uncovering the truth of each case is exhilarating, largely because of its excellent soundtrack and lively character animations, and the way Ace Attorney balances its unabashed silliness with genuinely serious, heartfelt moments is nothing short of masterful.
It’s also an essential game in its genre, as Ace Attorney’s surprisingly successful sales paved the way for more visual novel and puzzle games to find footing in the West.
Logan Plant (IGN)
Considered by many to be the apex of the ‘classic’ Castlevania entries, Dracula’s Curse remains a wonderful example of a talented group of developers pushing ageing hardware to its maximum potential. By the time it arrived in 1989, the 16-bit era was already in full swing, and the NES was looking very old-fashioned.
However, despite the humble nature of the host hardware, Konami created a stunning action platformer, boasting multiple playable characters and optional routes through Dracula’s castle. Indeed, many consider this to be superior to the first 16-bit entry in the series, Super Castlevania IV, which arrived just a short time later in 1991.
Damien McFerran (Nintendo Life)
Is there a non-localised game that has garnered more attention than Mother 3? EarthBound’s follow-up could have been more of the same — more satire, more charm — and it is both of those things.
But Mother 3’s story of family, capitalism, and corruption will deeply touch anyone who plays it. It’s also a smart evolution of EarthBound’s turn-based combat, using rhythm mechanics to let you flex your skills. Its tearjerking moments may transcend the games, but there’s so much more richness within Mother 3 that it deserves to be played by all.
If only it were easier to access…
Alana Hagues (Nintendo Life)
A Western counterpart to the Japanese Osu! Tatakae! Ouendan, Elite Beat Agents got toes tapping as much as fingers thanks to its snackable episodic rhythm hilarity.
A star-studded list of tracks, including Earth, Wind & Fire’s September and David Bowie’s Let’s Dance, provides the backdrop for the titular government agents to go out into the world and help those in need. Doing so tests your reflexes and challenges even the most hardy of rhythm-action veterans, as you try and keep up with the “tap and drag” mechanics while also fighting against the urge to laugh all the while.
Although it never sold enough to become a mainstream hit, it has cemented itself as a cult classic and a vital DS game that encapsulates the handheld’s willingness to experiment and just get weird with it.
Simon Cardy (IGN)
There’s no platformer series with better vibes than the Donkey Kong Country games. Rare used technology that transforms pre-rendered 3D objects into 2D sprites, giving the SNES trilogy a wholly unique look that’s still beautiful on CRT televisions, and most agree that Diddy’s Kong Quest (Get it? Conquest?) is the top banana of Rare’s Donkey Kong games.
With darker themes as Diddy and Dixie Kong explore King K. Rool’s vile Crocodile Isle, creative locations like a dilapidated theme park or the inside of a beehive, and tons of meaningful secrets and collectables to uncover, DKC 2 is an outstanding adventure that’s perfectly paced from start to finish.
What cements it as an all-timer, though, is its soundtrack, which is easily among the best on SNES. Stickerbush Symphony, anyone?
Logan Plant (IGN)
I cannot BELIEVE the others let me sneak Mario Sunshine onto this list. I was ready to concede it, despite it being my second favorite 3D Mario (after Odyssey), but everyone kept insisting we keep it because of “vibes”. And yes, vibes are precisely the reason to love Super Mario Sunshine.
Look, it hasn’t aged well in some places. It’s got some goofy movement, and some of the levels make you want to rip your hair out (Pachinko, Sand Bird). But the goofiness of Mario being sent to a tropical island and being forced to clean up gunk to avoid going to jail is unmatched. And it makes for some pretty interesting level design, which Nintendo manages to concoct in Sunshine around a variety of conceits that all fit the tropical vacation theme while each feeling distinct.
I love the silly Piantas, shooting myself high into the air with FLUDD, skidding through Delfino Plaza on my stomach like I’m on a slip ‘n’ slide, and collecting every last one of those pesky blue coins. They’ve never made another game quite like Super Mario Sunshine. I’m not sure they ever will, but its pure ambitious strangeness has earned it a spot among the Nintendo greats.
Rebekah Valentine (IGN)
Released in Japan as Seiken Densetsu 2, Secret of Mana is one of those rare JRPGs that completely changed people’s perception of what the genre could deliver.
Even by modern standards, its gorgeous visuals and bewitching Hiroki Kikuta soundtrack have lost none of their impact, while the nuanced storyline and captivating characters grab your attention and refuse to let go. Released at a time when it was rare for a game of this type to be blessed with a global release, Secret of Mana is rightly compared to other SNES role-playing classics.
The 2018 remake was welcome, but didn’t quite match up to the original – which tells you everything you need to know about how highly this game is regarded by fans.
Damien McFerran (Nintendo Life)
