Greatest arcade games

Retr0gamer

Was messing about with mame today and on my Saturn and it got me thinking about the best arcade games ever made. Here's my list:

1. Street Fighter 2: Championship Edition

The best version of the best fighting game ever. It could be argued that the soul calibur or Virtua Fighter games have surpassed it but those games never built up the as big a gaming community as the SF2 cabinets. I can still remember the feuds between myself and other players and also the queues for a game of winner stays on.

2. Radiant silvergun

I've admittedly only ever played the Saturn version but this game is the best shmup ever created. It is great fun to play but even after you can beat the levels easilythere is an incredible amount of ways that your score could be improved by diferent combos and clipping bullets and obstacles. You could play this game forever trying to better your score.

3. Alien vs. Predator

An excellent streets of rage type scrolling fighting game from capcom. I remember becoming very good at this game and built up a few crowds to watch me play it in Dr. Quirkies. Tonnes of alien sprites to kill and the moves were extremely satisfying (its great ripping an aliens head off an upward slice). Better than the film as well

4. Ghouls and Ghosts

Fantastic platformer from capcom. Still has a special place in my heart for being the first non beat'em up or racing arcade game i beat on one credit.

5. Sega Rally

Excellent racer from Sega. Handling felt really slippy but it was still great fun trying to control that beast of a supra around the 3 courses.

6. Salamander

Excellent shmup from Konami. Improves on gradius because in doesn't send you back when you lose a life. The game is still brilliant despite its age.

7. R-type

Quite possibly the best designed shmup ever. Extremely difficult, like all great arcade games it was great for showing off. Only spoiled by levels 6 and 7 being far too difficult.

8. Killer Instinct

I'm not a big fan of this game and there are much more strategic beat'em ups around but killer instinct was a show offs dream come true. It was very easy to pull a big crowd around you if you were any way decent.

9. Metal slug

Excellent run and gun game and probably the best example of the genre on an arcade system. The quirky cartoon comedy really added to the insane on screen violence.

10. Puzzle bobble

Insanely addictive puzzle game.

i_am_dogboy

My single favourite arcade game was bubble bobble, and that was a really long time ago, when I'd go to the arcade in the back of the florist down the road with 2 pounds and play games for hours.....

After that I've always loved gun games, especially point blank and time crisis. Most of my arcade time was spent shooting things. Never got into fighting games either, super street fighter was great, and the original DOA was pretty impressive when I first saw it.

It's been far too long since I was a regular arcade goer to remember the games I liked though......can't think of any of the names but I can remember the games.

Retr0gamer

Can't believe i forgot Virtua Cop 1 + 2. I remember spending a fortune on them trying to get the perfect score. 3 shoots or mercy shot for every bad guy and then the secret boss

abccormac

Daytona USA multiplayer. Or Double Dragon.

deckie27

Bubble Bobble All the way
Had it on commdore at home
used to play doubles with a friend
When we would go into the arcade we would play for ages on a credit each
best value I ever got in an arcade


Dec

Stalfos

Retr0gamer wrote:

9. Metal slug

Excellent run and gun game and probably the best example of the genre on an arcade system. The quirky cartoon comedy really added to the insane on screen violence.

Metal Slug, spent hours playing it, brought out for the GBA recently, total crap.

Silent Scope is another good arcade game

Dr. Dre

Hard drivin' - for me, without doubt.

Bubble bobble, shinobi, r-type etc.. for sure, but they're well emulated in MAME.

But as an actual ARCADE game - it has to be HD.

[EDIT] Oh, and wonderboy too.

jonnybadd

Spend countless hours playing puzzle bobble, golden axe and that tenni sgame with the rollerball doen in mosney , then later on die-hard arcade in my local arcade. I also used to play Golden Axe 2 or 3 in the local chippie while waiting on a bag of chips.

ranDom_tAsk

My favorite arcade game was called "SNOW BROS" very like Bubble Bobble but better, anyone evry play it ?

monkeyfudge

I used to spend alot of time with Chase HQ and Out Run.

There was even a pretty great follow up to Chase HQ. It would keep switching from an 'in-car' view to a 'behind the car' view.

There was another good frantic driving game called Cisco Heat which was great fun too.

I used to always punish myself with Hard Drivin'... but I was really rubbish at it.

R-Type was probably the arcade game I speant the most time on. And it's probably has some of my favourite in-game music of all time.

I also used to get alot of pleasure out of Pac-land.

Mimikyu

This post has been deleted.

Rhyme

Time Crisis was good for a quick larf when it first came out... not too flash nowadays though.

R-Type, soooo good... apparently a lot of the bosses were based on what the designer found in his bathroom (dirty), and surprisingly a lot of the clones of the game were quite good.

The justice shot in Virtua Cop was great, that right hand was asking for it.

...and not forgetting Rampage, "Smashy smashy"

bounty

street fighter alpha 3 is better than champ edition

radiant silvergun is just another top down shooter, all those games get boring fast


i liked the time crisis and ridge racer series

Vyse

I think the first game I got hooked on as a kid was Pole Position. What a feeling of power. However, I grew up in Sega's golden age so my fav game is without a doubt Shinobi. All those warm summer days with 10p's down in Bary. Ah the memories.

nanook

lads does no one remember stryker

My god i remember the day that we got it into our pub manmany moons ago.

thank god for poor family accounting, i remmeber when we emptied it, my mother thought that this thing was a gold mine, little did she know that i was the major contributor to it.

all those levels, all those baddies. the flying pirahna's going through the river/jungle section.

and the anti gravity thunder dome. Simple but effective and if i am correct around the late eighties

CiDeRmAn

Loved, and still do, the original Star Wars arcade game, Outrun, R-type 2, Xybots, Flying Shark and Starblade, racing game that took my breath away was Virtua Racing, have a saturn, 32x and megadrive version of it, can't wait for the arcade perfect PS2 one.
Best shooter I have played is Dodonpachi, incredible stuff.
If you guys love your arcade games, you must all have chipped Xboxes, right?
Mine is stuffed with about 2,500 arcade games, nice to dip in and out of.

Wolf

Retr0gamer wrote:

Was messing about with mame today and on my Saturn and it got me thinking about the best arcade games ever made. Here's my list:

1. Street Fighter 2: Championship Edition

The best version of the best fighting game ever. It could be argued that the soul calibur or Virtua Fighter games have surpassed it but those games never built up the as big a gaming community as the SF2 cabinets. I can still remember the feuds between myself and other players and also the queues for a game of winner stays on.

Your a Nintendo Fanboy aren't you? Tekken best fighting game.

PcP

Street Fighter 2 CE was easily my favourite. Snow Bros, Raiden, Rolling Thunder, Shinobi, Stryder (late eighties sounds about right) and the Ridge Racer with clutch and proper gear stick all stand out though

Edit: Add Golden Axe and Pacland to that, even if the c64 version was a joystick killer

Fysh

All time favourite arcade game would probably be Snow Bros - it's hard to pin down though, so many other greats - Shinobi, Shadow dancer (Shinobi + dog!), Street Fighter 2, World Heroes, Night Slashers (best scrolling beatemup ever), Time Crisis, Silent Scope, After Burner (gotta love the moving case!), New Zealand Story....ah, fond memories.

ranDom_tAsk

Fysh wrote:

All time favourite arcade game would probably be Snow Bros - it's hard to pin down though, so many other greats - Shinobi, Shadow dancer (Shinobi + dog!), Street Fighter 2, World Heroes, Night Slashers (best scrolling beatemup ever), Time Crisis, Silent Scope, After Burner (gotta love the moving case!), New Zealand Story....ah, fond memories.

Ah Someone else who loves this game

I had this jamma board at home with a few other classics, I use to play them on a Super-Gun.

marshmallow

pacman!

KdjaCL

Sf2 CE and Bubble Bobble


Endless fun on 20 pence.


kdjac

Operation wolf
Cost me a fortune in the arcades in Kilkee!

d22ontour

Double dragon and bad dudes were favs of mine.

monkeyfudge

Deleted User wrote:

Operation wolf
Cost me a fortune in the arcades in Kilkee!

I was never a fan of Operation Wolf.

But I did love... I think it was called.. Space Gun. It was the same type of game but on a space station over run with aliens. It had some great boss battles.

Creature

Street Fighter 2 CE without a doubt. Best arcade game ever.

However The Punisher will always hold a special place in my heart.

djhooley

blockout,tetris,ghosts n goblins,bubble bobble,shinobi,double dragon(elbow all the way) golden axe(the dwarf fella was the only one) new zeland story. all are perfect runnin on mame. i've a cabinet built around my x-arcade. i be such the hero when i have parties in the flat

Giblet

House of the Dead

I played this nonstop for about 3 years. Anytime I was bored, rather than play some new game that I would suck at and would be just wasting money playing, I just used a solitary 50p on House of the Dead and completed it (usually)

I also have a claim to fame, my score was top in the Atari Expo in tallaght for about 3 weeks before it was turned off


Final Fight was just ^-^ aswell.

ranDom_tAsk

djhooley wrote:

,double dragon(elbow all the way)

lol

Spacedog

Ace driver - Victory Lap
Operation Wolf
Chase HQ
Double Dragon
Street Fighter 2
Virtua Racing
Time Crisis
the Rise of the Triad VR machine
Bubble Bobble

Dance Revolution (never played it but think getting gamers off their asses to have fun is no bad thing)

That game with the flying machine you'd peddal with the wind machine in it

That game that used to be in the front of Dr. Querkies, was a jet fighter game that went 360 degrees.

Retr0gamer

bounty wrote:

radiant silvergun is just another top down shooter, all those games get boring fast

It's obvious that you haven't played radiant silvergun. The best thing about it is that it never gets boring only more challenging, even the earlier levels when you start chaining them.

Wolf wrote:

Your a Nintendo Fanboy aren't you? Tekken best fighting game.

Not a fanboy I just appreciate their games. Actually SF2:CE was never released on the SNES but was on the megadrive.

And Tekken is a disgrace of a fighting game that is about as balanced as the leaning tower of pisa. I'd have respect for you if you mentioned soul calibur or virtua fighter. tsk, tsk.

Retr0gamer

nanook wrote:

lads does no one remember stryker

Strider is tha game and it was indeed excellent.

abccormac

Jesus, I forgot all about asteroids. Best game ever, and it cost me a fortune in pocket money when I was a kid.

dearg_doom

Wolf wrote:

Your a Nintendo Fanboy aren't you? Tekken best fighting game.

Dunno if the guy is a Fanboy or not, but, the game he mentioned is a 2-dFighter, you mentioned a 3-dFighter. Huge Difference!!

And you didn't even mention the nest of the 3-dFighters (ATM anyway) VF4!!; Tekken was a woeful game, T2/3 were a lot better, though I just couldn't accept ANY 3-dFighters until recently, I was just too into the 2-d ones at their time!


Other great Arcade games:

SmashTV
House of the Dead
Killer Instinct
G-LOC

byte

Chase HQ "Let's go, Mr Driver"
Pacman
Space Invaders

ranDom_tAsk

Final Fight was another one I enjoyed...

Fysh

Yeah, Final Fight was class - only thing was my favourite by far is Final Fight 3, which I don't think ever made it to the arcade (SNES exclusive, iirc- oh yeah baby ). Night slashers was ever so slightly better though, more for the visuals and story than playability - I think they're about even there.

(Just realised I also forgot Sunset Riders, a game I shovelled a fair amount of cash into in my younger days)

The Bollox

Retr0gamer wrote:

9. Metal slug

Excellent run and gun game and probably the best example of the genre on an arcade system. The quirky cartoon comedy really added to the insane on screen violence.

I remember playing that game YEARS ago and I loved the cartoon violence, I mean it was brilliant, the mackine gun bullets were as big as the enemies heads and the fire balls took up half the screen, then while vacating in portugal last year I came across it again, what a classic, took up most of my holiday... but well worth it!

BloodBath

Good list so far.

Anyone remember badlands? Top down racing game where you picked up wrenches to buy powerups like missiles and nito. I pumped money into that as well.

Don't forget Mortal kombat.


BloodBath

ranDom_tAsk

OH OH !!!!

Remember Aliens ?

robbie1876

BloodBath wrote:

Anyone remember badlands? Top down racing game where you picked up wrenches to buy powerups like missiles and nito. I pumped money into that as well.

Ah yes, I was da man at Badlands. 50p used to get me about an hours worth of entertainment in Bray on Badlands.

My other fave was Outrun, I could finish it on one credit. I am da man.

Robbie

super_furry

Sega's brilliant Derby Owner's Club is the only arcade game to get me hooked in the last decade or so. Such a shame that they got rid of it from the Atari Expo. Does anyone know of any other places that have it in Ireland?

Retr0gamer

The Simpsons arcade game. A final fight clone that was really enjoyable. The best feature was that it could be played in 4 player.

KdjaCL

Retr0gamer wrote:

The Simpsons arcade game. A final fight clone that was really enjoyable. The best feature was that it could be played in 4 player.

Ninja turtles was also 4 player and very playable.

Never played many car games Chase HQ was the only one really .....

Line up in our arcade was Bubble Bobble Chase HQ Tetris Sf2 CE haxored edition,Sunset Riders (bruy me with my money hur hur hur), snow bros,Aliens Op Wolf for about 7 years same games



kdjac

i_am_dogboy

Retr0gamer wrote:

The Simpsons arcade game. A final fight clone that was really enjoyable. The best feature was that it could be played in 4 player.

That was fantastic, can you remember the co operative moves they could do? As bart you could jump onto homers shoulders, and I remember the 4 getting together to pick up a car......It's a shame the rest of the simpsons games didn't quite live up.

bush

SF2 CE. The ultimate arcade game
Others

Wonderboy 2
Snow bros
Midnight resistance
Rygar
Robocop
New zealand story
Super pang
Chelnov
Hammerin harry
Aliens
Air buster
Oscar
Strider
Un squadron
Final fight
Heavy barrell
Ghosts and goblins
Sunset riders

I used to live in arcades when I was younger, robbing money anywhere I could to play games

bush

KdjaC wrote:

Sunset Riders (bruy me with my money hur hur hur)
kdjac

HA HA. "Me in big big trouble"

Boro

Oh the memories!
Clonmel had 2 arcades when i was in school there and i used to spend some amount of money in them. In no particular order, my favourites.

Street Fighter 2
Tekken 1/2
Samurai Showdown 3/4
King of the Fighters (95 or 96)
WWF WretleFest (i think)
Golden Axe
Final Fight
Cadillacs & Dinosaurs
Badlands
R-Type
Prehistoric Isle

entropi

1 . SF2 , Absolute Classic

2. Salamander , loved this game for many years, and still do

3. Rastan Saga , side scrolling slash-em up , reminds me of HE-MAN still

4. Puzzle Bobble , addictive little beggar

5. Golden Axe , Just so good to play

and others to mention are :

Wonderboy

game with captain america and some marvel heroes.. can't remember what it's called..

The Punisher
Simpsons Arcade game
Cadillacs and Dinosaurs
Pang, and Super Pang
Rallisport Challenge ... i liked it
Aliens
Final Fight
Street Fighter.. original Ryu kicks ass
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
Soul Blade
Time Crisis
another i cant remember, but involved like cowboy western shootouts, side scrolling shooting and running over cattle occationally.. thats all i can think of atm.

TCamen

Originally Posted by Retr0gamer
The Simpsons arcade game. A final fight clone that was really enjoyable. The best feature was that it could be played in 4 player.

Ninja turtles was also 4 player and very playable.

I remember finishing the turtles one with my younger brother years ago -- that was satisfying! So many cool games mentioned above, Snow Bros, New Zealand Story, Street Fighter,... great choices!
I loved the side-scrolling X-Men beat 'em up, think it was around in the early-mid 90s.

Anyone remember the Superman arcade game they had in Dublin airport years and years ago? It had ground-based levels where you could throw cars & stuff, and then flying levels where you blasted missles with your heat vision. It was brilliant

In more modern times, I have a huge weakness for 'House of the Dead' 1/2 and the Star Wars Trilogy SEGA arcade game. They're the ones I'll gravitate towards in any arcade these days

Wolf

Retr0gamer wrote:

The Simpsons arcade game. A final fight clone that was really enjoyable. The best feature was that it could be played in 4 player.

It wasn't a final fight clone it was a Turtles clone which was another great arcade game. I have the lot on mame32 anyways.