The best Sega Genesis games of all time

Ecco the Dolphin has seemingly been given a second shot in the hands of creator Ed Annunziata, but I doubt a next-gen rendition of Sega’s second-in-command mascot could trump the waterlogged roots of the series’ past. Ecco the Dolphin, the first in the Ecco series, oversaw the time-traveling escapades of a bottlenose dolphin — not to mention his hostile encounters with a group of marine-life-abducting extraterrestrials. Despite its childlike appearance, however, the title was one of the toughest on the console, offering little in the way of clues and helpful tips for spurring the initial storyline or navigating the maze-like crevasses spanning Atlantis to the Atlantic. The 25 stages were tropical and eye-catching upon the game’s debut, the controls novel and innovative given the four-direction mechanics, while additional facets like Ecco’s requirement for air added an even deeper level of difficulty. You can also ram schools of sharks, use sonar to communicate with a massive blue whale and destroy the Vortex Queen on a level named after a cut from Pink Floyd’s seminal 1975 album, Wish You Were Here. Not bad for a title that can be beaten within a mere hour if you know what you’re doing. The game is available on the Sega Genesis Mini.

We doubt you’ll see The Lost World: Jurassic Park in many best-of lists. Despite being one of our personal favorites as children and one of the last released on the Genesis, it wasn’t known for pushing the console’s graphical performance or engrossing story, focusing more on top-down gunning and a keen element of exploration. It is loosely based on Spielberg’s ’97 film of the same name, and in turn Michael Crichton’s novel, but it merely serves as supplementary content to both. The Appaloosa Interactive title follows players through the mysterious, dino-drenched Site B as they journey across the island to reclaim a radiophone to call for help. The gameplay is challenging and well-paced, spliced with a fair amount of strategy reliant upon your use of the tranquilizer, machine gun, rocket launcher, and other weapons used in combating the myriad of dinosaurs and hunters constantly working against your survival. The foliage and environmental hazards, though often comprising small sprites, are lush and detailed, and the boss battles and dynamic token system break up the otherwise straightforward gameplay. Most importantly, it’s the only title on our list where you can play as Jeff Goldblum.

The formative fighting game, Street Fighter II established many of the conventions of the genre, particularly the idea of linking combos together to prevent your opponent from being able to react. Street Fighter II also pioneered one of the most notorious trends in fighting game history: releasing several slightly improved iterations of the same game. All told, there are seven main releases of Street Fighter II, one of which was a recent remaster for the PlayStation Store and Xbox Live Arcade. Nonetheless, each iteration of the title introduced new characters and mechanics while tweaking older elements and retaining the core elements of the franchise. Super Street Fighter II, in particular, introduced four new characters — T. Hawk, Cammy, Fei Long, and Dee Jay — thus further expanding the series’ diverse cast. Each of the new characters had radically different styles of play and all four have become mainstays of the franchise ever since. SSFII also slowed the game speed down from that of the previous version, Hyper Fighting, a decision Capcom would later reverse with the release of Super Street Fighter II: Turbo. The increasingly long names also remain the most ridiculous part of the franchise’s production model. While it’s not as good as its follow-up, a game so polished they still play it at the most prestigious fighting game tournaments in the world, this version represents the best Street Fighter experience on the Genesis. Super Street Fighter II featured a full cast of SFII characters minus Akuma, improved animations, and introduced a combo scoring system that only brought it closer to perfection.

Sega’s plucky mascot has had a rough few years. For nearly a decade, every new Sonic game has been a disaster, an unending parade of goofy characters, bad camera angles, and attempts at “hip” theme songs. It’s almost hard to even recall the halcyon days of Sonic when Sega took the standard platforming formula of the era and threw some N2O in the engine. Sonic’s big selling point was speed. Players could move fast, and environments were designed to emphasize this, with intricate systems of vertical loops to travel through and enemies to dispatch. Sonic 2 introduced Sonic’s sidekick, Miles “Tails” Prower, allowing a second player to join the game. The addition of a spin-dash move gave players another option for dispatching enemies, allowing them to better traverse a series of levels that each culminated in a battle against archvillain Dr. Robotnik. Sonic 2 features some of the lushest environments of any platformer and the expansive, colorful environments are still a joy to zoom around in. Sonic 2 represents the zenith of the franchise in nearly every way, making it the perfect distillation of high-speed platforming. The game is available on the Sega Genesis Mini.