Re:
Symphony of the Night. I distinctly recall asking my parents for the
Spawn game on PS1 for my birthday that year (I was an edgy '90s teen, we all make mistakes). But I rented it and SotN together and promptly was like "no, no, I have decidedly changed my mind." And I was absolutely correct to do so. I spent a lot of that winter making my way through Drac's castle. And I still have my original 192% save file on my memory card!
Nowadays, when I pull it out every couple of years, I always play with the Luck Code on. It bumps up the challenge in the early-going and makes the late game quite interesting, given how much weird stuff you have by then. I'm continuously shocked at how well it holds up, and how many ways there are to just crack the thing wide open. Last time I played it, I stuck mostly to Shield Rod combos, but you can use the Crissaegrim, the Fist of Tulkas, or if you're like
this crazy bastard, level up the Muramasa (the "bloodthirsty sword") to an obscene degree so you can kill almost everything in one or two hits. What a game.
My list (bold didn't rank):
1) Resident Evil 2 (PS1/N64)
2) Castlevania: Symphony of the Night (PS1)
3)
WWF No Mercy (N64)
4) The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time (N64)
5)
Gradius Gaiden (PS1)
6) Mega Man X4 (PS1/Saturn)
7) Super Mario 64 (N64)
8) Metal Gear Solid (PS1)
9)
Guardian Heroes (Saturn)
10) Marvel vs. Capcom: Clash of Super Heroes (Arcade)
11)
Dungeons & Dragons: Tower of Doom (Arcade/Saturn)
12)
Sexy Parodius (PS1/Saturn)
13)
Fire Pro Wrestling S: 6Men Scramble (Saturn)
14)
Resident Evil (PS1 Director's Cut version, if we're splitting this up to its 4 separate releases? PS1/Saturn if we're not)
15) Goldeneye (N64)
16) Radiant Silvergun (Arcade/Saturn)
17)
Tekken 3 (Arcade/PS1)
18)
Time Crisis (Arcade/PS1)
19)
Twisted Metal 2 (PS1)
20) Bushido Blade (PS1)
21)
Einhander (PS1)
22)
Point Blank (Arcade/PS1)
23) Tony Hawk's Pro Skater (PS1/N64)
24)
NFL Blitz 2000 (Arcade/PS1/N64)
25) Star Fox 64 (N64)
Like Peklo, I suspect I would come up with a largely different list if asked again tomorrow or next week or next year, and getting a PVM last year with some Guncons definitely shaped this list, because, wow,
Point Blank and
Time Crisis rule incredibly hard. (
House of the Dead II also could have found its way to this list, but since it didn't get ported to systems of this generation, I suppose it didn't really belong here.)
It's hard to be shocked at the non-inclusion of wrestling games here, but it merits mentioning that
WWF No Mercy is still broadly considered the best 3D wrestling game of all-time, to the point that
AEW sought out the director to oversee their first videogame. It has a thriving mod community working continuously to bring in both modern stars and pre-Attitude Era wrestlers. I rank it only behind two touchstone games and, yes, above
OoT. It's really that good.