Super Mario 64

The best selling game of the system, was one of the earliest 3D games and set the tone for how 3D games would go on to be played. It used analog controls rather than just the D-Pad, open spaces for free roaming to wherever you please, and varying camera angles and settings. The game had many levels where you could wander on grass or desert, swim in the water, or fly through the air. The main goal in the game was to collect stars to unlock doors in the royal castle, and go on to save Princess Peach from Bowser (Koopa). Super Mario 64 was simple and yet brilliant, and even had sequels on future systems, such as Super Mario Sunshine for the GameCube, and Super Mario Galaxy for the Wii. It was also remade for the Nintendo DS.

Super Smash Bros.

My favorite game on the system and of all time. I even like this better than it's sequels Melee or Brawl. I find that they added a lot of unnecessary things and made the game play a bit more difficult overall. The N64 has the games original essence and purity, which is simply just Nintendo icons fighting it out and knocking each other off-screen. While the single-player mode in the game was rather bland, multi-player rendered endless hours of fun. To this day I can still play this game on multi-player for hours on end. Even single-player was quite a challenge on maximum difficulty.

Goldeneye 007 and Perfect Dark

The games that set the field for first-person shooters. I've only played Perfect Dark a few times, but I'm quite familiar with Goldeneye so that's what I'll talk about. Goldeneye was again, one of those games that was more fun on multi-player. The single player mode was still rather interesting, but something about going around and shooting 3 other people was just really exhilarating. You could sneak around or hide depending on how well you knew the level. There were many kinds of guns you could use, most notably the golden gun which rendered the opponent dead in one shot, or the laser which was simply fun to use and had unlimited ammo. The mines were also really fun to set up, including the proximity mines which were set off when you were near them, or remote mines that you'd set off yourself. Golden-eye is still my favorite shooting game.

The Legend Of Zelda: Ocarina Of Time

In all honesty, I've never played this game. I know, it's really sad. I was pre-occupied with a lot of other games and just never got around to this in my childhood, so I pretty much missed out on the whole Zelda hype. Many critics do however agree this this one of the, if not the best game for the system. It also set many standards for 3D adventure and RPG games, and had sequels for each of the major gaming platforms Nintendo released. The game has also been re-made for the 3DS released in summer 2011. I will get around to playing this game someday.

Other Games

Now that I've mentioned some of the most critically acclaimed games from the system, I'll share a few of my personal favorites. Mario Kart was another amazing racing game that added something new. Not only could you race in this game, but you had power-ups to sabotage the other players while you were at it. There was also battle mode which simply involved throwing power ups at opponents 3 times to knock them out of the game until you were the only one remaining. Crash Team racing was the PlayStation rip-off of this game, and while still fun, not nearly as good.

Pokémon Stadium was another favorite of mine. Aside from the basic battling, there were some really cool mini-games that were featured in the game that really weren't meant to be as addictive as they were. My entire family would always spend hours competing in the mini-games and to this day every time my cousins visit we always play. Pokémon Stadium 2 featured even more fun mini-games. Speaking of which, Mario Party was another great game which featured mini-games and spawned many sequels.

Some great fighting games for the system were Mortal Kombat Trilogy and Killer Instinct Gold. While Mortal Kombat gained notoriety for it's gory battle style and fatalities, Killer Instinct was more known for Kombats and fighting style. Both aren't really that big in terms of N64 but are my 2 favorite fighting games for the platform.

Kirby Crystal Shards was an adventure game with a somewhat similar concept to Super Mario 64, but had cooler items to use as weapons. The game also had 3 fun mini-games that could be played. Blast was a game where you had various challenges and tasks that you needed to perform but was mainly fun because you could go around blowing things up. Rush was my favorite racing game because the cars could actually get damaged, and if I remember correctly even blew up after a while.

The list can go on for quite some time, N64 had few games but all of them had their own significance in the gaming world and not one of them can be forgotten or taken lightly. N64 is still notable today establishing so many standards that are seen in today's games and consoles.