1. Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars
Really love this game and I beat it at least once a year. Surprised to not see it in too many top 10 lists, maybe I've just got the nostalgia glasses on. The thing I really love about this game is the many many hidden small stuff in it like the invisible treasure chests, the gameboy you can buy off the kid in the mushroom kingdom inn, the casino, Link and Samus cameos, etc. Just found the characters and dialogue really charming, Maybe someday square and nintendo will collaborate to make a sequel.
2. Chrono Trigger
Not much to say here that other people haven't already said, the game's amazing.
3. Ogre Battle 64: Person of Lordly Caliber
Still think this is the best game made for the N64, not sure how many people have played this though. Unit progression in this series is just really fun, spent so much time planning out the classes and formations for my squads. Alignment is sometimes annoying but it brings an interesting dynamic to squad and deployment planning. Every decision made in the story felt like it mattered too. While you couldn't make whole squads of teleporting dual-wielding ninjas like Final Fantasy Tactics, game had a lot of awesome classes.
4. Final Fantasy Tactics/Tactics Ogre
Lumped them together because I like them for the same reason and didn't want to take up two spaces on the list.
5. Front Mission 5
Just the pinnacle of the series and a real shame we never got it. Some pretty dedicated people on the internets did spend years on completely translating the game. The link system quickly became essential in this series and it feels really good when you surround an enemy with melee units that will break its face when they're linked to a sniper.
6. Final Fantasy 6
The characters and the world just draw you into this game. Bonus points for me totally not seeing the mid game twist coming and I have the memory of me just staring at the screen at 4 in the morning as the world ended( I totally thought the game was over at that point, it felt like you had enough party members at that point.) It had a really huge cast and they were all pretty well fleshed out.
7. Persona 4
3 was just a very depressing game and it was surprising to me that the two were set in the same universe. But yeah, this games been discussed to death.
8. Super Street Fighter 4 AE 2012
The game that revitalized the fighting game genre. Also probably the most balanced fighting game Capcom has ever made, hard to decide on a bottom tier in this game. Too bad I play on ps3 controller and my combos are ass
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9. Suikoden 5
The most refined game of the series unsurprisingly. Always fun to figure out the plot connections between the games of the series and get all 108 stars. Only problem with the game is the obscene amount of loading times and that Georg Prime is unstoppable against everything except bosses.
10. Dota 2 and LoL( Maybe the Infinite Crisis Moba)
Mobas, like MMOs, are just giant black holes for free time, who knows how many hours of my life I have fed into this addiction. These games just make you feel good when you win and quite depressed when you get steamrolled, which is why I try to only play when I have a full team. On a side note, they are making a moba based on infinite crisis and I have signed up for the beta as it looks pretty awesome(
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=deDCqAao4tE). Msg me if you guys are ever bored and want to play a round or two.
Runner-ups
Castlevania: SOTN- There's a reason a whole bunch of games in the series after it have taken so much stuff from this
Megaman X- The game that started all the riding armors and element+animal bosses
RE 4+5- Fun with friends, more action than horror, but it's good action.
On a side note, I'm surprised people have played MM network transmission for gamecube, that game surprisingly hard.
