Like every other game-obsessed nerd on the web, I’ve compiled a list. The list is simple: the greatest games you’ve never played. You’ll notice a Games page is now LIVE. Do you have a great game you feel was forgotten by history? Well pass it on and I’ll post it up!

I’m in a rather unique position in that I enjoy entries in every genre. I can switch between Mario, FIFA, King’s Quest, and Cave Story in a single day. I’ve also tinkered with a vast number of systems and keep my ear to the ground on retro and indie markets (in many different countries.)

In my experience, gamers pick their favourites for reasons beyond just fun. What you’re looking for in a video game will determine what you find appealing and what you find boring. My unique position is that I have many different reasons for playing games, each with it’s own mindset and perception.

That means there will be a lot of games in the database; I’m likely to leave no stone unturned. But take it for what it is: a subjective list by an obsessed geek. My true purpose? To offer downloads for games you can’t get anywhere else. Don’t you hate it when you gotta look for hours to find that game you only kinda remember from years ago?

Well, now I’ll do the legwork for you.

So it turns out I missed the boat ten years ago. Listening to every gamer on the planet, all I hear is a unanimous chorus:

But is it really that great? Hindsight does wonders to put it all in perspective. Would a fresh-faced, yet hardcore gamer agree with the consensus? Is it fair to judge this old game by the standards of today? I say yes.

It’s time to test the crazy hype surrounding this classic. Stick around if you never played it. You might just learn something. Allow me to elucidate my experience with excruciating detail.

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No game critic or hardcore gamer would ever do this in their right mind. Who admits that they’ve never played a famously revered piece of gaming history? It’s time to come clean.

It’s one thing to say, “Oh I skipped Call of Duty 5 because it didn’t look that great.” It’s quite another to say, “Mario? Yeah, I never played any of them.”

As a gamer, your street cred is all you got. It’s what others think of you and your dedication to the art. Your experience (and therefore intelligence, because somehow they’re magically related) is constantly called into question. You have to prove it with every comment, with every post. To quietly admit that you don’t fully grasp every nuance of the industry is career death.

So what must each of us do? We pretend. We read review sites, watch trailers, and analyze the forums. We must get a sense of what each and every game is about. We can’t afford to be caught off-guard!

The prep-work pays off. When someone asks you about a top ten list, you can say, “Yeah, Mario 64 in the top ten games of all time? I can see why, because it was the first 3D Mario game and it did everything right. You see when you consider this innovation here–”

All the while, you’re completely talking out of your ass. Well, maybe we’ve all played Mario and don’t have to lie. But sometimes I see gamers lie. A lot of ‘fans’ pull the ‘pretend shtick’ when it comes to Sega in particular.

In the world of gamers, it’s all about what you’ve played. Your history is all that counts. After all, if you never played Prince of Persia: Sands of Time, how can we really trust your opinion on the latest Prince of Persia game? Or Assassin’s Creed? Hell, can we trust you at all!?

Paranoia? Perhaps. With all this in mind, I dare to sacrifice myself upon your bitter game-nerd mercy. It’s time for my confession. Me, the man who has played near every system on the planet. The man who plays foreign games from every corner of the world and not just Japan. The man who has played indie games since the time of the BBS. He who knows the difference between doujin and homebrew. He who plays the artsy games and actually gets all pretentious (for a few minutes anyway.) The man who…look you get the idea. I’ve literally played TENS of THOUSANDS of different titles. And no, that’s NOT an exaggeration. I keep close records, thanks to a curious form of OCD.

But it’s all meaningless in the face of what I haven’t done. There are some titles I’ve never played. ANd some of them are far from obscure. The ones I bring you today are all revered and adored and cherished.

It’s true. There are some popular, historic titles that I never gave so much as a glance. How do I get away with such a travesty? There should be hell to pay. All you fans out there, get ready to pounce and tear me apart. The wounded zebra is about to come out of hiding.

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As some of you know, Fukio Mitsuji passed away late last year due to medical complications. I’m sure you’ll forgive if I spare the details.

The truth is, he had ducked out of game design as a career years ago. Instead, he started a school to teach young up-and-comers about the subject. The man had a lot of great principles when it came to game design, many of which I hope his students took to heart.

This is the man that refused to retread old ground in his sequel. This is the man that can boil down the concept that guides a game and rebuild it into something refreshing and completely unexpected. He can take such a simple idea for a game and, with excellent design skills, turn it into something wonderful. It’s the sign of a true chef to do so much with such simple ingredients; MTJ is one of the legends of our time. His work proves that game design can be art and not just a job.

It really says something that his design skills are still talked about at places like Gamasutra to this day. You should pick up Taito Legends 1 & 2 just to watch his interviews and learn, if nothing else. Today, I’d like to examine his best work. I’m sure we can all learn something by picking it apart (and having some fun along the way, cough cough.)

It wasn’t easy figuring out exactly what he had done. The Japanese are infuriatingly modest when it comes to giving and taking credit and Mitsuji did some work beyond the confines of Taito. Google was no help on this one. There are some projects where he is attributed as helping out a little (such as some character design for New Zealand Story or as a publishing exec for Halley’s Comet), and there are other projects where his contributions are certainly not the main event (such as for Storming Party, Super Dead Heat, and some other obscure Arcade games.)

I’d like to focus specifically on his projects where he was lead designer. These are the games where he spent many sleepless nights sketching and dreaming. Keep in mind that these were originally Arcade games, designed for quarter-sucking over everything else. His goal was to make sure you kept playing and playing until you were broke. He did a good job.

[The downloads are for console ports. In each case, I selected what I felt to be the best or most accessible version.]

Bubble Bobble (Arcade, NES)

This game is his first work and, in my opinion, still his best. Not many people start at the top. I think Mitsuji realized it though, because he really didn’t make all that many games in the following years to come. I mean, where do you have left to go after creating such a masterpiece?

There is a very good reason that Bubble Bobble was showered with so many quarters during it’s heyday of 1986. MTJ wisely designed the game to feature co-op multiplayer, a rarity at the time. But more than that, the game was so challenging that you’d be a fool to play it alone! I gotta admit, I’m glad he made such a tough decision. To design a game that’s actually intended to be played by two people is a ballsy move. But then again, how many of us really go to the arcade alone? And isn’t it great when you find an addictive co-op game that everyone loves?

And it’s addictive for many reasons. First off, the concept of your bubble shot doubling as a weapon and a make-shift platform just doesn’t get old. The graphics are clean and bright and I’m still humming the damn music even as I write this. But you know what truly defines success? The fact that I don’t even need to explain this game to you. Everybody knows it, everybody has played it. It sticks in your head and appeals to us all on some level. MTJ set out to make a fun ‘couples’ game, giving us a guilt-free reason to bring a date to the arcade.

What a brilliant success.

Rainbow Islands (Arcade, Sega Genesis)

A follow-up to Bubble Bobble was a must. Taito was demanding and Mitsuji was willing to deliver. So what’s in the sequel? Admit it: what do you expect of every sequel? Most of us are quick to think about better graphics, more levels, better power-ups, new bosses, and more complex moves. We want to see our great game expanded to be something even better.

Mitsuji dropped the ball. Right into the net. This game is a winner in every sense of the word. Does it deliver what a sequel should? I want you to really think about what that means. MTJ thankfully wasn’t willing to settle on making a standard sequel. Instead, he put a lot of thought into what Bubble Bobble was really about.

He stripped the gameplay down to it’s basic concept: “Hey, let’s use our projectile as a platform”, and built it once again from the ground up. This game has nothing in common with the original, even throwing out the idea of two players. Instead, it’s a solid solo adventure filled with secrets and secrets within secrets and even more secrets! Did I mention the secrets? This game is deceptively simple upon first glance, but it becomes nothing short of amazing to the curious explorer.

The game-changing influence of Rainbow Islands was felt throughout Bubble Bobble even after new designers took over. Parasol Stars was another departure for the series, followed by Bust-a-move. Sure Taito eventually wrestled Bubble Bobble back to it’s original inception, but it went kicking and screaming.

[The PC-Engine version is available on Wiiware. It's the best arcade conversion, if you're interested.]

Syvalion (Arcade, SNES)

Now here’s one hell of an odd game. Moving away from platformers, MTJ decided to develop a shooter that exemplified his personal touch. He had worked on arcade shooters in the past (e.g. LSA Squad), but this time he was in charge. He came up with a crazy idea, like always. In this game, you play a serpent…lion…alien…dragon thingy. You go around shooting things in sort-of-a-top-down fashion. And stuff. It’s labyrinthine, hectic, nibblesy, and actually pretty tough (at least for a wuss like myself.) It really is quite something just trying to fully absorb the insanity of the experience.

The game was a hit in the arcades, likely due to just being so damn odd. It was released for the SNES in Japan and Taito planned on bringing it to our shore. They even had a commercial running for awhile and it was advertised in gaming magazines… but then nothing. What happened?

Volfied (Arcade, Sega Genesis)

By this point, Mitsuji was tiring of his stay at Taito and with game development in general. The guy was a born-teacher, and it wouldn’t be long before he would take up that profession full-time. Before he left Taito, he designed one more game. This game is the only sequel he ever made. I think it was a personal challenge for him, to see if he could even do it. It was conceived as a pumped-up version of Qix. It features better graphics, different enemies, and everything else you would expect of a sequel.

It’s also as hard as sin.

It’s not a great game (although it’s the best Qix you’ll ever find), but it’s obvious that MTJ was trying for something different. This is the game where he became obsessed with details. What could be the power-ups for Qix? How do they affect the game? Notice how cutting in one level leads to graphics from the second level? A lot of the enemy designs pushed the limits of what an arcade machine could do at the time. And the fact you have to cut a level down from 80% while avoiding a boss for each field certainly is a challenge. It’s a hearty effort from a great designer, if a little empty.

Magical Puzzle Popils (Sega Game Gear)

Fortunately, MTJ’s career ended on an incredibly bright note. Having left Taito, Mitsuji was offered a project at Tengen (you know them better as Atari.) He decided upon one genre in which he had no prior experience; the one genre that you would never see on an arcade machine. He made a puzzle game.

It is awesome. In each of the one-hundred stages, you must head-bash and block-punch your way to the princess, avoiding spikes and slimes galore. It may seem simple, but each step you take can alter the level into an unsolveable mess. The presentation is really catchy; after each level, the prince and princess waltz about in a silly song and dance.

What can be said of Bubble Bobble can be said here: the gameplay may be simple but it’s surprisingly deep. In this case, it’s the level design that really shines. You have to play it to see just how far MTJ pushes the engine.

Is Popils the only game he made outside of Taito’s arcades? I might never have a solid answer to that. But if you ever see a game with the initials MTJ in the hi-scores, please don’t keep it to yourself. Send it my way and I shall be grateful. Play the games on these list and you too shall be grateful.

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Personally, analyzing his works has done a few things for me:

• I have a new-found appreciation for Bubble Bobble, including Parasol Stars and all the other ones he didn’t even make.
• I’ve finally found a version of Qix that isn’t boring.
• I wasted my entire Saturday night playing Popils. Tonight doesn’t look too good either.

Seriously though, I did learn one important thing. In this day and age, we have 3D graphics and HUDs and sixteen button controllers and demanding gamers, etc. Now, more than ever, we need to really think about the future of game design. What did it mean to MTJ? Complicated gameplay is not necessarily long-lasting and even the simplest ideas can be deep and meaningful.

The confusion between deep, fulfilling games and over-complicated, long games is a trend that is likely to continue. Make sure you aren’t one of the thousands of players that falls for it. I’ll take a 2-hour kick-ass romp through Portal over a 40-hour ordeal of yet-another-JRPG drudgery any goddamn day of the week.

Keep that in mind when you watch the next trailer for FF XIII.