PTE97: The Red Cap

[Neon Ignition]

Onto the second company look over and the oldest of the big three. It's an astounding story of ups and downs in of itself following Nintendo's repeated march from successes to failures. They seem to be one of the few gaming giants able to pull themselves out from murky times but never able to keep their fingers clasped around success for too long before popularity wanes again. The coming years will see Nintendo seek to uncover another pot of gold in some form but for now we look back at their console past.

The WiiU seems to be entering its relative twilight. Nintendo is almost soley supporting the console and increasingly looks to be gazing its eyes forward, but for some it's been a brightly coloured and fun distraction from the very similar offerings its main rivals thrive on. It isn't unique in that regard though, with Nintendo's history of machines hosting similar titles over the years.

What are your favourite Nintendo console memories, your favourite games and the best home console Nintendo ever made?

I doubt it will win but I've included the Virtual Boy in the poll because it wasn't really a portable even if it wasn't really a home console either.

[kryss]

Absolutely N64 with Goldeneye and Perfect Dark.

[charlesr]

Only got into Nintendo with N64 (apart from Gameboy). GC and Wii never quite got as close to the quality line-up.

[Tobal]

N64 by far. Aside the ninty/rare classics everyone would list im going give a shout out to NWO vs WCW and line of top 3d wrestling games AKI produced, Turok2, ISS64, and Rocket robot on wheels.

[speedlolita]

For me the Cube is most memorable, Game Boy aside. Until the Wii I thought all their consoles were very strong though.

[Dogg Thang]

For me, Nintendo shine in handheld. There is no denying the impact and range of wonderful treats on the NES and SNES but with those I pretty much missed the NES in its day and only got to play the SNES in the houses of others so I didn't have that full immersion that others had. But revisiting them years later revealed why they were both so important.

I have owned each Nintendo home system since the N64 and just bought a Wii U. I have fondness for all of them and yet, without exception, my Nintendo consoles have been the ones to gather the most dust. Mario 64 was a spectacular game, as was Zelda OoT and those alone made that system worth owning for me. I loved Mario Kart 64 and enjoyed others. Quake 2 was pretty good on the N64. I enjoyed Turok 2 and others. But I didn't get a huge amount of play from it compared with my PS1 or Saturn. Not even close.

Then the GC wasn't much different. A few real treats, although I didn't feel Sunshine or Wind Waker delivered in quite the same way. But we had Pikmin, the two excellent RE games and some good above average stuff (Star Wars games etc). But I ended up with relatively few GC games compared with my other systems. The pattern repeated with the Wii but that delivered Mario Galaxy, which I think is one of my favourite Mario games of all time. I think my relationship with my Wii was hampered by the fact that I bought a US Wii and for years had to order the games. No real impulse buys.

And yet now that I think about it, out of the Nintendo systems I have owned and in spite of the excellence of Mario 64 and Zelda OoT, I probably got the best out of the Wii. Which actually is not the answer I expected when I started writing this post...

I now go into the Wii U knowing that there are very few games and will likely be very few more. I made my peace with that before I got it. But like those older systems, there will be a few treats that I will always be happy to have played.

[noobish hat]

I was going to vote Virtual Boy because I adore mine without irony and think it was tragic how it was gunned down in its prime when it could have had a huge killer library in different circumstances. However, when I saw N64 in the list, I could not bring myself to vote for anything else. Best memories of my life. Playing and watching my brother play Episode 1 Racer, Goldeneye, Ocarina, Pilotwings, Lylat Wars, Hybrid Heaven, Perfect Dark, Goemon, N64 Magazine and Nintendo World, and coinciding with the best Nintendo handhelds: the Game Boy and the Game Boy Color. Don't need to say much more than "Pokemon" in that regard. Maybe I'm crazy, but some times it's physically painful to think I can never go back to that time.

[Baseley09]

I've thought N64 was a skank console for a long time, granted Mario 64 blew me away but over the years those murky textures look worse and worse, I guess the majority of my N64 time spent playing via RF/50hz PAL hasnt helped it's cause.

During my earlier gaming years I was a Master System owner and typically raged on about it's merits over NES, though played a lot of that at peoples houses, always dismayed at the awful colour pallette....though enjoyed many of it's games.

Megadrive > Snes etc

My Nintendo life didn't come alive until the Gamecube, which for me had such great graphics for the time, compared to PS2 at least. I had owned a few Snes's in the past but GC was my first Shop bought Nintendo console.

As for Wii U, what a marvelous system. Ok so the controller doesnt really add anything, but ive not witnessed such an excellent small line up of games in ages, I think it gives the machine real focus, and everything looks beautiful.

[nakamura]

The SNES is by miles their best system for me. The simple reason is they had massive third party support to go along with their great first party stuff. Squaresoft, Konami and to a lesser extent, Capcom were masterful on the machine.

[Anpanman]

Rock n Roll Racing on the SNES.

[DeathAdder]

Nintendo 64 for me. That was the first time I had enough money to buy all the games I wanted. Never really got into the Gamecube, and there are fewer games I like on the Wii than on the 64. The Wii U would be my second choice.

I have only played most NES and SNES games years after they were released - only had about three SNES games at the time and never had an NES, so I didn't really feel I could vote for them, although I can see the quality of both libraries.

[Mr Ono]

SNES or Cube for me. In the end I went for Cube as I love everything about it.

N64 I never really got into even though I have 2 of them.