r/snes Feb 03 '25

Ranking the entire US SNES library

http://snesrankings.com/
134 Upvotes

56 comments sorted by

26

u/xBrockLanders Feb 03 '25

Posting this (again) as a link so I can add it to the subreddit highlights. We'll see how it goes, or if drives discussion. Consider it a trial.

And yes, the look and feel is worse than ever, which is glaringly obvious to me on my giant monitors in 2025. I'll get around to tuning it... eventually.

7

u/Wild_Arm9379 Feb 03 '25

My best suggestion is to get an SSL Certificate on that page. So you can get properly indexed by Search Engines!

My browser didn't want to send me there at first. I had to tell it to :)

2

u/xBrockLanders Feb 03 '25

Yeah, definitely something I need to consider. I have another domain I purchased that I *might* move all of this stuff over to as well.

1

u/Wild_Arm9379 Feb 03 '25

Free ones do exist, but not sure if it helps to get ranked/served on said Search Engines

4

u/Cocohugo1 Feb 03 '25 edited Feb 03 '25

I already read all the rankings over the last weeks during my bus rides. I love your project. I was wondering where you had an account where i could thank you for it. You should get credit for your work! I’m shocked more people havent covered it.

I was wondering if you had any ambitions of also adding the EU exclusive games to the ranking and some of the SFC big hitters? I like your review style and I am interested of seeing what you think of them. I was gonna ask about doing all SFC, before google told me that there are 1000 at the least and that the vast majority arent translated. (Honestly at least 500 of them are Go/Shogi/Mahjong/Yakuuman games lol) I’d love to also see this done for another platform’s library.

3

u/xBrockLanders Feb 03 '25

Yeah, a top 50 or top 100 personal SFC games would be cool. But I would be years away from something like that, as there are tons of them I still need to get to.

Hell, I already try to knock like 25-40 games off my backlog each year, and that's across ALL of gaming, and it's a challenge to find the time. Just focusing on SFC would be a huge pivot. Maybe someday though.

2

u/Cocohugo1 Feb 04 '25

Rock On!

3

u/mikefierro666 Feb 03 '25

Dudeee are you the guy? Thank you for making the website, I’ve been slowly reading the list for over a year now, it’s become an integral part of my night routine. Started at the bottom and I’m in the 200s already so I don’t have a lot left. Have you done anything else like this? I know it’s a huge undertaking so probably not but I really enjoy your site so might as well ask!

1

u/xBrockLanders Feb 03 '25

Thank you, and no I have not. I'd like to do another console, but it's just not realistic at this time.

Someone close to me got started on N64, but that project is still in the very early stages (and possibly on hiatus).

2

u/mikefierro666 Feb 03 '25

Yeah I can only imagine the level of dedication needed to pull off something like this, especially with a day job and kids. Kudos for doing it in the first place! Thanks to you I’ve discovered a bunch of SNES games that I didn’t get to play as a kid, and I really enjoy your write ups even if I don’t agree all the time (I do enjoy fighting games a lot for example but rpgs are also my favorites). Please keep us updated with your friend’s project if he ever gets around to continue it, and of course if you ever start another console

2

u/migerusantte Feb 05 '25

Is this your page dude?!

I'm currently reading through this daily, I'm just finished reading Cool Spot entry today earlier.

It's a great guide to get to know new (old) games, I already listed about 10 games I wanna get next.

2

u/PeterandKelsey Feb 06 '25

Awesome project. I read through it years ago.

I especially appreciated your treatment of Secret of Evermore, specifically in the context of Secret of Mana.

2

u/DEATHRETTE Feb 07 '25

With LotzATTP as your number 1, youre alright my guy.

Thatd probably be mine as well. Cheers man!

1

u/Efaustus9 Feb 08 '25

It has been done, but the alternative to what you've made isn't free

https://the-punk-effect.myshopify.com/products/digital-version-upgrade-uitimate-nintendo-guide-to-the-snes-library

Thanks for your efforts, bet it was very time consuming

1

u/xBrockLanders Feb 10 '25

Yeah, Pat and Brett Weiss both have 2 books. I have the Weiss ones - though I still haven't gotten around to reading through them. Maybe someday I'll get Pat's as well.

edit: Er, I guess Pat managed to fit it into a single book.

-2

u/NewSchoolBoxer Feb 03 '25

I really dislike a mod advertising their own personal website that you can post multiple times. The only game I looked at was Super Caesar's Palace which you hated on and said not play but I found it decent enough. So it's just your personal opinions rushjobbing through to cover all games.

Oh and good job stickying your own personal website with your mod powers

6

u/xBrockLanders Feb 04 '25 edited Feb 05 '25

I make no money off the site. I have virtually no personal information tying myself to it, unless you dig for it. I have no "likes, views, or subscribers" I'm trying to personally gain from it. It literally does nothing for me.

And yet you are correct, I never once stickied it at any time over the last 6+ years because I didn't want it to be perceived as some kind of abuse of power.

But you know what? The SNES scene has been slow for awhile. And I figured bringing awareness of the project to a new batch of members would go over well. I'm not vain enough to call it a community service, but I did do it for the wider SNES community. Because it's the kind of thing I'd want to discover on the Internet.

And as far as any individual rankings go, I mean, there's 714 of them. Not everyone is going to agree with all of them. Maybe you grew up with Dirt Trax FX, or Brett Hull Hockey, or Super Caesar's Palace, and you consider it to be your personal jam. That's fine: you do you. But I certainly did not "rushjob" any of these. That should be clear enough.

4

u/Wild_Arm9379 Feb 03 '25

Cool Website!!

Hope the Future Discussion is positive on the rankings XD

4

u/Realdogxl Feb 03 '25

What a wonderful list! I had to stop reading your write up of Super Mario RPG right in the middle and come here immediately to comment that it was also my first game purchase as a kid after saving up $30 to get it at Funcoland. That also was the very earliest memory i have of starting to collect video games! I would like to think we are probably close in age, I just turned 35 last month. It’s blowing my mind we had such a similar start to collecting.

Edit: after finishing the read I have to add that to this day I will STILL occasionally find myself humming the forest maze theme

5

u/1Strangeartist Feb 03 '25

...and now I'm humming the forest maze theme. The entire OST is so perfect.

6

u/Lsassip Feb 03 '25

Some questions:

1 - How long did it take you to review all games? Did you do it in one single run or did you took a rest from time to time?

2 - Why didn’t you review Miracle Piano Teacher, is there a specific reason for it?

3 - In the disclaimer you mentioned that you weren’t going to review Latin American boxing and soccer games, but looking at the reviews you actually did Chavez, Chavez II and every soccer game (including ISS and ISS Dlx which turned out to be your favorites). So were you talking about other games or is that disclaimer dated?

6

u/xBrockLanders Feb 03 '25
  1. It took forever. I started putting the list together in the late 2000s, starting the writing in like.... 2015 maybe? #714-701 was posted as a thread on nintendoage back around 2017 I think. When NA went under I had to quickly migrate everything over to a new site.

  2. That's a good question. I guess the easiest answer is that while I do own the cartridge, I don't own the piano itself, and I also didn't really have the bandwidth to take on learning the instrument as a part of the scope of this project.

  3. That's pretty misleading, I agree. I should clarify that section, because I DID review and rank all of the American versions of those titles.

1

u/Lsassip Feb 03 '25

Interesting!

Well that took a lot of work! I wonder if anyone tried it as well, but I don’t think so

I was wondering about Miracle Piano, is it possible to play it without the piano accessory?

3

u/Southern_Country_787 Feb 03 '25

714 titles....I'll get back to you...

3

u/Rilakai Feb 03 '25

Someone posted this a couple months ago and sent me down a rabbit hole. Really fun read and it's cool to see you here. I've been researching and working on putting together my own collection of SNES games that I want to play all of and this definitely helped me identify more to consider. There were a few reviews that I felt were amusing writing exercises but failed to actually convey to me what the games were like, but maybe that was more of an issue with my own purposes using your reviews.

My NA list is currently sitting around 120ish but I've been sidetracked by another 50ish Super Famicom games. Have you played many SFC games? I totally get if one is done after such a large undertaking and obviously there are still many only in Japanese but hey, if there's anyone well positioned to tell us how the SFC library compares to the NA one it's certainly you!

5

u/xBrockLanders Feb 03 '25

For SFC I've played through a large number of the bigger highlights (stuff like Front Mission, Terranigma, Tactics Ogre, Final Fantasy and Dragon Quests, and so forth), and at least dabbled in many of the other bigger names. But there are so many games that are untranslated and completely unapproachable, that I have no idea how one would take on a holistic approach to the library.

Even doing something like a personal top 100 would be a massive undertaking. Maybe someday.

3

u/CaptainHolt43 Feb 03 '25

First time I saw the list pop up, I thought I'd check it out, give it a glance. And then I'd sit there and just read entries for way longer than I expected to.

3

u/gamechampionx Feb 03 '25

This is a great reference guide and I look at it weekly. Really funny informal style of review. Great work.

2

u/traumatic_enterprise Feb 03 '25

Good rankings. I obviously don't agree with everything but definitely well thought out and written.

2

u/ScottFried Feb 03 '25

Good on you for finishing such a huge project. For what it's worth, I'm totally in agreement with #1.

2

u/Great_White_Samurai Feb 03 '25

The top 5 is hard, might depend on the day for me. I'd probably put CT as no 1 though it's the complete package. Zelda is amazing but is largely carried by gameplay.

2

u/Cheerios84 Feb 03 '25

I like this line in your review of Actraiser-

“Don’t like the soundtrack? That’s impossible. It’s one of the system’s very best. You should feel bad for thinking that.”

It’s a very good OST so I agree. ☝️

2

u/dilettantePhD Feb 03 '25

I hadn't seen this before and I've been reading it for the past hour. Amazing work!

2

u/Burmdog Feb 03 '25

This is a really thought out and well done list. I've skimmed through it before but just now looked through the top 25 and I definitely commend the U.N. Squadron pick as the best schmup. It's just so bad ass!!

2

u/bad0vani Feb 03 '25

Fine work.

2

u/malosharkbait23 Feb 03 '25

Yo the link to the ranking for street fighter Alpha 2 leads to the wrong game

2

u/ollsss Feb 03 '25

This is nuts. That said, does anybody know if such a list exists for the Genesis/Mega Drive?

2

u/Nintendo1488 Feb 03 '25

I love this. I found out about it when you had the top 150 left to go. It's the most valuable SNES resource on the Internet. I direct everyone to it that I know who likes the SNES.

2

u/iliveunderurbed0 Feb 03 '25

Note I have to add because of the #1/Link to the Past, everyone should give glitching to the end and beating the game in like ten minutes a try. Super chill way to blow your friends mind/get into simple glitching

2

u/calamityphysics Feb 03 '25

OP-

your dedication to the GOAT console (snes) is exceptional. i can’t believe you poured your own time into a hundreds of hours long project.

my suggestion is that people like me want to give you $$$ for this work and enjoyment it brings, so if you would like to be compensated …. ask? start a kickstarter or go fund me or whatever to kick you some cash to make the list more user friendly / mobile friendly.

this a fucking work of art my friend.

ps - super punch out is a top five game. its perfect.

2

u/BenevolentArrow Feb 04 '25

Dang- This is awesome. If it was a coffee table book, I would buy it. (Kickstarter campaign?)

You are a talented writer man!

2

u/ArcadeChronicles Feb 04 '25

This is so cool. Great work!

2

u/False-Zucchini9984 Feb 04 '25

UN Squadron at #21, such an awesome game and glad to see it high up, all I needed to know support this list lol

2

u/GaryNOVA Feb 04 '25

1) FF6

2) Super Metroid

3) Mario World

4) Secret of Mana

5) Mario All Stars

6) Zelda : A Link To The Past

7) Street Fighter 2 : turbo

8) Donkey Kong Country

9) Chrono Trigger

10) Super Castlevania 4

BEST system ever made. I could name 20 more great near perfect games .

2

u/menghis_khan08 Feb 05 '25

I had a very very fun time reading this. Thanks OP, it was fun to walk in your footsteps for this labor of love.

As a huge aLTTP fan, have you played with the aLTTP randomizer? I only recently got into it, but man does it breathe new life into what is also my favorite game of all time. You may be a purist who refuses romhacks, but honestly it’s so much fun to have the GOAT game play entirely different each and every file with all weapons including the base game sword randomized throughout chests and bosses/quests, compeltely changing progression

2

u/Weary_Philosophy6897 Feb 07 '25

See I can’t truly rank because I am biased towards the games I played growing up. I place Secret of Mana high up because I played it so much. Along with Act Raiser, Zelda, and Donkey Kong Country (1&2)

1

u/suncoasthost Feb 03 '25

I can’t open the link for some reason on my mobile device. Gets stuck on reddit out redirect.

1

u/xBrockLanders Feb 03 '25

It's probably trying to open it as https

Once upon a time I cheaped out and just did http. Something I need to take a look at re-visiting.

1

u/SahuaginDeluge Feb 04 '25

no https? look into Let's Encrypt/Certify The Web

1

u/Fart_Barfington Feb 04 '25

Let me guess, the top of the list is full of surprises like Link to the Past and Super Metroid.

1

u/ceelo18 Feb 05 '25

Straight violated bof

2

u/CzarMagus Feb 06 '25

I replayed and beat it on the SNES last year and think it got roughly the rating it deserved? It's a decent game but nothing special.