Mine has to be Dragon Quest: Rocket Slime, a DS spin off of the Dragon Quest series that sees you playing as a slime operating a tank and rescuing the people from your town. You run around the overworld, collecting items to use as ammunition and saving money to upgrade your tank. The art and music are just as great as you'd expect from the Dragon Quest series. It made fantastic use of the DS's dual screens. It's also written for a younger audience, so a lot of it is just really silly and fun! Try it out for sure, I'm so sad there's no sequel :(

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[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (3 children)

Let's see what I can come up with (and see if I can remember the names correctly!):

NES: Back in the day, it was probably River City Ransom. Growing up, it was a game my brother and I loved to play... but no one ever knew what we were talking about at the time. Now the Kunio games are a bit more known, and with River City Girls 1/2 they're getting attention, which is great.
Gameboy: Avenging Spirits. When I was younger, a friend and I loaned each other a bunch of our games. Sadly, he ended up moving away before we managed to swap back, and he got the better end of the deal when it came to the games. However, I did get left with a copy of Avenging Spirits... the game is a bit strange but its very fun and the sprite work is just adorable.
SNES: Dragon View. It has great sprite work and a very (at the time) cool looking 3D overworld you can stumble around in... Solid gameplay and some RPG elements make it a nice little gem of a game.
GBA: River City Ransom EX. Same deal as the NES version. I worked at Toys R Us around this time, and I think I'm the only person who purchased this game from the store...
PS1: Brave Fencer Musashi. Someone else already mentioned Einhander, so I'll go with my other go-to PS1 gem from Squaresoft.
Saturn: Guardian Heroes. While I bought the console for X-men vs Street Fighter, I go it with a handful of games on the cheap at EB Games: Magic Knight Rayearth, some crappy 2D Dragon Ball Z game, X-men vs Street Fighter (and a 4in1 cart of course!) and Guardian Heroes. Its such a well made beat-em-up that really doesn't get a lot of love because most folks never played any Saturn games.
PS2: Way of the Samurai. Maybe not super unknown, but definitely a niche game back when it released in the US I think.
Dreamcast: Cannon Spike. I bought my DC for Capcom games (and SoulCalibur), and this is one of the many gems on that console that never really pops up in discussions. I bought it on the sole merit that Charlie/Nash was in it, but it was wacky and engaging enough to warrant a place in my heart.
XB360: Tenchu Z. I loved Tenchu back on the PS1/PS2, but this was probably the one that most folks didn't touch... it was a bit weird but a friend and I played the hell out of it on many a weekend back in the day.

Any other console I either didn't own (Genesis, Gamegear, PS3, etc) or just couldn't think of anything that really stood out as a hidden gem (PSP, PSV) or are more current and also don't really have anything that ranks (PS4, PS5).

[–] Slyder 3 points 1 year ago

NES: Back in the day, it was probably River City Ransom. Growing up, it was a game my brother and I loved to play… but no one ever knew what we were talking about at the time. Now the Kunio games are a bit more known, and with River City Girls 1/2 they’re getting attention, which is great.

Wow. I can't believe you know River City Ransom. I played this game with my friend for hours and hours but no one else has ever heard of it outside of us until now. It was so fun and we beat it several times.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

Man I loved Tenchu: Wrath of Heaven. Really underrated couch multiplayer, both verus and co-op. How does Tenchu-Z compare?

[–] TwilightVulpine 2 points 1 year ago

Brave Fencer Musashi was really weird and funny. It was obviously going for a Zelda type of gameplay but the writing really gave it its own vibe.