The SNES Games That Defined The 1990's

The Super Nintendo sold 49 million units and ran for about a decade. In that time, it produced a library of games that people are still arguing about today, not because of nostalgia, but because some of these games permanently changed what a video game could be. This isn't a list of the best-selling SNES games. It's a list of the ten titles that, when you trace a line from them to what's being made right now, changed the entire trajectory of the medium. Super Mario Kart started as a two-player F-Zero prototype nobody planned to ship. Secret of Mana was built for a CD-ROM add-on that died when the Nintendo-Sony deal collapsed, the same collapse that gave the world the PlayStation. Super Metroid sold barely over a million copies and invented an entire genre anyway. Donkey Kong Country used £80,000 Silicon Graphics workstations to make a cartridge-based console look like it could compete with the next generation. And the number one spot isn't what you'd expect. It appears twice on this list, for a reason that's going to start an argument in the comments, and we want you there for it. If you grew up with a Super Nintendo, you already know some of these games. You might not know the stories behind them. Do you agree with the list? Is there a game we left off? Let us know below, we read every comment. Subscribe for more deep dives into the games and hardware that built the industry. #SNES #SuperNintendo #RetroGaming Timestamps 00:00 Intro 01:02 Super Mario World, 1990 02:56 Super Mario Kart, 1992 04:44 Street Fighter II: The World Warrior, 1992 06:39 Star Fox, 1993 08:34 Secret of Mana, 1993 10:34 Donkey Kong Country, 1994 12:27 Super Metroid, 1994 14:35 The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past, 1991 16:26 Chrono Trigger, 1995 18:34 The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past Copyright Disclaimer Under Section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976 Allowance is made for “fair use” for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research. Fair use is permitted by copyright statute that might otherwise be infringing. All video clips, images, and music used in this video belong to their respective owners.