Many great games were made in the past 29 years, but only a handful actually defined the genre. Today, these genre defining games still continue to produce and outsell millions across the globe, bringing much admiration to the humble country of Japan.

MARIO BROS.
An Italian plumber? Um ok. Hey do you mean there’s an actual character with a name? In 1981, Mario entered a newly designed video game called Donkey Kong. This was the first true platformer of its time to feature an actual character, with an identity, goals and a backstory. Pac-Man gave birth to the “character” in a game, but Mario gave birth to something completely new. This game defined the Platform genre.

FINAL FANTASY
Before there was Final Fantasy, there was Western made dungeons and dragons style role playing games such as Might and Magic. Think of Excalibur, Lord of the Rings and you have the template for it. The games were serious all the time and lacked something. In Japan came a legendary mastermind by the name of Hironobu Sakaguchi, his goal was to create a new type of video game to save his failing career. It was the last straw, if this game would fail, he’d leave video games forever–Hence the name “FINAL” Fantasy. The game added new innovations to redefine a totally new genre. The character classes was first to stray from typical D n’ D, as hence the artwork, the style of game play and the “Asian” factor was breathed into a definite masterpiece. What also set it apart was the use of romantic themes and orchestrated music. The creators thought, why can’t games be more like books and movies? Final Fantasy continues to sell out and the next major chapter will soon be released.

LEGEND OF ZELDA
Nintendo was just getting warmed up with Mario and Luigi. Nintendo knew the gamers would never tire of European medieval fantasy style games. But Nintendo also knew that Square was successful to break away from D n’ D. What came out of Japan was a top-tilt world that was a combination of an adventure, platform and RPG that was easy to play, yet in depth at the same time. Multi-millions of copies later, they keep releasing successful sequel after sequel. Saving the princess never gets old, ya know?

METROID
You can call male gamers sexist all you want, but all throughout gamer history, they’ve always looked up to females as the ultimate super hero. Take Samus, the heroine of the story is highly glorified and 90% of the time she’s completely covered in a cybernetic suit. In this game, what never was done before was having the ability to control a suit in human and “ball” form. Tired of shooting your laser cannon? Lets go bowl the enemies like pins. Can’t fit through a tunnel shaft? Time to roly poly your way in. Speaking of, I wonder if that’s where the got the idea from? This game series continues to produce mainly 10’s in reviews.

STREET FIGHTER
Hadouken! This game was also invented as a new breed of video games. Before Street fighter, you had Karate and Kung Fu. Both of these games played like traditional tournaments, 3 points to win, and was more like a slow chess game. Snorreee… did a blade of grass just grow? So, once again the crazy Japanese brainstormed an action packed fighting game that allowed much faster gameplay, an actual story, cooler characters, monsters, fluid animation, beautiful artwork and whats this? Hadouken? You can toss “Energy Wave projectile fists??!”Ok, that’s incomprehensible to us lamers so the U.S. Media sometimes renamed it “fireball.” Having the ability to toss projectiles across the screen definitely changed game-play, as no longer you could hide at the end of the screen anymore. 18 years later, the game is making hit sequels without any slowdown.

Conclusion
Games were so innovative back then. It seems we keep remaking what’s already been done. Every now and then we have something mind blowing, however it was the 80’s that gave birth to the genres that exist today. Any game after was simply a clone, rival or “inspired” by title. If you’re actually surprised with my list, I’ll have to proceed with a face palm.