1. Super Mario Bros. 3 (yep, you guessed it)

So it was really really difficult for me to choose the order of my top 10 best NES games with the exception of this one game which will always be number one. And did you doubt it? I mean, what game is in everyone's collection? If you went to one of your friends' houses who has a Wii, what is the one game they most likely have from the Virtual Console? Super Mario 3! Well, I'm sure if Sesame Street ABC was on the Virtual Console, things would be different...

This game took the Super Mario Bros. And just blew it out of the water (even out of that Midus stage). Everything was bigger, everything was better. The stages, the graphics, the powerups... The first time I found the leaf and realized I could fly as raccoon Mario (or tanooki or whatever) totally blew my mind. The levels went from a simple left to right sidescrolling experience to a whole new dimension (well not literally but still).

Again, playing with friends opened up so many of the game's secrets. How else would I have ever found that one whistle where you have to press down on the platform for three seconds? I mean who does that on every platform until they happen to find a secret?

And the uber powerups the Princess somehow seems to sneak out of her Bowser captivity to send to her dear plumber protagonist! Flying through an entire level, the ability to “cloud skip” the really annoying levels, the stupid music box... God this game was awesome.

Oh yeah did I mention: Cloud world and that silly green boot thing you could jump around on piranha plants with (Yoshi has nothing on this), the awesome giant world, the fox suit that let you hide from enemies, airships, all of world eight, mushroom house powerups, minigames, end of level one-up slot machine boxes, etc. etc?

I could fill a novel (well probably not) with all of the reasons this game was awesome (music) and should be (and is) number one in any self respecting NES gamer's library (well, I might listen to arguments of why Zelda was better).

The Top 50 best NES games List Epilogue:

You may be wondering why your awesome favorite game is not on my list, and yet something like Whomp 'Em made the list right? Well, I have yet to play every great NES game, which is something I'm hoping to remedy. Feel free to leave a comment in the comment box about what you like or hate about my list (just be prepared to revisit the site to defend your arguments).

Many of the other "great" NES games I do have that are not on this list are more recent acquisitions and I just haven't given them enough play time to know where they would end up on my top 50 (eventually hope to make it a top 100).

Currently, I am playing Crystalis which is awesome, so expect it on the list one day. I also have The Legacy of The Wizard, The Goonies 2, and Faxanadu, all of which [I believe] ended up on IGN's Top 100 NES list.

I also hope to one day attain and play Dragon Warrior II-IV, Final Fantasy, Ninja Gaiden, and of course Castlevania 3. But beings as I prefer to play these games on the NES instead of an emulator, this may get expensive.

Nevertheless, expect the list to change from time to time as I play more (writing it inspired me to make a trip to my parents' house to pick up my beloved NES from my old bedroom).

Think your top list is better? Leave it in the comments!

Also, if you liked this list, you may enjoy my Best RPGs of All Time list or my Top 10 Wiiware Games list!