Top 5 Games for the PlayStation?

[thorr]

I have never owned a PlayStation, and only played on one a few times back in the day. I have no idea what the best games are. Sure, there is always youtube, but that would be one opinion for each video and I would love to hear what everyone's top 5 games are. It will be interesting to see if the same titles keep showing up by different people. Now that NTSC CRT TV support has been added, my interest in this core has skyrocketed and I am looking forward to trying it out, once I know what games to try.

Please list your top 5 PSX titles... If you have trouble picking only 5, then be sure to rank them so I can see what your top 5 are, lol.

[aberu]

Not really going to rank them, but 5 at the top for me personally that I think you should try:

* Final Fantasy VII
* Valkyrie Profile
* Metal Gear Solid
* Castlevania Symphony of the Night
* Final Fantasy Tactics

[Stupid Dufus]

Jumping Flash 2 (3d platformer before Mario 64)
Metal Gear Solid (stealth action)
Lunar Silver Star Story (rpg)
R4: Ridge Racer Type 4 (racing)
Castlevania Symphony of the Night (helped define the "metroidvania" genre)

[PistolsAtDawn]

I'll give you more than five because the PSX was a great console with a big library full of fantastic games. To limit it to five is madness!

Metal Gear Solid and MGS VR Missions
Final Fantasy VII
Xenogears
Castlevania Symphony of the Night
Crash Bandicoot series
Tony Hawk's Pro Skater series
Spyro the Dragon
Silent Hill
Resident Evil series
Time Crisis series (but you'll need a light gun)
Ace Combat series
Gran Turismo series
Wipeout series
Colony Wars series
Alundra
Tekken series
Tomb Raider series

There were lots of ports from PC, some better than others. Quake II is a good one if you can deal with a gamepad over a mouse and keyboard.

[zorrobandito]

Ridge Racer - they're all pretty good but the first one is a perfect slice of arcade racing
Driver - perfectly captures those old American 70s movies & TV shows - fantastic car handling, great damage and some very aggressive cops
Tenchu - Metal Gear Solid with Ninjas
Tekken 3 - Namco got everything right with this one - roster, moves, timing, graphics, extras
Tony Hawk's Skateboarding - Neversoft nailed it - tricks, environments, modes, skaters but perhaps most of all, the music.

Honourable Mentions: Pandemonium, Wipeout 3, Need for Speed 3 and the three best lightgun shooters - Point Blank, Time Crisis and Die Hard Trilogy

[retro]

Final Fantasy VIII
Metal Gear Solid
RayStorm
Soul Edge
Tekken 3

[GreyAreaUK]

Populous:The Beginning.

Sure, it's got lots of issues (it can get very sluggish sometimes) but it's still a game I regularly play.

[barfood]

I like shoot em ups

1. Einhander - most eye-catching game on the system in my opinion
2. Raystorm
3. Raiden Project
4. Thunder Force V
5. Gradius Gaiden

[metalfacemark]

My favourites (no particular order)

Parappa the Rapper
Ridge Racer
Xevious 3d/G
Metal Gear Solid
Jumping Flash 2

[DiamondDave]

https://youtu.be/52LNO6UcVVo

You can watch this video (or pretty much any other "Top 50 PS1 Games" video) and see all these suggested titles in action.

[AtomicShroom]

Just 5 games is pure torture. This system has so many must-plays.

But still, if I must... ...

1. Castlevania: Symphony of the Night
2. Metal Gear Solid
3. Final Fantasy VII
4. Crash Bandicoot 3: Warped
5. Resident Evil 2

[Hyper Space Squid]

Be sure to check out Skullmonkeys. For me this is still one of the best platformers for the system and a PSX exclusive to boot.

[Wave]

No order:

R-Type Delta
Jumping Flash! 2 (surprised/glad to see this get mentions already!)
Castlevania SotN
WipEout XL
And I really enjoy the first Suikoden fsr. That music, atmosphere, breeziness.

[thorr]

Thanks everyone! That will definitely give me a great place to start. Some of your comments were awesome. Sorry for making it so difficult by limiting it to 5, but I only have so much time to play and I wanted to get the best of the best from each of you so I would be sure to get the bestest of the best, lol. As I hoped, many of your favorites are the same, so I will probably start with those and venture to your other favorites next. I have a nice driving wheel and chair, that I may hook up and play some of the driving games with. Thanks again and keep them coming for anyone else who wants to share their top 5!

[barfood]

Thanks everyone! That will definitely give me a great place to start. Some of your comments were awesome. Sorry for making it so difficult by limiting it to 5, but I only have so much time to play and I wanted to get the best of the best from each of you so I would be sure to get the bestest of the best, lol. As I hoped, many of your favorites are the same, so I will probably start with those and venture to your other favorites next. I have a nice driving wheel and chair, that I may hook up and play some of the driving games with. Thanks again and keep them coming for anyone else who wants to share their top 5!

It would be really cool if you wrote small reviews about games you tried because of recommendations from this thread. It's ok to give your honest opinion if you like things more than others!

[Wave]

Oh no, I forgot to mention Klonoa: Door to Phantomile. Original still best imo, don't miss it.

[akeley]

To pick only 5 for best ever is too cruel, so maybe I'll gow with a 5 recent favourites instead...
-Castlevania
-Lomax
-Einhander
-Grandia
-Vandal Hearts

[DevilHunterWolf]

There's going to be a lot of overlap for top games and part of the fun of having something like a MiSTer build is being able to experience anything on the system. So instead, I'll offer 5 games that are different from the usual lists.

1) Wild Arms - An RPG that many times gets overshadowed by Square(Enix)'s releases on the system. But because there were sequels, it also sometimes gets skipped on hidden gems lists. Definitely worth checking out.
2) Blood Omen: Legacy of Kain - First game in the Legacy of Kain series. It's a gothic top down action game with a strong emphasis on voice acted story telling. The other games went full 3D so this still stands out among its other entries.
3) Die Hard Trilogy - 3 games in one: a beat 'em up, a light gun arcade shooter, and a driving game. Just a nice sampling of different gameplay with knockoff Bruce Willis voice acting.
4) SoulBlade / SoulEdge - It's a bit rougher to play than SoulCalibur, but this is where it started. Also, the PS1 version has a very good alternate soundtrack you can choose that's different than most Original and Arranged options in Namco's other home ports.
5) Street Fighter: The Movie - This is not the same as the horribly broken arcade game. It plays like Super Street Fighter II Turbo but it's the digitized movie actors. Just worth it to see what an alternate universe would have looked like with Capcom in Midway's place.

[Newsdee]

4) SoulBlade / SoulEdge

This is one is worth it even if you just check the opening cinematic

[thorr]

I only got a chance to try a few minutes of a few games so far, but I am totally blown away and can't believe the MiSTer is capable of this level of gaming. A lot of the early 3D games I used to play are available for the Playstation, so I can't wait to play some of those again along with the titles in this thread. For example, I am looking forward to trying Quake II (mentioned), Forsaken and the Tomb Raider series.

I need to get the manuals so I can get the most out of each of these games. My favorite Castlevania game is Simon's Quest because I love the exploration and puzzle solving aspect of it as well as the leveling up. The PSX one reminds me of it in a lot of ways. I haven't played the other Castlevania games much because they feel quite different. I think I am the opposite of most people, and they hate Simon's Quest, but oh well.

I tried a few driving games and quickly realized I need to hook up my steering wheel. I have been spoiled using it over the years and using a thumbstick instead was well, you know, not as good to put it politely. I am not sure if any of these games support analog throttle and brake controls or not, but it would be cool if they did.

I don't remember which game, but one of the games suggested gave me an E2 message part of the way into the game. I assume that is an error and it crashed.

Is there a way to play lightgun games on the MiSTer? Is there a way to use SNAC?

[setiawan]

If you're into JRPG at all, I would highly recommend Suikoden 2 and FF9. These two are by far my favourite games of the console, and have been since childhood. Suikoden 2 has somewhat of a cult following, and is revered for its wide array of playable characters, and political/tragic story. FF9 is often overlooked among the FF series, but it's a very charming and easy going JRPG.

[DuckSocker]

The problem with this question is that playing only the best titles of the playstation is really missing half the experience.
The playstation's massive library is due to its very special place in time and the huge market success it got and because of that there's so many unique and weird games, or simply games that are not mega-masterpieces but are still interesting and/or very enjoyable. Nonetheless, I've found the challenge of making a top 5 interesting, but I also took it one step further by making a top 5 for every years from 1994 (ps1 launch) to 2000 (ps2 launch), then from this shorter list I made an overall top 5. Also it's worth noting that I only included 1 game per series and it's all in no particular order.

1994: (for this year it's more a "here's the only 5 game worth playing" than a "top 5")
King's Field -> The father of souls games
Geom Cube -> 3D top-down tetris
Parodius -> even if you don't like shmup, this one is worth checking
Ridge Racer -> the very first game of the console
Nekketsu Oyako -> Snes style Beat'em Up

1995:
Jumping Flash! -> 3D platformer series (3 games) and a classic of this console
Gunners Heaven/Rapid Reload -> Run'N'Gun a la Metal Slug
Rayman -> French Mario
Twisted Metal -> destruction derby on crack
D -> 3 CDs horror/puzzles adventure game with a time limit where you can't even pause! (is that a selling point?)

1996:
Crash Bandicoot -> Tasmanian Mario
PaRappa the Rapper -> The story of an dog who learn Kung Fu using rap in hope to get a date with a flower
Earthworm Jim 2 -> Absurd humor Mario
Resident Evil -> Don't trust pharmaceutical company or they'll turn you into a zombie
Tomb Raider -> Indiana Jones with guns and boobs

1997:
Bloody Roar -> Virtua Fighter meet Animorphs
Bushido Blade -> "realistic" sword fight where 1 hit kill is possible
Castlevania: Symphony of the Night -> Where Metroid style games became Metroidvania
Final Fantasy 7 -> that's a game
Mega Man X4 -> A future where computer anti-virus are physical robots with guns and swords

1998:
Brave Fencer Musashi -> Squaresoft's 3D action/plateformer
LSD -> 3d rendering of whatever the hell is happening inside the head of a Japanese man
Medievil -> After 100 years of sleep, a skeleton awakens to beat the crap out of an evil sorcerer (Hack'N'slash 3D action game)
Metal Gear Solid -> Smoking can save your life.
Parasite Eve -> Square's attempt at survival horror (but it's still an RPG)

1999:
Valkyrie Profile -> It's not a metroidvania, it's not an RPG, it's both
Driver -> vroom vroom zoom zoom
Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver -> I'm surprise this haven't been mentioned yet. You're a vampire, but blood isn't good enough, you drink SOULS!
Silent Hill -> the radio stations in this town suck...
Syphon Filter -> Despite the title, it's not an aquarium management game. (3D shooting series (3 games) and a classic of this console)

2000: (year of the ps2 launch but ps1 releases haven't stopped before 2006!)
Spider-Man -> KID MODE! (https://youtu.be/HLI5XIe9p1k)
Spyro: Year of the Dragon -> American Yoshi (3D Action series (3 games) and a classic of this console)
Strider 2 -> 2.5D over-the-top hack'N'slash
Tenchu 2 -> 3D hot ninja action (3D Stealth/Action Series (2 games + a level pack) and a classic of this console)

Overall: (based on the above list and in no particular order)
Castlevania: Symphony of the Night
Final Fantasy 7
Metal Gear Solid
Resident Evil
Soul Reaver

[thorr]

I tried playing again tonight. Jumping Flash 2 gives me an E2 error when I try to start playing the game after the intro videos. Does this work for anyone? Final Fantasy VII is potentially pretty cool, but I don't know what I am doing. It seems like you just run through a set path and give it commands to fight bad guys. Eventually I died, and I don't know what I could have done differently to live. I just keep telling it to attack. Maybe I should watch someone else play on Youtube to see what I am missing. I am going to try Quake II and Forsaken next (games I am familiar with).

[grizzly]

Been a looooong time since i played FF VII but yes there are lots more then just attack!

Then about PS1 on mister.
Personally i have not tried it at all yet even tough i´m dying to, because the core is far from finished and have bugs and games that do not work and so on.
So i will probably wait a couple of months longer, or in other words playing PS1 the whole summer.

[LamerDeluxe]

For me:
WipEout 3 Special Edition (with a neGcon controller) - Hypnotically smooth racing, awesome design and music
Rollcage Stage II (also with a neGcon controller) - Drive on the walls and ceiling, flippable cars, weapons and insane mayhem.
Tekken 3 - Great presentation and game-play, motion-captured animation works really well.
Ridge Racer: Type 4 - Dear announcer, stop saying "My grandmother drives faster than that" during time trials.
Driver, you are the wheelman - zorrobandito described it perfectly in this thread
Special mention: V-Rally 2 with a JogCon controller
Also enjoy WipEout 2097, Crash Bandicoot 2 (the only one of the series I had), Point Blank, Parappa, Gran Turismo 1&2, Metal Gear Solid, Syndicate Wars. PS1 has such a large variation of fun games.

EDIT: Oh no, I forgot Colin McRae Rally (first one) - Driving school with the fun instructor "put yer foot down, you can go faster than that", really enjoyed the game-play.

[thorr]

(with a neGcon controller)

Thanks! I love driving games. One of my favorites on the PC was Porsche Unleashed which is available for the PSX. I tried it briefly, and I am not sure if it is going to be as good as the PC version, but I didn't play it very much yet to really know. I can't stomach it with a thumbstick.

I never heard of the neGcon controller before, but your post prompted me to change the controller type in the MiSTer to neGcon and my PS3 Dualshock controller works with the left thumbstick for steering, and the right thumbstick for break and throttle. This got me very excited to literally dust off my
Logitech G25 driving wheel that was designed for the PS3 and PC usage. Unfortunately, the MiSTer won't use it when I try to assign the joystick in the menu even though it shows up in lsusb. I am really hoping that this can get resolved so I can enjoy all these amazing driving games!

Also, I tried Jumping Flash 2 after upgrading to the latest unstable nightly, and I think I will really enjoy this game once I get the hang of it. It reminds me a lot of Super Mario 64. It can be quite frustrating when you fall to your death and have to start all over again, and I am not quite sure what all these power ups do, but I will figure it all out eventually. Thanks for the recommendation! For now, it gets 2 thumbs up from me.

[LamerDeluxe]

(with a neGcon controller)

Thanks! I love driving games. One of my favorites on the PC was Porsche Unleashed which is available for the PSX. I tried it briefly, and I am not sure if it is going to be as good as the PC version, but I didn't play it very much yet to really know. I can't stomach it with a thumbstick.

Really loved playing Porsche Unleashed with a force feedback wheel on PC, it was like being on a holiday.

I never heard of the neGcon controller before, but your post prompted me to change the controller type in the MiSTer to neGcon and my PS3 Dualshock controller works with the left thumbstick for steering, and the right thumbstick for break and throttle.

Racing games play really well on a PS1 with a neGcon controller, especially steering works much more precise with it than with a thumb stick. It really transforms the WipEout games, making them a very smooth experience.

The actual neGcon controller works on MiSTer, in combination with some of the Playstation to USB controllers. The dead-zone seems to be too large though, I still need to compare this to my actual Playstations.
PS1 steering wheels used the neGcon protocol, so they should also work.

This got me very excited to literally dust off my Logitech G25 driving wheel that was designed for the PS3 and PC usage. Unfortunately, the MiSTer won't use it when I try to assign the joystick in the menu even though it shows up in lsusb. I am really hoping that this can get resolved so I can enjoy all these amazing driving games!

I still have my G25 (and MOMO Force, even though I also have a G27, I should really sell the other ones). Would be great if steering wheels like that worked on MiSTer, now that we have the PSX core.

[FatSlob71]

I gotta Believe

[thorr]

Really loved playing Porsche Unleashed with a force feedback wheel on PC, it was like being on a holiday.

I still have my G25 (and MOMO Force, even though I also have a G27, I should really sell the other ones). Would be great if steering wheels like that worked on MiSTer, now that we have the PSX core.

I used an Act Labs Force RS with RS shifter using a shifting hack for Porsche Unleashed back in the day. At first, I used a program called ShiftIt that would keep track of where your gear was and push up or down several times for you when shifted gears. Later someone came up with a way to directly shift in the game that changed the gear in memory, but during the replay, it didn't know about the shifting unless you shifted again during the replay, and of course the timing would be different and the car would drive all over the place, lol. Good times. I still have my Act Labs wheel. I wonder if that would work with the MiSTer. I opened a github case for the Logitech wheels, so here's hoping!

Another extremely fun driving game back in the day was Whiplash with the 3DFX. When I saw Wipeout being suggested, I was thinking maybe it was that game, but unfortunately not. I have a PC that I am planning to set up with a Voodoo 2 card, so maybe I should get to it and then I can start playing some of those great games again. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EW53laHM6Pg

[AdamM]

Metal Gear Solid is really "the one" for me, particularly to recommend now. It will feel old and clunky in some ways, but it really felt like it was being created to make the most of the PlayStation and not one of those games trying too hard to hit a realism target it could never reach in that era. I played it in 2015 or so and still had a great time with it. Still looks good (great artistic direction) and the music and voice acting are fantastic. And once you get used to ways it might feel unconventional to modern tastes (no over-the-shoulder aiming, fixed camera angles, etc.) it really is very fun to play even now.