Hulk Ultimate Destruction, nothing else comes close.

Friggin car halves as boxing gloves

Starflight, on Sega Genesis/Mega Drive. The graphics don’t look outdated, it just feels retro.

SSX Tricky, Mercenaries, Katamari Damacy, FIFA Street, the various Mario Kart games.

If you count DOSBox as emulation (what it definitely is - unlike WINE it actually emulates an x86 PC and peripherals):

• The Settlers 2: This is a timeless classic. The graphics are 2D, but they still look OK today.
• Albion: A Science Fiction and Fantasy RPG (yes, it has both, and that’a a key point of the story). The gameplay itself isn’t that great, but the lore, story and the graphics are amazing.

I’ve played both on the Deck, and they both work great. (Btw: I did not use Settlers 2 as an example for my DOSBox setup guide by chance. I picked it because it is an amazing game and still fun nowadays.)

F-Zero X on N64

OK, let me fix that for you permanently.

This is Retroachievements.org.

Not only does it do what it says on the tin, but it’s, for my money, the best discoverability tool out there for old games. The most obvious way to use it for that is to check the new games they’ve added achievements to, but they also have book club-style events (they’re revisiting F1 games this month to go with the movie currently in theatres), challenges, seasonal achievements, leaderboards and all sorts of the types of metagaming stats tools you’ve seen in modern platforms to point you in the rigth direction.

You can start by selecting “all games” and sorting them all by players to see what’s popular. Or, hell, reverse sort by players and see what weird crap is in there. Once you start down that rabbit hole you’re more likely to have too much in your retro backlog than you are to ask this question again.

A lot of PS2 games have busted PC ports or ports with invasive EULAs. PS2 is still probably the best way to play GTA: San Andreas.

But really, just pick a console with a graphical aesthetic you like and find the games people buzz about. I’ll give you some recommendations, based mainly on my taste, but a quick “(console) best games” search can help you expand upon this.

NES: Mike Tyson’s Punch-Out, Super Mario Bros 3, Kirby’s Adventure, Castlevania, Mega Man 2, Contra

Genesis/Mega Drive: Streets of Rage 2, Castlevania: Bloodlines, Road Rash, Sonic 2, Contra Hard Corps

SNES: NBA Jam: Championship Edition, Mega Man X, Star Fox 2

PS1: Crash Bandicoot 3: Warped, Crash Team Racing, Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater, Metal Gear Solid

N64: Super Mario 64, Star Fox 64, Banjo-Kazooie, Mario Kart 64, The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time

Dreamcast: Sonic Adventure, Sonic Adventure 2, SoulCalibur

PS2: GTA San Andreas, Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3, Tony Hawk’s Underground 2, Resident Evil 4, Silent Hill 2, Metal Gear Solid 2 & 3, Kingdom Hearts, Kingdom Hearts II, Sly Cooper (entire series)

GameCube: Super Mario Sunshine, Mario Kart Double Dash, The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker, Super Smash Bros Melee, SoulCalibur II

Xbox: Halo, Halo 2, Fable: The Lost Chapters

That’s a decent start, but not comprehensive by any means. Just pick a console with games you like the look of and search the top-rated games, the cream really rises to the top when you’re looking for retro games.

I play through Donkey Kong Country 1 and 2 at least once a year. It is largely nostalgia for me, but goddamn those games are fantastic.

3 is much less so, unfortunately.

Yoshi’s Island is also worth diving into. One of the best 2D Platformers ever made.

The PS2 version of Shadow of the Colossus still looks great to me.

The 2D Castlevania games still hold up well, except the NES ones for being NES hard. Most of them are available for purchase through collections.

NES: Contra, Bubble Bobble, Faxanadu

SNES: Super Metroid, Kirby Superstar, Chrono Trigger

Terranigma (SNES)

Honestly depends on what kind of games you like.

Many Metroid games are classics and still great to play. For the 3D Metroids, you can install Primehack and play Metroid Prime Trilogy for an amazing experience. For the classic style 2D metroids, I’d recommend a play order of Zero Mission (GBA), Samus Returns (3DS), Super Metroid (SNES), and Metroid Fusion (GBA).

Many older mario games are great, both 2D and 3D. Mario 64 has some great recompiled versions, and even stuff like sm64coopdx that lets you play online coop. Mario Sunshine (GCN) is fun too, and both Mario Galaxy (Wii) games are fantastic. Lots of good Zelda games too, such as Wind Waker (GCN/WiiU). Until recently I would have highly recommended Xenoblade X (WiiU), but it just got a remastered and expanded version on switch.

I’ve been playing Gravity Rush from the PS Vita. I went in blind and have been enjoying it so far. I can’t get motion controls to work, but that hasn’t stopped me yet.

There’s a world of options out there and you need to be more specific with what sorts of games you enjoy. I’ve been emulating on my Switch for a while, but also recently bought a dedicated retro emulation console so I have quite a few recommendations.

For games that are literally still up to modern standards, you can go back to Wii, 3DS, PS Vita, PS3 and beyond and you’ve basically got games that will still hold up just fine.

For older games: PSP, PS2, SNES and GBA are gold mines of content.

I’ve found it difficult to get into PS1, N64 and Dreamcast gaming. This was a time when 3D graphics were just starting to be widely used and are so very dated. It’s difficult to look past the terrible graphics without nostalgia goggles. I’ve had more success in going back to SNES and Mega Drive games… At least they have great pixel graphics with suitable games (side scrollers, platformers, etc).

For specific games, I find it best to go to metacritic and look at their list of all time best games, and limit by console and then work through the best every reviews. This does miss a lot of games though and if you say what sort of games you like then people can make recommendations. There are tons of hidden gems and niches… Rhythm games, block drop, quirky puzzle games, etc. E.g.:

Everybody’s Golf 6 (PS3) - excellent arcadey golf game

Mercury Meltdown (PSP) - puzzle game about manipulating mercury blobs. Great to play entirely with the Steam Deck gyroscope.

GTA China Town wars (PSP) - top down GTA game, modernised beyond the GTA2 controls

Rhythm Heaven Fever (Wii) - excellent rhythm games

Super Mario 3D land (3DS) - 2.5 D Mario. Really solid platformer.

Wipeout 2048 (PS Vita) - solid combat racer

Micro machines 2 (Mega Drive) - quirky top down racer. Excellent for multiplayer.

Crazy Taxi (PS2) - taxi driving, really crazy though