I mean, when you open it up to 16-bit, you really get into what is considered a golden age of videogames. It gets really hard to whittle down a list when you've got the SNES library alone, with classics like Star Fox, Super Mario World, Legend of Zelda: Link to the Past, Super Metroid, Harvest Moon, Final Fantasies II and III (U.S. numbering), Chrono Trigger, Secret of Mana, Mario Paint, Pilotwings, Donkey Kong Country, F-Zero, Super Mario Kart, Earthbound, Megaman X, Super Castlevania IV, Actraiser, Dragon Quest V...
...and this is right off the top of my head. I haven't even started on the Sega Genesis library, which is almost as long and storied. And I've omitted cross-platform titles and ports, because you simply don't need them at this point to overwhelm the selection criteria. The death of the arcade was undeserving and not for lack of quality work either, but somewhat understanding since the home console market was so consistently amazing that arcades just couldn't compete with them. Not even the ultra-wide screen 6-player X-Men. And 16-bit PC games from around the same time invented the AAA gaming industry.
I was a Nintendo kid, so most of my personal favorite titles from the 16-bit era were Nintendo titles. Even narrowing the field to just the SNES, I honestly can't pick 10, there are simply too many deserving titles in contention for the list, and adding Gameboy games to the list doesn't really help. Nintendo had a great generation. Squaresoft had a great generation. Rare had a great generation. Capcom had a great generation. Pick a title from any of their SNES libraries, and odds are it deserves a spot in the top 10.
For me, anyways, it's a lot easier to discuss a top 10 from the 8-bit era.
Duck Tales (NES/Gameboy, Capcom). With enough entries in the 16-bit list, this title would still good enough to break into the list before some other SNES classics. The gameboy port was faithful and great road entertainment, as well.
Pokemon Red and Blue (Gameboy, Game Freak). Honestly, late-era Gameboy games are almost unfair to include in the list, because they were amazing works.
Super Mario Land 3: Wario Land (Gameboy, Nintendo). I mean, see what I mean? Great platformers that were moving the genre forward came out on Gameboy hardware, alongside other SNES platformers that were still catching up.
Super Mario Bros. 3 (NES, Nintendo). But okay, I can probably keep myself to the NES and earlier at this point, I just needed to get those few in.
Final Fantasy (NES, Squaresoft). Honestly, I can understand why Square didn't bring FFII to the U.S. But why not FFIII? It would likely have supplanted the original's place in this list.
Mega Man 2 (NES, Capcom). Legend is that this was an unfunded work of love. I have a cousin who can still beat this game with just the arm buster.
Tetris (Everyting, Multiple developers). I mean, I should be rightfully strung up if I don't include this.
Legend of Red Dragon (BBS, Robinson Technologies). I mean, I had to do something with Mom's dumb terminal and modem, and one of my teachers introduced me to the world of BBSes. Ironically, not one of the teachers from the school's computer room. That's a long story for another place.
Kaboom! (Atari 2600, Activision). Personal tilt here. I kept coming back to this one, and a number of Activision titles for the 2600, even after our family had an NES with a respectable library.
Pac-man (Arcade, Namco). I'm going to level with folks here. Asteroids was great, Missile Command was great, Battlezone was epic, but in terms of time and quarters spent in the 8-bit era, Pac-man had my loyalty.
Criminey, I'm out of slots. Uhh... honorable mentions (in no particular order or platform):
Asteroids
Missile Command
Battlezone
TMNT (yeah, that one)
TMNT II: The Arcade Game (yeah, I'll mention the version that was back-ported to 8-bit on the NES)
Arkanoid
Breakout
Defender
Video Pinball
Starmaster
Metroid
Combat
Donkey Kong
Barren Realms
Igloo!
Donkey Kong Jr.
QBasic Gorillas (does that even count at 8-bit? Probably was 16-bit...)
Mixed Up Mother Goose (Hey, I was four at the time. I get to include this.)
Oregon Trail (ran out of room, to my shame)
Track and Field
Excitebike
Duck Hunt
The Legend of Zelda
...ah hell, who am I kidding, this list is never going to end.
