Face-Off: Which ’90s Video Game Is the Best?

It’s ‘90s week here at IGN and we are celebrating all the wonderful things that made this special decade one to remember. Movies and TV obviously had their standouts, but the ‘90s also saw the release of some of the most important video games and consoles of all time. With key moments, like the epic battle between Nintendo and Sega to the arrival of 3D games like Super Mario 64 and Final Fantasy VII that changed how we played forever, it’s hard to overstate the importance of those 10 years. However, which game was the best of the best? We can’t possibly hope to answer this question alone without your help.

Do you think Super Mario World deserves the top spot? How about The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time or Metal Gear Solid? We’ve selected 163 of the best ‘90s games to “Face-Off” against each other two at a time, and you’ll have to make the difficult choice between them to help us crown the ultimate ‘90s game. Will you choose Half-Life over Unreal Tournament? Resident Evil over Pokemon Red? The choice is yours…

(And don’t forget, you can pass on a Face-Off round if you don’t know a character by just hitting “skip” at the bottom of the page.)

Click here to start voting in Best ‘90s Video Game Face-Off!

What Is a Face-Off?

Like the name suggests, a Face-Off pits two games against one another and you decide which one is the superior of the two. In this case, you are voting to determine what the best ‘90s video game is. It’s possible to see certain games multiple times, so you can keep voting for your favorites to ensure they get ranked higher than the rest. IGN’s resident team of ‘90s experts pre-selected 163 games for you to choose from. These get randomly paired up and each time you pick a winner, it’s tracked.

How Is the Winner Determined?

When voting ends on August 3, we’ll tally up the total number of “wins” and “losses” each ‘90s video game has and create a ranked list based on your choices that will go live on August 4. The game that won the most match-ups will be crowned the “winner,” and in the event of a tied number of “wins,” the game with the least “losses” will take the top spot. If you continue to keep voting for your favorite game, they’ll have a better chance of ranking high on the list. You can vote as many times as you want until the Face-Off closes.

How Do I Know When I’ve Clicked Through Everything?

It’s difficult to know when you’ve seen every ‘90s video game included because they are matched randomly, and there are many possible match-ups. Playing until you vote for all your favorites or ensuring that certain games don’t get in the winner’s circle are different options you can take with a Face-Off. By deciding the winner throughout all these match-ups, you’re ensuring that your picks for the best ‘90s video game will have a fighting chance to reach the top of the list.

Which ‘90s Games Have You Included?

This list of ‘90s video games has been created without considering limits of console, region, or otherwise. The only criteria was that it had to be released somewhere in the 1990s and it had to be a game we feel deserves the chance to fight for the crown. Are we missing one of your favorite games? Be sure to let us know in the comments below!

Click here to start voting in Best ‘90s Video Game Face-Off!

For more, check out our welcome to 90s week @ IGN letter and our look at how Dreamcast killed Sega’s hardware reign.

Adam Bankhurst is a news writer for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter @AdamBankhurst and on Twitch.