You have to pay respects to your elders; without these classic video games we wouldn’t have some of the Triple A titles we have today. Here’s are some of the best retro games to pick up and try in 2025.
It used to be so much simpler back when the 360 and PS3 were the current generation. But that certainly hasn’t been a thing for a while. Now its not just pixel games and your current titles. For the purposes of this article we’re going to ignore that the 8th generation of consoles ft. the WiiU, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One are over 10 years old. Mostly because it makes me feel bad. For the purposes of this list, we’ll be looking at your pre-PS1 era games. Your arcade classics, early home systems and cartridge games are what we’ll be thinking about. So get ready to blow into a cartridge or two as we list 5 retro games worth playing in 2025.
Image via Steam
All Pacman games have an extensive history and a slew of modern re-releases that try and iterate on the formula. The OG is still a brilliant experience and holds up well thanks to its solid gameplay loop and defined rules, making it a great high-score title. It has had some questionable reps at the top level. Pacman is one of the classic arcade games that is still found in real life arcades across the globe. It’s stood the test of time and will go on for many more years.
Credit: Nintendo
Super Mario practically catapulted arcade games to the stratosphere. When you ask a nongamer to list an arcade game, there’s a very high chance that they’re going to list Super Mario Bros games. This game will stack up against any modern title in terms of level design, catchy tunes, gameplay, and more. And who doesn’t love Mario? This franchise put platform games onto another level, with everyone trying to compete with Nintendo to make the next big game.
Image Credit: Sega
Sonic the Hedgehog is back in the limelight after the recent releases of the game adaptations to the big screen, starring the likes of Jim Carrey, James Marsden, and more. It wasn’t the movies that made this little blue hedgehog so popular, though; it was the hundreds of hours people had playing the Sonic games. When you think of what makes Sonic games, you get that in the sequel to the Mega Drive game that came out. People won’t even call it Sonic the Hedgehog two, they will just call it Sonic the Hedgehog, a game they played when they were children.
Image Credit: Steam
Another game that simply stands the test of time, so much so that it’s in modern arcade machines, is Street Fighter 2. This is the ultimate game to settle a score on, and many hours have been spent playing this game at the local games arcade. While the game takes an incredible amount of skill to master, Street Fighter 2 is one that everyone can pick up. Who doesn’t like a good old-fashioned button-mashing game?
Donkey Kong is a classic arcade game, one of the more challenging games out there.The counter to Mario, the Gorilla that steals Princess Peach and forces Mario to have to come save her. If you got a high score in Donkey Kong, you were respected amongst the community.
This is another game that would frequently appear at local arcade stores with everyone trying to beat the community’s high score. Some would say that this was the game that launched Mario into the global franchise it is today, surpassing Donkey Kong and taking over the gaming industry for many decades.
Retro Games and old games from our youth hold a special place in our heart and a memory about the good old days. This feeling is so unique, that games and developers dream of their games eventually becoming the retro title that players seek out and return to years down the line.
The best way to find retro games is seek them out online in their modernized browser version or some new platform that hosts them. If your games are tied to an older console, or you want to play them on your own Nintendo or Atari or even an Arcade machine, seek out Pawn Shops, Garage Sales or old Game Stores that hold physical copies or entire devices containing your games.
Retro games in general should be cheap, yet some may need a dedicated console or a unique setup to run the game making running the game quite costly. If that is the case, your retro games may cost hundreds of dollars just to setup the proper environment or to acquire a unique console to play them.
Yes. Most retro games are cheap and those that aren’t will be eventually added to emulators or special services where you can play the games on your phone or tablet or any device you want to. Most license and rights holders for games will give usage rights to various platforms to run these titles in dedicated emulators for a small fee.
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