A couple of video games I played and can recommend:

• Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire
• Super Mario 64

A couple of video games I played and can recommend:

• Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire
• Super Mario 64

Games I played that didn't impress me as much:

• F-Zero X

A couple of video games (both console and PC) I played and can recommend without reservation. The order of the list should not imply any particular quality or preference, I'll just extend the list as I find time and can get access to the necessary recording environment:

• Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire

  When Star Wars was still Star Wars, this amazing game was published. It's the only Star Wars game I ever played through completely and one of the first 3D Star Wars games. I also read the novel, a great addition if you want to know more of the story behind the game. It takes place between Empire Strikes Back and Return Of The Jedi. In contrast to many other games of the game, this game has third-person-view shooter sections, two "plane" piloting sections, a section taking place on a fast freight train, a bike-riding section and an arcade-shooting like section. It even has a jetpack, allowing for six degrees of freedom of movement in some of the third-person sections. And then of course there is the amazing Star Wars soundtrack. I also want to mention the craziest cheat code I ever used, occurring in this game - you had to use both hands and your nose to enter it, but it enables amazing features. I see that supposedly the reception of the game was "mixed" and I can't agree with most of the criticisms. The controls are perfectly fine, especially compared to competing console games of the time. It is also not "extremely difficult" unless you suffer from some handicap.

  

• Super Mario 64

  Enough has been said about this game, but it also was the first 3D jump'n'run/platformer I played and so far still the best. The wide variety of levels, the many different movement abilities, the 120 different stars to collect and the iconic soundtrack mean you can spend a lot of time in this game without getting bored. And even though it is close to impossible to lose all your lives in this game (in contrast to older Mario games), it isn't trivial. Many riddles have to be solved, many tightrope balancing acts have to be completed and every corner of the castle has to be checked to get the 120th star. Beating Bowser the second and third time also requires quite a bit of skill and maybe even luck. I did complete the game, but I took my time. It may feel less like a jump'n'run because there is so little shooting and evading enemies involved and because essentially no enemy can one-hit-kill you, but the challenges of 3D movement (and 3D camera management - maybe the only suboptimal part of the game) make up for that. As this was a launch title and was sold bundled with the console, Super Mario 64 was probably the first 3D console game they ever played for many people, making a first impression that is hard to top. I may have played 3D PC games before, but they were not quite on the same level (Doom was very impressive, but I think I played this after Super Mario 64).

  

Other games I have played, but didn't find as impressive. I'm not saying they are bad, they just didn't sweep me off my feet. I list them as contrast to the list above, to give my statements some qualification:

• F-Zero X

Nota bene: Where I present video clips, I try to present them as they would have presented on the original hardware. Thus Nintendo 64 clips will have resolutions like 320x240. Don't get fooled by modern emulators' default settings, those present the games in an anachronistic fashion. While it's fine trying to make older games look more modern (and I'm all in favor of projects like Quake 2 RTX), I want to preserve the original look of the games. Games only come alive in the mind of the viewer anyway, no amount of screen trickery can get around that.