The Best Nintendo Game Every Year 1983 - 2024
35. 1990 - F-Zero
Using your underdog marketing to directly call out your competition is incredibly bold. “Genesis Does What Nintendon’t” was the battle cry of Sega that their console and its so-called blast processing were capable of far more than Nintendo’s new machine.
But Ninty let their games do the talking, and F-Zero screamed into high gear in a way that made players' jaws drop.
The ingenious use of Mode 7, the overclocked frame rate and the astounding 16-bit soundtrack meant that console gaming had rarely felt so futuristic and exciting. Where some games used Mode 7 sparingly but effectively, it was the core component of Nintendo’s sci-fi racer. This enabled players to see far more of the track ahead of them and gave an incredible illusion of 3D, allowing the team to construct a wholly original racing game.
Which is another notch of Captain Falcon’s bounty-hunting belt. Whilst Super Famicom games released at a steady pace, the console launched in Japan with two titles. One was the wonderful (but safe) Super Mario World. The other was this intense racing IP that came out of nowhere and left Sega lusting for a super-fast title of their own.