The other day I started randomly thinking about this: What are the gold standards in the gaming industry? What games best define their own genre? This is what I set out to figure out.

Let’s go right away and define what “Gold Standard” means. It’s pretty simple. It has to be:
1. A game that defines the genre it’s in.
2. It has to be a high-quality game/series.
3. It still has to be fun to play.
4. Of course, it doesn’t need to be the BEST in the genre, but it has to be the one to have set most of the genre’s standards.
5. It has to be an older game, as much as possible.

So read on and see what are the Gold Standards in the gaming industry! Of course, if I’m missing a genre(there’s some I didn’t put in because I either could think of any 1 game that defined the genre, or that were too similar to another genre that I didn’t need to include them), or if you think about a game that I might not have thought about for any of the categories, be sure to comment!

Action

The Action genre is fairly new. There were multiple games in the genre starting in the Playstation generation, but they were rarely good. The genre really took off when Devil May Cry came out. At the time, it defined the genre. Fast-action, multiple combos depending on the timing of button presses, multiple weapons, badass cutscenes, no cumbersome QTEs… it had it all. Some tried to copy it and failed (*coughgodofwarcough*), others did a fairly good job at taking the concepts from DMC and making their own game(but never as good). But the genre was near perfected when Devil May Cry 3 came out. And THAT is when the Gold Standard of the genre was decided. It took everything from Devil May Cry but made it all better. The original DMC was held back by the fact that it used a slightly modified Resident Evil engine. DMC3 had it’s own engine and was a lot smoother and just overall better than its predecessor.

So the Gold Standard for action games is: Devil May Cry 3. As of the writing of this post, the game to follow the standards it set the best is Bayonetta. We’ll see if it becomes the new Gold Standard in the coming years.

Fighting

There’s really no doubt behind this choice, right? This is THE game everyone thinks about when you mention “fighting games”. It’s still one of the best fighting games, and it’s been at it for all of 19 years. Street Fighter 2 is without a doubt the Gold Standard for the genre. And what better example for what I mean by “Gold Standard”? It’s been around for 19 years, it has consistently been good for 19 years, and people still play it after 19 years(with occasional new versions from time to time). It will always be a great game. Every fighting game after it used the same basic gameplay as it, but they made minor changes to make it their own game. May it be concentrating more on juggling, different button input methods for special attacks, or adding a bunch of cancels, more speed, every fighting game is basically SFII.

So the Gold Standard for fighting games is definitely Street Fighter 2…. any of its millions of incarnations.

Beat’em Up

This is a tough genre to decide on a Gold Standard, mostly because most games in the genre pretty much play exactly the same. So for this one I just had to go for one that is highly recognized and popular. It’s timeless and still a high-quality game. And all that after 23 years in existence. The game I went with here is Double Dragon. No, not the NES version, but the original arcade version. A good Beat ‘em Up always needs multiplayer, which the NES version lacked. Since then there have been tons of Beat ‘em Up games, some just as good, and even better than Double Dragon, but at the basics all of them are following closely in the footsteps of Double Dragon.

This is why Double Dragon is the Gold Standard of the genre.

Platformers

I don’t even know WHY I have that genre on here. the answer is incredibly obvious. May it be Side-Scrolling or 3D platformers, is there a better choice than Mario? No, there isn’t. There were platforming games before Mario came on the NES, but none of them were anywhere as good as what Mario created with its NES incarnations. Mario perfected the side-scrolling platformer with Super Mario Bros 3. In the switch to 3D, Mario was eager to use the new dimension to it’s full potential, and Super Mario 64 was the perfect way of doing so. It might have started the trend of collecting a bunch of things instead of a more linear story progression, but it worked very well with idea.

Mario is easily the Gold Standard of the platforming genre. Super Mario Bros 3 is the Gold Standard for Side-Scrolling Platformers (and has yet to be surpassed). And while I think Super Mario Galaxy was a better game than SM64, it did just follow the standards SM64 set and didn’t really add innovation to the mix. So Super Mario 64 is still the Gold Standard for 3D platformers.

Shooter

By shooter, I mean shoot em’ ups. Side-scrolling or vertical-scrolling games where you control a spaceship or flying magic-user, shooting everything in your way, finding power-ups and dodging millions of bullets (sometimes literally). This is a genre that hasn’t been very well represented in recent years, but it’s still not dying. Neither should it, because the Shmup is one of the more exciting/challenging genres in gaming. What would best represent the genre? I think Gradius fits the best. Gradius 2 to be exact. The arcade version released in 1987. I feel it’s the one that solidified the power-up system(with multiple options) in the series and created better level design for the genre in general. It solidified the genre’s fast-paced bullet-dodging gameplay, had a nice comprehensible upgrade system, cool bosses, it was pretty tough, and being able to choose the upgrade “path” at the beginning set the basis of shmups with multiple characters and play styles.

So the Gold Standard for Shooters is Gradius 2!

Action Platformer

The action platformer is basically a mix of platforming and shmups. It’s not exactly a Shmup, yet not exactly a Platformer, but it concentrates a bit more on fast-paced action rather than the platforming. Contra set the standards for that genre. The NES version I’d say, the arcade original isn’t exactly as fun. There’s bullet’s everywhere, the controls are silky smooth, shooting enemies is fun, it’s challenging, the various different weapons are awesome, Co-op… and there’s the spreader. What’s not to love about Contra?

Contra definitely set the standards for its genre. A genre that is very under-represented nowadays, but a great one nonetheless.

FPS

Another hard choice. Because there are so many of them, and because it’s kinda hard to pinpoint exactly which of them started it all. To get some of them out of the way right now: it’s not Wolfenstein 3D. It’s not Doom or Quake either. Though each of those are definitely inspirations for the Gold Standard, they don’t have enough gameplay elements to count. It has to have, at the least, fast gameplay, cool weaponry and solid multiplayer. A good single player is a nice asset but not exactly a must. It’s a hard choice, but I think Unreal Tournament(released on PC in 1999) takes this one. There’s other good candidates like Goldeneye and Perfect Dark, or even *shrugs* Halo. But UT took the basic multiplayer gameplay from Goldeneye and made it near perfect. It took all the modes and made some modes of its own, made the gameplay millions of times smoother, better controls than basically anything else on the market, the weaponry was a lot more interesting and it was a lot more satisfying to blow the crap out of other people. Not to mention the game’s modability.

So… while it wasn’t exactly an easy choice, I think Unreal Tournament defines what an FPS should be. It might not have a great epic single-player story, but the single-player mode is still quite interesting and playing a LAN game with friends is tons of fun. To this day, all FPS multiplayer is based on modes UT created. (I know some people will disagree with me on this one)

Adventure / Action-Adventure

I originally had a section for both Adventure and Action-Adventure… But suddenly I realized both genres had a similar Gold Standard. I think it’s a simple to find who wins this one. Of course it’s Zelda. I had a few other choices(like Adventure on the Atari 2600), but none of them fit nearly as well as Zelda. The original Zelda is definitely a great adventure game. You have to find hints to get to the next part, you need to find new items to solve puzzles, there’s tons of hidden stuff. Definitely an adventure. There’s really no other game that’s as influencial to the Adventure genre than the first Zelda game. It sets a shitload of standards not only for Adventure games, but for gaming in general. For Action-Adventure games, I’ll says Link to the Past had a bit more influence on the Action part of the genre. The action was faster and more interesting, and the huge amount of items to use in combat just made it that much better.

So the Adventure genre has 2 Gold Standards: the original Zelda for Adventure games, and the faster-paced action gameplay of Link to the Past for Action-Adventure games.

RPG

The RPG genre has a ton of colossus. Giant super series that have existed for over 20 years and that are still popular. Sure, the main inspiration for the genre is basically Pen and Paper RPGs like Dungeons and Dragons, but those definitely can’t count as the Gold Standard. There are 2 series that are the obvious choices for the Gold Standard: Dragon Quest and Final Fantasy. But choosing which game in both series can serve as the Gold Standard… not an easy task. Both series set standards in the whole genre. Final Fantasy 1 and 3 went with the whole “custom team” idea and character classes, as did Dragon Quest 3. Final Fantasy 4 and 6 innovated the kind of story an RPG could tell, as did Dragon Quest 4, 5 and 6, with multi-character/multi-quest epic plots that spanned long time periods…

So let’s cheat this time and say that the Gold Standard for the RPG genre is both the whole of the Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest series(up ntil the final SNES incarnations of both series), why don’t we? Both contributed greatly to the genre, and are the main inspiration to most RPGs now… Other than the ones that use a D&D system, of course. Those series also set the standards for RPG sub-genres such as the Action and Strategy RPG.

RTS

When I think RTS, I think Command and Conquer Red Alert. It’s the game that introduced me to the genre, and it was a very good game. But after replaying it not too long ago and having a bit of trouble with the controls, I realized it couldn’t exactly be the Gold Standard. Nah, the Gold Standard for this is a relatively easy choice: StarCraft. Great fast-paced RTS gameplay, incredible resource management, 3 unique races with completely different gameplay styles and… high-level games are just crazy to watch (not like I have the skills required to actually play in those high-level matches). It’s no wonder there’s still a ton of people playing the game online, and that’s probably not going to change, even when Starcraft 2 comes out.

There’s little doubt about this one(though I did consider WarCraft 2 for a minute there, before remembering that StarCraft exists), the Gold Standard of the RTS is StarCraft.

Simulator

The simulator… Now I don’t mean Flight Simulators, or Train Simulators, or Racing Simulators, or Rape Simulators. What I mean is games where you’re given a city, or people, or companies, and you have to manage them. Getting money to build up, keeping residents/clients happy, becoming as successful as possible… that’s what I’m talking about. Though my favorite in the genre is probably the original Roller Coaster Tycoon game, there is little doubt in my mind that Sim City set the standards for the genre.

With its multiple scenarios and innovative gameplay and features, Sim City set the standards for the Simulator genre (and spawned a needlessly high amount of sub-series).

Racing (arcade)

It’s Ridge Racer!

RIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIDGE RAACEEEEEEEEER!!!
(I could go on and talk about how it did things that no other racing game before did and such… but I won’t waste my time when just 2 words is all I need)

Racing (Simulator)

The racing simulator genre is still a young genre. The game that I think set the standards is Gran Turismo 2. Sure I think Forza 3 is a lot better and might be setting standards itself, but until Gran Tursimo 5 comes out (it’s not out as of the writing of this post), I’ll hold back and keep an older game as the Gold Standard here.

So Gran Turismo 2 it is!

Music

The music genre exploded recently. But it’s been going on for a while. Before Guitar Hero and Rock Band, there was only one: Dance Dance Revolution. Okay, that’s a bit wrong. Other games came out a bit before/around the same time in the genre(like Beatmania), but the first one to really have an impact was DDR. It started out a bit basic, but the fun and original techno music and the new type of fun gameplay had instant appeal. Sure, we all looked like morons playing the game (unless we had insane skills… which I didn’t), but we had lots fun(AND it was great exercise). The gameplay was fast and frantic, the music was occasionally interesting(though newer versions just slap on a bunch of crappy pop music… the older Konami Originals are badass), it was challenging, and becoming good at it was very satisfactory.

Now we have Rock Band, which takes the fun DDR gameplay in a good direction with multiple instruments and such, but the game that set all the standards for the genre is definitely Dance Dance Revolution. So that’s the Gold Standard this time.

Puzzle

One day I woke up and my Gameboy had Tetris in it. I could never get it out.
Also: Tetris music by Powerglove
And this too: Tetris God (it’s so true)
And maybe a bit of this: Brentalfloss
Why the hell not?: First-person Tetris (even like that it’s insanely fun)

I don’t need to say anything about Tetris…. Really. I think it’s the most obvious Gold Standard in the list.

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