Easily one of the all-time great RPGs, Shining Force II on the Mega Drive took a great original and improved it tenfold. The decision to ditch the chapter system in favour of freely roaming the map granted the player much greater scope to explore and discover – I remember finding an academy of monks and thinking “I shouldn’t be here!” because it was a secret!

The battle system is always the core of a Shining game, and although SFII introduces fewer new features than the series’ third instalment it’s hard to complain when it’s so close to perfection. Each character has a clear role to play, and even if you don’t like them there are plenty of others waiting to take their place, from the seemingly useless lizard (whom I named Verol after the NiGHTS enemy!) to an endless array of centaurs, archers and birdmen. There’s also opportunity to access a limited number of extra promotions for your characters such as Pegasus Knight, meaning there’s always something to come back for. The battle scenarios themselves are imaginatively designed – keeping your Force out of the sightlines of the Prism Flowers, fighting the huge Kraken (an SF staple) and felling Taros with Bowie’s Achilles Sword all stand out almost ten years since I first played it.

The music also deserves special mention for providing a wide range of rousing, chilling and relaxing pieces as high quality as any other RPG. Working on a number of themes, yet each distinctive enough to stand out, the music excels at drawing you into Granseal.  Princess Ellis, in particular, is one of the all-time great pieces of RPG music. It’s almost a shame Motoaki Takenouchi was replaced by the rather less subtle (in my eyes) Motoi Sakuraba for the third instalment, but to be honest he would have struggled to beat this stunning soundtrack.

Following the traditional RPG route of a young group of friends gaining strength to vanquish a great evil, Shining Force II does little new over the first one, but does it so brilliantly it doesn’t really matter. A truly great game and, with the exception of Shining Force III, better than any Shining game since.

If Team Andromeda had intended for Panzer Dragoon to be played in nightclubs, they would have created Rez. Tetsuya Mizuguchi changed the rhythm genre with Space Channel 5 and the puzzle genre with Lumines, but neither approaches the beauty and ingenuity of Rez.

Essentially, Rez is an on-rails shooter in the classic mould of AfterBurner, Space Harrier, Panzer Dragoon and more. There are no bullets, just lock-on lasers, of which you can fire up to eight at a time. Each level is divided into ten areas with a final boss, and to pass each area you must simply find and destroy a small box. It doesn’t sound hugely innovative, but every aspect of the game exudes style, elevating it far beyond its simple concept.

Graphically speaking, Rez is the most unexpectedly beautiful game you’re likely to encounter. Made up of simple wireframe models against a black void, it’s like being back in a 1980s Atari arcade game, but this simplicity is deceiving; the beauty is in the execution of such minimalism, with no need to introduce huge explosions or cluttered backgrounds. There’s a wonderful sense of fluidity and inertia to the game, and you can feel yourself gaining momentum as you approach each of the five stunning bosses.

Part of that sense of acceleration is down to the astonishing soundtrack, which does the impossible by making me like dance music. Each level begins extremely sparsely, with perhaps a simple drumline and some bass, but grows with each area, swelling into some of the most exciting and adrenaline-boosting music I’ve heard in a game. I could tell it was good when I found my heart beating faster and my foot tapping halfway through the first level of my first play. Couple that with the now infamous "trance vibrator" and you’re left with a completely euphoric experience that leaves you sweating every bit as much as any Wii game.

There’s just something revelatory about playing Rez that I can’t define. In spite of its simplicity, it’s not a casual game by any means, and I’ve found it requires quite a level of preparation to enjoy it properly. Such preparation will be familiar to any gamer – curtains closed, lights down, music up – but the idea of creating atmosphere for the game is a huge part of its appeal. It doesn’t work in daylight; it’s an intimate, sometimes demanding experience that reciprocates your input tenfold.

Rez is a classic Sega game because I can’t imagine it coming from any other publisher. It’s a testament to the freedom and expression they afford to their most talented staff that such a game got made when it would perhaps have been easier for Sega to push Mr Mizuguchi back towards more lucrative arcade driving games. Such integrity is a classic Sega characteristic.

Rez‘s rarity on Dreamcast and PlayStation 2 places a high price barrier in front of many people after the original dance-on-a-disc game, but with Rez HD one of the best-selling games on Xbox Live (which must please Mr Mizuguchi after Lumines Live‘s poor performance!) there’s never been a better time to access this true classic in Sega’s history.

One thing unites the games in this top fifteen: they all have class. They might be flawed, they might not be universally agreed on as the greatest Sega games ever, but they are all undeniably wonderful games with tremendous class, and nowhere is this more evident than Panzer Dragoon Zwei.

The original Panzer Dragoon in 1995 introduced us to the series’ bizarre world, but Zwei (or PDZ) threw us deeper into its military struggles from the point of view of a young boy named Lundi and his Khouriat, Lagi. We soon discover that Lagi has the power to fire laser blasts, and so when Lundi’s village is attacked the two do their best to defend their settlement, and from then on a huge adventure is set into motion.

The action itself is very similar to the on-rails original, but different paths are available at certain points which bring replay value to the levels. As you progress through the game your dragon gains strength and changes shape depending on your score, evolving into the most powerful dragon only if you achieve 100% shot-down ratio on each level, a task to test even the most skilled players. The evolution system went onto influence Panzer Dragoon Saga and Panzer Dragoon Orta extremely heavily.

Panzer games are always an aesthetic treat, and PDZ was arguably one of the greatest-looking games of its time, at least until Panzer Dragoon Saga. The tremendous and coherent design shines through with incredible architecture and enemies, with several highlights including the enormous Alien-like creature in Episode 3 and the classic waterway chase in Episode 4. Each time it manages to make the scripted events seem surprising and spontaneous, and with the addition of Pandora’s Box makes each playthrough different.

All in all, Panzer Dragoon Zwei is a stunning achievement that stands up even now as a wonderful shoot ‘em up that succeeds by making the Panzer world one of the most alive and amazing ever created, and sits perfectly as one of the dozen best Sega classics.

I never fully understood Sonic CD‘s quality until I bought it for the Mega CD this year (best year EVER). I’d dabbled in the PC and Sonic Gems Collection releases, but when I got the original edition I sat down to play it as it was first intended, and it completely blew me away.

One of my favourite aspects of Sonic CD is Sonic’s animation – just before Sonic 3 made him a more rounded character (in more ways than one), Sonic CD gives us a lean, lithe Sonic, who manages to combine grace and menace in his movements. The level backdrops all feature trademark Sonic touches, from swaying trees to running water, and the bosses stride and stamp on anything in their way.

Speaking of animation, the introductory movie stands as the greatest moving depiction of Sonic ever, as he races through the green fields, the sun racing through the blue sky filled with clouds (and so on…). He breaks boulders, runs on water and even leaves a rainbow when he splashes water behind him. It’s exhilarating and is one of very, very few animations to demonstrate it actually “gets” Sonic. The ending is every bit as good too, of course.

The biggest innovation seen in Sonic CD was the introduction of time travel to the mix, and its success is a big raspberry to anyone who claims Sonic was only ever about speed. Within each level lies a number of time posts, which when activated let you travel back or forwards through time when you reach the right speed (88mph, perhaps?). It’s not just a gimmick, with new routes available in each time period, and destroying Dr Robotnik’s factory in each Act’s past creates an amazingly joyful future, full of blue skies and free animals. Even the music changes, with the Good Future Palmtree Panic being one of my favourite Sonic tunes ever.

One thing that came to mind whilst writing this article was how good a brand new 2D Sonic would have been on the Sega Saturn. It was such a powerful 2D machine that a new game designed to take advantage of all its features would have been absolutely amazing, especially when the Sonic Xtreme videos show what was being achieved in 3D. I suppose I’ll have to add that to the bottom of my list of Sonic regrets.

Sandwiched between Sonic 2 and Sonic 3, Sonic CD bridges the gap beautifully, combining Sonic 2‘s style with Sonic 3‘s heavy exploration, creating an adventure that still amazes over fifteen years after its release.

Thanks to UK:Resistance for providing the screenshots!

Following on from the superb first game, Streets of Rage 2 goes bigger and better, with more characters, chunkier graphics and even more dance classics from Yuzo Koshiro.

The bazooka support attacks from the first game are replaced by life bar-sapping special moves like Axel’s Fire Punch, and keeping the fights at this close-range works in the game’s favour immensely. Two-player mode ramps the intensity up further, and teaming up with a friend to take down the scores of thugs is as satisfying as games get. New characters Max and Skate occupy opposite ends of the speed-power spectrum, keeping all four fighters different enough to mean everyone’s favourite is good enough to take down Mr Big.

One last word on the game’s music, which just like Headhunter raises the game’s quality significantly, but in this case the quality is already stunningly high. Yuzo Koshiro’s dance beats keep the blood pumping through each level, and every piece is something close to nirvana. It’s hard to believe this is the same Yuzo Koshiro who went on to craft such subtle piano tracks for Shenmue, but in the early 90s it was all about dance, and nobody did it better.

Streets of Rage-style games seem to have gone out of fashion over the past few generations, which is a real shame as there’s huge possibilities for four-player combat and online play. Sega tried to keep the genre going with Die Hard Arcade in 1997 and later Spikeout, both of which are decent games just missing a certain spark. Streets of Rage II has sparks in abundance, and even some fifteen years on, it’s still the pinnacle of the scrolling beat ‘em up genre.