With Super Mario Bros. 3, Nintendo created the formula that virtually all of their 2D platforming games have followed since, including last year's hit, New Super Mario Bros. for the Wii console. Its graphics were advanced for the time and its gameplay was much more refined than prior Super Mario Bros. releases, making for a more enjoyable and less frustrating gaming experience. This game has withstood the test of time and is an easy choice for the top spot on this list.

Few games have formed such powerful associations and memories as the challenging Mike Tyson's Punch-Out!!. The game was originally released in Japan as Punch-Out, and was rereleased in the United States in 1990 under the original title after Nintendo's license to use Tyson's likeness expired (his character was replaced with Mr. Dream). Many adults today can still remember the music of this game by heart, burned into their minds as children trying to beat the game's progressively more challenging opponents.

The first game in Nintendo's durable Zelda franchise, this action-adventure/role-playing hybrid was innovative in its gameplay mechanics and inclusion of a "second quest" that began just as the player thought the game was drawing to a close. It was also immensely popular; this game sold 52 million copies and has spawned 15 follow-ups (and counting) across all of Nintendo's subsequent platforms, save the disastrous Virtual Boy.

Ported from the arcade game of the same name, Tecmo Bowl was the best football game of its era and the first to achieve widespread cultural traction. Nowadays, with the advent of EA Sports' Madden franchise, football games are the biggest sellers in the industry; they all have Tecmo Bowl to thank. A rerelease of the game, Tecmo Bowl Throwback, is planned for the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3 consoles later this year.

Contra is perhaps best known for popularizing what is now simply known to gamers as "The Code," a sequence of button presses that enable the player (or players) to start with 30 lives instead of the nearly impossible standard amount. Yet unlike the other Konami releases that featured "The Code," Contra endures for its fun, fast paced gameplay, and for being one of the first games to offer an engaging two-player cooperative campaign on the NES.

Like The Legend of Zelda, Metroid was one of the first games that required players to replay and explore its virtual world as the game progressed, unlocking new abilities and new pathways; this is now the standard format for quality action-adventure games. It also spawned a franchise that continues to this day, with its 11th game arriving later this year for the Wii console.

The original Final Fantasy was far from a major commercial blockbuster (it sold 400,000 copies worldwide), but it paved the way for an explosion in the role-playing game industry. Along with Enix's Dragon Warrior, Final Fantasy was one of the first major role-playing releases for the NES in the United States. The role-playing video game industry has since exploded, and the Final Fantasy franchise has become one of the biggest in entertainment world, selling over 96 million games and spawning two feature films.

In 1987, Double Dragon ruled the arcade with its innovative cooperative beat-em-up gameplay. The NES version of the game was one of the first big ports of a popular arcade title to a home console. While the NES version of the game was limited by technology - simultaneous cooperative gameplay was not yet possible - it was wildly popular, and the franchise generated many sequels and, somewhat inexplicably, a feature film in 1994.

While it may look primitive by modern standards, Double Dribble helped usher in several technological innovations in game design, including the use of cut scenes (slam dunks triggered animations of silvery-looking players jamming the ball home) and speech (with the comically bad announcement of the game's title). Double Dribble remained one of the better basketball games available on a home console until the arrival of NBA Jam in 1994 on the Genesis and Super Nintendo consoles.

Mega Man is now a successful and long-running video game franchise, but that wouldn't have been possible without Mega Man 2. While the first game in the series was a commercial bomb, Mega Man 2 was a huge commercial and critical hit, selling over a million copies. Its graphics and sound, along with a more humane difficulty level, set it apart from its predecessor and laid the ground work for over a dozen follow-ups and multiple TV series.

Considered a classic by many NES enthusiasts, the video game adaptation of the cartoon series DuckTales remains one of the best video games spun off from a TV show. It became a hit due to its solid gameplay, above-average graphics, and, oddly enough, its music, now regarded as some of the best produced in the 8-bit era. The game was also among the first to feature an alternate ending for players who had achieved certain benchmarks during the game, a now-common practice in adventure titles.

In addition to being one of the more fun, simpler NES games, Excitebike is notable in several respects. First, it enabled players to design their own custom tracks, an advanced feature that is still uncommon in games today. Second, it was ported into an arcade game following its release for NES, a rare inversion of the then-standard march of technology.

Ported from an arcade game of the same name, Capcom's Bionic Commando featured some of the most innovative gameplay on the NES. Instead of being able to jump, the player's character instead had a grappling hook that allowed him to swing and climb from platform to platform. It was also one of the first games to feature a stage selection map, an innovation that many action games incorporated (and which Nintendo borrowed for Super Mario Bros. 3 and nearly all of its subsequent 2D action-adventure titles).