Super Mario Kart: Most Influential Video Game in History

[wraggster]

Super Mario Kart has the longest legacy and the biggest impact on video games in history, according to Guinness World Records which compiled a list of the top 50 consoles games of all time.

Tasked with selecting the best console games of all time, contributors of this year's Gamer's Edition reviewed hundreds of releases to compile a list of the top 50 titles ranked on their initial impact and lasting legacy.

Tetris ranks in at number two, according to the list, and the original Grand Theft Auto is in the number three spot. Where does Super Mario Bros. turn up? Way down at number 17, beneath Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas.

Guinness World Records Editor-in-Chief, Craig Glenday, said of the selection process: "We knew this would be a complex task so we invited a crack team of industry experts to form a judging panel - and the result is a "top 50" list of games ranked both on their importance and on how fun they are to play."

I would love to know who was on their team, because their picks are just friggin insane.

The team said they picked Super Mario Kart for the top spot because it is the best-selling racer on the SNES, the GameCube and the DS. Tetris, a good choice for number two, was selected because it is available on at least 50 different gaming platforms. And Grand Theft Auto holds the record for the most controversial series of games.

The full list, shown here, appear in the newly-released Guinness World Records 2009 Gamer's Edition.

Look over that list and then tell us what your top ten picks would have been. Keep in mind this is being judged on a game's initial impact and lasting legacy, not necessarily how fun they were.

1. Super Mario Kart
2. Tetris
3. Grand Theft Auto
4. Super Mario World
5. Zelda Ocarina of Time
6. Halo
7. Resident Evil IV
8. Final Fantasy XII
9. Street Fighter II
10. GoldenEye
11. Super Mario 64
12. Tomb Raider
13. Metal Gear Solid
14. Call of Duty 4
15. Sonic the Hedgehog 2
16. GTA San Andreas
17. Super Mario Bros
18. Zelda: A Link to the Past
19. Gran Turismo
20. Final Fantasy VII
21. Pro Evolution Soccer 4
22. The Orange Box
23. Lego Star Wars Complete Saga
24. Tekken 2
25. Wii Sports
26. Pokemon Red/Blue
27. Guitar Hero
28. Project Gotham Racing 4
29. Super Mario Galaxy
30. Resident Evil
31. Ico
32. Chrono Trigger
33. Gunstar Heroes
34. Soul Calibur
35. Advance Wars
36. Ridge Racer
37. Super Metroid
38. Castlevania: Symphony of the Night
39. GTA Vice City
40. BioShock
41. Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic
42. The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening
43. God of War
44. Sega Rally Championship
45. Starfox 64
46. Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion
47. WarioWare Inc
48. Saturn Bomberman
49. Crash Bandicoot
50. Outrun 2

http://kotaku.com/5160745/super-mario-kart-most-influential-video-game-in-history

[JDvorak]

Okay my top ten console games would have been much different, some the same as on their list but in different positions.

1. Prince of Persia
2. Super Mario Bros.
3. Tomb Raiders
4. Sonic the Hedgehog
5. Street Fighter II
6. Resident Evil 2
7. Mortal Kombat
8. The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time
9. Army Men: Sarge's Heroes
10. Super Mario 64

[WhizzBang]

A bit of a jumbled up list that one. I think it would make more sense to do it by genre like so:

Driving games
Super Mario Kart
Gran Turismo
Ridge Racer

First Person Shooters
Doom
Quake
Half Life

Puzzle games
Tetris
(it stands alone)

[dejkirkby]

Did gaming only start in the 90's?
The people who compiled this list seem to think so.

[kojiro7]

Ico,Oblivion,Crash Bandicoot,Saturn Bomberman,Bioshock,Star Wars KOTOR,Guitar Hero,Lego star wars,COD 4,Project Gotham 4,GTA 1,The orange box,warioware inc,Guitar hero,Gunstar Heroes,Halo,Advance wars,DO NOT deserve to be in that list

[Auriman1]

It's pretty hard to make a very good list of the top ten most influential games with lasting impact that extends out of its own series, but I'll give it a shot:

1. Super Mario Bros.
2. Pokemon
3. Tetris
4. Final Fantasy
5. The Legend of Zelda: OoT
6. Super Mario 64
7. Super Mario Kart
8. Goldeneye
9. Dragon Quest
10. Doom

[mike_jmg]

I really think that list needs some makeup
Okay, initial impact and lasting legacy

1. Super mario Bros
2. Tetris
3. Doom
4. Pokemon Red/Blue
5. Final Fantasy VII
6. Street Fighter II
7. The legend of Zelda Ocarina of time
8. Grand theft auto III
9. God of War
10. Devil May Cry

This is my list based on their impact and lasting legacy. Acutually I never played FFVII until recently, and I got bored, even so lots of people love it. Same as doom, which I think is the predecesor of all modern FPS games and I never got the hang of it

[apex05]

What about pong, space invaders, asteroids and pac man? Obviously just too old fashioned for Guinness

[darkriku2000]

If we're talking about influence then the first final fantasy should definitely be on that list

[maxipower90]

What about pong, space invaders, asteroids and pac man? Obviously just too old fashioned for Guinness

dude while they are indeed classics they are hardly ground breaking.

on the other hand it just shows that they just like everyone else just throws the big names on the list... Halo 6th most influencely game ever, yea yea right

and Castlevania: Symphony of the Night is 37th? tell me why its a complete clone of Super Metroid which only came 36th like what games has been influenced by Symphony of the Night. im not dissing on the game but just were it stands behind Super Metroid.

Soul Calibur and Tekken on the same list is there any need like, both made by the same company round the same time and both fighting games that has been stamped into the gaming world

also games like Chrono Trigger, FF7 and goldeneye, like everyone knows there overrated by a mile and they got in

[juiceface]

what about pong? :(

[apex05]

If you talking about influential games, those early games i mentioned just can't ever be ignored, i mean the first time someone plays a Atari 2600 in the 70's and see's that pressing a button can like magic make things happen on a tv screen, anyone old enough to remember games like Pong will tell you the kind of influence it had on them

[CraigG]

What an unbelievably dumb list. I write for various gaming publications, so I know plenty about games of all ages, but even the man on the street would look at that list and go 'bwuh?'

OutRun 2 is a great game, but influential? Not remotely. After all, it's hardly spawned a flurry of arcade-oriented racers, and the game itself had forerunners.

That Robotron—the game that spawned dual controls—isn't even on the list is just unforgivable, as is the lack of Pong, Tank, Space Invaders, Battlezone, Pac-Man and Donkey Kong, to name a few obvious omissions.

Hell, a bit of research and you can trace paths back easily enough. There are lots of horizontally scrolling platform games, and the most famous is SMB. Stick that on the list, or the game that inspired it, Pac-Land. For FPS games, go back to true milestones, Quake or Doom, not modern titles.

By that list, I'm actually shocked Tetris made it on at all, let alone got the #2 spot.

EDIT: OK, so it's a console list and of 'top games', not necessarily influential ones, according to Guinness, but it's still pretty subjective.

[DrBlue]

Number 1: Worms 3D
Number 2: world Cup Italia '90 (Master System)

It just makes sense.

[kojiro7]

What an unbelievably dumb list. I write for various gaming publications, so I know plenty about games of all ages, but even the man on the street would look at that list and go 'bwuh?'

OutRun 2 is a great game, but influential? Not remotely. After all, it's hardly spawned a flurry of arcade-oriented racers, and the game itself had forerunners.

That Robotron—the game that spawned dual controls—isn't even on the list is just unforgivable, as is the lack of Pong, Tank, Space Invaders, Battlezone, Pac-Man and Donkey Kong, to name a few obvious omissions.

Hell, a bit of research and you can trace paths back easily enough. There are lots of horizontally scrolling platform games, and the most famous is SMB. Stick that on the list, or the game that inspired it, Pac-Land. For FPS games, go back to true milestones, Quake or Doom, not modern titles.

By that list, I'm actually shocked Tetris made it on at all, let alone got the #2 spot.

EDIT: OK, so it's a console list and of 'top games', not necessarily influential ones, according to Guinness, but it's still pretty subjective.

That list is for console games.But its all wrong,how can they have a game such as Lego star wars in it???

[DaviL]

i think who wrote this article never play.
most influential games was super mario bros.
STOP.

[Eyedunno]

what about pong? :(
That's a toughy. While it's historically important, I wouldn't say that it qualifies as very "influential", except on games like Arkanoid.

My top-ten list:
1) Super Mario Bros. (launched the platforming sidescroller craze and introduced a slew of famous characters)
2) Pac-Man (made gaming mainstream)
3) Tetris (was a shot in the arm for portable gaming and spawned a whole slew of imitators)
4) Wolfenstein 3D (was the first popular FPS)
5) Final Fantasy (brought Japanese-style roleplaying to the world at large)
6) Street Fighter II (brought sophisticated competitive play to a market otherwise saturated with platformers)
7) Space Invaders (another iconic game that did a lot for the popularity of gaming as a whole)
8) Legend of Zelda (mixed action and roleplaying elements)
9) Super Mario 64 (added a third dimension to platforming, while staying very fun)
10) Pole Position (first modern racing game)

Honorable mentions: Adventure (may not be all that influential on modern gaming, but brought entertainment capabilities to home PCs at a time when few of them could even display graphics at all, and is thus kind of a granddaddy to home gaming in general)

My list probably isn't perfect, but it blows away Guinness'.

[Darksaviour69]

Number 2: world Cup Italia '90 (Master System)


That was a AWESOME game!!!

SWWS on that saturn was they only footy game to beat it!

[JDvorak]

People as has been said before this is a console list. Most of the games you are listing are for computers and arcades. While games like space invaders and pac-man have shown up on consoles it was not the console versions that made them influential. Stick to a console list. I included Prince of Persia because the Genesis updated graphics and the better levels of the SNES stuck out in my mind as great console versions of the Apple II original. But I didn't include games like Doom and Wolfenstein 3D because the console versions just sucked. I have the SNES carts for Doom and Wolfenstein 3D and the Sega 32x cart of Doom and they are just bad. The Saturn and Playstation versions of Doom are ok at best. The N64 Doom wasn't bad. But then again all the ports of the these games pale in comparison to the downloads of the Shareware version of Doom for the PC when it came out. On my old modem it took me 6 hours to get the shareware version of Doom for the PC and cost me a fortune in long distance phone charges from Alaska. It cost me more to get that game downloaded than to buy the special edition of Doom 3 in the collectors tin on the X-Box. And it included full versions of Doom.

[WhizzBang]

My top-ten list:
1) Super Mario Bros. (launched the platforming sidescroller craze and introduced a slew of famous characters)
2) Pac-Man (made gaming mainstream)
3) Tetris (was a shot in the arm for portable gaming and spawned a whole slew of imitators)
4) Wolfenstein 3D (was the first popular FPS)
5) Final Fantasy (brought Japanese-style roleplaying to the world at large)
6) Street Fighter II (brought sophisticated competitive play to a market otherwise saturated with platformers)
7) Space Invaders (another iconic game that did a lot for the popularity of gaming as a whole)
8) Legend of Zelda (mixed action and roleplaying elements)
9) Super Mario 64 (added a third dimension to platforming, while staying very fun)
10) Pole Position (first modern racing game)



Very well put.

I think Super Mario Kart was influential not just for inventing the kart racer, but also for it's handling of unlockables. Before SMK these were rare in games but afterwards they became pretty much standard.

Jet Set Radio was influential in that it introduced cell shaded graphics.

Knight Lore for the ZX Spectrum was hugely influential in its day for it's isometric view gameplay. There had been a few isometric view games before it, but there were loads that followed the Knight Lore style after it. These types of games died out with the advent of real 3d, but Knight Lore was reckoned to be the 2nd most ripped off piece of software ever - after VisiCalc which was the first spreadsheet program.