Best of Retro XP, 2021

A look back at my favorite pieces of mine from the year that was.

December 29, 2021

We’re nearing the end of 2021, so, it’s time to recap the year. Big picture, I wrapped up the project that kicked off this entire venture — ranking and writing up the top 101 Nintendo games of all time — and also did a little celebration for the 30th anniversary of Sonic the Hedgehog, and a month-long celebration of the 25th anniversary of the Nintendo 64. If I’m not miscounting, I published 145 Retro XP entries in total this year: when you consider some of those include not just one or two games but sometimes a couple dozen, well, that’s a lot of video games. I’m going to use this space to look back on the articles I enjoyed the most, and hopefully, you did, too.

Maybe you subscribed later in the year and missed out on some of these, or maybe you’ve been here from the beginning and just want to do a little end-of-year reminiscing with me. Either way, thanks for reading, and for sharing, and we’ll get right back to writing about new old games once 2022 kicks off.

Ranking the top 101 Nintendo games: No. 37, Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance

It wasn’t the top-ranked Fire Emblem in the Nintendo top 101, but it was my favorite of the FE features from that project. I wrote about how the game tackled the nobility in a different way than it had in prior Fire Emblem installments, and did so most effectively through the series’ first non-noble lead in Ike. Racism was also a major focus, and unlike plenty of games that awkwardly fumble around for something to say on the matter, Path of Radiance managed to actually pull off the trick.

Ranking the top 101 Nintendo games: No. 32, Mother 3

Mother 3 explores alienation, the impact of capitalism on people and nature, the meaning of power, of labor, of exploitation, of community. Of broken homes, mourning, and its impact on others, of forgetting history. It's a beautiful game, and I think I somehow managed to do its themes justice in my write-up.

Ranking the top 101 Nintendo games: No. 13, Sin & Punishment: Star Successor

A write-up for a game that no one ever expected to exist, and that manages to be one of the very greatest offerings from two development legends in Treasure and Nintendo. Maybe you aren’t inherently an arcade or on-rails person, but I hope that my look at this game inspired a few of you to change your minds on that.

Ranking the top 101 Nintendo games: No. 6, Super Metroid

Ah, the game that not only helped to spawn a genre that continues to grow and remain popular to this day, but that still manages to hold up against the very games it inspired, too. This serves as both a look at Super Metroid and at the franchise as a whole, as Super Metroid’s critical success made this a franchise that Nintendo knew they had to keep making games for, but they didn’t know how, and couldn’t convince anyone else to pick up the torch, either.

Ranking the top 101 Nintendo games: No. 4, The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask

Breath of the Wild might be the “best” Zelda, but Majora’s Mask remains my personal favorite, and with good reason. Thematically, it’s dark. It is haunting in both its sights and sounds. It asks questions that other Zeldas, and plenty of non-Zelda games, do not, and it remains astounding that this game released when it did, considering so much of it still feels like it’s ahead of the curve. I have spent decades now arguing that Majora’s Mask is the better game than Ocarina of Time, and this feature lays out the reasons why it isn’t just Ocarina that it surpasses.

Ranking the top 101 Nintendo games: No. 1, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild

It would be kind of sad if I ranked Breath of the Wild first but didn’t feel that I did the game enough justice to include it among my favorite pieces from the year, huh? What a stunningly beautiful game, in every facet.

It's new to me: Snatcher

I promise I am not just re-sharing this so I can get the opening song from Snatcher stuck in my head yet again. This game that feels so much like a film school effort from Hideo Kojima, one that is letting you know just what you’re going to be in for thematically and such in his later career, really does stick with me, and I’m going to go back to it again at some point in the future despite its mysteries already being unraveled.

Buying a Wii U can still be worth it

Sure, most of the Wii U’s greatest games have been ported to the Switch and enhanced in the process, but the Wii U still has a vibrant (and working) Virtual Console service, as well as Xenoblade Chronicles X. Maybe most importantly, it’s your best bet at playing a significant portion of the Nintendo top 101 in one place. That I convinced anyone to go out and buy a Wii U by writing this is proof enough of its power.

Retro Spotlight: Crystalis

I am not just listing this because the discussion about box art is something I am constantly thinking about while I play Japanese RPGs from the 80s and 90s, but it sure didn’t hurt. No, this is listed mostly because it serves as a good explanation for why flawed games from the past can be worth revisiting in the present, and how sometimes, all you need is a little quality of life spit shine to get past even those little issues in a classic.

25 years of the N64: The N64's controller is good, actually

It is important to fight for the things you believe in, you know.

25 years of the N64: Perfect Dark

Perfect Dark sold over 2.5 million copies despite being a late-life release on the N64, and has seen not just a prequel, but also an HD remaster, and a coming reboot. And yet, it remains underrated. The ambition behind the original — ambition that Rareware did not allow the technical limitations of the N64 to hinder — is something few games can match, and it remains extremely playable to this day, whether you’re enjoying an ultra HD upscale, twin-stick experience on your Series X or playing it old school with the N64’s Memory Expansion Pak.

Re-release this: L.O.L.: Lack of Love

This game is a masterpiece, and I implore you to at least read about why, if not experience it yourself, as well. There probably aren’t many games out there that evoke references to John Locke, Kim Stanley Robinson, European justifications for land seizures from Native Americans, the Gaia hypothesis, and the Leopold Land Ethic that also have a button mapped specifically for peeing.

The music of Final Fantasy VI's Opera

This was the week of going real deep, apparently. I was actually pretty nervous about this piece (and the one above), but the response and feedback on them convinced me I actually managed to pull off what I was going for. So, thanks for that, and if you missed out the first time on either, I hope you give them a chance now. This piece on the opera of Final Fantasy VI is about a whole lot more than the opera itself, and focuses its energies on how the opera is actually a vital storytelling component that enriches the game’s narrative and fills out the characterization and backstory of one of its many protagonists.

A conversation with Trevor Strunk, author of Story Mode (part one)

Part one of a discussion on Trevor Strunk’s book, Story Mode, and the themes contained within; we’ll get to part two at some point in 2022. Trevor has me on his podcast, No Cartridge, pretty regularly, and it is safe to say that I would not feel like I had something worth saying about video games to an audience without him encouraging me to be a guest and go deep on why certain games work for me the way they do.

Also the first game-specific question is about 9/11’s impact on video games, so, you know, that was fun.

How to find and play 40 years' worth of Nihon Falcom games

Like with the Wii U piece, writing this was partially about getting the ever-growing swarm of bees out of my head and somewhere that it would be more useful. It’s not a deep dive look at these games, like most of the rest of this best of list, but is instead meant to be a resource. I spent a significant chunk of 2021 playing Nihon Falcom games for a reason, and plan to do so again in 2022: if you want to join me on this journey, consider this your map.

Gaming’s All-Digital-Everything Future Threatens To Erase The Past

I actually wrote this for Defector (it was my debut there!) not for Retro XP, but it’s still worth sharing considering that (1) I think it’s pretty neat and (2) a feature focusing in on the past of video games sure fits with this site’s mission, yeah? Thanks to David Roth and co. for trusting me to handle this editorial.

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