After Labor Day Weekend, I was able to bring my family’s N64 back with me to college. Various covers are missing, the connector cables barely survived my brother’s “terrible-two” years and one of the four controllers mysteriously vanished. And yet, all the games were still intact. Because of this recent obsession of mine with N64, I have decided to compile a list of my three favorite games for that system. These may not be the best games, but heck, they are in my book.

1. Donkey Kong

Anyone who knows me knows how much I love this game. There’s so much to do that this game can keep me occupied for hours. It’s simple enough that I’m close to beating it, yet it still provides a challenge. The special graphics cartridge needed to play this game ensures that the graphics are better than most other N64 games, but kudos to you if you can tell the difference.

2. Mario Kart

This is hands down the best racing game for N64. This is the original game kiddies, not whatever is on the Wii. The tracks are classics and the racers are all from the original Mario games. This game is still fun to play with friends, granted that you are able to go back in your memory to relearn how to use the controller. Even after all these years, I still find it amazing how the opposing characters in the game manage to pull off some of their racing moves.

3. Banjo-Kazooie

This game aggravates me beyond belief, but is still one of my favorites. The noises the characters make are absolutely hilarious and like Donkey Kong, there are so many things to do in this game. The reason this game aggravates me is simple: after losing a life, you are forced to collect all of the music notes over again. For whatever reason, losing a life in this game is like restarting the entire level…every time you lose a life. As you can imagine, this can become very annoying. And yet, I would still say this is one of my favorite games for the N64.