Well, not that expensive I guess For the NES, SNES, N64 and Sega Genesis that I got, I paid a grand total of $0. I got my PS1 for $4. Video game collecting can be cheap if you get lucky and know where to look; it was also cheaper back when I started. Yeah, I've probably spent quite a bit over the years, but as it's been gradual, I've never broken the bank/went too overboard or anything like that. My mom doesn't really approve, she used to say that I wasn't allowed to buy more games, but now that I'm an adult she doesn't say much. My step dad seems to think it's cool.

I generally prefer retro stuff. Had access to a SNES, N64, PS1, Saturn, PS2, Dreamcast and Gamecube growing up. Have loads of great memories from those consoles (although I never played the Dreamcast much, watching my brother play through the first two Shenmue games at Christmas was an incredible experience), and some of my all time favourites (Yoshi's Island, Tomb Raider 1-3, Dino Crisis 2) come from this era. Here's a few games I love(d) aside from the general classics:

SNES: Plok, Jurassic Park, Aladdin, Alien 3
N64: Silicon Valley, Beetle Adventure Racing
Gamecube: Turok Evolution, XIII, Sphinx
PS1: Alundra, Exhumed (Powerslave), Future Cop LAPD
Saturn: Deep Fear, Burning Rangers

Thanks I never played "Streets of Rage" despite my first console being a Genesis. The music sounds pretty good though.

It sounds like you were pretty late to the party but that was a decade ago! Considering your age, it makes sense actually..

I don't object to modern games as such, but I do feel that modern corporate games usually lack the heart of the classics from times when development teams were smaller. I would say that, largely speaking, the financial industry has taken over mainstream AAA gaming and made it more formulaic and predictable than it used to be. Indie games often still capture that magic of the old days for me though. Not all of them for sure, but a lot. Occasionally, a AAA game will to, but that's much less often.

As to the older games I love best, I think my favorite retro title would be 1995's Chop Suey for Macintosh computers. Chop Suey was about a pair of teenage girls who hallucinate after eating too much Chop Suey and explore their community in a daydream. It's mundane, but not if you get what I mean. I got into it when I was 13, which was the perfect age to try out that kind of a rebellious-themed title for girls and it's just kinda stuck with me over the years. The visual aesthetic looks handmade and very surrealist and it was also the first game I ever played that had a looping narrative structure, which was WAY ahead of its time! Some of the best point-and-click gaming ever made. Seriously. MASSIVELY overlooked title!

Other than that, Beyond Good & Evil and Okami are I would say my runners-up among the classics.

I guess you might say that I've always had a bit of a soft spot for greats that were/are never given a real chance.

Grab a friend and go play SoR 2 - right freaking now!

Interesting. I've never heard of Chop Suey myself, and it seems like footage is hard to come across on YouTube, I was only able to find 1 video on it.

Yeah, it's quite obscure, for sure. All "girl games" from that era were typically about as successful. Except 1996's Barbie Fashion Designer, which sold 500,000 copies is its first week, to the shock of everyone and now influences the dress-up modes of all kinds of modern, mainstream games as a result. :P That was the exception though. Everything else flopped. (All the Purple Moon games, etc. Even the Nancy Drew games and (a favorite of mine) The Longest Journey acquired only a cult following.) But a lot of them also deserved to flop, truthfully. Purple Moon's games were frankly just plain boring and relied on too many lame stereotypes, for example. But Chop Suey did not deserve its fate. (Neither did The Longest Journey.)

As to console gaming, here are some of my favorites among the classics by system:

NES: The Guardian Legend
Super NES: Final Fantasy III (or VI, if you prefer to use the Japanese title)
Nintendo 64: Wonder Project J2
GameCube: Beyond Good & Evil
Sega Genesis: Golden Axe
Sega CD: Out of This World (or Another World, for European gamers)
Sega Saturn: Magic Knight Rayearth
Sega Dreamcast: Jet Grind Radio (a.k.a. Jet Set Radio)
PlayStation: Oddworld: Abe's Oddyssey
PlayStation 2: Beyond Good & Evil
PlayStation 3: Portal 2

(I'm skipping some of the more obscure systems I have that don't really have a lot of great games, IMO.)

I no longer have my Genesis

my brother should still have his though, we would have to buy the game but it's possible..I think

Luckily, you can play it on many other platforms... for example, Steam, 3DS, and PS3.

I don't have a PC or PS3. I have a 3DS though! o: 

if I get it on 3DS, can you play it with a buddy?