There were so many awesome games that fall into the "old school" category. I'm going to stay away from the popular titles (Zelda, Mario, Sonic, etc.) for the purpose of interest.
There were several games that were less common on the NES that stood out to me. Some of these would be Cobra Triangle, Wizards and Warriors and Karnov. I actually spent about six years when I was a kid trying to find Karnov and finally found it in 1997 at a pawn shop. These games were good but not the best.
The best old school game to me is The Guardian Legend. The game had awsome music, a great overhead exploring element (similar to Zelda), and overhead flight shooter element, and an awesome story to back it up.
I ran across the game by pure chance when I was a kid because a relative happened to have it, although they didn't even play it. I eventually bought it from them and discovered one of the truly great hidden gems of the NES era.
When it comes to the SNES there were a couple of games that stood out. I really enjoyed Breath of Fire, Uniracers and F-Zero, but I think I have to give the nod to Tetris Attack as the best from the SNES era. Fast action with one of the greatest soundtracks in gaming. To this day I still play that game and it owns as much now as it did before.
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