#2: Sonic & Knuckles (1994)
Last Year: 2
On a good day, this game could be my #1 game of all time. Honestly, what keeps Sonic & Knuckles from being my favorite ever is pretty much a coin toss when I initially made the list. So as you can see, it lost that particular coin toss. But as for the game itself, there's not enough praise I can heap upon this masterpiece of platforming. Tight, responsive controls, gorgeous 2D-Sprite graphics, amazing music (Sky Sanctuary Zone... love it!), a simple yet involving story that's told within the game and never gets in the way of the player, and the ability to use the Lock-On feature to play as Knuckles in Sonic 2 and Sonic 3. As you can tell from my avatar (and sig for that matter), the Sonic the Hedgehog series was my first gaming love, and Sonic & Knuckles is the pinnacle of that series. What an incredible game.
