Since polls on the best Nintendo system usually come down to either SNES or Switch, I wondered what would happen if we set those two aside for the moment.
Of Nintendo's other systems, which do you think is the best, and what exactly makes it worthy of the top spot in your opinion?

Take it with a grain of salt because I never owned some of them (NES, Game Boy, Game Cube and Wii U), but those are my impressions based on their libraries, design, features, controllers, and legacy. Many of their titles I only played in later systems (ex, some SNES games in DS. Wii U games on Switch, etc) or through emulation:

3DS above DS is certainly controversial but I personally never enjoyed DS all that much. I think it was a time when I was expecting more power for games and DS simply couldn't provide it for me, I think PSP was more aligned with what I was expecting for a system at the time. I appreciate a lot of its older system ports though and recognize it's a very good system with a vast library

GB/GBC and NES were great systems at their time, but rendered a bit useless for me because their design philosophy was overhauled by GBA and SNES, which were the first Nintendo systems I've played and loved both, GB and NES just never stood a chance against their sequels

N64 and GC are great hardware. Both suffer from poor support

Wii and Wii U are pretty bad. Weird controllers, underpowered. I pray they never comeback

I'm torn between 3DS and Wii.

GameCube.
The first-party titles I've played are really enjoyable, and there's plenty I haven't played. I like some of the third-party games as well.
But really most of the Nintendo systems I've played are relatively comparable in quality, so this was tough.
3DS deserves more love. It's my favorite pure Nintendo handheld (never used Switch Lite and Switch is a hybrid).

I think the SNES is the best, but excluding it, I would choose either NES or Wii.

Going 3DS.

Not only did it have ports of Nintendo 64 games... I.E. StarFox 3D, Ocarina of Time 3D, Majoras Mask 3D... But they are arguably the best and "definitive" versions of those games.

You also have Virtual Console so you have a plethora of NES, SNES, Gameboy, Gameboy Colour, Gamegear and if you were an Ambassador, some GBA games as well.
And of course native DS backwards compatability.

It is the only console where you can play all of: Pokemon Red/Blue/Yellow/Green, Gold/Silver, Crystal, Diamond/Pearl/Platinum, HeartGold/SoulSilver, Black/White, Black 2/White 2, X/Y, Omega Ruby/Alpha Sapphire, Sun/Moon, Ultra Sun/Ultra Moon.
Pokemon eat your heart out.

The 3D display is also fairly unique and is likely a feature that will -only- exist on the 3DS... Motion controls pioneered on the Wii has been done to death since and has been included on the WiiU and Switch... And the idea emulated by Microsoft with Kinect and Sony with the Move.

Let me justify my answer:

NES - It's my favorite console from the early video game history. The 8 bit graphics still have a lot of charm, games like Super Mario, Kirby, Contra, Ducktales 2 and Castlevania are still classics. Well, it saved the video game industry from the crash, so that tells enough.

WII - Nintendo got a nice recovery from the GameCube with a simple and fun system with a insane first party support. We have Super Mario Galaxy 1 and 2, Super Smash Bros. Brawl, New Super Mario Bros. Wii, Wii Sports, Kirby Returns to Dreamland, and the list goes on. The only problem is that it didn't get some huge 7th gen third party games, but still, what we got is decent enough.

Wii U.


I will not elaborate.

3Ds and N64 for me.

Gamecube for me. Some of my all time favourite games came out on that system first. Star Wars Rogue Squadron, Resident Evil 4, Metroid Prime, Zelda Wind Waker, Fire Emblem Path of Radiance...