My best list of N64...

1) GoldenEye 007
2) Star Fox 64
3) Zelda: Ocarine of Time
4) Super Mario 64
5) Star Wars: Rogue Squadron
6) Banjo-Kazooie

Yeah dudes... GoldenEye 007 is still better than 99% of the shooters today.

Yeah, everyone should give that game a go =)

Gosh, yeah! I remember I almost cried when I watched the credits. I wasn't grown up back then but I knew I had just finished something very special. Also, the last fight against bowser! The first two times you just had to throw him into a bomb once but in the last fight he even destroyed part of the platform. And that music!

Jeez, there's so much magical stuff in that game:

- Mario's head in the beginning to play with

- The actual start of the game

- Jumping into a painting to start a level! Never been done in a game before!

- Entering Bob-omb Battlefield ("omg! This is what 3D levels look like?") 

- Jolly Roger's Bay (the music!) 

- Using the wing cap for the first time

- Being able to walk through walls and turn into fucking Metal Mario!

- First fight against bowser

- The Giant / Mini level

...the list just goes on lol. Today that stuff would be nothing special but back then it had never been done before! It was crazy exciting. Every single level contained some element that had never been seen before in such a way. The only thing that came close to this was Ocarina of Time.

the multiplayer in golden eye was amazing! i never played the single player though (just the first level) but i feel sad that mario kart is missing from your list

Mario 64 is probably the only main line Mario I have no affection for. It felt ugly and empty to me then playing it and was depressing to think this was somehow the future of gaming after the excellent 16-bit era. Thankfully games with polygons finally stopped looking so hideous as technical barriers were broken in successive generations.

To me the "magic moment" was years prior when the hype for "Super Mario Bros. 3" was coming out. It was a cultural event and featured in a pretty bad film "The Wiz" which I drug my parents to as well. I remember Christmas playing it and being in absolute awe. Must have beaten it a dozen times over next few years and I could still go back and play Mario Bros. 3 today and marvel at it.

What a cool idea for a thread.  And I have the perfect screenshot & song to summarise my magical moment in a game.  This scene; this music and then what followed on from it:

Doesn't look like much anymore and probably doesn't mean much unless you've played it, but Ho-ly shit.

That feeling that you've just been on this epic adventure and you're given a few minutes to just sit and recuperate... chat to everyone... make sure everyone's okay.  Then you take a few steps outside and realise...

...you've got a whole fucking world to explore and the adventure has only just started.

Firmly sold me on JRPG's for life.

Yes! A hundred times Yes.

its my fault i even posted, i should have known who i was talking to the biggest GT fan i ever met LOL. i get where you are coming from.

and yes it was! the only shooter i liked back then and the only one i liked for a LONG time

The worst I did they get my parents to do something they didn't want to do was whine endlessly, I never went as far as drugging them.