Colossal Game Adventure: February 2026 Nominations Topic
We are up for another round of nominations for Colossal Game Adventure, Tildes' very own retro video game club!
These nominations will form the ballot for the next round of voting, in which will we choose the next SIX games to play after March's Kaeru no Tame ni Kane wa Naru (The Frog for Whom the Bell Tolls).
Nominations for CGA do not start fresh each time. We rollover the top 50% of nominations from the previous round, and we decay their vote totals by 30%. So, many of the previously nominated games are still eligible to win in the upcoming voting.
Procedural Details
Nominations will be open for 96 hours (4 days) from the time of this posting.
Anyone can nominate. You do not have to have previously taken part in CGA in order to participate.
Anyone nominating in this topic will be added to the CGA notification list if they're not already on there (unless you request otherwise).
There is no hard definition for "retro." Choose whatever you feel fits that label.
Games that have been nominated in the past but were cut are still eligible for nomination again. They do not get "locked out" of CGA.
Voting will follow in a separate topic, and I will also be trying out a "lobbying" topic this time around to see how that goes. More on that in the comments.
Nomination Process
Everyone has the ability to take one (and ONLY one) official action for the nominations topic.
EITHER: Boost a rolled-over title.
This will add 3 points to the title's rollover points from the previous round.
You will also be able to add points to the game during the voting round.
The purpose of this is to limit new nominations if there are games already in the list that strongly interest you.
OR: Nominate a new title.
This will add a new game/arcade special to the ballot.
An arcade special is a group of shorter/smaller games meant to be played together.
Any new title starts at 0 points.
Nomination Formatting
Please do the following:
Bold your action (boosting/nominating).
If nominating, please link to your title on MobyGames. (You do not need to do this for boosting since the links are already in the list.)
Examples:
Boosting a game:
- Boost: Lode Runner
Nominating a game:
- Nomination: Portal 2
Nominating an Arcade Special:
- Nomination: Windows in the 90s
Minesweeper
Chip's Challenge
JezzBall
It is recommended (but not required) that you share why you are nominating/boosting a particular game as well.
Rollover Titles
| Game | Rollover Votes |
|---|---|
| Arcade Special: Back in a Flash Bloons Tower Defense Line Rider Motherload QWOP Stick RPG |
22 |
| Sid Meier’s Pirates | 21 |
| Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow | 20 |
| Another World | 19 |
| Metroid Prime | 19 |
| Descent | 18 |
| Lufia II: Rise of the Sinistrals | 17 |
| StarTropics | 15 |
| Arcade Special: Behind the Wheel Lego Island Rally-X Sega Rally Championship |
15 |
| Crystalis | 15 |
| The Colonel’s Bequest | 15 |
| Threads of Fate | 15 |
| Beneath a Steel Sky | 15 |
| Metroid | 14 |
| Arcade Special: Scroll Lock-on Einhander Ikaruga Paradroid Raid on Bungeling Bay Thunder Force IV |
14 |
| Tetris | 13 |
| Freddy Pharkas: Frontier Pharmacist | 13 |
| Tony Hawk’s Pro-Skater 2 | 13 |
| JSRF: Jet Set Radio Future | 12 |
| Lode Runner | 12 |
| Arcade Special: The Grue That Binds Border Zone Twisted! Zork |
12 |
| The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past | 12 |
CGA Announcement: The nominations topic for the next 6 months is now up. Please read the topic text to see how it will work.
I specifically limited options this time around because I feel like last time we got a little flooded. I think focusing our efforts a bit more is a step in the right direction. Hopefully this isn't TOO limiting, but if it turns out that it is, we can always swing the pendulum back in the other direction.
I'm also going to use this topic to talk about some potential changes I'd like feedback on. Let me know your thoughts.
Change #1: Moving the Remove Cartridge topic from the 20th to the 28th.
The 20th has felt pretty early to me, month after month. I originally set that date to give a longer runway for conversation and to separate it a bit from the Tildes Book Club discussions.
There's not a lot of overlap in participation between CGA and Book Club, so the latter feels like a non-issue. Also, 10-11 days (for most months) feels like TOO much runway for discussion. I'm thinking it's better if we push it back.
The only month this really crunches is February. I originally didn't want the Remove Cartridge topic to step on the next month's Insert Cartridge topic, but now that we've done several months of this, I feel like the two can coexist pretty easily.
Change #2: Adding a "Lobbying" topic prior to voting.
Once all the nominations are available and boosted points have been tallied, I think it would be a good idea to have a short topic where people can really sell other people on choices and lobby for their favorites.
It doesn't work well in the voting topic itself because comments like that get relegated to replies (because we have to keep the top level comments clean for the script). Also, doing full lobbying within the nominations topic can feel a little early since it's not entirely clear what all the choices would be.
I know I personally edited my final vote probably five or six times last time simply because I kept getting swayed by other people, so I think having a designated space to talk it out beforehand is good. I also think this gives a better chance to smaller, lesser known games. Someone passionate about one can really sell everyone on it.
My current thought on the rotation would be:
Anyway, let me know if you have strong feelings on these. Also, feel free to use this comment as a place for any meta discussion about CGA itself: feedback, ideals, celebrations, frustrations, etc.
Notification List
@1338
@Akir
@ali
@arctanh
@AriMaeda
@atomicshoreline
@avirse
@balooga
@BeardyHat
@Boojum
@Bwerf
@CannibalisticApple
@chocobean
@clayh
@datavoid
@Debook
@DistractionRectangle
@dotsforeyes
@dozens
@Dr_Amazing
@granfdad
@Gummy
@hamstergeddon
@IsildursBane
@J-Chiptunator
@JCPhoenix
@jmpavlec
@joshbuddy
@kaiomai
@Kawa
@kej
@kfwyre
@kingofsnake
@Kirisame
@Lapbunny
@mayonuki
@Mendanbar
@mysterylevel
@PancakeCats
@Pavouk106
@PetitPrince
@Plattypus
@polle
@preposterous
@psi
@rosco
@rubix
@Rudism
@SloMoMonday
@Sodliddesu
@Soggy
@sotix
@Spore_Prince
@SpruceWillis
@squidwiz
@talklittle
@ThatMartinFellow
@tildes-user-101
@Timwi
@tomorrow-never-knows
@Trobador
@Venko
@vili
@Weldawadyathink
@xk3
@zod000
If you would like to be added or removed from the Notification List, please PM u/kfwyre.
CGA Announcement: 18 hours until nominations close!
I was intending to do a 24 hour notice but got my times wrong. XD
Notification List
@1338
@Akir
@ali
@arctanh
@AriMaeda
@atomicshoreline
@avirse
@balooga
@BeardyHat
@Boojum
@Bwerf
@CannibalisticApple
@chocobean
@clayh
@datavoid
@Debook
@DistractionRectangle
@dotsforeyes
@dozens
@Dr_Amazing
@granfdad
@Gummy
@hamstergeddon
@IsildursBane
@J-Chiptunator
@JCPhoenix
@jmpavlec
@joshbuddy
@kaiomai
@Kawa
@kej
@kfwyre
@kingofsnake
@Kirisame
@Lapbunny
@mayonuki
@Mendanbar
@mysterylevel
@PancakeCats
@Pavouk106
@PetitPrince
@Plattypus
@polle
@preposterous
@psi
@rosco
@rubix
@Rudism
@SloMoMonday
@Sodliddesu
@Soggy
@sotix
@Spore_Prince
@SpruceWillis
@squidwiz
@talklittle
@ThatMartinFellow
@tildes-user-101
@Timwi
@tomorrow-never-knows
@Trobador
@Venko
@vili
@Weldawadyathink
@xk3
@zod000
Update: Something came up for me, so I won’t be able to make the lobbying topic until tonight, possibly even tomorrow. So, if there are any last minute nominations, feel free to get them in!
Sorry for the delay everyone.
Just added one! I hadn't checked Tildes in a minute, so happy I could swoop in.
I like the proposed changes a lot.
Thanks again for taking the time to organise all this, @kfwyre!
I love the idea of a lobbying topic. But I do wonder, are 48 hours and 24 hours enough for topics? Can or should we assume that everyone who is interested will visit Tildes that frequently? I myself don't typically check the website daily. Sometimes less than once a week. But maybe I'm an outlier.
I often forget that not everyone lives here like I do. 😅
I'll extend them, especially because, unlike last time, I'm not getting inundated with nominations. That was also part of the reason I gave a shorter window -- to have a definitive cutoff if we were getting too many.
We're not under a time crunch since we still have March queued up, so I'll double everything:
I agree with moving the Remove Cartridge topic, sometimes it definitely feels too early while other times it feels late. Depends on the game's length, really. Maybe we can have February's on the 25th though? (Also, we should probably make sure February has short games with super easy setup in the future.)
February's being on the 25th makes sense. I liked the simplicity of having it be the same day every month, but one outlier is easy enough to manage.
My brain is a bit scattered right now, so the text of this topic is not processing for me.
However, I just wanted to say thanks for putting all this work in on the CGA @kfwyre. I haven't been a great participant, playing all the games, but really only making decent progress in two of them, but I've been looking forward to the new games every month and at the very least giving them a try and reading others thoughts and opinions on them.
Thanks!
Also, the tl;dr for this topic is:
Either add 3 points to a game already on the list.
Or nominate something new.
That's it!
Boost: Lufia II
For the sole reason that I've been meaning to play it for years, and this will finally encourage me to do so
Ooh, I remember playing that one many years ago. Got decently far but never finished.
Lufia II is probably the best non-Square RPG on the Super Nintendo. I hope you and others finally get to play it.
Nomination: Red Dead Redemption
I got to thinking about the first RDR after this recent post about RDR2. I hadn't played it in over a decade, if the timestamp on my last save file is to be believed. Honestly it's held up very well. Mechanically it's simpler than RDR2, but that game is so... much... that it's kind of refreshing not to have to manage everything. It's gorgeous for its age, with fantastic art direction and sound design. The voice acting and mocap are top-notch too. I think John Marston is a more likeable protagonist than Arthur Morgan. The ludonarrative dissonance is still an issue — you're slaughtering people by the hundreds while carrying on like an upstanding do-gooder (if you choose the Honor path). Still a great game. I love all the side content like the stranger quests, the treasure maps, liar's dice, horse races, and so on.
Feedback on proposed changes:
Change #1: I support the date change. Removing the cartridge so early in the month felt weird to me, so doing it on the 28th feels better. Maybe a couple days before that in February, but we've already done it this month so that's a year away before becoming relevant again.
Change #2: I like the idea of a lobbying round. I'm not convinced it would be materially different from just voting, but I'm down to try it! It might help mitigate some of the first-mover advantage that nominations posted earlier in the thread have. (I assume that's a real problem/imbalance, but haven't actually looked into it to confirm.)
Yeah, I'm not sure if the lobbying round will change anything.
The reason I wanted to do it was that there was a big friction point last time: for the voting round, people could lobby under their own ballot, but that meant that comments were scattered around under different parent comments, instead of being grouped by game. My vision for the lobbying topic is that someone can really sell everyone on a game and generate a discussion about it prior to the voting.
Nomination: The Genesis of Treasure
Gunstar Heroes
McDonald's Treasure Land Adventure
Dynamite Headdy
Alien Soldier
Light Crusader
My pick for the nomination thread would be the strong lineup of Sega Genesis/Mega Drive games developed by Treasure, a studio formed by ex-Konami staff who left to escape the company's creative restrictions. Their early work set a new standard for inventive, high-energy gameplay that still feels fresh and challenging today. Honestly, it's easy to imagine PlatinumGames following a similar path if they'd existed in the 90s or early 00s.
Getting into Treasure's early catalog isn't hard at all. Every one of their international releases is on a single platform, and running them doesn't take much effort or hardware. If you've got the Nintendo Switch Online Expansion Pack or the (now-delisted) Sega Mega Drive & Genesis Classics collection, you can access almost their entire lineup, except for McDonald's Treasure Land Adventure and the Japan-only Yu Yu Hakusho Makyou Touitsusen.
That's the origin story of Treasure in a nutshell. I'll be posting previews for each of their five Genesis titles in the lobbying thread soon!
Nomination: Maniac Mansion
Was going to boost Another World, but it has a lot of points already so I figured might as well drop this nomination. Might be more fun to save Maniac Mansion for closer to Halloween though. Also, it might be good to use as part of an Arcade Special since it can apparently be completed in about 5 hours.
Speaking of Arcade Specials, should we talk about potential combinations? What should be the criteria for an arcade special? Should we have some way to suggest whether a nomination—whether a new one or one of the roll overs—should be added to an Arcade Special?
I feel like some games are short enough to merit being combined with other games. At the very least, Tetris can easily be tacked onto something else. Another World, which I plan to lobby for, might be another good one to combine with something else since How Long to Beat says it can be beat in 2 and a half hours. Looking it up, I beat it in just under 2 hours, but I did use a guide because there's a good bit of backtracking and trial and error.
It may also be a good idea to have some alternative to games with more tricky setups, like Racing Lagoon this month needing to have an English patch. And the extra steps needed to setup CD ROMs compared to Nintendo ROMs... And also the gameplay being 30+ hours... Yeah, it probably shouldn't have been the February game.
Actually, that gives me a thought: what if some months have the option to "revisit" games? Have a short game as the main game of the month, and then have a previous game as an alternative option. E.g. Another World, and Racing Lagoon. Might be better to consider and try it in the third round when there have been more games played, but just putting it out there.
Ideally, people would nominate their own Arcade Specials (like @J-Chiptunator just did!).
I didn't intend for them to be something that we put together after the fact, but it ended up being a necessity during the last round because I got FAR more nominations than I was expecting. Creating ad-hoc Arcade Specials was a way of paring down the list. I actually felt quite bad about doing this, because I feel like I "buried" some nominations that people were eager about by pairing them up with other games.
I used HLTB times to make Arcade Specials, but there's a definite flaw in that methodology, pointed out by fount of retro knowledge and wisdom @vili here:
A lot of older games are relatively quick when played with a guide/save states, but a casual, non-directed playthrough might take, say, ten times that. I'm someone who would just use a guide for the convenience, but I know there are people participating that want that more time-intensive retro experience as well.
With regards to February, you're absolutely right that I made the wrong call. We'll get it right next time!
In all honesty, placing Racing Lagoon and Kaeru no Tame ni Kane wa Naru last was a bit of a hedge on my part. I wasn't sure whether CGA would actually keep going or kind of fizzle out over time, so I put the more "difficult" to acquire/play games on the back end. I liked the idea of the opening months being more accessible in hopes of building momentum.
I like the idea of having designated "revisits", but I'm thinking limiting it to a specific game is too narrow? Maybe in months where a very short game is picked, we have a "catch up" month where people can play an older game they didn't get a chance to? Or maybe we just schedule one month each year for that with no new game?
Ooh I love Ron Gilbert and the old LucasArts point-n-clicks but I’ve never actually played Maniac Mansion. Could be fun!
Hmm. Thinking about this just reminded me of Yahtzee Croshaw’s 5 Days a Stranger and the whole Chzo Mythos series of adventure games it spawned. I wonder if any other Tilderinos are familiar with those? I haven’t played them in an eternity but I remember thinking they were good spooky fun, doubly so considering they’re freeware. They might make for a fun CGA nomination at some point in the future.
October is just past the current six month window, but this makes me suddenly want a "Spooky Mansion October".
Boost: Lufia II
I rented this from Blockbuster as a kid. Didn't get very far, but like @endymiion, just looking for a reason to finally play it again. For real this time!
Boost: The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past
Why? I'll be honest, I'm still playing Wind Waker from last month, which I'd never played before. (I'm nearly done now and hope to have a very belated post on the January thread soon!) But playing WW has given me all the more appreciation for ALttP, which I'm dying to play again soon now as a little palate cleanser after WW. Compared to WW, it's a relatively short and fast game without much padding. It might pair well with another short game. (I'll admit that my sense of length may be off here, however.) It's also pretty easy to find ways to play it - Nintendo's Switch Online service has it, for example.
And while it's an old favorite that I think still holds up really well even today, there's no way for me to play it again for the first time, so I'd dearly love to hear from others experiencing for the first time. (And for those of us who are old hands and want to mix things up, there's always the randomizer - we could even share a common seed and settings.)
Feedback:
Change #1: Very reasonable. I think moving it later will help to avoid that sense of "it's too late in the month for me to start now, so I might as well skip this month and wait for the next."
Change #2: Also very reasonable. I think half the fun here is discussing which games to pick and why. Seeing other people's explanations of why they picked what makes voting far more interesting.
LTTP is by far my favorite Zelda game, and it has been quite a while since I have played it. I'm definitely interested in the randomizer option if it is chosen.
Boost - Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow
Between the very recent death of Shutaro Ida and the announcement of a new Castlevania, what better time? To me it's the cleanest entry of the Metroidvania series style - learning up lessons from SotN in a pocket-friendly format, but never missing an opportunity to make a lofty castle with a slew of customization. Secrets around every corner, excellent bosses, propped up by a dream team of IGA, Ayami Kojima, and Michiru Yamane putting out some of their best work.
Solid game, and one of the best Castlevanias IMO. I actually prefer both SOTN and Dawn of Sorrow (minus the horrific touchscreen gimmicks because it was on DS) to this game, but its very good and probably the least likely to have been played by most people.
Nomination: Mother 3
It’s a game that is unique in my opinion. A rollercoaster of emotions and given the medium (GBA), it does a very good job at conveying a solid story. And the combat system is unusual, because you can try and hit on the beat of the combat music (different for each enemy type) to get extra multipliers. But you don’t have to, I suck at these rythm things and I could still beat the enemies it just took a little longer.
It was released in Japanese only but there is a community English translation of excellent quality.
My favourite game I played last year. Even if it doesn’t end up in the roster, I strongly encourage you all to give it a shot it’s fun.
Is this one still enjoyable if you haven’t played the previous games in the series?
Yeah all three games are fairly separate from each other. Mother 1 and Mother 2 (or Earthbound) are definitely more related, but I don't necessarily know if I'd call 2 a sequel of 1. I played EB as a kid and loved it; never played Mother 1 and really don't have a huge desire to do so.
And Mother 3 is even more separate from the first two. IMO. There's one important character that comes from Earthbound and is even more important in Mother 3, but you can still solidly enjoy the game and story of the latter without understanding that character's backstory. In some ways, I don't even think the backstory is that important.
You wouldn't be missing anything by playing Mother 3 by itself. Though I will never not recommend playing Earthbound!
Yes, I haven't played any of the previous ones; it stands on its own. Maybe you'll miss a reference or two but it doesn't hurt the story or anything.
Adding Points: Sid Meier's Pirates!
Not sure if we're picking a particular platform for it, but wouldn't mind playing it! At least, in theory.
I see CGA as very much a "play it in a way that works for you" kind of space, which is to say: no restrictions! People can choose whichever version they want.
I also think that can potentially generate some interesting discussion in cases where there are major differences between versions, or if some people play a remaster/remake versus the original, etc.
Boost: Sid Meier’s Pirates
The original Beneath a Steel Sky is a very lovely game. The 2020 remake is also really interesting in different ways! But I suppose 2020 is not quite 'retro' yet.
Nomination: Resident Evil (REmake)
Nomination: Space Rogue
I will tell you why in the lobbying topic. But in short: it's a major game that was highly rated at the time of its release and sits at an interesting juncture in the history of space sim gaming, yet is largely forgotten now.
Boost: The Grue That Binds
A lot of our games from the last batch were on the more modern side of "retro", so I like the idea of going in the opposite direction and getting REALLY retro with some text-based titles.
Boost: Lufia II: Rise of the Sinistrals
There are so many good entries on here that I'd like to boost besides this one (Crystalis, Metroid, Arcade Special: Scroll Lock-on, LTTP, Aria of Sorrow), but I'm not sure that helps things if we don't focus on our actual top choice.
I boosted ALttP for the same reason (top choice), but I'll definitely be voting Lufia II and some of those others during the voting phase.
Boost: Back in a Flash
Edit: I just realized I was supposed to write something... I don't really have much to say, but I loved these games back in middle/high school when burning time, so I think they would be fun to revisit!
What computer class would be complete without trying to hide the fact that you are actually just playing line rider. Everyone in class would test each other's tracks, great times were had. Naturally all the tracks featured some incredibly horny artwork
@kfwyre: You might want to double check the Moby Games link to Another World in the list here. I think it should point to the game that Moby Games lists as Out of This World, which was the North American title, rather than the German Commodore 64 game where the link currently points to.
As far as I see, the link that @CannibalisticApple gave when the game was first nominated pointed to the French game, and that's also the link that was used in the voting topic last autumn. And well, the French game is of course also one of the greatest video games ever made. If my memory serves me well, that isn't necessarily something you could say about the German namesake.
Ah, good catch! Thanks. I must have whiffed that one when making the new table. It's now updated.