Best Video Games of 1992

The first entry in Quintet's soul trilogy — Soul Blazer has the player acting as an angel defeating demons and restoring souls to a corrupted world, resurrecting villagers and NPCs as enemies are cleared.

Konami's SNES beat-em-up adaptation of Tim Burton's Batman Returns, featuring cooperative two-player combat against a Halloween carnival of villains. Batman Returns SNES offered significantly different gameplay from other platform versions — a slower, heavier brawler with grapple mechanics that matched the film's dark aesthetic.

The debut of one of Nintendo's most beloved characters, Kirby's Dream Land introduced the pink puffball's signature inhale mechanic and charming aesthetic in a breezy platformer designed to be accessible to all ages. Short but delightful, it launched an enduring franchise.

Konami's 1992 NES beat-em-up and the second side-scrolling TMNT NES game — Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles III: The Manhattan Project improves on TMNT II: The Arcade Game with Super Jump moves unique to each turtle, a longer eight-stage campaign with Manhattan transported to Florida by Shredder's flying island, and a larger budget presentation that made it one of the NES's finest late-era beat-em-ups.

The NES Mega Man series' most polished late entry — Mega Man 5 introduces Beat, the bird weapon found by collecting hidden letters, with eight Robot Masters including Gravity Man, Crystal Man, and Charge Man.

Compile's Sega CD vertical shoot-em-up set in feudal Japan — Robo Aleste (Dennin-Aleste in Japan) puts players in control of a mechanical samurai mech battling through samurai-era enemies using scrolls (weapon power-ups) collected during combat. A visually distinctive shmup that uses the CD format for voiced anime cutscenes and CD audio while delivering Compile's signature weapon variety gameplay.

Data East's 1992 SNES port of the 1991 arcade prehistoric platformer — Joe & Mac follows two cavemen rescuing kidnapped cavewomen from rival dinosaur-riding cavemen, wielding bone clubs, stone wheels, and fire attacks across colorful prehistoric stages in two-player simultaneous co-op.

The Neo-Geo fighter that introduced the spirit gauge, zoom camera, and desperation moves to the genre. Art of Fighting's distinctive power-dependent gameplay created a different strategic rhythm from Street Fighter II, and its characters would later cross over into King of Fighters.

Sega's shape-shifting Genesis platformer — Casey collects masks to transform into eight characters (Jason, Berzerker, Maniaxe, Iron Knight, Eyeclops, Juggernaut, Red Stealth, Skycutter) with distinct abilities across 103 stages.

Capcom's underrated Disney NES platformer — Darkwing Duck uses his gas gun with multiple ammunition types, swings on his cape, and battles five of the series' iconic villains across stages based on the cartoon.

A unique Genesis game — guide a dolphin through an increasingly dark undersea narrative involving aliens, time travel, and extinction-level events, rendered in some of the console's most impressive fluid animation.

Toaplan's 1992 Genesis horizontal shoot-em-up — Zero Wing has CATS, Zig, and the 'All your base are belong to us' opening cutscene that became a 2001 internet meme phenomenon. Beyond its cultural notoriety, Zero Wing delivers competent horizontal shmup gameplay with a tractor beam mechanic that captures and repurposes enemy ships.