25 of Nintendo's greatest hits

Virtual Boy (1995)

Despite its name, the Virtual Boy wasn't a tiny humanoid companion to alleviate your crushing loneliness. Instead, it was a head-mounted Virtual reality doohickey which consisted of a head-mounted eye piece for displaying (undeniably primitive) 3D graphics. A wacky idea? Yes, and it flopped on launch – but it was a clear precursor to innovations like the 3DS, the Wii and the upcoming Wii U.

Super Smash Bros. (1999)

In 1995 Nintendo decided to put an end to those 'this Pokemon could beat up Donkey Kong and Mario in its sleep' arguments once and for all. With a dream lineup of our favourite characters from Link and Samus to Fox and Captain Falcon, Super Smash Bros. was responsible for many a busted friendship and a few black eyes to boot. Good times.

Nintendo 64 (1996)

GoldenEye 007, Mario Kart 64, Ocarina of Time, Mario 64. The list of some of the most glorious games ever to hit the screen goes on, and all of them were available on Ninty's cartridge-blowing console. So what if it didn't have the fancy CDs of its PlayStation rival and its controller looked like a science experiment gone wrong? It was ergonomical, damn it. And the games were, well, simply fantastic.

GameCube (2001)

Not remembered as a huge success, the GameCube was Nintendo’s first outing into CD gaming. Unfortunately Ninty went with mini-DVDs while rival Sony opted for DVDs for its PlayStation 2 – giving the movie-playing PS2 a leg up in sales. But Nintendo's cuboid console still had much to recommend it, with games like The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker and Metroid Prime. Did you know that holding the Z-button simultaneously on a controller plugged into each port will produce a Japanese sound effect of a man shouting a battle cry?

Wii Sports (2006)

While this wasn’t a graphical mind blower the Wii Sports active controls and wide array of games did get many a couch potato up and about. Bundled with the Wii, this title was a big factor in the console's initial success, its simple, intuitive controls appealing to novice gamers and seasoned joystick jockeys alike.

Read our Nintendo Wii U review