EarthBound

EarthBound was a commercial flop in America — the 'This Game Stinks' scratch-and-sniff ad campaign was a disaster. But over the years it became an absolute cult classic. Ness traverses a caricatured America fighting with bats, frying pans and PSI powers. The humor is surreal: you fight runaway taxis, hippies and cows. But the finale — where the player is called by name to pray — is one of gaming's most emotional moments. Shigesato Itoi wrote a world where childhood, nostalgia and fear merge into something unrepeatable.