In the 40 years it’s been around, Capcom has built a resume to rival any other game developer in the history of the medium. They’ve been crafting all-time great entries since the arcade days, and they’re still going strong, which makes it sort of easy to take them for granted. It also makes it easy to lose track of all of their iconic titles from years past.
The 16-bit era alone was spangled with a staggering number of awesome Capcom games, some of which rank among the best of the best in gaming history, and others that may be somewhat more obscure but remain eternal fan favorites. Seeing all the best entries in the prime of the pixelated era laid out can really help shine a light on how abnormally consistent Capcom has been.
8 Mega Man X
There are a number of Mega Man games that have an argument for the franchise's best, but when it comes to the 16-bit generation it’s relatively clear that one stands above all the rest and that’s the original Mega Man X for Super Nintendo.
This game took everything fans loved about the original series and built upon it with an appealing updated aesthetic, useful new abilities, an awesome new character in Zero, and the endlessly cool X armor. A number of the subsequent sequels were great, too, but that initial jump into the 16-bit world will always be the finest.
7 Super Ghouls ‘N Ghosts
Capcom has produced more than a few masterpiece platformers, but few if any have rivaled the Ghosts ‘n Goblins series in its ability to challenge, impress, and downright torture even the most nimble-fingered and dedicated gamers on the planet. These games are tough to an almost sadistic level, but they’re so compellingly well-made that fans are more than willing to accept the pain for their chance to play.
Super Ghouls ‘n Ghosts is the third entry in the series and it is the best of them all. It’s a brutal gauntlet of endlessly shifting levels full of not only ghouls and ghosts, but demons, zombies, and various other supernatural antagonists. Even three decades after its release it remains a fan favorite among all of Capcom's titles.
6 Final Fight 3
By the time the 16-bit era rolled around, Capcom had already created one of the most successful platforming franchises in Mega Man and one of if not the most successful fighting franchise in Street Fighter, which of course begged the question: why not combine the two?
The Final Fight series was their answer to that question in a way. It crossed Street Fighter’s flying kicks, uppercuts, and special moves with Mega Man’s side-scrolling world of irritating enemies who are desperately in need of a beating to create one of the finest beat ‘em up franchises ever. They just kept getting better, too, with the third and final entry marking the pinnacle of the main series.
5 Aladdin
Capcom and Disney had a lucrative relationship starting in the 8-bit era and running through the 1990s, with the game developer using their incredible prowess to defy the typically agreed upon notion that all licensed games are low effort money grabs.
The high point of this licensing frenzy was probably with Ducktales for the original NES, but as far as the 16-bit entries go, it doesn’t really get better than the two fairly different versions of Aladdin they created for SNES and Sega Genesis. The better of the two is something that’s up for debate, but in the end there’s no real wrong answer because these are some high quality platforming adventures.
4 Breath Of Fire 2
The RPG series Capcom is best known for today has to be Monster Hunter, but back in the 16-bit days it was all about Breath of Fire. Capcom was far more into the fighting and platforming genres, but this humble yet fantastic series proved that they could probably master just about anything they really wanted to.
Big fans of the series might rank later entries above Super Nintendo’s Breath of Fire 2, but it’s probably the most well-known game in the series among gamers as a whole. It held its own in a decade that was loaded with iconic RPGs and still holds up to this day.
3 Mega Man 7
Mega Man X may have set a new precedent for the franchise moving forward, but Mega Man 7 was far from a slouch. Released in 1995, a few years after X, the only main series entry on the Super Nintendo gave fans a look at what a new adventure from the original Blue Bomber would look like in the world of 16-bit graphics.
Mega Man 7 looks great, feels great, and adds in enough innovation for it to rank up there among the best in series history. And while Mega Man X offered a breath of fresh air in terms of story and characters, this entry offered a blast of nostalgia with the return of Rush, Dr. Light, Dr. Wiley, and more.
2 The King Of Dragons
A lot of Capcom’s best work has gone on to become a full-on franchise that just about every gamer on the planet has heard of, but they do have some more obscure titles that rival those franchises in quality. The King of Dragons is one of those titles.
This 1994 SNES arcade port was an extremely entertaining beat ‘em up with some great graphics that also happens to be super tricky (or at least super pricey) for fans to get their hands on an original copy of. Fortunately, it was included in the 2006 Capcom Classics Collection, which makes it easier for curious gamers to try out one of Capcom's best lesser known titles.
1 Street Fighter 2
It’s safe to say Street Fighter II stands among the most iconic and beloved Capcom games of all time. Of the top 15 best-selling Capcom games ever made, it’s the only entry from the 16-bit era, and it’s 14 years older than anything else above it.
There was something about this arcade fighter and its colorful cast of international characters that connected with gamers on a level very few ever have. It’s had several iterations across multiple consoles since, and consistently ranks among the all-time greats, not just among fighting games but among all games.