Borrowed from here, via here. However, unlike in those threads, you can demonstrate anything you want here. Want to extol the virtues of beat 'em mechanics? Go ahead. But remember you're not just picking the best games, you're picking the games that you can use as the best examples. Like so:

"I'd begin with a powerful, protracted admonishing of my students for studying videogames at university. And then I would finish with a brief oration on the first person shooter genre, and how it might be studied beyond more obvious means:

Metroid Prime:


Not only does it double as the finest example of environmental storytelling in videogames thus far, but it also demonstrates that within the genre of the FPS there is sufficient room for diversion. A first person shooter may rely on platforming, exploration and puzzles just as much as on violent conflict.


Metroid Prime also demonstrates that within a genre where mechanical imitation is not only acceptable, but actively encouraged by press and laypeople alike, that ostensibly awkward, sluggish and slow mechanics (that serve no aesthetic purpose such as illustrating the weight of a weapon) can, in fact, work perfectly when combined with equally divergent level and encounter design. The environmental storytelling is also easy to emphasis due to the great narrative aesthetic that is tangible in Metroid Prime, despite the literal narrative being abstruse and insubstantial, and composed with no great sense or feel for narrative pacing.

S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadows of Chernobyl.


The best ever adversarial AI in videogaming is obviously highly relevant to the first person shooter genre where adversary AI is so vitally important, and often so utterly insufficient. The AI results in some of the most complex and engrossing encounters in any FPS and, much like Metroid Prime, this quality is amplified in its overtness by the simplicity of the level and world design.


The realistic, ungamey environments nevertheless result in incredibly tense, and often challenging battles because the AI is clever enough to move in and out of houses, flank, flee, and use improvised cover just as the player might. Thus we get to see that first person shooters need not rely on gamey environments as they have since time immemorial; so long as the AI is sufficiently intelligent. Oh, and the AI also contributes greatly to the atmosphere, so there's that too.


The mechanics are just as impressive (if not so original) as well, meaning one needn't look to the likes of Arma for demonstrations of how advanced ballistics can enrich the FPS experience.

Homefront.


The purest, most classical exploration of mechanics and level design that a student could possibly experience. The mechanics, the level design; the majority of Homefront's entire milieu is an amalgamation of its coevals done so inadequately that one can easily discern what went wrong and, thus, what should have been done.


While one might look to Call of Duty 4 to demonstrate purity of design and vision, one finds the same qualities of Call of Duty 4 in Homefront; just as pure and tangible in their failure. But one also finds inept, obvious threads of Half-Life; and more subtle snippets of Quake and Halo. Therefore the entire history of the first person genre is present in Homefront; demonstrated to perfection if viewed through the lens of reverse engineering. "

No More Heroes - teaching us how to fap properly.

SteelAttack said:

I bet there still were people that jumped over the mushroom and missed it.

I know I did that.

I always missed it.  Always.  Nowadays there would be a Toad to explain:

the game freezes, Toad explains what to do with the mushroom being.

" Ok, press 'A' to jump on top of the Koopa.  Oops, you missed.  Let do this again."  

Everything freezes in place and a spotlight is shown on Koopa again.

"Remember, when he gets right to you, press 'A'. You got all that?"

A menu pops up that let's you choose 'Yes' or 'No'.

travo said:

I always missed it.  Always.  Nowadays there would be a Toad to explain:

the game freezes, Toad explains what to do with the mushroom being.

" Ok, press 'A' to jump on top of the Koopa.  Oops, you missed.  Let do this again."  

Everything freezes in place and a spotlight is shown on Koopa again.

"Remember, when he gets right to you, press 'A'. You got all that?"

A menu pops up that let's you choose 'Yes' or 'No'.

This is so true!

When you reach the Zelda overworld the first time every path leading away from the first dungeon would be conviently closed off. There will be a wagon that got stuck in one of the exits. Some dudes clearing boulders that fell on another exit.  And there still will be signs telling you witch way to go even though that is the only way you can go.

"Grumble, Grumble. I want some food, preferably red meat on a bone. Give it to me!"

Fairy: "Hey Listen! He says he wants some food! I think I saw some in a shop a while back, we should probably find some before continuing."

Next time you talk to fairy

"You need to find the red meat. Its in a store near the lake!"

Next time you talk to fairy

"Its right here! *Marks on map*"

I'll try to choose my three tomorrow.  You already chose Metroid Prime, so there goes that.