At the turn of the millennium, there was a big difference between PC and console gaming. PCs were the home of first-person shooters, strategy games, and simulators, while consoles served as the main hub for platformers, third-person shooters, and RPGs.
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If you have a controller and a high-end PC, you can have a console experience - often even better - without relying on physical media. But in the late 90s and early 2000s, few console games ever made it to PC. Some console exclusives left an indelible impression on their fans, so much so that they've received fan-made PC ports.
All official releases for these ports have no copyrighted materials included; you have to provide your own copy of the game to make them work.
8 Super Mario 64
SM64Plus
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Super Mario 64
3D Platformer
Systems
- Franchise
- Super Mario Bros.
- Platform(s)
- N64
- Released
- September 26, 1996
- Developer(s)
- Nintendo
- Publisher(s)
- Nintendo
- Engine
- Nintendo 64 SDK
- ESRB
- E for Everyone
- How Long To Beat
- 12 Hours
The pinnacle of platforming prowess and the game that ushered in the 3D revolution for good, Super Mario 64 remains a beloved classic to this day. The game retains an active speedrunning community and a loyal fanbase. It was inevitable that a PC port would eventually come.
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What's really impressive about the Super Mario 64 port is its wide array of forks, each with its specialties. If you don't have an N64 controller, don't worry: any Xbox controller, or even your keyboard, will work just fine. There's even a version with ray tracing support. Yes, ray tracing in Super Mario 64. Technology is incredible.
7 Star Fox 64
Starship Centauri Alpha
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Star Fox 64
Rail Shooter
Systems
- Franchise
- Star Fox
- Platform(s)
- Nintendo 64
- Released
- June 30, 1997
- Developer(s)
- Nintendo EAD
- Publisher(s)
- Nintendo
- Multiplayer
- Local Multiplayer
- ESRB
- e
- How Long To Beat
- 2 Hours
Star Fox 64 is a pillar of the N64 library and served as many people's first brush with the rail shooter genre. If you want to do a barrel roll on your PC, you can: all you have to do is provide your own verified ROM dump of the original game.
Starship Centauri Alpha is a port of Star Fox 64 that runs on DirectX 11 and OpenGL, as well as Metal for MacOS. It also has modding support. With its versatility and optimization, Starship Centauri Alpha is a true labour of love.
6 Perfect Dark
Part Of The N64Decomp Project
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Perfect Dark (2000)
First-Person Shooter
Systems
- Franchise
- Perfect Dark
- Platform(s)
- Xbox 360, Nintendo 64
- Released
- May 22, 2000
- Developer(s)
- The Initiative, Nintendo, Rare, Crystal Dynamics
- Publisher(s)
- Rare, Nintendo, Xbox Game Studios
- Multiplayer
- Local Multiplayer
- Engine
- unreal engine 4
- ESRB
- m
- How Long To Beat
- 8 hours
- X|S Optimized
- No
- File Size Xbox Series
- 784 MB (June 2023)
Although first-person shooters are often associated with mouse and keyboard controls, the genre wasn't always this way. Alongside GoldenEye 007 and Turok, Perfect Dark was part of the N64's FPS library and featured tank controls that were the default for the time.
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Mouselook is so taken for granted now that it can be quite hard to enjoy Perfect Dark without rose-tinted glasses on. Enter the fan-made PC port, which allows you to aim with the mouse, configure the field of view, and set the framerate to 60. It supports several different ROMs, but the NTSC version seems to work best.
5 Doom 64
Doom 64 EX
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Doom 64
FPS
Systems
-
- Top Critic Rating: 76/100 Critics Recommend: 76%
- Franchise
- DOOM
- Platform(s)
- Nintendo 64, Nintendo Switch, PC, PlayStation 4, Xbox One
- Released
- April 4, 1997
- Developer(s)
- Midway Games
- Publisher(s)
- Midway Games
- Engine
- doom engine
- ESRB
- t
- How Long To Beat
- 7 Hours
- X|S Optimized
- No
- File Size Xbox Series
- 279 MB (November 2023)
- PS Plus Availability
- Premium
- OpenCritic Rating
- Strong
The question of whether Doom can run on any device that comes to mind has long since been put to rest - the answer is always yes, it can run Doom. The real question Doom fans had was: when could their PC run Doom 64? In a surprising omission, Doom 64 didn't receive an official console port for 23 years.
While NightDive Studios finally gave the game an official PC release in 2020, for many years, fans had to turn to Doom 64 EX. This project first saw daylight in 2008 and remained active for a full decade. Since 2020, the site's only updates have been regarding the NightDive remaster.
4 The Legend Of Zelda: A Link To The Past
Zelda3
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10/10
The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past
Action-Adventure
Systems
- Franchise
- The Legend of Zelda
- Platform(s)
- SNES, Nintendo Game Boy Advance, 3DS
- Released
- April 13, 1992
- Developer(s)
- Nintendo EAD
- Publisher(s)
- Nintendo
- ESRB
- E For Everyone Due To Mild Violence
- How Long To Beat
- 15 Hours
Given the cross-generational appeal A Link To The Past has, it's easy to see why the game has a fan-made PC port. In fact, the real question would be why it took so long.
The reason: this port is a painstakingly reverse-engineered clone of the original. This means the entire source code for the game was manually reconstructed by fans. A great deal of labour and dedication went into Zelda3. The reverse engineering was so successful that it gave rise to Android, PS Vita, and Xbox One ports as well.
3 Jak And Daxter Series
OpenGOAL
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Jak and Daxter: The Precursor Legacy
Platformer
Action
Adventure
Systems
- Franchise
- Jak and Daxter
- Platform(s)
- PlayStation 2, PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, PS Vita
- Released
- December 4, 2001
- Developer(s)
- Naughty Dog
- Publisher(s)
- Sony Computer Entertainment
- Engine
- Kinetica
- ESRB
- E10+ For Everyone 10+ // Fantasy Violence
- How Long To Beat
- 10 Hours
- PS5 Release Date
- December 10, 2024
- Metascore
- 90
- PS Plus Availability
- Premium
Jak And Daxter: The Precursor Legacy is one of the most rewarding collectathons ever made. Fresh off the Crash Bandicoot series, Naughty Dog created a seamless open-world platformer using the GOAL programming language.
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With the project starting in 2020, series fans now have reason to celebrate twice: the first two games are now considered playable, with The Precursor Legacy being playable from start to finish. Theoretically, all three mainline Jak games for the PS2 could receive native PC ports this way, as they all used GOAL.
2 Sonic Trilogy
Sonic The Hedgehog Forever, Sonic 2 Absolute, And Sonic 3 Angel Island Revisited
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4.0/5
Sonic the Hedgehog
Platformer
Systems
- Franchise
- Sonic the Hedgehog
- Platform(s)
- Android, iOS, Nintendo 3DS, PC, Sega Genesis, Switch
- Released
- June 23, 1991
- Developer(s)
- Sonic Team
- Publisher(s)
- Sega
- Engine
- the hedgehog engine
- ESRB
- e
- How Long To Beat
- 2 Hours
No video game fanbase comes close to being as loyal as that of Sonic the Hedgehog. The series has seen countless fan games developed in its time, fortunately welcomed by Sega, but the first three titles didn't languish unforgotten.
While they are now playable on PC in an official capacity using Sonic Origins, fans went ahead and ported the first three titles over the years. The first two titles were ported by Team Forever, while Sonic 3 & Knuckles received a widescreen remaster through Angel Island Revisited.
1 The Legend Of Zelda: Ocarina Of Time & Majora's Mask
Ship Of Harkinian And 2Ship2Harkinian
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The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time
Action
Adventure
Systems
- Franchise
- The Legend of Zelda
- Platform(s)
- Nintendo 64, GameCube
- Released
- November 21, 1998
- Developer(s)
- Nintendo
- Publisher(s)
- Nintendo
- Engine
- Zelda 64 Engine
- ESRB
- E10+ for Everyone 10+: Animated Blood, Fantasy Violence, Suggestive Themes
If there were any games on the N64 that fans wanted on PC more than Super Mario 64, they had to be the Zelda titles. Helmed by a group of developers called Harbour Masters, the Harkinian duology ports over both titles using source code that took over 21 months to decompile.
The ports feature quality-of-life options and improvements that have led fans to declare them superior to the ones officially offered on Nintendo Switch Online. Harbour Masters is playing a dangerous game by defying the notoriously litigious Nintendo, but as long as the releases contain no copyrighted game files, the team can stand by its work.
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