Video game collections are a boon to gamers’ recently expanding interest in both playing and experiencing older titles. As seen in the successful reception of well-crafted/curated “vintage” collections – such as TMNT: The Cowabunga Collection and Metal Gear Solid: Master Collection – there’s a viable market for re-releasing games in conveniently accessible compilations (especially those with extra content and quality-of-life improvements). What follows is a list of hypothetical game collections that could be utterly spectacular if the stars were properly aligned.

10. Batman: The Sunsoft Collection

Following on the then-overwhelming critical and financial success of Tim Burton’s blockbuster Batman from 1989, multiple tie-in video games were produced and released by Japanese developer Sunsoft, with Batman: The Video Game still being seen as one of the very best NES games. This game collection would ideally feature both the NES and Game Boy versions of Batman: The Video Game and Batman: Return of the Joker, with the special inclusion of Sunsoft’s Batman and Superman games for the Sega Genesis to round out the whole package.

9. Earthworm Jim 1+2 Remastered Collection

While franchise creator Doug TenNapel is (to put it judiciously) something of a “divisive” figure to many people, I nonetheless have a massive soft spot for the first two Earthworm Jim games, respectively released in 1994 and 1995. My hypothetical game collection would have newly (and painstakingly) remastered/optimized versions of Earthworm Jim: Special Edition and the enhanced Saturn port of Earthworm Jim 2 as the main attractions, but with the original Genesis and SNES releases of both games included for prosperity.

8. Mega Man / Mega Man X Archives Collection

To supplement Capcom’s Mega Man and Mega Man X Legacy Collection releases, I would suggest the addition of a game collection including various “odds and ends” from both subseries that have yet to be re-released for wider purchase. On the “classic” side, I would include all five Game Boy games, a proper localization of Rockman & Forte (SFC, 1998) in place of the 2002 Mega & Bass GBA port, The Wily Wars, and Powered Up (with revived online functionality); on the “X” side, I would include both Xtreme titles for the Game Boy Color, Command Mission, and Maverick Hunter X.

7. Castlevania HD Collection

As in the entry above, I would love to supplement Konami’s excellent Castlevania Advance and Dominus Collection releases with a third game collection featuring high-definition upscales of the 3D/2.5D titles Lament of Innocence, Curse of Darkness, and The Dracula X Chronicles. The first two games would receive quality-of-life improvements to try and address criticisms involving gameplay, while the third would (ideally) maintain the PSP release’s two unlockable titles (Rondo of Blood and Symphony of the Night) – and get Castlevania Chronicles thrown in as a nice bonus!

6. ReadySoft Legacy Collection

Despite this being a very niche idea for a game collection, I wouldn’t mind seeing a well-designed and optimized compilation of the multiple FMV-based “animated adventure” titles developed/ported by the long-defunct ReadySoft corporation: the Dragon’s Lair trilogy, the Space Ace duology, Guy Spy & the Crystals of Armageddon, and Brain Dead 13. Hopefully, all of this will incorporate additional viewing and playing features like in the later DVD/Blu-ray releases of Dragon’s Lair and Space Ace.

5. Sonic Gems Collection -Extra Edition-

Effectively just reworking and adding to the preexisting Sonic Gems Collection, I’d like to see an enhanced re-release of the 2005 game collection to address some of the criticisms lobbed at it: reinstating the unlockable Bonanza Bros. game and Streets of Rage trilogy for all regions, adding more Genesis and Game Gear titles (such as Sonic the Hedgehog, Sonic Chaos, and Sonic Drift missing from the latter selection); the replacement of Sonic the Fighters with its updated 2012 digital re-release; and – if finally possible – the long-awaited inclusion of SegaSonic and Knuckles’ Chaotix.

4. Clockwork Knight 1 & 2 Remastered Collection

Despite the Clockwork Knight franchise only consisting of two fairly obscure Sega Saturn games from 1994 and 1995 (that are arguably just one longer game split into notably short “halves”), both games are still pretty fun and charming 2.5D action platformers. My idea to make both of these titles accessible again – while also attracting newer audiences – is to develop and bundle together enhanced remasters of them (but, of course, also including the original Saturn versions as bonuses).

3. Konami Quarter-Munchers Collection

This one would be admittedly very impossible due to encompassing various separate licenses, but – if pigs could fly – I would genuinely love to see a definitive game collection of the multiple co-op arcade games that Konami released throughout the early 1990s based on then-upcoming and popular media franchises. This would include the company’s arcade releases of X-Men, Aliens, The Simpsons, Bucky O’Hare, G.I. Joe, Wild West C.O.W.- Boys of Moo Mesa, and both TMNT titles (if it’s okay to repeat their inclusion from The Cowabunga Collection).

2. Silent Hill Definitive Collection

I count myself as one of the starving Silent Hill fans hoping beyond rational hope that the success of last year’s Silent Hill 2 remake (as well as the enhanced GOG version of SH4) might finally encourage the necessary parties to work out the issues preventing a more complete – and less disastrous – game collection than the infamous Silent Hill HD Collection. This collection would need to include all four of the original PS1/PS2 Silent Hill games (pre-Origins) fully optimized to a level comparable to the aforementioned SH4 re-release on GOG, with all original voice-acting and graphical assets intact.

1. Team Ico Trilogy

Readers will undoubtedly have picked up my love for the overarching work of Team Ico (Shadow of the Colossus in particular) and would be ecstatic if more people could experience and (hopefully) fall in love with them too. To this, I suggest a game collection with the following content: an enhanced “remake” of Ico done in the same vein as the 2018 remaster of Shadow of the Colossus, upscaled PS5 reworkings of SotC 2018 and The Last Guardian, and – to appease purists – the inclusion of the optimized PS3 editions of Ico and SotC from The Ico & Shadow of the Colossus Collection.