You may remember me from such fanzines as Project: Ignition and The Gameroom Blitz!
Anyway, I've known Joe Santulli for a long time... he's a big reason why I started writing about video games in the first place! Ten years later, I'm still doing it. I no longer edit newsletters (too expensive), but my site The Gameroom Blitz is still updated from time to time.
Annnyway, my favorite games are mostly arcade titles from the 80's. Sure they don't have a lot of substance, but fast intense action is what video games are all about in my opinion... the rest is just filler. I strongly resented it back in the late '80s when game companies took popular arcade titles and turned them into generic adventures on the NES. The Nintendo Entertainment System had plenty of these frustrating, convoluted games as it was... Capcom and Tecmo didn't need to add to the pile with so-called arcade "translations" of Strider and Ninja Gaiden.
That turned into a rant awfully quick, didn't it? Heh heh... anyway, here's a list of my personal favorite games...

NightWarriors
Street Fighter (series)
Galaga
Gyruss
Gradius (series)
Aleste (series, includes MUSHA, Zanac, The Guardian Legend, and others)
Gunstar Heroes
Radiant Silvergun
Grandia
Suikoden (usually I won't touch RPGs, but these ones were so good even I couldn't resist them)
Mega Man (early games)

Anything else? Well, I can't think of anything offhand, so I'll wrap up this post right now.

JR