The 11 Best Video Game Remakes of All Time, Ranked

Image via Nintendo Published Nov 6, 2026, 6:48 PM EST Writing from the Chicagoland area in Illinois, Robert is an avid movie watcher and will take just about any excuse to find time to go to his local movie theaters. Robert graduated from Bradley University with degrees in Journalism and Game Design with a minor in Film Studies. Robert tries his best to keep up with all the latest movie releases, from those released in theaters to those released on streaming. While he doesn't always keep up with the latest TV shows, he makes it a goal to watch nearly every major new release possible. He has been honing his craft and following any and all movie news all his life, leading up to now, where he has a vast knowledge of film and film history. He also logs every movie that he watches on his Letterboxd page, and has hosted a weekly online movie night with his closest friends for over 6 years. Sign in to your Collider account The act of remixing and remaking a previously beloved work of art has been pervasive in all different mediums and forms of entertainment, yet there are distinct elements of video games as a medium that make their respective remakes different from other art forms. While movie and television remakes are often defined by their change in artistic vision and technological improvements, video game remakes often take the initiative of refining poorly aged aspects of the original games, making use of the exponential growth of technical capabilities, or just simply making the game readily available to modern gamers. This has resulted in many video game remakes, when they are successful, not only living up to the stature and legacy of the original games, but in many ways replacing the original in terms of replayability, being the definitive ways to experience these legendary titles. Remakes come in all different forms and approaches, but the very best video game remakes find this perfect balance between delivering the strengths of the original game and having something new and exciting to offer. 11 'Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door' (2024) Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door continues to be celebrated as one of the very best games on the GameCube, with its overwhelming charm and engaging battle system making it the fan-favorite peak of the Paper Mario franchise. However, the series largely abandoned the signature battle system and engrossing worldbuilding that made the game such a hit, making it all the more exciting that the game was receiving a super polished remake in the modern age. It would be great enough to simply release the exact same masterpiece for modern consoles, but the Nintendo Switch remake of Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door adds just enough quality of life changes to make it the definitive version of the game. Most notably, the game makes improvements to pacing through the addition of a fast travel area and a quicker way to switch between partners. The game also features two new secret bosses to challenge veterans of the original game and a better translation of the original Japanese version of the game, portraying fan-favorite character Vivian as a transgender woman. 10 'The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time' (2026) Image via Nintendo The game just came out, so it's still early to tell how much of a legacy and impact this will have on the larger gaming industry as a whole, but the beautifully constructed Nintendo Switch 2 remake of The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time flourishes and evolves what was already one of the greatest games of all time. With beautiful visuals, a multitude of quality-of-life changes, and full voice acting, this remake is the complete package and a love letter to one of Nintendo's most cherished gaming experiences. As influential as the original game was and as great as it still is to this day, this remake serves to solve and update the game to the modern standards of not just visuals, but primarily control and ease of access in experiencing its mastery. The remake leaves a mark on gamers who experience it, whether they've played through the original game constantly since it was released or they only just recently got into the series with games like Breath of the Wild. 9 'Silent Hill 2' (2024) Image via Konami Digital Entertainment Following in the footsteps of the other major horror video game franchise's tendency to create massive, fully-fledged remakes of their most beloved classic titles, it was only a matter of time before Silent Hill 2 was given the AAA remake treatment. While the series as a whole has had a middling reception and was outright abandoned for large chunks of the 2010s, there was a lot of clear passion and care put into this remake to make it faithful to the original masterpiece as possible. The major strength of this remake is to provide a modern third-person camera system and a more dynamic combat system to a central narrative that is still celebrated as one of the very best in video game history. All of the strengths of its story and emotional beats are still there, with even legendary composer Akira Yamaoka returning to remix his all-time classic themes. It certainly helped that the game was largely developed by Bloober Team, a dev team of deeply passionate horror game fans who were inspired by the original Silent Hill 2 in the first place. 8 'Yakuza Kiwami' (2016) Yakuza had always been an appreciated franchise, but it reached an overwhelming state of newfound success and appreciation following the release of series prequel Yakuza 0, putting the series in the perfect spot for a high-profile remake of the first game in the series. Yakuza Kiwami makes use of a lot of the improvements that the series has made since its humble PS2 beginnings, more directly honing into its distinct voice for hard-hitting crime drama as well as wildly goofy and over-the-top comedic side content. It also helps that this remake more directly amplifies some of the most celebrated aspects of the entire series, having some of the most iconic side missions and a perfect portrayal of the iconic rivalry between Kazuma Kiryu and Goro Majima. This game has outright replaced the status of the original game in the eyes of many Yakuza fans, as well as being one of the best entry points to the franchise in all of its brilliance. 7 'Super Castlevania IV' (1991) While video game remakes directly utilizing the improvements of technological advancements largely seems like a modern trend, this phenomenon has been occurring even during the 16-bit era of gaming, with one of the best examples being Super Castlevania IV. The SNES classic acts as a remake of the original NES classic, seeing Simon Belmont facing off against the monsters in Dracula's castle looking to defeat the infamous monster. The game is a perfect example of just how much video games as a medium was growing and evolving in the 80s and 90s, having massive visual and gameplay improvements despite releasing only 5 years after the original game. It adds more exciting gameplay elements, increases the scale and memorability of its missions, and features one of the absolute best video game soundtracks of all time. The game is still considered one of the best games in the franchise and one of the best games on the SNES. Collider Exclusive · 8 Questions · 2 Minutes What Fantasy World Do You Belong To? Middle-earth · Grand Line · The Continent · Camp Half-Blood Pick your magic, your crew, where you want to wake up and who you would rather be fighting, and we will tell you which world you actually belong in. Four are open to you: an ancient kingdom living through its last good age, an endless sea full of pirates, a continent that pays people to kill monsters, and a summer camp where the Greek gods are extremely real and mostly a nuisance. 💍Middle-earth(Rings of Power) 👒Grand Line(One Piece) 🐺The Continent(The Witcher) 🔱Camp Half-Blood(Percy Jackson) FIND YOUR WORLD → 01 What kind of power do you want? Every one of these worlds runs on a completely different sort of magic. ASomething ancient and half forgotten that came down through my family. BSomething completely ridiculous that works in a fight and gets a laugh. CNo magic at all, just training, potions and a very sharp sword. DSomething I inherited from a parent I have barely met. NEXT QUESTION → 02 Who is travelling with you? Nobody gets through any of these stories entirely on their own. AA fellowship drawn from every corner of the world who barely trust each other. BA crew I picked up one at a time, all of whom would die for me. CTwo or three people I would never describe out loud as friends. DTwo mates from school who are exactly as out of their depth as I am. NEXT QUESTION → 03 Where do you want to wake up tomorrow? The best fantasy is usually just somewhere you would genuinely like to live. AA high city of white stone with the sea somewhere far below. BA ship under sail, with an island ahead that nobody has mapped. CA rented room over a tavern, in a town I am leaving in the morning. DA cabin at a summer camp with everybody else already awake outside. NEXT QUESTION → 04 How are you making a living out there? Even in fantasy somebody has to pay for the horse. AI am not, because somebody far older than me decided this was my duty. BTreasure, and I am not always careful about whose it used to be. CI take contracts, since people will pay well for what they will not touch. DI am fifteen and this is all technically a school trip. NEXT QUESTION → 05 There is something in the woods. What do you do about it? All four of these worlds keep something unpleasant out there in the dark. ASend word to somebody who has seen this before, then hold the line. BWalk straight in, because it is interesting and possibly edible. CAsk what it has been eating and what the village is willing to pay. DWork out which myth it escaped from, then improvise very badly. NEXT QUESTION → 06 Who is the villain of your story? The enemy tells you far more about a world than the hero ever does. AAn ancient evil that has been patient for several thousand years. BA government that has spent a long time calling itself the good guys. CA man who turns out to be far worse than anything I hunt for money. DA god, or possibly my own family, and quite likely both at once. NEXT QUESTION → 07 What do you actually believe in out there? Every world hands its heroes one rule and asks them to hold onto it. ASome things are worth defending even when the odds are hopeless. BNobody gets to tell me where I can go or what I am allowed to want. CPick the lesser evil, and never pretend afterwards that it was not evil. DMy friends come before anything a prophecy has to say about it. NEXT QUESTION → 08 A thousand years from now, how are you remembered? Eight questions in, this is the one that decides your world. AIn a song, in a language hardly anybody still speaks. BAs the one who got there first and proved the whole thing was possible. CBarely, and mostly wrongly, in ballads I would absolutely hate. DOn a plaque at a camp, read by kids about to do the same thing. REVEAL MY WORLD → The Map Is Drawn Your World Is…Four worlds and four completely different ideas of what a good life looks like. This is where you belong, what it would ask of you, and what you would get back in return. Middle-earthYou belong somewhere old enough that the mountains have names and somebody can still tell you who gave them. Middle-earth is for people who think the right thing is worth doing even when it will not be finished in their lifetime. This is the only world on the list where doing good is understood as a very long defeat, fought anyway, by people who will never see how it ends. You are drawn to grandeur, to white cities and deep forges and the sense that almost everything you touch is older than your entire family line. The Rings of Power is set in the last good age before it all goes wrong, which gives every quiet scene in it a slightly unbearable weight. You would take the hard road, and you would take it on foot. The Grand LineYou want the sea, a crew, and absolutely nobody telling you where you are allowed to go. The Grand Line is the world for people whose main ambition in life is finding out what is over there. One Piece has run for decades on one very simple engine, which is a group of people who each want something impossible and have decided to go and get it together. You collect people. Your ideal crew is a set of misfits who were each written off somewhere else before you turned up and offered them a better idea. The world is enormous and deliberately ridiculous, and the emotional gut punches land harder because of that rather than in spite of it. You would set sail knowing the map runs out, which is more or less the entire point of it. The ContinentYou would rather be feared and useful than liked and useless. The Continent is a world where the monsters are the straightforward part of the job and the people are where it all gets complicated. Witchers get paid to do what nobody else will and resented for existing at all, which is a trade most people would refuse and you would probably accept. You have no real illusions about which side is the good one, largely because on the Continent that question tends to have a disappointing answer. The best of these stories are not about the fighting. They are about somebody with a rigid code being repeatedly cornered into caring about people. You would take the coin, finish the job properly, and be out of town before the story got told wrong. Camp Half-BloodYou want the myths to be real and loose in the actual world, and you want to find out at about thirteen that you were never anywhere near as ordinary as everybody kept telling you. Percy Jackson takes the oldest stories we have and drops them into car parks and diners, which makes the gods considerably funnier and a great deal worse. You would be the kid every school gave up on, who turns out to have been built for something nobody thought to test for. The series is genuinely about friendship rather than destiny, and it says so out loud every time a prophecy tries to get in the way. Camp Half-Blood is the real fantasy here: a place where the thing that made you difficult everywhere else is the thing that makes you belong. ↻ RETAKE THE QUIZ 6 'Persona 3 Reload' (2024) The Persona series was already massively celebrated and acclaimed when Persona 3 first released, but the series saw a massive explosion in popularity and visual style following the overwhelming success of Persona 5. This largely led to the creation of Persona 3 Reload, which acted as a definitive modern remake of the classic PS2 game that utilized the visual flair and brilliance of Persona 5. Reload proves to be incredibly faithful to the storytelling and character of the original game while upgrading it to the modern standards of the series. In terms of pure polish, the game is one of the most beautiful and striking pieces of visual art that gaming currently has to offer, elevating and evolving what was already a game with half-decent visuals into a masterclass of style. While the visuals are the clear immediate strength of this remake, the game also makes a lot of quality of life changes to better align its gameplay with the systems of Persona 5. It overall just makes for a more impactful and compelling version of what was already one of the best JRPGs ever made. 5 'Shadow of the Colossus' (2018) Image via Sony Computer Entertainment The original Shadow of the Colossus was one of the most critically acclaimed adventure games of its era, with its beautiful and somber tone mixed with the massive scale of its boss fights making it a true work of art that pushed the medium forward. Considering just how much of the original game was defined by its then pristine graphics and the weight of its scale, amplifying and further iterating on this scale in a full 4K remake for PS4 made the Shadow of the Colossus remake an undeniable leap forward. Development team Bluepoint Games already had experience in recreating the strengths of Shadow of the Colossus, having previously developed the PS3 remaster of the game. However, this remake proves to be a massive leap forward in terms of the visual brilliance and scale of the game, making its most iconic moments all the more breathtaking and captivating for players to experience. 4 'Metroid: Zero Mission' (2004) Image via Nintendo Many of the games from the 8-bit era of gaming, as massively influential and important as they were for the industry as a whole, certainly don't hold up nearly as well when placed under a modern lens. In terms of actively updating and evolving one of these legendary titles to fit the standard of its modern titles, Metroid: Zero Mission is about as great as a remake of an 8-bit game can get. This Game Boy Advance classic and remake of the NES original Metroid adds so much new content to the original classic that it's almost staggering. It's filled with new puzzles, more engaging combat, and a whole slew of new bosses and areas that expand upon the world and story of the NES original. While the original Metroid continues to be defined by its age, Zero Mission is one of the most timeless and well-crafted entries in the entire franchise, to many people being one of the high-points of the franchise in terms of its 2D entries. 3 'Pokémon HeartGold/SoulSilver' (2009) Image via The Pokémon Company Few video game franchises have been as consistent and frequent with their updated remakes of classic titles as the Pokémon series, as their remakes often go beyond simply porting the original game, but create vast, new experiences complete with all sorts of content and changes from the modern games. While several Pokémon remakes have surpassed their original games in the eyes of fans, Pokémon HeartGold and SoulSilver were so beautifully crafted in their recreation of the Generation 2 games that they are still considered some of the best Pokémon games ever made. HeartGold and Soulsilver are not just defined by how effectively they match the original games, but also by just how much new content and experiences that they add to this title. Gameplay additions that have been added since the Game Boy Color days, like Abilities and the Physical Special split, made an overwhelming difference in terms of the feel of the game and Pokemon battling as a whole. The game also has the fan-favorite feature of having Pokemon follow the player around, a feature many fans still beg to be included in modern games to this day. 2 'Final Fantasy VII Remake' (2020) Image via Sqaure Enix It's a lofty undertaking to remake and modernize one of the most influential video games of all time, even moreso, that Final Fantasy VII would end up being remade not just in the form of one game, but an entire trilogy of AAA experiences. While the trilogy itself is set to conclude this upcoming April with Final Fantasy VII Revelation, the highlight of this trilogy still stands as the iconic first game, Final Fantasy VII Remake. The essential PS5 game expands and builds upon the first act of the original game, creating a complete action RPG experience from the iconic locale of Midgar. It speaks volumes that Final Fantasy VII Remake is adapting what is only the first 7–10 hours of the original PS1 game and transforming it into a fully complete, nearly 100-hour adventure complete with engaging fights, emotional storybeats, and a dynamic remix of its classic story. The game further redefines what a Final Fantasy game can be in the modern age of gaming while staying true to the brilliance and timelessness of the original game.