In celebration of its 40th anniversary, Japanese magazine Famitsu surveyed over 5,000 people on a few sentimental topics, like what games influenced them most, their favorite characters, and what titles they would recommend.

As reported by Nintendo Everything, unsurprisingly, a lot of people got their start with Super Mario Bros. and Pokémon, but what is surprising is the disparity between the top-voted influential games and favorite characters.

  • Favorite Character

    1. Mario
    2. Cloud
    3. Tifa
    4. Kirby
    5. Link
    6. Leon S. Kennedy
    7. Pikachu
    8. Slime (Dragon Quest)
    9. Kazuma Kiryu
    10. Joker (Persona 5)

  • Most Influential Game

    1. Dragon Quest
    2. Final Fantasy 7
    3. Dragon Quest 3
    4. Pokémon Red / Green
    5. Dragon Quest 5
    6. Final Fantasy 10
    7. Chrono Trigger
    8. Super Mario Bros.
    9. Kingdom Hearts
    10. Resident Evil

Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest dominate the list for most influential games (and yes, I'm counting Kingdom Hearts in that), but Mario still comes out on top over Cloud and even Tifa. And I'm sorry to all the Yakuza fans out there — apparently a generic slime is better than Kiryu.

Nintendo Voted Favorite Developer, While Everyone Is Busy Playing FF14

Nintendo, as you would expect, got a lot of love in the survey, being voted the favorite developer, while Super Smash Bros. and Kirby creator Masahiro Sakurai took the crown for favorite creator.

A few Nintendo titles also appear on the "game spent the most time on" list, but the top spot goes to Final Fantasy 14.

  • Favorite Developer

    1. Nintendo
    2. Square Enix
    3. Capcom
    4. Atlus
    5. FromSoftware

  • Games Spent The Most Time On

    1. Final Fantasy 14
    2. Monster Hunter Portable 2nd G
    3. Final Fantasy 9
    4. Animal Crossing: New Horizons
    5. Dragon Quest 10
    6. Minecraft
    7. Apex Legends
    8. Final Fantasy 7
    9. Splatoon 2
    10. Super Smash Bros. Ultimate

The PlayStation was voted as the "favorite startup sound," ahead of the GameCube, PS2, Sega Saturn, and Game Boy.

Zelda might feel oddly underrepresented in the lists we've mentioned so far, but Ocarina of Time was voted the 12th most influential game, while Breath of the Wild was the number one "game to play again if you lost your memory," and "favorite game to recommend to others." Otherwise, Zelda on the whole was voted the 8th most influential series of all-time, ranking behind Tales of, Monster Hunter, and Persona.

Most Influential Series

  1. Final Fantasy
  2. Dragon Quest
  3. Pokemon
  4. Mario
  5. Persona
  6. Monster Hunter
  7. Tales of
  8. Zelda
  9. Metal Gear
  10. Kingdom Hearts

Japanese Gamers Want Even More Yakuza

Participants were also asked what series they most want a new game for, and while there were some bizarre inclusions, like Resident Evil, Yakuza, and Final Fantasy, which get new games every other day, there were a few solid picks worth highlighting, like Bloodborne, Metal Gear, Super Smash Bros., and Kingdom Hearts.

Bloodborne was also the 11th most-requested remake.

Dragon Quest, however, took the top spot, with Persona landing in second place (despite having just announced a sequel and remake). And while I ragged on the survey for including Yakuza, I do have to give props to participants for including Judgment, even if it ranked 22nd. It's a criminally underrated spin-off that's well overdue a return.

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