What are your favorites? One of mine is probably Mission 3 from Metal Slug 2: Ground, air, rail, and sea combat through several very different atmospheres. It's almost impossible to predict how the level ends by how it begins.
There's so many well designed levels in games from the 90s. Just about everything in A Link to the Past is a masterpiece, especially Ganon's Tower.
Pretty much anything from Super Mario 64 IMO. Ones that stick out are Bom-Omb Battlefield, Lethal Lava Land and Shifting Sand Land.
Agreed - Tick Tock Clock, Wet-Dry World, Hazy Maze Cave, any snow level, Boo's Haunt... The list goes on. On the topic of Mario, Tubular from SMW and pretty much all of Mario 3 World 8.
For FPSes, I nominate (most of) the original Doom's maps. I still usually miss some secrets on E1M7. Honorary mention: The Duke 3D map "Lunatic Fringe" that had you running in a big circle that was geometrically impossible - you had to run 720 degrees to get back to the starting point. Wonderful (ab)use of the game engine. Fun fact: Early versions of the Doom engine could do sth very similar, but it got removed for performance reasons soon after it was discovered by accident by the level designers.
I like how Streets of Rage 2 takes you through environments. Although I always wondered how they arrived at the start of the next stage. Like, what happened in between?
Shinobi III. All of it. Also, Panzer Dragoon and Panzer Dragoon II Zwei. Some of the best level designs (with musical arrangements that perfectly complement the levels) ever.
Definitely agree about Shinobi III and SoR 2. Revenge of Shinobi and SoR 1 were great, Shadow Dancer was alright, but their sequels perfected the form. Here's a few more that stand out! "Air Raid" - Stage 3 of Thunder Force IV/Lightening Force "Spook Mansion" - Stage 3 of Tiny Toons: Buster Busts Loose Deep Sea Research Center from FF8 Why wouldn't they count?
@Eviltaco64 Because I really loved Speed Punks' level designs, especially the amount of detail put into them.
I've been playing the original God of War upscaled in HD on a backwards compatible PS3. I forgot how interconnected the levels were, how you go so deep into some labyrinth from the start of the level only to come full circle and end up at the starting point again. The visuals have aged well.
