Metroid: Zero Mission is the first thing that comes to mind for me. It's an example of a remake that's very different from the original so I can see why some might argue, but I'm of the opinion that the original is kind of hard to recommend to anyone who didn't grow up on it. ZM is just phenomenal and holds up perfectly.

I'll say Kirby Super Star Ultra for a remake that's nearly a straight upgrade over the original. The only real nitpick is that multiplayer is a little janky, SNES is obviously just a smoother experience for that.

The gen 1 Pokemon remakes (FR/LG not LGP/LGE). Sure the graphics are better (and in color!) but what really makes them worth it is how they fixed how insanely broken and bugged so much of the originals were. That alone would make it worth it but also adding a whole new post game that was from a part of the anime we never got to explore in the games? That was exciting and fun! Plus as a nice bonus we got all the quality of life features that had been added to the series over the past 2 entries (which makes a big difference), a lot of general updated features from the series like breeding and abilities, and you could move Kanto Pokemon into future games again as the final cherry on top.

A much needed update with enough new added to make it fun to jump back in, and brought up to the features expected of more modern titles in the series that makes it a no-brainer when recommending the way someone should go back and experience the first gen of Pokemon. I only ever play through the originals purely for nostalgia nowadays.

There are remakes, remasters, and rereleases. A lot of time they get lumped together but are distinctly different. Usually I prefer a good remaster. If the game has improved graphics, sound quality, works on modern systems with modern controls, and other quality of life upgrades then that's awesome. The Command and Conquer Remastered collection really hit the mark with this recently. Quake 1 and 2, Halo Master Chief Collection, and God of War Collection were all pretty solid. Bioshock 1 and 2 were nice but fighting the mouse controls sucked. GTA Trilogy remaster seemed great too, but I only originally had played Vice City on initial release.

Rereleases are usually cash grabs and I hate that. It can be nice to get a port but when Nintendo is charging $30 for ancient games you have several copies of that just sucks. The recent Clash of Heroes M&M remaster felt like a cash grab rerelease too.

Remakes are usually a miss because they change things I dont want changed. I hate the FF7 remake. Give me a remaster and I would love it but that remake is packed with so much garbage filler and fundamentally changes the combat into button mashing boredom, its awful. Very pretty looking, but just horrible to play.

To answer the original question, remakes I like: Resident Evil 1 and 2 nailed it. Better controls, graphics etc, and maintained the majority of the game layout, awkward fucking script, and everything that made them iconic. Dead Space nailed it too except for the transition stutter when moving from area to area. Other worthy mentions are Crash Bandicoot, Spyro, Shadow of the Collosus, Duck Tales, Grim Fandango, and Prince of Persia collection.

I'm playing System Shock now, but having never played the original I cant compare it. Its neat to have the opportunity to play a classic with improvements, and it reviewed well so I think its faithful enough I'm getting a good experience of it.

Most modern remakes I'm pretty meh on, but I do think they nailed it with X-Com. I can't really think of another game from my childhood that got treated properly.

Sid Meier's Pirates! was remade twice - once in '93 and once in '04. Probably the first title that springs to mind for me. I have unfortunately only played the 2004 version, although I know the older ones are considered all time classics. Maybe one day.

There have been lots.

Some consider it to be sacrilege, but I think Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes is a fantastic remake. Yes, it makes parts of the game significantly easier, but they're parts of the game that I would argue are more difficult due to unfortunately cumbersome controls that were outdated only a few short years after MGS1's initial release. I think this one is a matter of which game you played first, because I played Twin Snakes first. It does have the unfortunate effect of making MGS2 far less impressive though, since all of the graphical and mechanical upgrades were carried over to the first game, so when you continue the series after Twin Snakes, it just feels like you're playing that game two times in a row.

Then there's stuff like the Baldur's Gate enhanced editions. I'm sure I'm enjoying countless quality of life improvements over the original versions of the game, not the least of which is support for modern monitors, resolutions, and aspect ratios. I know of a couple that I'm quite thankful to have, like UI improvements for information display and inventory management.

Remakes like these really do breathe new life into old games, and the lack of one for something like Goldeneye 007 is a major barrier to me going back and playing a game like that. Maybe we were okay with 13 frames per second in 1997, but I can't say I am anymore; I probably stopped being okay with it just a few years later. Then you've got the System Shock remake. It goes pretty far with how much they modernize that game, but I ran into a loop of dying, not having enough resources, and losing those resources again to respawning enemies. It would have been nice if they brought those quality of life features far enough that I could change the difficulty settings halfway through the game, but that's not a feature it supports.

I have no idea why we're remaking a game like Assassin's Creed 4 or The Last of Us or Horizon: Zero Dawn already. That's just going to make the market prematurely sick of something that has legitimate use cases, like what Hollywood did to 3D.

One of my favorite Remakes is Lunar: Silver Star Story Complete on the Playstation and Saturn from 1996. The original game is on Sega/Mega CD from 1992. I never played the original game on real hardware, only looked into it through emulation. In 2025 they remastered those games for multiple modern systems. Also I played the hell out of original Dune 2 on Genesis/Mega Drive in 1992. And later the Remake Dune 2000 on Playstation in 1998.

Also what constitutes to being a Remake was even harder to tell back then, because in some cases a port is a new implementation of the game that could be classified as such. BTW visit the page https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_video_game_remakes_and_remasters and click following to have the list sorted by Remake/Remaster versions:

No need to read the following paragraph. I just yap about Remake and Remaster terminologies and why Castlevania 4 isn't a Remake.

I never accepted Super Castlevania 4 as a Remake. To me "Remake" implies making the same game. Otherwise we have lot of candidates: https://castlevania.fandom.com/wiki/Category:Remakes/Reimaginings . This is more inline with a Reimagining like Final Fantasy 7 Remake or the recent Resident Evil Remakes. But not a Reboot that has nothing to do with prior games, like DOOM or Tomb Raider. I would rather count the Castlevania for Sharp X68000 as a proper Remake, which I only played the Remster of the Remake with Castlevania Chronicles on Playstation! And yes, I have some strong feelings about these categorizations. Just wanted share my opinion, no opinion is wrong or right.

Remakes are usually a miss for me, but I like seeing attempts at building upon pre-existing games. I draw the line at "building upon" instead of "replacing/reimagining" the original, though.

For example, someone else already mentioned that Pokémon Fire Red/Leaf Green are miles bette than the originals, and really great games in and of themselves. Although nowadays I only play rom hacks that fix some of the more... Weird and annoying design choices (running shoes, national dex, etc).

Resident Evil 1 Remake is my favourite horror game of all time, which is funny because I don't care much about the OG RE1. It takes what worked in the original (the mansion map), improves upon that, and adds more stuff, including the Crimson Heads which are my favourite mechanic in any RE game (and I'm sad it never was reused elsewhere).
On the contrary, I love the OG RE2 and was very disappointed with the remake. It botches the story and completely shits on the characters to the point that I felt disgusted by it, even though from a gameplay standpoint it feels and plays great, and I love the RPD redesign.

Spyro is one of the first games I ever played, and I absolutely adore what they did with Spyro Reignited Trilogy. I consider it the best way to play those games outside of nostalgia.

I also would never recommend playing Yakuza over Yakuza Kiwami, which is just the same game, but better in every way. The English dub in the original is bad, the combat is clunkier, and the story is better explained and tied up in the remake. There's also a lot more content all around, including the Majima Everywhere system, which is a debated topic within the OG fandom, but I found it hilarious.

The Secret of Monkey Island and its sequels. I haven't played the originals, but the remasters felt very much like old school adventures.

I don't like the controls in super Mario all stars. The original controls were tighter and better. Whenever I play all stars I go back to the originals because all stars just feels off and not as good. Sure looks pretty though