I was never able to beat the ecco games, there would always be a level that didn't have a way to win, in the first one there was a level with strong currents I think that I could never get past, but ecco 2 it was that level when you return from the future after finding the asterite there were orcas and you save a bunch of orca pups and you'd think that she'd help you in some way get past the barier blocking the exit to the level but she never did. I always liked that game, something about a time traveling super dolphin wageing and interstelar war against an all powerful alien menace just seemed so origonal.
Rocket Knight adventures was a great game that I thought I was the only one to have ever played, something about the blending of opossums, midevil syle, and laserguns and rockets and giant hovering airships and massive orbital weapons platforms... also very origonal.
but I was alsways a sega fanboy, nintendo lost me after the nes ended its tyranical reign. I should try out the origonal starfox, I never played the origonal (did play SF64 though, very good other than the charicters being animals, but I still found them more or less ok, exept that for that dumbass frog).