Wow, surprised no one brought up Metroid Prime. I loved the music in this game, it fit the stages so well.
I wandered the tundra for hours just to listen to this song. It made you feel like you were truly alone (minus the baddies
) exploring a frozen wasteland.
In the underwater space frigate, again that alone feeling exploring the depths of a vast body of water.
The fire spitting badlands!
This game gave you all the life in the world, active gun changing (new for Metroid games) and various super abilities and the bosses were still tough! It didn't rely on cheap tactics like 1 hit taking off more than half of your HP. You had multiple life bars in fact. Then combine those awesome boss battles with the soundtrack and Metroid Prime is one of the best games I've ever played. As bad *** as Super Metroid was, I spent the most time in the original Metroid exploring, finding shortcuts the devs never intended. Metroid Prime's soundtrack was a great throw back to the original but better.