i'm going to shotgun a huge variety of choices and you can just pick what sounds most appealing.
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assuming the obvious like double dragon 2, the turtles games, contra, and taking turns on smb3 and whatnot are already considered. actually, let's just pretend anything with mario in the title, all turtles games, and all contra games are already considered for each system -
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plasma ball, if this NES somehow capable of playing famicom games. one of my absolute favorite games. kinda similar to windjammers, but a bit more casual and silly and with a tendency for worse players to occasionally win against better ones. 2-player game where both player pilot a cute robot and then slam a ball around the screen. there's 3 main modes: a battle mode, a mode where you try to get the ball in the opponent's goal, and a mode where you try to blow up your opponent's city. has japanese menus but they're easy to figure out with guesswork.
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wit's, just in case you somehow grab a multitap and again if this can play famicom stuff (rare FC-exclusive game that works with NES multitap). it's like 4 player snake with a few silly bonus modes and multiple characters. very simple, very easy to pick up, menus are pictorial so you don't even need to figure things out.
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freedom force. a two-player zapper game. pretty much -the- multiplayer zapper game, it's a standard lightgun shooter.
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joy mech fight. a late-life, famicom exclusive fighter actually done by nintendo. very goofy and simple.
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puyo puyo tsuu or
kirby's avalanche. you probably know what puyo is at this point - kirby is more a crowd-pleaser, but tsuu has some slightly more varied play options. one of those games where you have to match people up by skill level, though, not everyone knows it and good players will consistently destroy bad players - though there are simple handicap options.
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TETRIS BATTLE GAIDEN. YOU MUST HAVE TETRIS BATTLE GAIDEN FOR THIS PARTY. THERE IS NO EXCUSE, IT'S CHEAP. this is the best multiplayer party tetris, ever. it rules. everyone knows how to play tetris and certain characters can balance the handicap level. make sure you printout a list of what each character's specials are. this game doesn't have a huge learning curve but it is a bit different than regular tetris and you'll need to acquaint people with the basics of how the bonus moves work.
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final fight 3/final fight tough. maybe too obvious, but this is a big favorite. i really love this game. there's still quite a few brawlers on here to recommend that aren't TMNT IV, which is probably the too-obvious party choice everyone has played.
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pirates of dark water. probably the most obscurely recommended of this trio of brawlers, here, but i really love this game. it's fantastic two-player, though keep in mind a single play is a bit long at an hour and a half. this is a particularly good choice if you're going for some 90's nostalgia party, but i was personally never really that into the cartoon and mostly just love the game.
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ghost chaser densei. another really great brawler and maybe the best of the bunch, here, for simplicity's sake. i say this because the other two can have the other player kind of rudely interfere with one another, where in this game if you're doing mega scrub-tier play you'll occasionally just run into each other and activate really cool supers.
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goof troop. multiplayer pirateship higemaru. for a bit of a slower, more co-op play mood.
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kirby super star. maybe too obvious, but i genuinely think this is easily one of the best co-op games of all time. very easy to swap controllers around at a party, just leave the better player with kirby. whoever is playing helper basically cannot die, and that asymmetry is fun for both experienced players to completely wreck the whole game and someone playing with a totally inexperienced player to make them not feel bad. fucking
do not substitute this with dream land 3, they are a world of difference in quality and by different directors.
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mega man 7. it has a hidden fighting game mode that may serve as a "oh hey, that's weird" type novelty for 20 minutes. just look up the password.
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mega man soccer. when you gotta have a sports game, but you're still like "fuck sports."
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mighty morphin' power rangers: the fighting edition. extremely easy-to-grasp fighter by natsume. natsume!!! has some really cool beat 'em up-esque controls like double tapping to dash into attacks. also obvious nostalgia choice for a lot of people (i recommend every game on this list bereft of nostalgia, but you're throwing a party, so it's worth bringing up). i actually really love this game, but i'm a sucker for natsume.
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gundam wing: endless duel. super badass fighting game that is basically the follow-up to mmpr fighting. natsume masterpiece, though a bit less immediately accessible than mmpr. also going to make everyone at the party go "remember TOONAMI?" lol
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power rangers zeo battle racers. great alternative to mario kart. has both a relatively solid racing mode and a cool battle mode. also by natsume.
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super smash tv. i kind of hate smash tv but it's a decent party game. you know what this is.
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ganbare goemon (series). each of these are co-op platformers. i don't much care for them but they're pretty widely loved and i'd be remiss to not mention them.
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wild guns. it's the premiere gallery shooter. gotta recommend this excellent game, as it's just as fun in co-op! nastume masterpiece.
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kaizou chojin shubibinman zero. really great 2-player action game/beat 'em up lite. only available as a cart by columbus circle as a modern re-release - i've heard the voltage on it is slightly wrong and can fry your system, but i risked it and had no problems. i was too big a shubibinman fan to pass up owning this, i really love the series.
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sunset riders. better than the mega drive version! it's a solid co-op shooter and good alternative to contra.
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the obvious being streets of rage as a series, hyperstone heist, and gunstar heroes.
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streets of rage 2. yes, everyone has played it. but... it's streets of rage 2. i'm trying to not recommend the mega obvious but this is a whole room pleaser because even if you're not playing, you're getting to listen to some of yuzo koshiro's best.
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the adventures of batman and robin. i think this game is awful, but a lot of people like this as a co-op shooter. surprisingly difficulty, but mostly because it is exhaustingly filled with stuff with too much HP. very highly technically impressive, has a jesper kyd soundtrack people like (i do not), and based on a property lots of people love (admittedly, i do).
that's... really all i've got, here. huh. i've heard columns 3 has 5-player, maybe that's worth a grab? i remember general chaos being fun but i've not played it since i was a kid. it's a shame mercs/senjou no okami II is only one-player.
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assuming nothing but bomberman '94 is obvious, here -
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dungeon explorer & dungeon explorer 2. up to 5-player gauntlet-style multiplayer. pretty widely loved among people who enjoy the pc engine. i've only ever gotten 2 other players together and briefly touched both and they felt a bit clunky, but i've been meaning to give this another shot for ages. maybe it's secretly better with just two people, even with only 3 we were fighting over who got upgrades.
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kaizou chojin shubibinman 3: ikai no princess. SUPER fun and fast 2-player action game. briskly paced, filled with silly humor, and easy enough for anyone to jump in as a partner. the other two games in the series are also simultaneous multiplayer but the first is uh... really not great in multiplayer, and the second can be a bit rough around the edges, though i still really like it.
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nekketsu koko dodgeball bu: pc bangai hen. THE super dodgeball game. god fucking damn this is blisteringly fast & fun. i really, really, really love it. it just feels so fast and fluid and perfect. people on here might have some other recommendations for kunio games but this is the dodgeball one you absolutely want. surprisingly skill-intensive and fun in single-player, too. the other kunio dodgeball games feel just slightly off, to me when compared to this.
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psychic storm. maybe the only multiplayer vert shmup i'm going to put on this whole list because it's just easy enough to play with someone not that good at shmups and not pull your hair out. has some goofy engrish good for a few laughs at a party and is otherwise pretty solidly built with an impressive presentation.
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rock-on. the only
single player shmup i'm going to put on this list. this game is
awful but the engrish text scroll at the beginning is absolutely fucking hilarious and the game is only like 500 yen. really bad but a good gag for its opening text.
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mystic formula. pretty decent top-down shooter with a very anime flavor that i've been meaning to put more time into.
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puyo puyo tsuu or puyo puyo cd. more puyo options.
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ane-san. an honestly mediocre brawler elevated mostly by its completely sukeban cast, weird rockabilly soundtrack, and outright total weirdness. pretty obscure and interesting to say the least. you might want to look up some information on this game because it does have a bunch of side-stuff you can do between missions you can mostly ignore, but there's a weird mini-game hidden in there where you mash buttons to make a weird scary face before your opponent that is extremely bizarre and silly.
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ai cho aniki. let's be frank, here. you want this for a party. you know why.
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i don't have one, so no idea other than the obvious recommendation of all metal slug games.
though... for this or dreamcast, you can pick up
garou: mark of the wolves, which is my favorite snk fighter despite being an ftg scrub. the movesets for motw are very simple but it's just as technical and challenging as most snk fighters get. this is probably the only "real" fighting game i started to get decent enough to play with people who actually loved fighting games with, not counting those two natsume games on the sfc (or melee).
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other than the super obvious recommendation of saturn bomberman, i don't actually know what to recommend, here. with all the controllers i bought for saturn bomberman, i should probably look into other stuff...
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aside from super puzzle fighter II turbo, which fucking rules but was outclassed by its rebalanced version on the xbox live arcade, i can't actually think of anything at the moment.
m-maybe chocobo racing? though i revisited that recently and wondered what on earth i had been thinking to ever love this. g-darius, maybe, though shmups aren't really good party games most of the time. gradius gaiden falls in that alley, too.
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i'd like to recommend the armored core series, here, but you'd have to get multiple consoles and saves and etc. and it would be a huge headache.
neo contra - okay, i know i said that the contra games are all obvious, but this is probably the best co-op contra game. absolutely blast of a top-down shooter and with a difficulty and control scheme reasonable and welcoming enough to invite new players into. the last vestige of good top-down shooters before they all became samey twinstick garbage.
the red star - this can get unwinnable for even moderate players if you don't do well early on, but is a really cool, really unique co-op brawler/danmaku shooter combination not that far off being the only game you could reasonably compare the modern-gen furi to. the early stages are very accessible to newbie player co-op, but you want to be doing well at them to get stuff to upgrade your character to stand a chance against the final boss.
aqua aqua - the sequel to wetrix. i've played this single player quite a bit but totally forgot it even has multiplayer. is it
good multiplayer? i've never gotten someone to play it with me, to be honest, but i'm gonna try that soon now that i've remembered!! really cool 3d stacking puzzle game. i love wetrix immensely.
SNK arcade classics vol 1 - this has shock troopers on it! shock troopers!!!! SHOCK TROOPERS!!!!
everyone always recommends timesplitters, but i've never touched it.
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imho, the obvious here are mario kart 64, smash, any mario party game, perfect dark, and goldeneye. everybody knows the n64 is a good party system because of those games.
turok: rage wars - probably the best turok game to play multiplayer, though it does lack turok 2's cerebral bore, one of the most notoriously humiliation-kill fps weapon of all-time. has some outright goofball shit like weapons that make you skinny until you fall over or fat until you pop.
conker's bad fur day - really surprisingly fun party multiplayer, i highly recommend this! there's some asymmetrical modes here that you won't find anywhere else on the system, as well as a just-plain-solid 4 player battle mode with katanas, chainsaws, smgs, all sorts of goofy stuff. my favorite mode has one team of evil teddy bears trying to kill french caricature squirrels immigrating off the beach. the squirrels are at a severe disadvantage with no weapons, but if left unchecked, they can climb up and push this button to detonate the teddy base while trying to cross into the safe zone. might offend someone at a bigger party?? i guess?? i don't know if that's even worth bringing up.
wetrix - to be honest i haven't played wetrix multiplayer in several hundred years but the solo play is so awesome that it's fun to see who can do the best. i love this game.
edit: went to go play some multiplayer with roommate after typing this. if you haven't played in a while (and my roommate hadn't), the readjustment period is actually a bit difficult for multiplayer to just get going immediately.
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vigilante 8: second offense - the best version of this game and a pretty decent car battle brawler that imho is a lot better than the twisted metal games of the time. if you've got a bunch of dreamcast controllers, it's not gonna set you back to pick up a copy.
house of the dead 2 - you don't mention guncons, but it's worth grabbing two for this. superb port with a lot of added stuff and a hell of a good time.
sega bass fishing - pass the rod around, try to catch the biggest fish! doesn't
sound that exciting, but this game actually totally owns and is a blast of a party game. yes, really. the fishing rod isn't too expensive, either.
unreal tournament - bizarrely playable on the dreamcast pad. complete with low-grav and instagib settings for Maximum Casual Fun.
virtual on: oratario tangram - is this obvious? for some of these choices, i don't know what is or isn't obvious.
i'd like to recommend the power stone games, but i never got them! did so much dreamcast multiplayer back in the day but never picked 'em up. should maybe get 'em and play with some pals. i had some fun with the psychic force sequel with quite a few people but it's been ages since i've given it a go whereas i've revisited most of these within the last several years at least once or have more solid memories of.
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does this do something other than play smash? i like kirby air ride for co-op a bunch (it has a really delightful free-roam city mode that is very unique for a racer) and enjoyed the turok game on it (which has a bow that can make your opponent's character puke their guts out for like 10 seconds in a very grotesquely humiliating death).
Still plenty to choose from on home consoles, but whenever I have game night at my house and friends-of-friends come over who aren't hard-code gamers, nearly every. single. person. gravitates to the arcade games without fail.
