Hard to believe, but there are some great platformers without Mario title on them. Like my favorite for instance, Psychonauts. This game was awarded for it's brilliant humor and design. It brought storytelling, character depth and development on completely new level, as far platformers goes that is. Levels and enemies are not nearly as generic as in other platformers, bosses are actually unique and challenging. Shame though this game was not recognized by wider audience.

Another great one I played recently was Sonic Generations. Seeing as I never played Sonic games before everything was new and exciting to me. A well done mixture of 3D and classic 2D platforming was an excellent choice, it also has a decent story with a rather nice twist at the end. Supporting characters are gameplay wise implemented perfectly, Sonic Generations can also brag with tons of extra content to unlock and memorable music.

I also have fond memories of Donky Kong Country series, though I've never beaten any of them. Daxter is also awesome, one of my first games on PsP. I think I'll have to look into Jak and Daxter series. And who can forget oldschool games such as Dangerous Dave and Commander Keen series. First Dangerous Dave was hard as ****, Commander Keen on the other hand, third game in particular could be beaten in matter of minutes.

Now for little bit of discussion, a rather cliche question, what are yours favorite platformers?