u/Low-Poly_Bepis

This is part of my collection encompassing the Gen 5 and Gen 4 consoles which I keep in my bedroom. On my walls is a Mario Kart 8 advertisement from a GameStop I used to work at (which closed) and a poster I framed from an OG NES power set my Grandparents still had in-box.
On the shelf is my N64 (top left) PlayStation (bottom left) Sega Saturn (top right) and Super Nintendo and Sega Genesis (bottom right)
I turned the TV facing forward for this picture but I usually have it angled so I can play from my bed.

I've been collecting retro games for about a year now and the one thing I wanted to do with my collection is share with other people to impact them. I got to do that these past few months with my nephew. Specifically, with the OG Xbox.

My nephew is a great kid with a massive love for gaming. He's openly stated that he doesn't care what the game looks like so long as it's fun. With that in mind, I introduced him to the OG Xbox and we've been playing Halo CE and Halo 2 multiplayer a whole bunch every time he comes over. We like to get Mt. Dews and make a night of it. A lot of the time we just do Slayer, or we make our own little mini-games to play with the Slayer formula. One of our favorites is "Shotgun Hide'n'Seek." We go to Chiron TL-34, turn off shields and set the weapons to only shotgun. The "hider" then finds one of the many identical portals and stands in such a way that it fully eclipses his part of the splitscreen. The "Seeker" then has to basically play Russian roulette by entering each one of the portals in search for the hider--both ready to one-shot kill as soon as we see each other. It's TONS of fun.I missed out on the OG Xbox era and never thought I'd get to play the legendary multiplayer on Halo with anyone. But I got to do that with him and it's been incredibly special.

So for this Christmas, I picked up a broken Xbox console that I'm pretty sure just needed a cleanout and drive belt replacement. I'm currently waiting for the belt to come in the mail. But I want to repair this Xbox for him and hook him up with a handful of excellent games for the console.

Of course, I have to get him Halo CE. That way he can not only play the campaign, but we can also have a LAN party together--which would be the very missing piece to my Xbox experience. Also, my nephew is REALLY into tough games. He 100%'d Cuphead on the hardest difficulty before he was even 10 years old. He loves Soulslike games with Elden Ring being one of his all-time favorites. He actively seeks out challenging games to beat. So for that reason, I'm also going to get him Ninja Gaiden Black--a classic tough game.

If anybody has any recommendations for similarly difficult or classic experiences he needs, I'm all ears! Also tell me any peripherals that are a must too. (DvD playback kit maybe?)