I still think Xtrabytes and PascalCoin have much more interesting technology than a lot of coins valued a lot higher that got better marketing, thus I continue to hold them, along with Ark, NEM, BTC, and a couple others. I'm not a huge fan of all the carbon copy proof of work coins with simple basic wallets (though I admit deeponion is a compelling coin if they can get their forum software working) or all the new coins which all promise "smart contracts" or vague statements about all the services they offer.
I'm looking for scalability, power consumption, and how useful it is as a currency first. I love the user account and blockchain trimming idea of PascalCoin. I can remember my account number because it happens to be my zip code, but if you can't you can create any name you want to associate with it, like how DNS servers identify servers from host names.
Xtrabytes has their unique proof of signature.
NEM of course I believe if the best candidate to actually overtake bitcoin as something people can use to buy a pizza with. Proof of stake, low power consumption, low fees, user friendly wallets, fast confirmation times...
Maybe someone will come around and combine the best features of all this tech at some point.
I'd like to see more coins use their CPU power to benefit mankind. Curecoin, a noname altcoin with development that has left the coin long ago has managed to become the number one folding team by far... if one noname altcoin with a $10M market cap can do that, imagine what the processing power used to keep the bitcoin system going could do.
http://folding.stanford.edu/stats/teams