your Top Ten Games of all time

Hiya. I enjoy a good all-time list, sometimes one finds an interesting recommendation for the next game, especially if you like myself don't mind playing ancient games (i played Half-Life 1 for the first time only a couple years ago...instant top ten!).

What's yours? Be as detailed or as minimal as you like, you can include a series of games as one if they have an obvious unifying arc or are otherwise very related (like with the Mass Effect trilogy or the run of PS2 Pro Evos). They can all be recent if you feel ancient games don't age well (whereas I genuinely would rather play Turrican than most of the FPS's out today).

It has to be ten, tho'...some of your favourites are gonna just miss out, resist the temptation to 'honorably mention' haha

Here's mine, yous played them all?

10. X2: die Bedrohung/the Threat (PC)

Very chill yet involving space sim, and with epic dogfights too if you want. I ended up re-colonising a destroyed star system, took me several weeks of gameplay, and it had nothing to do with the game's story. Also replaced the soundtrack with a big selection of drum 'n bass cuts. This DIY vibe really suited the huge mostly-empty cosmos as playground. Gorgeous wow ambience when flying by massive ships. I realise X2 has been overtaken these days, but as I haven't got round to any of the successors it's X2 that cements a place in my all-time favourites.

09. Turrican I and II (C64)

They don't make them like this anymore...not just a sideways-scroller shoot'em-up but an up/down platform-explore-'em-up too. Excellent weapon selections make battling the varied hordes hugely satisfying. Large complex levels add to the fun challenge. I and II are largely indistinguishable, both perfect. I never got round to III but will one day!

08. Portal (PC)

Those brilliant "aha!" moments when you solve a fiendish level is unmatched in the world of puzzle-gaming. [SPOILER: Glados going insane and hunting you down outside the puzzle-rooms cements Portal's place in my top ten]. I also enjoyed the sequel but the first one is distinct and superior so the sequel doesn't get to tag along.

07. Half-Life (PC)

The spiritual successor to Turrican: crunchy varied weaponry, silent protagonist, lots of exploring and jumping with enjoyable quieter moments as well as the fun shooting mechanics, experiment-gone-wrong-causes-alien-invasion, the whole place explodes at the end. I haven't included the sequel as it's distinct, and it's not as varied. The original has Xen, the absolute highlight of the entire HL-series. Look forward to Black Mesa's Xen when it's finally ready!

06. Tomb Raider III (PS1)

I already loved the first one's loose open feel, and liked II's tighter action-orientated statement. III was the ideal marriage of the two: it has epic tombs to explore, and lots of great gunplay, plenty of varied environments from the jungle to Area 51 and lots in-between. I never played IV, but the Steam version is on my to-do list. The middle-trilogy of Legend/Anniversary/Underworld aren't as essential but still very enjoyable. The modern reboot meh...too emo. III is the finest Tomb Raider, so it gets a spot here.

05. Rollcage (PS1 and PC - caned the game on both platforms)

The greatest racing game ever...and I've played all the others, nothing comes close, not even Rollcage II or Grip. For some mysterious reason not even the original developers understand how the first Rollcage had absolutely amazing physics which somehow aren't quite replicable. Playing in first-person view is a must for ultimate immersion. You get mad unique races every time. It takes a lot of practice to master but extremely rewarding feeling when winning at the locked expert difficulty setting. Fantastic power-ups, clever Ai and a timeless selection of creative memorable tracks (racetracks, i mean...the music is so-so, i turn it off as the sound-fx are great).

04. Pro Evolution Series 1-5 (PS2)

I spent so much time on these games it's not even funny. Highlight was playing team co-op as a weak team like the default Master League side or in an international competition with a lowly nation, playing against the computer on unlocked 6-star difficulty. EPIC challenge and hugely-positive 2-player fun as you're on the same side.

03. Amnesia: the Dark Descent (PC)

Easily the scariest horror game ever. Must-play late at night with decent sound. This game was so influential it didn't just spawn a mass wave of survival no-weapons horror games, it also ignited the very popular Youtube Let's-Play culture, catapulting many youtubers to virtual stardom. It astounded me, masterful stuff. Frictional Games are quality, keep an eye on 'em.

02. Mass Effect trilogy incl. Leviathan DLC (PC)

Proper epic sci-fi space opera. Lovingly-created universe, more interesting than Star Wars/Trek. The trilogy has a truly incredible 'head-canon' ending. I do believe some of the team did intentionally put elements of that disputed ending in there, but that the chaos of 100+ people working on tight deadlines meant it never became official. Unfortunately as it wasn't made clear the ending(s) taken at face-value appear somewhat mild. Head-canon wins! Regarding all 3 games represented here, they're all roughly the same quality-wise and obviously from a gameplay and narrative perspective they make one über-epic experience. Andromeda? No.

01. Final Fantasy VII (PS1)

Mass Effect came close to toppling a game which has been my number one for 22 years now. If you asked every passionate gamer worldwide what their number one favourite is FFVII will consistently be up there, so hardly a controversial choice. Just that there's actual magic in it. I don't mean game magic, I mean actual indefinable magic where all the elements come together to create an astonishing work of art. Still addictively-playable and as emotive as ever today. Subsequent Final Fantasies were good but not magical in that sense, tho' I still have XII to-do so you never know.

Soz for long post, be happy to read yours, cheers!

Boo for putting multiple games in a slot.

Ten copies of Too Human.

I'll give this a go. I know the top few but after that the order gets fuzzy. So I'll work backwards.

1) The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt

2) Persona 4: Golden

3) Spelunky

4) The Last of Us

5) Mass Effect 2

6) Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic

7) Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time

Ok this is all I got. I love a lot of other games but I don't know what I'd put above all others I've played. But for the sake of having a full list I'll say

8) Super Mario World

9) Mega Man X

10) Beyond Good and Evil

The top games are almost all games I love for their story/characters/world more than the gameplay, which is usually what I prioritise in my games.

I think Civ 6 is the only major change to the list as compared to the last time one of these threads came around.

1. Command & Conquer (1995)
2. Descent (1994)
3. Frontier - Elite II (1993)
4. Sid Meier's Civilization VI (2016, with all current expansions/DLC included)
5. Wing Commander (1990)
6. The Ultimate Doom (1993)
7. X-COM: Terror From the Deep (1995)
8. Unreal Tournament (1999)
9. Populous (1989)
10. Crysis (2007)

I could, before the start of last gen, give a solid account of my top 10. Since then however it's become much harder. I'll have a go -

10.ICO

9. Wind Waker

8. Okami

7. Dark Souls

6. Metal Gear Solid

5. Halo CE

4. The Witcher 3

3. The Last of Us

2. Overwatch

1. EverQuest

1. Super Mario World

2. Tales from the Borderlands

3. WWF No Mercy

4. Halo

5. Super Bomberman

6. The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past

7. World of Warcraft

8. Katamari Damacy

9. The Binding of Isaac

10. Yakuza 0

Most of my favorite games are associated with memories. Playing Bomberman for hours with my friends, becoming stupid good as a team at Halo, not telling them about hitting the stick to get out of pins in No Mercy and earning the nickname 'Chief Cheat'. (It's not a cheat, it's in the instruction manual!) Those memories are more important to me than graphics and gameplay and the like.

1. Witcher 3

2. Legend of Zelda: Link to the Past

3. Super Metroid

4. Dragon Quest VIII

5. Goldeneye 64

6. Mario 64

7. Mario Kart 64

8. Diablo

9. Warcraft II

10. Master of Orion II

Looking at that list, the only game that has come out in the last 10 years is the Witcher 3.

They don't make them like they used to.

This is an impossible task. I’ll shoot from the hip and see what this looks like...

1) Virtual Pro Wrestling 2

2) Witcher 3

3) God of War (2018)

4) Street Fighter 2 (take your pick amongst the editions)

5) Ninja Gaiden Black

6) Halo: Combat Evolved

7) The Last of Us

8) Knights of the Old Republic

9) Rock Band 2

10) Tetris

Honorable Mentions:

- Shadowrun (Genesis)

- River City Ransom

- Overwatch

- Alan Wake

- Bioshock Infinite

- Mass Effect 2

- Splinter Cell Chaos Theory

@inevpatoria: I still think Too Human could have been alright if it didn’t get changed to 2-player co-op only just before shipping.

A few classes were basically useless playing 1 or 2 player and giant stages felt empty with only so many players and enemies...

Can't find an old post, so...

1. Either Fallout 4 or Senran Kagura: Estival Versus depending on my mood.
2. Persona 4
3. Devil May Cry 3
4. The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
5. Pokemon HeartGold
6. Dragon's Dogma
7. Star Fox 64
8. Kingdom Hearts 1
9. Deus Ex: Human Revolution
10. Need for Speed 2015

Whoa, didn't expect that one. I really liked it too, but as I recall Jeff and many other critics absolutely hated it.

It did so many silly things I enjoyed, the day/night cycle that skipped the day part, the way they integrated FMV and in-game graphics and all that stuff. The FMV characters were awful, but also 100% what I imagine these kinds of street racing car nuts to be like, so I loved it. Not in all-time favorites territory for me, mind you, but it's been one of the NFS games I've enjoyed the most.

Been a while since I redid one of these. It might be time for a slight revamp. I always enjoy doing lists like these just to reflect on old games for my own sake. Sometimes you remember or realize something cool in the process!

I'm not gonna read through it again so typos get to be typos forever.

1. Journey

Just about the only game I would consider approaching the perfection of a concept. On top of just thoroughly enjoying the "journey" with the amazing visuals and music, I also really, really love how pure it is. It's a simple and minimalistic idea, executed flawlessly. To me, there is nothing else quite like it.

2. Castlevania: Symphony of the Night

Honestly, SotN is just stand-in for one of my favorite genres overall. I'm a huge sucker for metroidvania in most of it's forms. However if there is one I would point to as genre-defining, especially to me and my experience. SotN is absolutely it. Great map, great aestethic, great music. The game feels just right to move around in, it has such a nice range of secrets, all of which are engaging to find. So good.

3. Bloodborne

Bloodborne is a perfect storm. A blend of all things I enjoy most in games. It's fast paced challenging action, combined with just the right type of compulsive (but achievable) exploration with a really unique and awesome tone and aestethic (you might notice by now that aestethic is a game changer on my list). Bloodborne amazing, and the only reason it's not the top of the list comes down to a few blights and blemishes with specific encounters or nitpicky stuff.

4. Bayonetta

Bayonetta changed the way I look at games. The core conceit of Bayo revolves around aggressively staying close to fast and powerful enemies, and deftly dancing around them without taking a hit. You want to be standing in the most dangerous position at all times, but through raw ability you can always make it through gracefully. Seriously, the high you get from this small gameplay loop is apparently my drug of choice, and Bayo was the gateway. Even now, 10 years later, it's by far the thing I find most engaging in games. Even bleeding into competitive games where I now tend to prefer the close range glass cannon.

5. Devil May Cry 5

For all the love I have for Bloodborne and Bayonetta, both those games suffer from the combat eventually growing stale. Once you have seen all the attacks, and learned all the patters. It's just not the same. But that's ok, because in my back pocket I will always have D M C. The absolute monolithic titan of action games. There is nothing that approaches the combat variety and just sheer unadulterated FUN you can find in DMC. And 5 is hand's down the best it's ever been. I've spent hundreds of hours on this franchise, but 5 gets to represent it on the list.

6. Witcher 3

When I realized the true breadth of content and the sheer amount of writing that was included in Witcher 3, I honestly thought it was a joke. Or an illusion. It's expansive to the point of insanity, and not a hollow type of large landmass, no it's also dense. As someone who was already a huge fan from the first game forward. And even back in 2007 I just wanted to live and breathe that world, getting a game like 3 was absolutely mindblowing. Witcher is special to me, largely because of the setting. While the fantasy is based off of Polish folklore, it's far closer to my own Scandinavian tales than any regular old high fantasy. It's the fantasy franchise that feels closest to home, and that's a rare feeling.

7. Metal Gear Solid 3

I've forgotten more about the MGS franchise than most people would ever care to find out. It's a special series.... In more ways than one. But I choose 3 to represent it, largely because I think it has done by far the best job of standing on it's own merit. It's a very fun game to play, with a cool and unique "James Bond meets cold war jungle" feel. And it can be enjoyed entirely with no context of the rest of the franchise, which can honestly only otherwise be said for the first game and five, both of which I think have too many other issues to rate. MGS3 is great, I should replay it.

8. Dark Souls

There's a lot to say about Dark Souls, and most of it has already been said in the myriad threads and videos it has spawned. But to me it was a beacon of hope during the worst gaming slump I've been in. The 360 era and the type of game and design that was popular at the time was absolute poison to me. And while gems like Bayonetta came out, they were generally relegated to niche status at best. But in comes Dark Souls which immediately hits all the right buttons for me personally, and then apparently the rest of the world as well. I honestly don't think it's an exagerration to say it changed the way the entire industry looked at games in one fell swoop. And I couldn't be happier about the result.

9. Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory

I have an on and off again relationship with stealth games. Much like with horror movies I think stealth games have very little room for error. Either it feels right, or it fails miserably. So by that perspective, I can be very picky. Chaos Theory in my eyes, is a very distinct peak of the genre. The things I think are most worth noting are the really well designed levels, the clear rules and visuals to help you make good judgment-calls and the variety of options at your disposal. Yet it manages to be just the right kind of challenging in spite of how much it helps you out. Stealth games have never quite been the same since this game... I'm old.

10. Nioh

Nioh is genius. It took the core gameplay loop of Souls and said "what if we made this infinite and added fantastic combat variety and mechanics". It doesn't quite nail it on the atmosphere and world building like Souls. But when you just want to scratch the itch of completing a souls style level, there is always another build or weapon class in Nioh you haven't yet spent too much time with. 10/10 would play a hundred hours again.

Honorable Mentions(youcantstopme): Nier: Automata, Resident Evil 2 Remake, Okami, Jak and Daxter: Precursor Legacy, Final Fantasy 10, Monster Hunter: World, DOOM 2016, Ultra Street Fighter IV, League of Legends, Starcraft 2, Ikaruga < Check some of those out why don't ya.

Did a search for "xeno" and got no hits, so this thread is invalid.

(I thought a long time about this and had to update my list a little. Dropping off my top ten and into the honorable mention category are Red Dead Redemption and Rainbow Six 3. I loved both games, but RDR's characters and humor aren't aging very well. Rainbow Six 3 has long held a spot on my list as a favorite multiplayer experience with a solid single player tactical campaign. CoD: MW2 bears mentioning for similar reasons, though its campaign was more bombastic than tactical. Also of note, Red Faction: Guerrilla is climbing my list based on the remaster holding up way better than I expected it to. It's not going to crack the top 10 yet, but I still like it quite a bit. On to the list!)

10. Titanfall - OG Titanfall is an underappreciated gem. What that game did to somewhat revitalize an FPS genre that was becoming increasingly stale should not be forgotten. It absolutely nailed mobility, a development which many games since have tried to imitate, but few have successfully duplicated. Additionally, the smart pistol and the stalker/chase gameplay style it encouraged was among my favorite multiplayer experiences ever. It replaces Rainbow Six 3 because I feel it did more for the genre. I was happy to see Titanfall 2 receive some critical/gamer acclaim, despite not being a sales darling from EA making a classically dumbass EA decision. I will continue to hope that they make a Titanfall 3 with a continuation of Titanfall 2's surprisingly great campaign and bring back the smart pistol from OG Titanfall.

9. Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory - I'm glad to see this game making appearances on people's lists. It's a truly great stealth game, and it cracks my top ten based on finally showing up on Xbox One backwards compatibility. Parts of it show their age, but it's still really good. Moreover, one thing that is sadly lost to time, but will always be remembered fondly in my mind, is the Spies v. Mercs multiplayer. I can't even really describe it adequately to people who didn't experience it. It was an amazing, but unfortunately brief time in which voice chat/online gaming was still new enough that people hadn't considered being awful to each other yet. You could co-op multiplayer with some rando, if one of you died, the other cheered you on instead of quitting out, and even the guys you were playing against would talk about how fun it was regardless of W or L afterwards. Consistently. I swear to God this happened, and it was a magical time. Best multiplayer experience ever.

8. Mario Kart 64 - Koopa Troopa Beach is kart racing perfected. There is enough skill, bullshit, and rubber-banding in this game to make it a great time even to this day. Seriously, some friends and I still pop some beers and fire this shit up every now and then, and it's still fun as hell. I guess they've made technically "better" Mario Karts since, but this one best captures the simplistic fun, IMO. I can't even count all of the photo finishes we've had due to well-fired green shells, bullshit lightnings, unavoidable bananas, etc. No game has precipitated more yells and laughter for my friends and I. It is taken both way too seriously and not seriously at all by us at the same time, and it's the goddamn best.

7. Gran Turismo 3 - The sheer amount of time I put into this game keeps it on my list. It's an all-time classic racing game, and in a world where the Forza games don't exist, it's the best racing game ever made. It looked mind-blowing at the time, and played well to boot. It was also a very deep game with a huge roster of cars and tracks, along with a quality soundtrack. I remember rigging intricate rubber band systems on my controller to run endurance races that were exactly that. I was playing it even when I wasn't playing it. It had the first loot box I can recall, with your car and its color as a prize reward at the end of a long race series or endurance race being a HUGE fucking moment that would make or break you. I 100%ed this game and got every car I wanted in every color I wanted, and that's something.

6. The Legend of Zelda - This is a game that was so good that my non-video game-playing father would kick us off the Nintendo to play it, reminding us when we protested that he was the one who bought the Nintendo. I'm not sure he's played a game since, but The Legend of Zelda was undeniable. It featured a high level of difficulty, a varied and interesting world, arcane/complex dungeons, and secrets galore. It's an adventure in the truest and best sense, and its nostalgia still hits me hard. I'm not sure how many times I've played through it, but it's enough to have memorized the long list of bombable areas, how to navigate dungeons, etc. That says enough for its quality right there.

5. Forza Horizon 4 - This may end up climbing higher on the list. All of the Forza Horizon games are fantastic, but this one is the best, thanks to the addition of seasons and how incredible it looks and plays in 4K HDR. This is far beyond what I thought consoles were capable of in terms of overall visual quality and scope. They've achieved perfection with this game and I literally have no idea how they could improve it. You can go as deep down the gearhead tuning rabbit hole as you want, you can create liveries to your heart's delight, or you can hop in some supercar and just hit some sick jumps. It's fun no matter how you play it, and it's my go-to game when I need to unwind and cruise. Five fucking stars.

4. Super Mario 3 - All respect to Mario 1 & 2 and The Legend of Zelda, but this is peak NES and peak Mario. It had fun and key powerups, puzzles, secrets, and was an incredibly tight platformer with enough difficulty to challenge me and keep me coming back to it over and over again as a kid. This game was a moment, and it probably deserves a lot of credit for video games garnering mainstream acceptance. It seemed like overnight the world went from only the nerdy kids playing games to you being some weirdo if you weren't playing Mario 3. There wasn't too much of a stigma left after this came out. Culturally, it thus commands a high spot on the list, and the substance of the game is obviously still there as well.

3. Goldeneye - Bond movies have always been fairly cool, but licensed games have mostly been trash. I still have a soft spot for Bond in general and Goldeneye as a movie, but some of it is cringe-inducing now. The game Goldeneye, though? Fucking excellent. It was the first game that proved an FPS could work on a console. Yeah, the N64 controller is a bit shit, but we made it work. I wholly rejected the PC crowd shitting on Goldeneye and still do. I'm glad you liked Quake. I liked Goldeneye. It's a graphical nightmare now, and Dan's Die Another Friday series proved that not all of the gameplay holds up, but it was incredible at the time for both its campaign and multiplayer and completely deserves its place among the annals of gaming history. I will die on that hill.

2. Halo: CE - Goldeneye proved that you could do a console FPS, but Halo: CE proved that you could do a console FPS extremely well. Do I even really need to make the case here? This game somehow still plays better than most shooters, and thanks to various graphical refreshes over the years, visually still works as well despite its age. Honestly, if the original game had never existed, you could release the visually updated version now and it would still become a classic. It's that good and holds up that well. I fire up the campaign often to this day. I look forward to the MCC's impending PC release so it can find some new or renewed love there. This is a perfect video game, and I have a hard time not putting it atop my list.

1. HITMAN 2 - I'm really glad they included Season 1 within this game because it allows me to cheat and include both on my list. I don't want to have to choose between HITMAN 2016 and HITMAN 2. Everything about this speaks to me. It can be played as a tactical stealth game, or you can throw an exploding baseball at a target's face in front of dozens of witnesses. It is as serious or as dumb as you want to make it, and it's a blast either way. Pulling the marionette strings on a giant sandbox of NPCs is amazing. Never has a game rewarded creativity more. It can hold your hand to some scripted moments, you can piece them together on your own, or you can create your own greatness. The dialogue and voicework is hilarious and self-aware, and there is so much depth to each map with easter eggs everywhere. I've dumped countless hours in HITMAN and still feel like I'm just scratching the surface. It is the best game.

10. WoW Vanilla: It was my first MMO and for a while it was all I cared about. The world was beautiful, the music amazing, and every class was fun to mess around with. Some of my fondest gaming memories come from doing some 5 man dungeon with a cool group of folks. A couple of years ago I played on a private server with a buddy for a while and it was still a blast.

9. Vampire Bloodlines: Although it was a buggy mess at release, as soon as I heard that not-Massive Attack opening theme with the shredding guitars, I knew things were gonna be ok. Already was a fan of the masquerade books, so actually playing one of these classes was a dream come true. Looking forward to the sequel next year.

8. Demon's Souls: I have a bad case of Souls fatigue these days but back in '09 this completely had me hooked. I imported it especially and played it so much it killed my first PS3. Took me 3 characters to finally finish the game. The game had very obtuse mechanics, but once I understood them, it was a lot of fun to plan out your character for the perfect stat distribution and gear. Don't know how many NG+'s I ended up doing but quite a few.

7. Shenmue II: I know this series doesn't often get mentioned without a snarky grin, but I genuinely loved the second game. I couldn't play the first one because of the horrid voice acting, and ended up waiting until some genius guy merged the japanese and english version in a rip a good while ago. It's a very flawed game. The second one just improves it in every single way. At the time there was nothing like it.

6. STALKER Shadow of Chernobyl: I'm a sucker for atmosphere done right, and up to this day, nothing beats this in that department. It starts out relatively inconspicuous but things gradually get weirder, psychedelic even. You feel you're slowly entering the lion's den and the culmination in the sarcophagus is like a dream more than anything. I love the Metro games but this is the game right here.

5. Bioshock series: Took me a while to warm up to this one, mainly cause I had it on Xbox360 and I'm terrible at fps on a controller. When it did click though, I was completely mesmerized by the world and it's inhabitants. This beautiful art deco world in ruins (well the first two), populated by batshit insane humans. The old timey music in contrast to the horrific violent scenes you witnessed. A work of art. The third one is amazing too albeit for different reasons.

4. Castlevania SoTN: I've been a fan of Castlevania since I got the first one with my NES. I used to collect everything related to Castlevania. This one came out in a period when most developers were experimenting with polygons. While the importance can not be understated, at the time I was really happy this came along when it did. Such a perfect game, and one only recently caught up with through the release of Bloodstained. Still the nod goes to SoTN, cause that game already did it 20 years ago.

3. Shadow of the Colossus: Basically one big boss rush, but set in a beautifully desolate world. No frills, just you, your sword and bow, and Agro, up until Roach the coolest animal companion ever. From the beginning you get the feeling something is terribly messed up, as you notice most of these giants don't really have any reason to fight you. Yet the desire to bring back a loved one through macabre necromancy keeps the main character persevering. It's a hugely tragic story and considering the limitations of the PS2, nothing short of a masterpiece.

2. Final Fantasy 7: Coming from that typical 16 bit design JRPG's used to have, this was a giant leap forward. I drooled over the gaming magazine which had a review, until one night a friend came by with the game. He wasn't an rpg guy so he left it with me. I had never seen anything like this. I was used to typical fantasy settings, now all of a sudden I was a badass punk in an industrial town visiting a brothel? Every screen was brimming with atmosphere, and I took my sweet time taking it all in. Must have finished it about 7 times and I can't wait for next year.

1. Baldur's Gate 2: To me, the culmination of the golden age of (isometric) rpg's. Torment had better writing to be sure, but the gameplay kinda blew. Icewind Dale had awesome combat but lacked a story. BG2 just was the perfect mix of all these games. What made it stand out though, was the characters and their interactions. Things could go very badly very fast sometimes if you weren't careful about maintaining relationships. Also this game, in my opinion, has the best villain ever in Jon Irenicus. Unlike other games, he is present throughout and interacts with the group on numerous occasions. He gets his own story, he has depth that I've never seen in an antagonist ever. I could go on and on, but this is my favourite game.

I will go with... (not fully ordered)

10. Knight of the Old Republic

9. God of War (2018)

8. Half-Life 2

7. Night in the Woods

6. Super Metroid

5. Grim Fandango

4. Baldur's Gate II

3. Final Fantasy VI

2. Ocarina of Time

1. Super Mario 64

Great list Heidegger! I'm a big fan of the Mass Effect series too, almost putting 3 above 2 just for The Citadel DLC. Gosh that was a gas. Here's my list I'll keep it short!

1. Legend of Legaia
2. Gunstar Heroes
3. Diablo 2: Lord of Destruction
4. Dead Space
5. Resident Evil 1 (PS4 HD Remaster)
6. Persona 4 Golden
7. Mass Effect 2
8. Jade Cocoon
9. World of Final Fantasy
10. Chaos Legion

The tenth slot is constantly shifting. I tend to have soft spots for games with monster mechanics of some sort.

https://www.giantbomb.com/profile/monkeyking1969/lists/games-everyone-should-play/43834/

In no particular order:

Tetris

Metal Gear Solid 2

Pop'n Music

Silent Hill 3

Vampire: The Masquerade Bloodlines

Fallout: New Vegas

Chrono Trigger

Kingdom Hearts 2 FM

Overwatch

Cadence of Hyrule as an interim 10th as not enough time has passed to make sure I'm not just still in the honeymoon phase.

Too hard to rank every entry, but I can say that there's a definite top 5 and bottom 5 of the list.

- Journey

- Fallout: New Vegas

- Heroes of Might & Magic III

- Dark Souls

- Little Big Planet

------------------------

- Civilization V

- Kerbal Space Program

- The Witness

- Kingdom Hearts II

- KOTOR II

The weak link there is Kingdom Hearts for sure. It's super important to me, but I feel bad loving Kingdom Hearts now after growing to see how...not good the series is.

I wonder what it says that I don't have any FPS games up there despite playing a truck ton of them.

I don't think I could do a ranked top ten, as any game in a top ten must be pretty (subjectively) impeccable, so mood mind change the ranking from week to week. But I think I might be pretty settled on which games make up the list for a little while.

Hitman 2 - I would have had Hitman (2016) as, in terms of level design, I think I prefer it over Hitman 2 but having that gold edition with all the levels from both games just makes the sequel the version I would always fire up now. Having not really enjoyed much of any of the previous Hitman games I am continually blown away with how much I have enjoyed playing this.

Starquake - My first computer that was wholly mine to use was the Tatung Einstein (my Dad worked for Tatung which explains the weird home system we had) and this was the game I played the most on it. It was the first Metroidvania I played, although being released before Metroid (certainly in the UK anyway) it seems weird to describe it as such. It was frustratingly challenging at times, but it just had me hooked. Loved the music from it too, I still have earworms that when I stop to figure out what I am humming it's one the bits of music from this.

Halo: CE - I think this just about pushes Goldeneye/Perfect Dark out as being my favourite early console FPS, mostly because with the anniversary edition I still go back a play a bit of Halo here and there whereas the other two have not aged well enough that I enjoy playing them at all. So many hours spent late on a sofa with a friend trying to get through that legendary campaign.

Wipeout - The first game I played on my new PlayStation, the game that got me to try and keep that busted old PlayStation (as it became) working to keep playing at university. I still love a good racing game but I don't think I'll ever get the rush that first playing Wipeout gave me again.

Super Metroid - Felt like I was in my own sci-fi movie, borrowed a friends SNES for way too long to play it and then genuinely tried to convince him to keep my Amiga so I could have this game all to myself. I failed so had to go back to playing Turrican 2.

Civ 6 - I probably could have picked any Civ from 3 onwards, I was one of the people that found moving from Civ X to Civ X+1 tough just because of how much time I'd sunk into the older one. But now I find going back to any of the older versions a challenge after playing so much 6 that it seems sensible to pick the current one.

Fallout New Vegas - Destroy all factions, become massively OP, punch everything into small pieces - all in a day's work for the courier. I really loved Fallout 3, played the first two games properly after the fact so don't have the nostalgia for them that some have, but New Vegas really grabbed my by the brain.

Super Mario World - I think this might be the best 2D platformer ever made and can't ever see myself not playing it now and then. The second part of the reason I really wanted to get that friend to keep my Amiga. Although now I have the version that also had Mario All Stars included on it - if I could pick that cartridge as a single game I'd have that.

Kerbal Space Program - I have never felt the level of elation from a game that a successful mission to another moon or planet (and returning) that this game has given me. I've also never felt so tense as I have with KSP when that fuel needle reads almost empty and you still have a couple of burns to do to get home.

The Return of the Obra Dinn - Looking over the games tend to play to completion, there is a large skew towards narrative based adventure/puzzle games, much more than I thought there would be. And this game was just an absolute pleasure to get through, I really wish there was a way to forget it all and play it again. Every month.

It was tough making this list, I really love games and find making decisions about anything a challenge. So, the arbitrary honourable mentions go to: Enter the Gungeon, LoZ:BotW, Prince of Persia (original and Sands of Time) Subnautica, Metroid Prime, XCOM 2, The Witness, Rocket League, Trackmania 2 and Batman: Arkham Asylum.

Top Ten's in there somewhere, too hard to eliminate any of these:

XCOM2, Halo Reach, ES IV: Oblivion, Forza Horizon 4, Dragon's Dogma: Dark Arisen, Borderlands 2, Diablo 3, Fallout New Vegas, Forza Motorsport 3, Last of Us, Mass Effect 2, Red Dead Redemption, KOTOR, StarCraft 2.

Too hard to say 'cause there are so many but I'll try:

• Deus Ex
• Far Cry 3
• AC 2
• AC Black Flag
• Hitman Absolution
• Resident Evil 1
• Mafia 2
• Splinter Cell Chaos Theory
• GTA V
• NFS Hot Pursuit 2010

10. Mega Games II (1993) Gen.

Golden Axe, Streets of Rage, Revenge of Shinobi.

I didn't actually own this as my parents said it was too violent, but I had friends who did and I loved it, especially Golden Axe, which I still have a very strong connection to.

9. Mega Games I (1992) Gen.

Columns, Super Hang On, World Cup Italia '90.

This was my go-to MegaDrive game for years (and it was the pack in, I think). All three are great, Super Hang On remains the only game my dad has ever played, and World Cup Italia 90' is the best football game ever made, there I said it.

8. Fifa '97 (1996) Gen.

Any Fifa at all will do here, some are better than others and the current '19 is very good. However, Fifa '97 was the one I loved the most. I remember the Christmas when I got it and played it to death. It had an indoor 5-a-side mode, and Fifa 20 is going to have something similar.

7. Red Dead Redemption 2 (2018) XB1

To my mind this is the most impressive game ever released. I enjoyed the story and immersion immensely and am so glad the industry still has showpiece games like this with no multiplayer, microtransacion bullshit. (RDR: online is not forced upon you in the single player)

6. Green Day: Rock Band (2010) PS3

The rock band and guitar hero series' were great, and I chose this one because I like Green Day a lot, and was at their live show that is simulated in this game.

5. Sonic The Hedgehog II (1992) Gen.

I was a Genesis kid, and Sonic was my boy. This is the one that came along when I was the right age for it. It makes my list, it may well not make yours.

4. Crash Team Racing (1999) PS1

It was great then, and it's great now. The best Kart racer ever produced.

3. Tetris (1984) NGB

I first played this on the Gameboy. What a game. Really good with a link cable, two Gameboys and my grandma.

2. Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 1-4 (PS1/2)

A franchise that means the world to me, especially THPS2. I hope for a proper remake of 1-4 in one package one day. Hopefully Robomoto will be nowhere near it if it happens.

1. Halo 1-3, Reach and ODST. (XBX/360)

Halo 1 was a real experience when I bought the Xbox on day one. Halo 3 is, to me, the best game ever made.

10. Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis (1992)
9. X-COM: Terror from the Deep (1995)
8. The Talos Principle (2014)
7. SOMA (2015)
6. Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective (2010)
5. Maniac Mansion: Day of the Tentacle (1993)
4. BioShock (2007)
3. Braid (2008)
2. System Shock 2 (1999)
1. The Binding of Isaac: Rebirth (2014)

Full list:https://www.giantbomb.com/profile/beachthunder/lists/top-100-favourite-games-2018-edition/364438/

Here goes!

10. Paperboy - I still play this game all the time (hence my avatar). The Genesis version was my favorite, but the NES version isn't too shabby either.

9. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Hyperstone Heist - Still love the Ninja Turtles to this day and this game was a mainstay during my summer vacations. I didn't grow up with a SNES, so I was convinced this was better than Turtles in Time as a kid.

8. Rock Band 2 - I can't tell you the amount of Rock Band parties that were held during my time in college. "Gamer" or not, everybody was interested in picking up an instrument and giving any song a go.

7. NBA Jam - My mom and dad would play this game with me all the time as a kid. My cartridge still somehow has my save on it from 90s.

6. NHL 95 - This game single handedly got me into playing hockey, something I still do to this day! I would love EA to make a "throwback" NHL game one of these days with sprites just like the Genesis era games.

5. Doom 2 - I would play this game with my dad every night. I remember eventually figuring out the executable in DOS so that you could jump to any level in the game. As a 8 year old I felt pretty awesome!

4. Warcraft 2 - My 6th grade teacher has our computer lab networked together. Each Thursday afternoon we would all meet there to try and take him out after school. During the entire year, we only were able to beat him once. We're talking 7 on 1. Those were the days.

3. Socom 2 - This was the first game I ever played online from home. My friends and I immediately made a clan and weekly clan wars every Friday and Saturday night for years. It's something we still talk about to this day. Where is Socom 5!?

2. Final Fantasy VII - I had no idea what an RPG was in 1997. I didn't get at first why I couldn't attack whenever I wanted. However, I eventually figured it out. This is one of my favorite games of all time.

1. Resident Evil: Director's Cut - I LOVE this series. RE1 and 2 are both amazing games. The series sort of lost me with 4 and 5, but the REmake and RE2 remake were amazing.

Lots of brilliant lists, lads!

Beyond Good & Evil and Sands of Time is on my to-do list. I agree world-building and story is very important to adventure games, tho' I'd still rate gameplay as number one priority.

Kotor and ME2 are both killer, agreed.

Nicely vintage list that. Frontier Elite on ye olde Amiga 500 would be in my top 20, also have very fond memories of Terror from the Deep. My Civ was III, haven't had inclination to try out the newer ones. Crysis and Descent are on my to-play list, tho'.

haha EverQuest was the obsession of a good old mate of mine for many years! From your list I also rate the first MGS (if you mean the PS1 game) and have Dark Souls and Halo on my to-do list.

Aye, the Halo series is on my to-play list not just for the supposedly epic sci-fi story (which hopefully will scratch the itch Mass Effect left) but also for the co-op play. Can you play the game's normal story as 2-player split-screen or is that just for specific separate missions only?

Also interested in Yakuza 0 as I enjoy japanese-voiced games.

No, they don't. Too much focus on movie-style storytelling, not enough on fun gameplay or exploring. My lady always says of modern games "if i want to watch a movie, then i'll put on a movie...if i want to play a game, i put on a game!".

I'm interested in the Metroid Prime series, tho' as an old Turrican fan I bet Super Metroid will be very fun.

oh aye, I've played, completed and thoroughly enjoyed the first two Spinter Cells, so Chaos Theory has been on my to-play list for well over a decade. I'll get round to it at some point haha

Never even heard of Senran Kagura...looks extremely japanese haha! From your list Deus Ex:HR is on my want-to-finally-get-round-to-playing list.

Nice detail, enjoyed reading it. From your top 10 and what's not been listed yet Bayonetta is maybe on my list-to-play. Not normally a fan of hack-n-slash but recently picked it up cheap (the 360 version) so will try it at some point. My better-looking-half enjoys Journey, tho' it's a bit too abstract for me.

ha i didn't even realise there was a game out there about scientology

Great detail, also...always like reading epic thoughts on games. Titanfall 2 is a potential to-play candidate for me as it apparently has a very good single-player campaign.

Sounds like we have similar taste. FFVII is my own number 1.

Quite a few here not listed on this thread yet and are on my to-do list: Shadow of the Colossus (just defeated the first spectacular monster last night), Bioshock, Chernobyl, Shenmue (the first one I've also just started, pretty good so far), Vampire Bloodlines and also playing with the idea if I should hunt down Demon's Souls before trying out Dark Souls, also Baldur's Gate & Torment always sounded interesting to me, tho' maybe an epic undertaking too far considering how many games are on my want-to-play list haha

Interesting that you pick Half-Life 2 over HL1 yet prefer the more retro Final Fantasy, Mario and Zeldas over modern offerings. From your list Grim Fandango looks interesting...one day!

@heidegger: tell me about it.... over 10,000 hours played!

Yeah. don't get me wrong though, I don't quite subscribe to the idea that games used to be qualitatively better, and I can think of a lot of things to improve on most of the games I listed - it's just that nobody seems to do that.

I don't rule out that the Descent-like Overload from last year may get on the list once I've had more time to play it and think about it, and I absolutely loved the feeling of Elite: Dangerous, but its always online requirements (which resulted in that I could almost never play the game since whenever I tried to play it almost always coincided with their maintenance time slot - and I always tried to play Solo anyway) and how barebones the original release was, adding the Frontier features as expensive DLC over time soured me on it quite a bit. I love the similar Evochron games though, but not quite to the degree that they could topple the original Elite series.

Needless to say, nobody has tried to do the proper Wing Commander campaign since the 90s, or the Command & Conquer style RTS since C&C 3 more than ten years ago (pretty hyped for the remaster though - I still prefer the more grounded C&C 1 over the sci-fi themed sequels or the over the top Red Alert spinoffs) or a proper Populous style God game, though From Dust and Reprisal Universe got pretty close.

The option for players to create and share their own content is also pretty important to me, so for Descent, Doom and UT99 I very rarely played any of the official maps, but played hundreds of user created maps and mods, and today many similar games just make it too hard for users to create new stuff for the games, or actively discourage it with file encryption and anti-tampering DRM.

cheers pal, Dead Space is a potential to-play candidate from your list.

I didn't play the Citadel DLC as funds at the time prioritised Leviathan, tho' I watched it on a youtube walkthrough...looked like a fine antitode to the seriousness as well as being a fun send-off!

------- Mass Effect SPOILERS incoming! --------------

I actually was disappointed in the first half of ME2 as I just couldn't get my head round working for Cerberus (they were an enemy in ME1) and at first didn't warm to any of the new characters, most seemed a bit cliché, but then I did all the loyalty missions, warmed to them after all, then lost my favourite Tali (despite succeeding in her loyalty mission) because of an unlucky positional constellation in Miranda's protective shield (I failed her loyalty mission). I didn't re-load as I applauded the masterful game design and writing to get to this dramatic point. ME2's final mission was truly spectacular. My favourite moment in the entire series tho' has to be the three-way conversation between Shepherd, Anderson & Illusive Man in the 'Citadel' during ME3's climax. I'm a big fan of the ending because I'm a believer in the indoctrination theory.

I still need to play Silent Hill 2, tho' I understand 3 is a sequel to 1, and 1 just missed out on my top 10.

FPS games are mostly forgettable with the exception of the Half-Life series. Do you mean bottom 5 as in your least-favourite or most-disappointing games? Kotor II is on my list as I loved the first one, and so is Witness tho' I fear it might just be a boring walking simulator.

Obra Dinn is on my interested-in list, I found Papers' Please too minimal but Obra Dinn looks like it has more about it.

The Titanfall 2 campaign is definitely worth a playthrough. That game is basically free as well (I've seen it for as low as $5). That campaign has a good story, some cool puzzle-style platforming, and plays with the mechanics to utilize your pilot's mobility in neat ways. Give it a shot. I still prefer the multiplayer of the original, and was happy to find that it's still got a playerbase going on the Xbox One.

Also, welcome to the community, duder! Stick around.

I'm interested in Dragon's Dogma as I hear the fighting is pretty good. Also wanna try RDR, tho' the wordy youtuber MrBTongue put me off where he said it's mostly just shooting goons.

oh aye, the first Resident Evil is a classic. Black Flag is on my to-do list, looks pretty spectacular!

haha yeah Mega Games! Streets of Rage 1 & 2 on the Megadrive are all-time top 20 material, deffo. Personally preferred Sonic 1 to the sequels, tho' one favourite memory was on the day Sonic 2 came out me and my best mate (aged 13 or so) planned to cycle the few miles to town to buy it, then skip school. My mate cycled so insanely fast due to excitement I couldn't keep up. I ended up going to school like a good boring lad and he skipped to play Sonic 2 all day haha

Interesting list. The other day I installed Steam's Fate of Atlantis and it soon crashed (probably Win10's fault more than anything). I might just stick to the Emperor's Tomb for some of that Indy fun. My other half is a fan of Talos Principle, while we both loved Soma. What an ending! Soma just missed out on my own top 10. System Shock 2 has been on my wanna-play list for yonks, it interests me more than Bioshock, to be fair, tho' according to Zero Punctuation the heavy-going RPG-crafting can be a little off-putting.