Your Thoughts Exactly

So here’s my list, which I’ve been promising for a while. It’s totally subjective; I make no qualms about including a game just because I had people to play it with who made it more fun, or because I was just in the right frame of mind.

Starcraft
My god, this game had it all. A great storyline, great single player, great multiplayer, and there were just a million things you could do in the game. Can I just tell you that I could still probably name every single unit’s statistics right now, off the top of my head? This game ranks as my number 1 in terms of total time played. And I have played a LOT of video games. Anyway, I could probably play this game today and still be totally entertained. In fact, in a few years, when we are all carrying wireless computers and can play Starcraft anytime we want, the pinnacle of human achievement will have been accomplished. This is so cool I have to go to the bathroom!
If there is one bad thing about Starcraft, I would have to say that it’s the fact that it was so intense sometimes it ceased being fun. It was more like a drug, I guess. That’s why it gets top billing. (Though the rest of these are not in any order)

Half-Life
Half-Life proved to everyone that games could be taken seriously, that they could be immersive, and that you can tell a story within a game. And that’s just the single player. Of course, once they came out with multi-player and Counter-Strike was released, a whole new ball of wax was there for us. It’ll probably be a while before we see another game that’s as revolutionary as Half-Life.

Homeworld
This game probably ranks outside of my top 100 in terms of time played; I’ve played it twice, probably totaling 30 hours of gameplay. (Yes, 30 hours ranks out of my top 100. Shut up.) But there’s just something about this game… when I played it the first time, notions of time and space ceased to exist. I think I didn’t get up for 15 hours. I attribute it mostly to the epic feel; you’re out in space, controlling this armada which is the last hope of your race, and you have billions of miles to go. I just can’t describe it. And the fact that I never played it with anyone else just goes to show you that this really could have been the greatest game of all time.

Tetris
There isn’t much to say about Tetris other than I guarantee you I will be playing it in 25 years, and it will be totally unchanged. And it will be just as fun. That’s pretty high praise in my book.

Doom
Doom was great; the first great multiplayer game on PC I have ever played. And you could play it co-op, like contra but so much better, because it was a first-person game. It was 3D (actually it was still 2D but it was the first game to look 3D), it was genuinely scary at times; and it was… just super.

Quake 3
Quake wouldn’t make the list except that it was the first game I ever played I played on a LAN with many other people. Being able to yell at your opponents really brings you into the game, I think. Otherwise, it was just your standard deathmatch. Plus it helped that I was a god at this game, and no one, especially not Ben Helms, could beat me.

Smash Bros.
I debated putting this on the list… the game lacks depth (it is a fighting game), I think, but then I realized that my friends actively engage in discussions about the game’s characters and pretend to be them while questioning each other’s sexuality. It takes a special game to do that, right?

Mario 64
One of the first platform 3D games, and it made full use of all 3 dimensions. This game offered you freedom; it let you use your imagination to do all sorts of things. And the controls were spectacular as it let you fling Mario all over the place, flying, jumping, punching and kicking. I can’t explain it. If you don’t like this game then I don’t like you.

X-Wing/TIE Fighter
A great space simulation game; they put you in control of all those cool ships you saw in the movies. And boy, were they fun; some missions even let you play scenes from the movie, like the Death Star trench run. And here’s another Star Wars game:

Knights of the Old Republic
This game gets here solely on the merits of its story, the only one to do it (no, not even Homeworld). It was like playing a movie, except that you got to know all the characters because it was a 30 hour game. And you got to fight with lightsabers. Why couldn’t they just have made episodes 1, 2, and 3 like this?

Grand Theft Auto 3/San Andreas
Now this game took Mario 64’s 3D freedom and opened the floodgates. Basically this game let you do anything… as long as it was horrifically violent. San Andreas upped the freedom level and the gore levels. When you and your friends sit around, passing the controller from person to person, having a conversation which is occasionally interrupted by ‘that was awesome!’ in response to a gory kill or gory crash, you know you’re in good hands.

SimCity 1/2000
SimCity let out the budding urban planner in all of us. Seriously, who hasn’t dreamed as a little kid of growing up to be the Mayor of a town, grappling with zoning laws, taxes and city ordinances? OK, what this game really did was unleash the little creator in all of us, basically giving us the ultimate train set. It was more of a toy and sandbox than a game, and it was awesome because of it.

Civilization 1/2/3
And if SimCity let out the creator in all of us, Civ let out the Genghis Khan/Attila the Hun/Alexander the Great/random psychotic tyrant in us. Plus, it was educational, teaching us that the Pyramids allowed the Egyptians to undergo regime change without any civil disobedience, and that Darwin’s Voyage let us get two free technological discoveries! Or… that a modern tank can indeed be taken down by a group of veteran spearmen. I love these games.

So there’s my list. I’m sure I left a few off, so I’ll probably update it later.