Your Top Ten Games [GA INSIDE YOU GREEDOS]

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Alright, so I thought I'd be fun to do one of those themed giveaways that everyone else seems to be doing, and also considering this is a gaming website, I figured we could nerd out on some games.

So here's my elevator pitch. List your top ten games of all time - give a blurb on each if you want, give one away. Then we discuss.

I'll go ahead and start (Counting down for maximum impact)

The Last of Us

A case could be made that this game has repetitive game-play, that the stealth systems don't make sense when Ellie is running right out for all the world to see, that it's attempt to make you feel the brutality of the world you live in withevery human life you take is undermined by the countless hoards of enemies that are thrown at you.

But who gives a shit - this is the FINEST story and characterization a video-game has yet delivered. The characters are nuanced and subtle, and that ending, oh it's perfection. Add in the fact that I think it's pretty damn fun to play, and beautiful - especially on PS4 w/ 60 FPS, and I'd say it's a masterpiece.

Mass Effect Trilogy

This is cheating, I acknowledge that, but to me they function best as a trilogy, not as individual games. If I HAD to pick one I'd say 3, but it's my list and my thread - so I don't. While me and my friends in college were running through these, I remember us discussing how everyone's games were turning out differently - I'd be like"Oh what you're with Tali? She has chicken legs that's dumb" and my Bro'd be like "Whatever dude she's the best," and then I'd have Sheppard do Miranda, but by the end of the game realize that Tali totally is the best, and I messed the whole thing up, and then I'd dump Miranda and relish in her salty tears in Mass Effect 3. Anyways, the point being that the time it seemed like these games were unfolding into an unbelievable web of choices and consequences, that everyone's game would be a unique snowflake. In hindsight, this is, of course, total bullshit. But what's important is that when you're playing it is you really FEEL like this is true. I may have other games listed higher on this list, but Mass Effect has the characters I care most about.

Final Fantasy Tactics -

An amazing blend of game-play and story, with a legendary awful translation. Which was great, because the story was so full of twist turns and double crosses, that it was already nearly impossible to tell what the fuck was going on. I love this game to pieces - I love how these adorable little Pixel art isometric baby men murder each other with crunchy sound effects. I love the systems, and how you can basically break the entire game if you know what you're doing (Calculators uber alles). I even love that damn Wiegraf fight scene, even though I saved there on my first run as a kid, and had to start the whole game over, which I'm pretty certain is a common fate.

FFT was GOT before GOT was GOT.

7.Persona 4-

I bought this with a Vita, and was 100% positive I would hate it. I did not, I played the whole thing in a week straight, my thumbs getting carpel tunnel holding the Vita in my oversized clown hands, grinning like a lunatic the whole time. It's not the best story, it's battle system is good but not great, bosses are just damage sponges, but it's so charming, likeable, and compulsively habit forming. It was like Civilization level "One more turn" but this one more turn might mean my teen boy avatar might end up on a date, rather than Ghandi nuking me.

X-Com -

The new ones - these are getting harder and harder to rank. Everyone has their own little X-Com stories, where they name their characters after their friends and families. I never understood this, because they die all the damn time - and it's depressing to watch your girlfriend or best friend get shot down by a Thin Man for the 80th time. I ended up naming my characters stupid names at random. This led to me screaming "NO NOT STALIN" when my burly Russian Mustache Man would be shot in the face. No other game can say that. Also it's stellar, there's that too.

The Witcher 3 -

Last of Us might have the finest overall story of any game, but the Witcher 3 has the finest writing. So many moments in this, Bloody Baron obviously, but smaller ones as well - the Pig Town, the political tension, Dykstra. It also came along after I played Dragon Age Inquisition and had become pretty much disillusioned with the giant open world RPG - and showed that every little quest in these games can have meaning or relevance.

Planescape Torment -

Witcher 3 has the finest MODERN writing then, a distinction I just made up. But there is something to be said there all the same. Really Planescape Torment is more of an unbelievable choose your own adventure fantasy novel than a game - but it's writing, it's writing is (you can't see it but I did that stereotypical Italian thing where you kiss your fingers). It's just so clever, and so imaginative. More games need to be made with the realization that you don't have to follow the same standard Tolkien esque RPG background. (On this note, I would literally (not literally) kill for an RPG set in China Mielvielle's New Corozan world)

Dark Souls-

I'm not going to get into Dark Souls - you know how you feel about Dark Souls if you have played it. You likely know how you feel about Dark Souls even if you haven't played it, or at least you think you do. I thought I did - and then I played it. I was wrong.

Mother 3 -

Of all the games listed here, I would imagine this is the one the least people have played, and that's a shame. This is a masterpiece of a game, it's a Studio Ghibli film slanted and shoved into a gameboy advance cartridge. It's weird, funny, exciting, brilliant, and touching - oh god is it touching. I have never cried at a videogame until I played this game, and then I could not STOP crying. It's all broad strokes stuff, none of it is particularly refined, but so are fables and fairy tales, so are the best children's books and movies. I urge anyone if they played Undertale, or the original Earthbound, or like JRPG's - download an emulator, find the translated copy, and play this game.

Fallout New Vegas:

I mean, it's just the best.

https://www.steamgifts.com/giveaway/NBJq0/fallout-new-vegas-ultimate-edition

8 years ago

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90 Comments

talgaby

Deus Ex 1
Final Fantasy VI
Ground Control + Dark Conspiracy

The rest are in random order and tend to change.
Baldur's Gate 2 with mods
Fallout 2
Planetary Annihilation with the Escalation mod
Still Life 1
Brink of Consciousness: Dorian Gray Syndrome
XCOM 1 (the original)
Age of Empires 2 with Forgotten Empires (didn't try AK yet)

Despite them being mostly 5-21 year-old games, I don't despise modern ones, but they often feel falling into two categories:

Completely sanitised corporate game with every small detail meticulously planned but little "soul" in it. It is a great product but their creators couldn't put any personality in them.
Random indie game that is adding so much personality it is almost pretentious in this regard, especially if it gets picked up on YT/Twitch and suddenly it is the best game ever. (Just to make myself popular again: the "Souls" series is a great example, with the added bonus of copying itself now seemingly infinitely, yet people eat it more up than CoD copying itself.)

Of course there are plenty others (good old cash grab hack jobs, the casual game scene, and so on), but the market/video game media seems to be dominated by those two.

8 years ago