To celebrate our 10 year anniversary I think it's only fair that we do the exact same thing every video game magazine did whenever they reached a milestone... create a top 100 list. So that's what I'm going to do. I've spent the last couple weeks thinking this over and I have a list in front of me that I'm pretty happy with. No one else on earth will be happy with it, but as I always say, "fuck off it's my list and I don't give two shits what you think you little pissant." At least I think I say that.
Also, if you recall I did do a top 28 list a while back. However, that was 5 years ago and many great games have come out since, so even that top 28 has some changes in it. There's a few new games, a few games my opinions have changed on, and there was one really great one that I completely overlooked somehow when I made the list the first time. So rest assured there will be some very noticeable changes.
And it's going to go by fast. Since I've got that new job starting in just over a week, my free time may be reduced, so I'm going to try to get all 100 games posted within the next two weeks. I need to sharpen up my writing since this is a PR job so it's good practice. Writing about insurance benefits and filing medical claims is just like video games right?
100Sonic Adventure
99Kaboom
98Conquests of the Longbow
97Streets of Rage 2
96Lollipop Chainsaw
95Bloodborne
94 Crazy Taxi
93Bit.Trip.Beat
92Wii Ski & Snowboard
91RiverCity Ransom
90Dragon Quest Monsters
89Jones in the Fastlane
88Dark Cloud 2
87Professor Layton and the Curious Village
86MadWorld
85Marvel Vs. Capcom 2
84Torneko the Last Hope
83Crystal Castles
82Space Harrier
81Retro Game Challenge
80Final Fantasy VII
79Bulletstorm
78Rayman Legends
77Super Dodge Ball
76World of Goo
75The Magic of Scherazade
74Minecraft
73Fantasy Zone 2
72Golden Axe: Revege of Death Adder
71Final Fantasy Legend II
70Hotel Dusk
69Splatoon
68Pitfall
67Dragon Quest V
66SteamWorld Dig
65Street Fighter 3: Third Strike
64Order Up
63Hearthstone
62Monkey Island II: LeChuck's Revenge
61Bayonetta
60Galaga
59 Earthbound
58Super Mario Bros.
57Wii Sports Resort
56Pac-Man CE: DX
55Trauma Team
#69. Splatoon
The Wii U was a god damned disaster, but even if it hadn't put out anything other than Splatoon I wouldn't complain. I loved Splatoon. Even with all of it's quirks, it's my favorite multi-player game of its generation, so much so that even to this day I haven't managed to get in more than about an hour of the single-player mode. I still probably should do that because accoriding to everyone who has played it the final boss is pretty amazing. The most remarkable thing about it though is that it successfully appealed to just about everyone. High skill players could go into ranked mode and fight each other in whatever game mode was offered. Gamers who weren't as good still had Turf War where you main goal is just to paint the ground, and any dumbass (including myself) can handle that.
Few games have given me so many good times and yet caused so me to hate Japanese adolescents so much. Everytime I reapeatedly die in this game, I just picture some little shit named Haruto-chan sitting on the floor in front of his TV shouting unfavorable things about my mother. And whatever the truth is, it's not far from that. It's been a blast to play, and it was nice to see Nintendo go a little outside of the box to create something new.
You should definitely play through the single player campaign just to play the final boss battle. It is worth it.
A game with questionable ties to tentacle porn listed at number 69?!
You sir disgust me.
Furries?!
It's the only thing I think is worse than tentacle porn.
I wonder if splatoon will make my list. I'm kind of waiting for this list to finish so it could be a while.
#68. Pitfall
There's not a lot of Atari 2600 games I'd consider playable these days, but Pitfall is just as good today as it was 35 years ago. Not many games can say that. It's the first great platformer and when you look at all the elements of it, it's amazing how much it got right (even sadder is how often these same elements would be ignored through the years). Good solid controls that needed to be mastered in order to make it to the end. Multiple paths to explore thanks to the caves. It even offered a level of replay since you could go through the jungle loop by going left or right which almost made it like 2 games in one. It's been an omnipresent game in my life. As a young kid it was one of those games that every kid (but me) owned, so I was always playing it at a friends house. It was released in Atari collections over the years, and its inclusion was the single redeeming quality of Pitfall: The Mayan Adventure on the SNES. Even as recently as last year I was still playing this on my Rasberry Pi. In my little world, Pitfall is a game of legend and will always have a place in my game collection.
#67. Dragon Quest V
The greatest story of the 16-bit era didn't have the words Final Fantasy in its title. It wasn't a Phantasy Star game. It wasn't even Chrono Trigger. It is Dragon Quest V. Sadly the West didn't get an official release for 15 years until the DS remake. I was lucky enough to play the fan translation that came out a few years earlier, and when I did, was I sold. This is probably the entry of the series that really made me the Dragon Quest fanboy that I am these days. Sure, the original game looked pretty plain, and arugably even a step back from DQ4, despite being on more powerful hardware due to fewer character model and fewer unique monsters. But this game had things going on that no RPG had done before. This game was offering up monster hunting/collecting before Pokemon. The first post-game bonus dungeon appeared here. The tactics/partner AI was greatly expanded as well, and you were able to control your party significantly more than before.
But all that doesn't really matter when you look at the main attraction....the story. It's shocking how good of a tale was told in this game given the original system limitations. The main character of DQV arguably had the title of "most screwed over lead character in a video game" until Zak from the Final Fantasy 7 series came along. WIthout going into too many details the story is told over a 30 year period, with the main character taking up his father's search for a legendary hero who will save the world from a great evil.... yeah blah blah blah. It sounds typical on the surface. It wasn't. They actually came up with a pretty special tale here, and its one that I suggest playing through.
I just checked and apparently I didn't download DQ5 and last time I looked, all the rom sites had been shut down. Looks like I'm out of luck until the Switch port.