Image result for top 100 video games of all time

(Totally random stock image of top games that has nothing to do with my list. But it looks cool.)

Welcome to my much more than top 100 games of all time list. Why is it not 100 because I found a way for my list to not be all Zelda, MGS or Mario games. I also hate the idea of only putting one or two per franchise, this is about individual games and some franchises are so good all their games are in the top. But that makes for a boring list so I wanted more games in.

The compromise I came up with is to bunch similar quality games together as one entry (example Galaxy 1 and 2). There could be two, three, maybe six games in one number. The idea being they are very close in quality so no reason to break them into separate ranks. I will order them from least favorite to favorite within that rank.

This is also a favorites list meaning if one game is ahead of another it does not necessarily mean I think its a better game, I just might have a deeper history with that game. Now toward the top of the list my favorites and what I believe to be the best games ever made are one and the same. It was not easy to pick the games I did, I constantly removed some games, put others in, rearranged the ranks many times. Ive always known my top 25 or so but the rest has been fun to explore and figure out which games have been my favorites over all these years.

Its actually kind of late so I will start officially tomorrow. But before I go I'll leave you with a few games that just missed the list.

Image result for toejam and earl

So funky and fresh but didn't make it.

Image result for splatoon 2

The splatoon games, one of the best online competitive "shooters" I've played. Slightly out of the splat zone.

Image result for FTL

FTL, such an addicting simple yet extremely deep game. A classic but just missses the mark.

Image result for longest journey

The Longest Journey, Incredible story and the best traditional point and click adventure game I have ever played. Excellent game but lets be real, adventure games aren't my thing.

MASTER LIST

  • 100. Resident Evil 3 and Resident Evil Outbreak
  • 99. Rogue Squadron 2
  • 98. Nights
  • 97. Destiny
  • 96. Astro Bot
  • 95. Pixeljunk Eden
  • 94. Tomb Raider 2
  • 93. Sim CIty 2000
  • 92. Splinter Cell Blacklist
  • 91. Panzer Dragoon 2 and Panzer Dragoon Saga
  • 90. Shenmue 1 and 2
  • 89. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 2 and 3
  • 88. Nioh
  • 87. Tetris
  • 86. Darksiders
  • 85. Assassin's Creed 2
  • 84. Portal 1 and 2
  • 83. Dragon Quest 8
  • 82. BloodBorne
  • 81. Ecco the Dolphin 1 and 2
  • 80. Dead Space 1 and 2
  • 79. Blood Omen: Legacy of Kain
  • 78. Kingdom Hearts 2
  • 77. Mortal Kombat 1, 2 and 9
  • 76. Uncharted 3, 4 and Lost Legacy
  • 75. Mike Tyson's Punch-Out!!
  • 74. The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild
  • 73. Rayman Origins and Legends
  • 72. Castlevania Aria of Sorrow and Dawn of Sorrow
  • 71. Crash Bandicoot 2
  • 70. Silent Hill
  • 69. Bioshock and Bioshock Infinite
  • 68. Bayonetta 1 and 2
  • 67. Donkey Kong Country Returns
  • 66. AM2R, Metroid Prime 2 and Metroid Zero Mission
  • 65. Final Fantasy 6 and 12
  • 64. The World Ends With You
  • 63. Hollow Knight
  • 62. Chrono Trigger
  • 61. Metal Gear Solid Ghost Babel
  • 60. Dragon Age: Origins
  • 59. Sonic Adventure 1, Sonic Unleashed, Sonic Colors and Sonic Adventure 2
  • 58. Mega Man 2
  • 57. Halo 1 and 2
  • 56. Mario and Luigi Superstar Saga and Paper Mario 2
  • 55. Devil May Cry 1 and 4
  • 54. Horizon Zero Dawn
  • 53. Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver
  • 52. Tie Fighter and X-Wing Alliance
  • 51. Gran Turismo 1 and 3
  • 50. Tekken 3
  • 49. Legend of Zelda A Link Between Worlds and Oracle of Ages/Seasons
  • 48. Sonic 1, 3 and Knuckles
  • 47.  God of War 3
  • 46. Super Smash Bros. Melee, Brawl, Wii U and Ultimate
  • 45. Metroid Prime 3
  • 44. Ratchet and Clank Going Commando and A Crack in Time
  • 43. GTA 3, 4, 5 and Red Dead Redemption
  • 42. Mass Effect 3
  • 41. Super Mario Bros, Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island, Super Mario 64 and Super Mario 3D World
  • 40. NFL2k1 and ESPN NFL 2K5
  • 39. Ninja Gaiden
  • 38. Deus Ex
  • 37. Shadow of the Colossus
  • 36. The Elder Scrolls 4 Oblivion and TES5 Skyrim
  • 35. Virtua Fighter 4 Evolution and Virtua Fighter 5
  • 34. Okami
  • 33. The Last of Us
  • 32. X-Com UFO Defense
  • 31. Fallout 3 and New Vegas
  • 30. Resident Evil, Resident Evil Remake and Resident Evil 5
  • 29. God of War 2 and God of War 4
  • 28. Red Dead Redemption 2
  • 27. Metal Gear Solid 2
  • 26. Devil May Cry 3
  • 25. Batman Arkham Asylum, City and Knight
  • 24. Legend of Zelda Wind Waker and Skyward Sword
  • 23. Final Fantasy 7 and 8
  • 22. The Witness
  • 21. Phantasy Star Online
  • 20. Half-Life 2
  • 19. LittleBigPlanet 1 and 2
  • 18. Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic
  • 17. Doom
  • 16. Sonic the Hedgehog 2
  • 15. Super Metroid
  • 14. Demon's Souls, Dark Souls and Dark Souls 3
  • 13. Uncharted 2
  • 12. Castlevania SOTN
  • 11. Resident Evil 2, Code Veronica and Remake 2
  • 10. Metal Gear Solid V
  • 9. GTA Vice City and San Andreas
  • 8. Super Mario Bros. 3 and Super Mario World
  • 7. The Legend of Zelda,  A Link to the Past and Link's Awakening
  • 6. Mass Effect 2
  • 5. Super Mario Galaxy 1 and 2
  • 4. Metroid Prime
Posted by Dvader Wed, 16 Jan 2019 06:47:24 (comments: 456)
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Sun, 26 May 2019 16:48:21

55. Devil May Cry 1 and 4

Image result for devil may cry 1

Image result for devil may cry 1

3D gaming brought many changes but it took a while to translate fast paced fluid combat into that third dimension. PS1 games were riddled with clunky controlling games, slow moving at times, simplistic in its combat. In the early days of the PS2 generation Kamiya and Capcom were trying new things out for Resident Evil 4, a more action packed version. In one tech demo they managed to create a demo where the player can air juggle an enemy with bullets and once Kamiya saw that Devil May Cry was born. Finally fast paced, stylish and acrobatic combat has come to the third dimension with combat that has never been seen before. Devil May Cry blazed the way for a new kind of action game, one where the objective wasn’t just to kill the enemy but do so in style using a variety of techniques.

I first played DMC from the demo disc that came with CVX, demo discs were so big back in the day, giving us a glimpse into these groundbreaking games. The first 15 minutes were enough to sell anyone on the game, because of the air juggle. I can’t stress enough how mind blowing this was back in the day, that first time you launch an enemy and use ebony and ivory to float them is a moment of zen, i moment where the possibilities of the games action feels endless.

The full game took that idea and expanded on it in so many ways. Sure looking back now the paltry list of weapons is sad compared to what is offered in later games in the series but for its time it was more than most any game offered. What really stood out for me was the enemy design and how detailed their attacks and defense was. All of it documented in an in game encyclopedia that fills in as you discover the best strategies. The boss battles were show stoppers as well and devilishly hard, the game found a great balance of difficulty and experience where with just some practice what seemed insurmountable becomes beatable. The first game retained some of that RE DNA with it’s creepy castle and twisting hallways. I don’t think the series has matched the first in terms of atmosphere. Combat wise it’s rather quaint when you look back at it but it was groundbreaking for its time.

Image result for devil may cry 4

Image result for devil may cry 4

And now we skip ahead a few years, we shall ignore 2 cause it never happened and we will get to 3 later. DMC4 is like RE5, took a masterpiece of a game and tried to do more but in a sloppy way. In the case of DMC4 mechanically it’s superior to DMC3 in most every way, especially because of real time style switching which gives Dante access to all his moves without ever needing to enter a menu. The depth in combat is at a fighting game level of depth, masters of combat can pull off moves that a mere mortal can’t even comprehend how it’s done. DMC4 goes a step further by added a whole new character into the mix with Nero who is a simplified character but plays differently enough to keep things fresh.

The problem with DMC4 is how these characters were used, first you play the whole game as Nero and then play the game in reverse as Dante. Same locations, same enemies, same bosses, the outcry for this lazy backtracking was deafening and has left DMC4 with a sour history when in reality it should be celebrated as one of the best action games. Further iterations added 3 more characters, new modes and more, for those wanting to master an action game DMC4 was tops. I couldn’t get enough of Dante’s combat, Nero for me did not fullfill that same itch so I found myself only wanting to replay half the game. Still I hold DMC4 above many many games, easily one of the best action games ever made.

 
Tue, 28 May 2019 22:41:33

With DMC1 and Bayonetta only making the top 100, I'm going to pretend this is a top 50 list that begins at 100 and ends at 50. Nyaa

 
Wed, 29 May 2019 05:22:37

54. Horizon Zero Dawn

Image result for horizon zero dawn

Image result for horizon zero dawn

My surpise 2017 GOTY, here I thought a year with a new Zelda, new Mario, and new Mass Effect would live up to all my dreams. Not exactly as every game went open world and lost many of the best aspects of what made them great to begin with. Horizon though was original, also an open world game but one with a unique hook, gigantic mechanical dinosaurs roam the world. These enemies come in all shapes amd sizes, from the quick raptor like enemies to the hulking t-rex monstrocities that act like epic boss battles roaming the map. These battles are some of the best battles in any game this generation, it looks better than some movies in action. Why it works so well is because you don't have traditional guns, instead Aloy's arsenal of suped up old weaponry like arrows, grapple hooks, and trip wires make you slowly bring down the beasts piece by piece. Different parts of the dinos control different systems which change the way they can attack, knock out their radar and they cant sense you anymore, take out their turrets and it may fall off allowing you to pick it up and fire on them. Each enemy is unique requiring different strategies to overcome. Oh and when multiple ones get into fights it's like being in the middle of a Godzilla movie. Horizon an open world game where the enemies are the star, finding combat is a joy and that alone makes the world more interesting than most.

But it didn't end there, Horizon tells a great sci-fi story starring one of the best new protagonists around in Aloy. There are minimal RPG elements but they are there, upgrading, finding new gear and so on is still key. Guerrilla games are wizards when it comes to graphics, this world is so beautiful and rich, exploring always lead to vistas that made me gasp. It has great side quests, mini dungeons, a few puzzles, and its paced very well.  I bought Horizon from my latin american contact who gets games early, I did this because Horizon was coming out days before Zelda and that would not be enough time for me to enjoy it. So I bought it early and had two weeks to enjoy it and who would have thought I would enjoy it more than BOTW. Horizon sets new standards for open world combat and is far more focused than many open world games that think putting 500 icons around a map makes for good content.

 
Sat, 01 Jun 2019 04:56:50

53. Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver

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Image result for soul reaver 1 bos

The year is 1999 and I don't own an N64. Zelda OoT has been released and I can't play it, so I desperatly want a game similar in scale. A big world to explore, dungeons to go through, lots of puzzles, well Crystal Dynamics pulled it off in 99 with the best entry into the Kain series, Soul Reaver. A bold new take in the franchise, like Zelda did it ditched the top down 2D sprites and went full 3D adventure. From the opening cinematic I knew I was in for something extremely special, all the voice actors from the first were back with new comers which retained the high quality voice acting. Then the game began and there it was, a 3D world to explore. I can't stress enough that back then that was still a mind blowing experience. PS1 had MGS, RE, and others but none captured what Zelda and Nintendo was doing with larger open worlds to run free in until Soul Reaver hit.

The Nosgoth in Soul Reaver is not as varied as in Blood Omen, in fact its dreary and devoid of much vegatation. The game world isn't as open as OoT was instead you follow a path that has major locations to explore along those paths. This world had a spirit realm and physical realm which Raziel can shift to and from on command with a nifty world altering effect, impressive stuff for the PS1. This lead to my favorite part PUZZLES. Shifting locations, moving blocks, using new abilities to get to new locations, its all there. The combat was pretty good as well with each family of vampire offering different enemy types. Vampires could only be killed when they are stunned and then impailed, burned or thrown into the sun. Its a neat combat system which worked extremely well.

Then there are the dungeons. Each of Raziels former brothers serve as a big boss battle with a dungeon to explore. Who can forget the cathedral with it's massive organ filled with webs and spider vampires. Gain the ability to swim underwater by defeating Rehab who has become a merman. It's such a great adventure with killer level design and pacing. Sure you can argue this game has one to many block puzzles, valid but when it comes to games in this era and almost any era matching what Zelda was doing very few come close. The future sequels never matched the design of SR1, they became more restrictive and linear. Still this is a series I adore and I would love to see it return.

 
Sat, 01 Jun 2019 05:11:40

Soul Reaver is one of my all time favorites too. It was the darker more adult oriented Ocarina of Time.

Definitely one of the most impressive games technically to ever hit the Playstation. Surprisingly, I installed this on my PC not long ago and it works well without the usual troubleshooting you have to do to run old games. May give it a playthrough at some point.

Another thing about the game, is how great it is despite having a huge chunk of unfinished content. It could have been even better.

 
Sat, 01 Jun 2019 15:20:36
As much as I loved Blood Omen, I never touched another entry in the series aside from a couple minutes with Blood Omen 2. whenever the game gets a remake, and at this point in time I'm sure it will eventually happen, I'm going to have to really give it a look.
 
Sat, 01 Jun 2019 20:54:59
robio said:
As much as I loved Blood Omen, I never touched another entry in the series aside from a couple minutes with Blood Omen 2. whenever the game gets a remake, and at this point in time I'm sure it will eventually happen, I'm going to have to really give it a look.

As someone who played every game in the series, I can confidently say that Blood Omen & Soul Reaver were 9/10 range, while the rest of the games were 7/10 range.

No idea why...obviously Crystal Dynamics have proven to be a great developer. But they dipped in quality before they took over Tomb Raider in 2006.

 
Sat, 01 Jun 2019 21:47:20
edgecrusher said:

As someone who played every game in the series, I can confidently say that Blood Omen & Soul Reaver were 9/10 range, while the rest of the games were 7/10 range.

No idea why...obviously Crystal Dynamics have proven to be a great developer. But they dipped in quality before they took over Tomb Raider in 2006.

This man knows his shit.

 
Sun, 02 Jun 2019 06:00:25

52. Tie Fighter and X-Wing Alliance

Image result for tie fighter game

Image result for tie fighter game

Early 90's PC was the PC's golden era and I didn't have a PC that could run any of the groundbreaking games coming out for PC, but my best friend did! So I would play all these games at his house and one of my favoites was Tie-Fighter, my friend had the flight stick and everything. Yes I played a game where every button on the keyboard did something while having a flight stick with multiple hotkeys and I loved it. This game made you feel like you were actually piloting a Tie or X-wing, not in a cheesy arcade way but a flight sim way. Every aspect of the ship was under your control from how much power thursts get, how to direct your shields, what speed to cycle through your lasers, kinds of radar, team commands and much more. I was in complete command of my ship, my squadron and the missions which had objectives which changed as the missions went on. Some missions have you defending bombers, some have you attack rebel bases, others support a giant screen filling star destroyer. It looked, sounded and felt like Star Wars.

The cool thing about Tie-fighter is that you get to play as the villain. You rise the ranks of the empire and meet all the famous villains including Grand Admiral Thrawn who was just created for the novels a few years before. How cool is it to have the emperor personally give you a mission thats on the down low from most of the captains, you get to see the ruthlessness of the empire first hand. Graphically it was a bit rough but it achieved what it set out to be which is a Star Wars flight sim. X-wing vs Tie fighter came out afterwards but it was a multiplayer focused game which I do not care for so I skipped it.

Image result for x wing alliance

Image result for x wing alliance

A five years later came the final entry into this sadly forgotten masterful X-Wing franchise, X-wing Alliance. I finally had a gaming PC so I played this at home, with my own flight stick and loved every second of it. There were massive graphical upgrades compared to Tie-fighter. Alliance tells the story of a new family that were smugglers but get embroiled into the galactic civil war and join the rebellion. You somehow end up flying the millenium Falcon for some missions including the epic final level which is the battle of endor. The whole game was worth it just for the battle of endor, this games would have some big battles but never anything on the scale of what was shown in ROTJ, until this game. Now they had to break up Endor into four levels to make it work but it worked. Capital ships all over, a death star firing its beam blowing up ships left and right and the endless swarm of Ties. The first endor mission begins with the famous shot of all the Tie's flying at the falcon, perfectly recreated in game form. The final mission has you flying into the death star to blow it up and of course escape afterward which quite frankly was a pain in the ass, but still you play the movie!

These games ruined all other space combat games for me. I enjoyed Colony Wars, and the Rogue Squadron games for the arcadey feel but nothing made me feel like the actual pilot of a spaceship. And not just any spaceships, the best spaceships, Star Wars spaceships. Missions would just play the same 4 star wars movie tunes over and over while a cacophony of classic laser sounds would be going off. The authenticity of the Star Wars space battles are why these games are so special.

 
Sun, 02 Jun 2019 23:19:31

X-Wing Alliance the third best game ever? This top 50 is ending with a bang! Nyaa

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