(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.
So funky and fresh but didn't make it.
The splatoon games, one of the best online competitive "shooters" I've played. Slightly out of the splat zone.
FTL, such an addicting simple yet extremely deep game. A classic but just missses the mark.
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
LOL wait till the next spot. Oh and my “top 10” (top 20)
So I should expect 42a, 42b, 42c?
Exactly, but obviously more of them.
41. Super Mario Bros, Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island, Super Mario 64 and Super Mario 3D World
Finally we have some Super Mario games. This is a varied collection of Mario games, a bunch of Mario games I put in a certain tier, all great. Lets start with the grand daddy of them all.
The most important video game ever made, the most influencial, the game probably most responsible for creating life long gamers. I am sure I played some arcade games before having an NES but the first game I really got into is Super Mario Bros. One of my earliest memories is getting an NES a year or so after it launched. We got two games for it, one was the pack in which was SMB and Duck Hunt on the same cartridge with the light gun, the other my dad decided to get Rush N' Attack. I have no idea why. Trust me Rush N' Attack will not appear on this list, you can guess which game I played the most. I can't recall the first time I played it, I don't know when I knew I was good at it, I just know I played it a lot.
My brother would show me all the secrets and that became my method of play, I almost never played SMB1 straight through. I would always jump over the exit in 1-2, go to world 4, in 4-2 hit the blocks and go up the beanstalk to warp to world 8 and try to beat it. Just think of that sentence and how cool it is to have a game so deep that it would have these elaborate secrets that would get whispered about in school playgrounds. Oh how can you forget the infinite 1up trick in 3-1 with the turtle, once again my brother was a pro at it, it took me forever to get the timing down and I can never do it like he did. Super Mario Bros. is filled with memorable secrets and moments that will stay with you.
It's also a perfect controlling platformer, to this day SMB1 might still feel the best to control of any Mario game. Every level impecably designed to be able to speed run through, filled with secrets and great tests of skill. It set the standard that all video games going forward had to match and few did. To this day I play SMB1 once a year or so, it is absolutely timeless. Back in the GBC days Nintendo released SMB Deluxe. a new version of SMB with tons of challenges and remixed levels, easily one of the best Game Boy games ever made.
Technically I played this on the GBA which served as my SNES. Remember I was a Genesis kid, I completely skipped the SNES and N64 but my sister got a Game Boy color which I played the most on it. I beasically played the SNES games on the GBA and this was one of them. Little did I know I was going to fall in love with such a creative and unqiue platformer. Yoshi's Island nails the balance of great platforming, challenge and secrets. Each stage can be beat the normal way but the true way is to find all the red coins and flowers, each level became a treasure hunt and a large puzzle as some of these secretes required some thinking to reach. The pastel colored art makes the game pop, you can instatly know what is just by the art. This game has so many great levels, superbv bosses and is long, very satisfying. I have no clue what happend with the sequels, they never come close to the impeciable design of this title.
Groundbreaking, a monumental shift in the gaming landscape and once again it is Mario that sets the standard for all others. The 3D revolution is still the most exciting time in gaming history. Nothing sense has replicated that feeling of the first time you got to move around in a 3D world. No game personified that sense of awe and pure joy of being free in three dimensions than Mario 64. Like an idiot I was stuck with the Saturn and PS1, while they had some 3D games, nothing game close to the fidelity in controls SM64 brought with its analog controls. The first time I saw Mario 64 was in some promotional video Nintendo shipped out, I could not believe what I was seeing, the way mario moved in a circle blew my mind. I had to play it and I got my chance when demos went up at Best Buy, I got to hold the awkward N64 controller in my hand and move Mario in a circle, there was no turning back.Mario would jump, I would jump again just a tad bit higher then jump for a third time as MArio sumersaulted higher and with a flourish. Mario's movements expressed joy, he would hold out his hands as he reached top speed, everything about Mario 64 was built around the player enjoying the act of simply moving about a 3D world.
A sister's friend gave up her N64 around 2000 so thats when I had an N64 to play around with and it came with SM64. I had played it at friends homes so I had an idea of many levels but this was the first time I could sink my teeth into it and get all 120 stars. What a journey it was, every time Mario would jump into a painting I could not wait to see where I would be. Nintendo was at their creative peak with these levels, they were open enough to encourage exploration but the stars were focused enough to require good platforming. It's a balance Nintendo never found again as Sunshine and Oddyseey went way too far in the big open level route. It's crazy how playable SM64 is to this day, seriously go back to games which came out in 1996 and play the best games of that era, see how well they hold up. Somehow SM64 controls better and has a better camera than most games do today, it's crazy, Nintendo is run by wizards.
Mario in 3D is fantastic but trying to replicate the creativity and variety of challenges in the best 2D games into 3D is extremely difficult. Galaxy found the space where it made a perfect hybrid of two Mario styles but even then Galaxy didn't really feel like the 2D Mario's perfectly recreated into 3D. Super Mario 3D World is that game, it's SMB3 in 3D. What started on the 3DS with Super Mario 3D Land, a great game on its own right, really fulfilled it's promise of a 2D style game in 3D with World. These levels are packed to the brim with non stop platfoming, crazy powerups, wild obstacles, the variety simply never stops. The new items join the ranks of the best Mario powerups, cat suit has so many great uses. This game even has coop which I never played but man is that great for families to play together. The Wii U was starved for games, SM3DW is at the very top of the Wii U best games list.
Next up a game in a genre that has not been on the list and will only appear in this one soot.
40. NFL2K1 and ESPN NFL 2K5
There was a time where I was big into sports video games. All through the 16-bit era Sega was the king of sports games and me being a Sega fan I endulged in plenty of their offerings. I have always been a football fan more than any other sport so Joe Montana Sports Talk Football was my go to football game. I also had Madden but I prefered the presentation of Joe Montana games. I also hplayed plenty of Wolrd Series Baseball, I had Pat Riley Basketball, played some of the NHL games, I really loved sports games. Like many Sega franchises sports took a break during the Saturn only to have a triumphnant return with the Dreamcast. When the Dreamcast was announced the most impressive part about the graphics was the look of NFL2K. I saw a live demo of it at Best Buy and I could not believe my eyes, it looked like a TV broadcast. And so NFL2K was one of the games I got with the Dreamcast.
The sequel promised to be better in every way and offer something groundbreaking, online play. A first for a console sports game, online play in a football game was like a portal into the future. First off the actual game of football was as good as its ever been, NFL2K1's gameplay was top notch and its presentation second to none at the time. Madden could not touch it and thats before you get into online. Online mode was basic, set up rooms and play others. I wanted more and online I found a website that created dedicated 2K1 online leagues where you schedule matches and each player reposts the results to online standings. It was super primitave but oh so exciting. I was not great or anything but I was hooked on these appointment games, they sort of followed the NFL season, once a week, it was one of the best online experiences I had. Part of why I liked it so much is because there was no expectations of voice chat, there was only text. It was just two guys who wanted to play for the fun of it. This was the last time I really played online sports, before it was taken over by the loud obnoxious masses.
This is the greatest football game ever made. To this day it is still the greatest because Madden can go fuck itself. Sega went third party and they were trying to compete with EA on all fronts, their games were better and EA knew this. Sega in a last ditch effort to take a chunk of the pie from the beast that was Madden was to offer their new NFL game for $20, greatly upsetting the balance of how much to charge for a sports game. Not only that, sega had teamed up with ESPN to have use of all their famous NFL coverage and sportscenter anchors. In terms of presentation NFL2K5 is unmatched, I was blown away at how authentic VC made the season feel by having Chris Berman give you highlights of all the games in your simulated league with the classic music of NFL Primetime playing.
2K5 was also the most feature rich football game at the time. Offering a DEEP franchise mode where you are the owner and control everything about the team from the prices of food at the stadium to all the contracts of your players. You would scout players in the combine to get info on them in preperation for the NFL draft. It has full online leagues, no more paper pencil leagues. Each team had playbooks tailored to fit their playstyles with constant updates to the rosters as the season went on. And it played like a dream, far better controlling than any Madden game.
EA was shook, in response to the exteremely aggressive apporach Sega took, EA decided to simply eliminate the competition by paying for an exclusivity deal with the NFL. It is one of the most infamous moves in video game history, in one day an entire franchise was wiped out. The landscape of sports games was changed forever as EA bought their way into a monopoly. Gone is proper competition that inspires creativity, instead EA took the easy route. I said I would never buy a Madden game ever again and outside some $2 used copy I got and almost never played of a random Madden a few years back, I have kept this promise. Not only did NFL2K die with that exclusivity deal but my love for sports games died as well. I almost never play sports games anymore, my favorite sport held hostage by a shitty company put a bad taste in my mouth.
It always irks me a little that sports games are excluded from most best games ever lists. Glad to see them make yours.
39. Ninja Gaiden
After DMC changed the action game landscape there were a few games that tried to enter that sphere and from that emerged what many might say is the best hack and slash action game ever made, Ninja Gaiden. I perfer DMC combat but there is no denying the incredible crqaftmanship that went into this masterpiece of a game. The game world is far more detailed and its a longer game than DMC. The combat feels like it is taken from a fighting game, every hit counts, defense has as big a role as offence. It has expert pacing with new weapons, new environments and a massive army of enemies and bosses to battle at a perfect rate. There is almost nothing to fault with this game, it's a near perfect action game.
Now I was a PS guy of course but NG was one of those Xbox games I saw value in. So when I did get my Xbox this was on the short list of games to buy at launch. And so I did after gflowing reviews, I could not believe the mind blowing graphics and pixel perfect controls. The first area was such a joy to mess around with, running on walls, jumping up waterfalls and getting my ass WHOOPED by the first boss. Yep right away that Nunchuck asshole beats you down and you know this isn't going to be easy. It just gets better and better from there. Really the only reason I don't put this game higher is because the combat system at high level play ends up being about absorbing orbs to power up Ryu to do a charge attack which in turn releases larger essence orbs and gets you a higher score. Hopping around doing the same move over and over is not that fun. That method doesn't work on bosses so the integrity of the best battles remain unharmed. Regardless this is an action game classic.
38. Deus Ex
It was the summer in the early 2000s and Blockbuster Video was selling a summer game pass where you pay one fee and get to rent as many games as you want. I was all over that deal and its when I played all sorts of weird games I never would have. One day while browsing the PS2 section I came upon Deus Ex. I vaguely knew of it, for the most part I knew it was very highly regarded in the PC world, a world I was not part of. So I rented Deus Ex on the PS2, yes I played one of the best PC games ever made on the PS2. The port was solid so I still got the full Deus Ex experience and what an eye opening experience it was.
There weren't games with this level of freedom on consoles. I was in awe of what I could do in this game, every room had things to look at, or hack, read, talk to someone and your dialogue choices had real impact. Games for me were game like, you have a level you fight shit, move on to the next. This felt like a cyberpunk simulation and I could do what I want. I could kill my boss, now that would lead to a death as the entire base would go on lockdown and hunt me down but I could still do it. It opened my mind to a whole different level of interaction that is possible in gaming.
What a game it is, I love scifi so I was hooked in the adventure of JC Denton and area 51, aliens, men in black, it was perfect. The way the story was told was so great. Dialogue alone could cover the main story but hidden on computers and side quests are lots of supplimental material that makes the world feel lived in. The side quests were fantastic, every location had plenty to do and see, almost playgrounds to explore your skill set which ever skills you chose to master.
This was the first time I played a game with the Deus Ex method of mission design, create a level where one could sneak in, one could brute force their way in, or one could hack their way in. The key to all aspects of Deus Ex was to have options, all of them valid, all leading to slightly different outcomes.