for me mine are 1. Elden Ring, 2. RDR2 3. BOTW, all because they genuinely blew my mind when playing them for the first time and changed how I saw and played video games.
- Minecraft
- Fallout: New Vegas
- Portal 2
My top 3 are based on “for their time”.
Morrowind
Portal
Halo 2
Tears of the Kingdom was amazing. The only thing BotW did better was how it felt riding on horseback through Hyrule field dodging lasers. But that was the high point, the average experience in BotW was less fun that TotK for me.
TotK really might be one of my top 5.
It’s too hard to really rank every game. I spent a ton of time on Minecraft over the years but haven’t recently. Like over a decade ago I liked gmod and still spent so much time on it but haven’t played recently.
Lately colony management games have been scratching the itch. Do id probably say Dwarf Fortress, Rimworld, and Oxygen Not Included.
Portal 2 and Warframe. I’m not sure about a third, several contenders. And can’t really say which spot any are in, feels more like they share 1st.
Questions like this are always hard, it’s never a certain answer and it shifts over time, no matter if something new comes along to take a place or not. It’s as fluid as anything else.
- Oldschool Runescape
- Halo 2
- GoldenEye 007
Hello fellow old!
Now this is a tough one to be honest. But if i had to pick:
- Cyberpunk 2077
- Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice
- Hades
Honorable mentions (cant leave these out): Return of the Obra Dinn, Wasteland 2, Darkest Dungeon, and many more…
Forever stuck in mid to late 90s JRPGs, if I had to pick 3
Final Fantasy VI Final Fantasy Tactics Suikoden II
- MGS3
- Metal Gear 4: Peace Walker
- MGSV
Honourable mentions: Metal gear, Metal Gear 2, Metal Gear Solid, MGSV: Ground Zeroes and Sons of Liberty
Sons of Liberty is the most cohesive entry in the series IMO. Best story too; prophetic, really.
Crab… Battle…
Broke muh knife
Thank you for enlightening me with this masterpiece. I will forever repeat this every time i replay the game while struggling to kill those crabs for food in that godforsaken cave
Metal… Gear… 4?
Lol. I always hallucinate and see an imaginary 4 next to peace walker since it technically should be if they decided to keep the numbering consistent
But what about the actual MGS 4 that came before Peace Walker?
No one is going to agree with me, but here I go:
- Counter Strike (all versions): the perfect shooter.
- Terraria: the progression is amazing, but what never ceases to amaze me is how, despite the game’s huge content, it is never overwhelming or intimidating. Just a lot of fun.
- Transport Fever 2: by far my favorite world-builder type game, and it still gets updates!
Going to have to go with the three that had the biggest impact on me.
1: Doom / Doom 2. In addition to being two of the most influential and important FPS games of all time, they got me into modding, programming, the internet, 3D graphics, shaping my entire future career path.
2: Kerbal space program. No moment in all of gaming had me leap out of my chair and whoop the way landing in the Mun for the first time did. Now that I understand orbital mechanics, I get annoyed at almost all depictions of space flight in movies.
3: Factorio. Got to this one late, on Switch about 6 months ago. I can’t think of any game which has rewired my brain as much. As a programmer, I come away from each play through with entire new methods of solving problems at work. May be the single most in depth and addictive game I’ve ever played.
In no particular order ( mostly cos i think ranking beyond a certain degree of precision hurts the art involved ):
- NieR Automata
- NieR Replicant (ver 1.22… , realistically)
- The Talos Principle ( one of the most suprisingly brilliant games that too many people haven’t played)
then i suppose one tier below, not consequent of any particular shortcomings, but rather just not being at the same “transendent” level as the above:
- Crosscode
- Citizen sleeper
- What Remains Of Edith Finch
- Portal & 2
NieR automata literally changed my life, so it kinda deserves it’s own top spot, but placed as is in spirit of the question.
Control, the horizon games and stardew valley.
Minecraft Borderlands 2 Bioshock
honourable mention for Zelda on N64
but the top 3 are based on replayability and just how easy it is to spend time playing them
- Horizon: Zero Dawn
- Ghost of Tsushima
- Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild
Call me Nostradamus 'cause it’s Silksong.
So Silksong is going to be a trilogy? Rock on!
Eventually… all we can do is believe.