Your favorite games from 2003?

Dear gamers in the Giant Bomb forums

Time for another blast from the past thread! so I would like to share my favorite games that are turning 20 years old by this year following are:

• Colin McRae Rally 04
• Project Gotham Racing 2
• F-Zero GX
• Hot Wheels: World Race
• Need For Speed Underground
• R-Type Final
• Time Crisis 3 (Home console port)

Also here are the games that I've missed out on and I really wished I had an opportunity to play them are:

• NASCAR Racing 2003 Season
• WRC 3: The Official Game of the FIA World Rally Championship (Evolution Studios' game)
• F1 Challenge '99–'02
• Racing Evoluzione
• TrackMania (2003 Game)
• SpyHunter 2 (2003 Game)
• Crimson Skies: High Road to Revenge

Of course I had to look this up, I used both Wikipedia's and Metacritic's lists. Here are the five that jumped out at me, in order of release.

Tenchu: Wrath of Heaven (PS2, March). This was the third Tenchu game, and was yet another From Software game that I liked, though I had much more love for the King's Field series, which had seen its final NA release in 2002 with King's Field: The Ancient City. If I ever played any other Tenchu games, I no longer remember them. This is the one I remember. It wasn't perfect, but it was a genuinely compelling stealth game, which I'm not sure I had really experienced before that point. I played it all the way through multiple times.

Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic (Xbox, July). I did not play this when it came out because I never owned an original Xbox. Instead I played it after I had bought my Xbox 360, under the limited backward compatibility that system had (I still remember being annoyed that Otogi and Otogi 2 were not on the backward compat list; they're still the only tentpole From releases I've never played). It was fun to experience once, though as a rule I don't love real-time combat that is purely composed of dice rolls.

One funny detail I remember. I bought it from a Gamestop, and as I was driving home I opened the case and realized the Gamestop employee had put the wrong game inside: he'd given me the sequel, which of course was also out at that point. I had to turn the car around and go back to the store to get the right one. Physical games, amirite?

Disgaea: Hour of Darkness (PS2, July). The first of the weird and wonderful Disgaea series. I played and liked the first three games quite a bit. It had the grid-based tactical JRPG combat I'd enjoyed from games like Final Fantasy Tactics, plus a basically endless grind, which at the time was something I appreciated. Now I'm more leery of that type of time commitment.

SSX 3 (PS2, Xbox, Gamecube, October). Boy did I play this one a lot. The dynamic adjustments to the music based on your performance were really compelling, and it was just fun to do a long free-form run down the mountain for nothing other than the joy of doing it. I remember that you could decide which music tracks you wanted to toggle on and off, and at some point I had toggled off everything but Yellowcard's "Way Away" and Autopilot Off's "Clockwork," my two undisputed favorites.

Monster Rancher 4 (PS2, November). I've never once played a Pokemon game, and yet I somehow got into a knock-off of them. I think it was the whole idea of spawning monsters from CDs and DVDs that I found fascinating as a kid (though at this point I was in my late teens)... I even went so far as to buy or rent some of the specific CDs/DVDs that would spawn unique monsters.

...

Additionally, I'd already mentioned it above, but Otogi: Myth of Demons came out in 2003. If I'd had an Xbox, I would've loved to play that one, but I only had a PS2 at the time.

Warcraft 3: The Frozen Throne

The concept of online gaming was still fairly new to me and Warcraft III just did a great job making it seem to matter with ranking systems, open qualifiers for tournaments and clan support. I think the rates were cheaper in the weekends. So i would spend the week figuring out good build orders and then test it out against real opponents in the weekend.

Thought the campaigns of Warcraft 3 were great as well to be fair. This even had a Diablo-esque stand alone campaign where you were only using hero units and doing missions for Orcs. Great package.

SSX 3: Amazing game. Felt great to play, great soundtrack and the customization options and light RPG elements (upgrading stats) made it a ton of fun. This one also had those long rides where you go down the mountain in 1 go and come across all those mini-levels you played before. Always thought that was a neat concept.

GTA Double Pack:

GTA III & Vice City in 1 package in the release-year of GTA Vice City? Amazing value.

Vice City was a real level up in my eyes and probably the best game of 2003. But getting GTA III on top of that is a nice bonus because that game does have merit as well.

Shoutout to LOTR: The Two Towers.

Those games were actually a lot of fun. I especially remember the level where you're holding the castle-wall down and the Orks keep putting these ladders up for you to kick down.

I didn't count GTA Vice City because it was actually a 2002 game, at least for PS2, though it did come out for PC and Xbox in 2003. But I certainly played a lot of that one, as well. Might be my favorite of the GTA games, or at least the one I have the fondest memories of.

@atheistpreacher: I remembered each GTA installment from the 6th generation console era, was prioritized to be released onto the Sony PlayStation 2 first while GTA Advance (Developed by Digital Eclipse and published by Rockstar Games) is exclusively for the Nintendo GameBoy Advance, even though it can be played on the Nintendo GameCube via Game Boy Player add-on.

My guess is, either Sony Interactive Entertainment paid Rockstar North (The Developer) for that or Rockstar Games (The publisher)'s marketing strategy.

Anyway, I don't like the GTA series these days because I find it very stupid and disturbing in terms of plot in my personal opinion.

Edit: Since the 7th generation console era, Rockstar Games appears they request its subsidiaries to prioritize developing their games for the PlayStation and Xbox consoles before porting to PC, but Angel Studios/Rockstar San Diego's Midnight Club: Los Angeles never got ported to PC natively.

Max Payne 2, SSX 3, KOTOR, Jedi Academy, C&C Generals, SimCity 4 and Rise of Nations were all great games. Crimson Skies: High Road to Revenge was not only a good game but it coincided with the release of Xbox Live in Europe and the dawn of online gaming on consoles as we know it today. EyeToy: Play was another interesting technology showcase. I'm also a bit of an apologist for Enter the Matrix, Brute Force and Unreal 2. And the release of Big Rigs was infamously memorable.

I very much doubt that Sony paid Rockstar anything. They had no reason to. The PS2 was the best-selling console of all time, and MS had broken in late with the Xbox and had a comparatively small market share (the PS2 outsold it 6-to-1). Rockstar prioritized the PS2 because that's where the money was, they couldn't sell nearly as many copies on any other platform. Likewise, mobile GTA was sold on Nintendo's handheld because it was really the only game in town.

I enjoyed GTA3, GTA Vice City, and GTA San Andreas. GTA4 was more ho-hum. None of those had memorable stories IMO, and it's not what I played them for. GTA5, by contrast, did have a half-decent story, or at least one that complemented the gameplay. Then again, I can't say I remember it all that well, I played it around release and that was ten years ago now. I do think that if and when Rockstar decides to make GTA6, they will try to include a female main character and perhaps try to make it all a little less tropey, after all the shit they took for never writing any female characters that had any agency or moved beyond tired stereotypes.

@isomeri: Yeah, Big Rigs feels more like a broken fan-made game, I'd rather play the other two following modern truck games are American Truck Simulator and Euro Truck Simulator 2 instead.

Wow. Just looking at a list on Metacritic, there were quite a few of my all-time favorites released in 2003, which seems kind of weird considering I was 10 years old at the time, and probably didn't play any of them the year they came out. NBA Street Vol. 2, Tony Hawk Underground, Viewtiful Joe, Prince of Persia: Sands of Time. And those are just the best of the best. There's way too much stuff for me to name it all.

EDIT: I put together a ranked list of my favorite stuff from 2003.

My Favorite Games of 2003

I remember going to college that year and buying a GameCube with my roommate because of the lineup. Wind Waker, F Zero GX, Wrestlemania XIX, Zelda Collectors Edition, Mario Kart Double Dash and Beyond Good and Evil just to name a few

Really haven't played much from that year.

WarioWare, Inc.: Mega Microgame$! (GBA, 2003)

Astro Boy: Omega Factor (GBA, 2003)

Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne (PC, 2003)(Expansion)

Mega Man Zero 2 (GBA, 2003)

Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow (GBA, 2003)

Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic (PC/XB, 2003)

Fire Emblem (GBA, 2003)

Ninja Five-O (GBA, 2003)

Ratchet & Clank: Going Commando/Ratchet & Clank 2 (PS2, 2003)

Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga (GBA, 2003)

Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time (XB/PS2/GC/PC, 2003)

Boktai: The Sun Is in Your Hands (GBA, 2003)

F-Zero GX (GC, 2003)

Advance Wars 2: Black Hole Rising (GBA, 2003)

Ys VI: The Ark of Napishtim (PC, 2003)

Disgaea: Hour of Darkness (PS2, 2003)

Beyond Good & Evil (PC/GC/XB/PS2, 2003)

Zone of the Enders: The 2nd Runner (PS2, 2003)

Freelancer (PC, 2003)

The list embed feature seems to be broken, so here's my Best of 2003 I made back around the time the site launched.

1. SSX 3
2. Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic
3. The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker
4. Beyond Good & Evil
5. Final Fantasy X-2
6. Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time
7. Call of Duty
8. Crimson Skies: High Road to Revenge
9. Viewtiful Joe
10. EverQuest: Lost Dungeons of Norrath

Yeah. I know. EverQuest 10th? It's not a very good expansion. Still spent a ton of time in it.

SSX 3 is the best PS2 game. Everyone loves Tricky because they remember the song. It's a great game, but it's basically just a director's cut or special edition of the original game. SSX 3 is superior in every way.

Not in any order, but here are mine:

KOTOR: mind-blowing twist at the time

Mario Kart: Double Dash!!: my favorite Mario Kart of all time

Soulcalibur II: This is probably the one that made the series popular

Unreal II: The Awakening: Rocket Launcher...enough said

Rise of Nations: Still my favorite RTS of all time

F-Zero GX: They should make another F-Zero game

Yu-Gi-Oh! Worldwide Edition: Stairway to the Destined Duel: Laugh all you want, I played the shit of this game

Ratchet & Clank: Going Commando: My favorite Ratchet & Clank game

Dynasty Warriors 4: Yeah, I said it

I should've included Soul Calibur 2. I saw that it was first released in 2002, but that was only in arcades. Played the hell out of that one. Siegfried/Nightmare and Ivy were my mains.

I've been known to like the Koei Warriors games, but I don't think I actually played DW4 much. DW5 was the one I played a lot... the one before they hit the reset button with DW6.

@anchorsahoy: Yeah, it's about 19 years without a new F-Zero installment being developed, the last one was F-Zero Climax for the Nintendo GameBoy Advance, only in Japan/Asia.

I actually didn't know what came out in 2003 that I could name. 2001 had Halo, 2002 Metroid Prime, 2004 Half Life 2, but 2003? Huh.

Jak 2, Ratcher and Clank: Going Commando and Mario Kart: Double Dash all came out that year, all games I played and enjoyed in that era. Later in life, I played a lot of Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow and Shin Megami Tensei 3: Nocturne, both some of my favorite games. And one of these days, I'll actually get around to KOTOR and Temple of Elemental Evil.

The Empires games were always my favorites - DW5 being the one I played the most. I think DW4 was probably their most popular overall.

2003 has a bunch of my GoATs. Soul Calibur 2, PoP Sands of Time, SSX3, F-Zero GX, Viewtiful Joe, Wind Waker, Jedi Academy, NfS Underground and a bunch of other good stuff.

NBA Street Vol.2……. Need I say more.

@judaspete: Totally awesome choices of games and a great year as well.

Sidenote: I hope Nintendo will announce the F-Zero's future and Nintendo Switch's successor by E3 2023.

A very solid year... some of my favorites were Command & Conquer: Generals, SimCity 4, Star Wars: Jedi Knight - Jedi Academy, Star Wars: KOTOR and The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King.