by lackingsaint
Keep in mind, these are not in my opinion the BEST games. Actually, some of these I would never ever suggest to friends. Still great games though. Disclaimer: I have an area dedicated to what I call "hanger-on" games. These are games that, if i'm in the right mood, i'd be ready to put in my Top 20. But only if i'm in the right mood.
Showing 1-10 of 20 items
There aren't many games i'd call "perfect", especially not among my favourites, but Silent Hill 2 just does everything right in terms of design reflecting tone. On detached reflection, I feel like I could talk my head off about the weird-ass imagery. In the moment though, I simply felt more hopeless and desperate than I've ever felt before in a game.
A game I cherished in my childhood that aged far more gracefully than I thought it would. Beautiful world, tight controls, and a difficulty that always pushed me that little bit further than I thought I could handle.
"Elegance through simplicity" and all that, and the team behind Shadow of the Colossus captured that brilliantly here. Light touches of story and a sublime atmosphere set the scene for some basic but super compelling gameplay.
Dark Souls manages to take things I don't like about games, things I might even call "bad game mechanics", and turn it into something addictive and endlessly entertaining. A true visionary accomplishment, and a perfect of Demon Souls' fresh new look at design.
With Psychonauts, Schafer and company used their collective writing and design talents to create a gameworld filled to the brim with invention and personality. It's a game that oozes style and comedy in equal measure.
Fallout 3 introduced me to a style of gameplay that has very quickly become one of my favourites. But it wasn't until patrolling the Mojave that I realised just how WELL that genre can be done, and just how wonderfully written this series could be. Also, how much I wished for a nuclear winter.
Some might argue Mass Effect 1 was the series high, and I wouldn't try to argue too hard about that, but for me Mass Effect 2 takes all of the political intrigue and character development I loved about the first game and wraps it in a more focused package. Plus, no Mako, so it gets points on that.
Before Bioshock, Irrational made this little guy, and on working my way backwards from that series to play it I found myself engrossed. While some of the streamlining of the latter Levine games is absent, the systems and atmosphere in place for System Shock 2 have aged tremendously.
After not really connecting at all with the Uncharted series, Naughty Dog blew me away with a game that made me remember why I loved them in the PS1/PS2 era. An amazing handle of pacing and fluidity from area-to-area; once you get past that initial hump, the game just becomes this blur of high-intensity drama and amazing character-building.
I have no history with the Resident Evil series, but hopping into this with the Wii Edition was the most fun i've ever had with the system, and an excellent introduction to a genre I did not have an affinity for.