I've spent one or two hours (give or take a few hundred) on GB member FunExplosion 's Official Giant Bomb Minecraft server ( link to official server forum topic ) over the last couple of months. There's a been a lot of really great construction going on by a lot of very nice people, and I wholeheartedly suggest taking a look and saying hi if you have a copy of the game. Anyhow, inspired by all...
Building forts and playing with LEGOs are two of my favorite childhood activities, two itches that Minecraft scratches in a really crazy way. There's no actual game to be played here, but if digging staircases deep underground, discovering crazy water and lava filled caverns, and building gigantic towers in the sky isn't some of the most fun I've had in years, I may be losing my mind. I've been...
I've always hated definitively ranked lists of "the best games ever." Who the heck do people think they are, ranking pieces of art like they are cars or computer hardware where the performance and value are measurable via the good old scientific method. So, just to make sure we're on the same page, I'm not proclaiming these to be the best games ever. For one, I don't play PC games much, and I m...
Super Mario Bros. on the NES was the first game I ever owned. Sure, I'd played my dad's Atari 2600 quite a bit, but nothing on that system could even approach the fresh brilliance of action platforming that Mario's first major outing provided. I've explored and exhausted every nook and cranny of every single Mario game since then, 2D and 3D. I view them as a sport, and--especially with the late...
Valve decided that cut-scenes are stupid. While I'd can't say I agree completely, I definitely can't argue against their masterful use of the first-person perspective and silent protagonist to weave one of the most immersive stories told in the video game medium. Add the ahead-of-its-time physics-based puzzles and spot-on shooting mechanics, and you got a game everyone should play, even if they...
1500 out of 1500 Achievement Points. 170 hours. Terrible Shotgun to thousands of faces. Heads rolling. Pure love.
Xenogears & Xenosaga, to this day, remain the only games I've ever spent any time nitpicking and debating the details of on internet forums. The gigantic 10,000 year time-lines, Judeo-Christian references, and bizarre mix of old-world and Sci-Fi fascinated me to no end. Xenogears' soundtrack is also one of my all-time favorites. All four games have their flaws, but each did a better job of capt...
Final Fantasy VII was my first RPG. I was 15, receiving it as a gift with my PlayStation in 1998, about a year after it was released. I didn't get it at first, and stopped maybe ten hours into the game, before setting it down for a couple of months. I eventually decided to go back to it, did some research, and when I restarted, I felt much more in control, having a better understanding of the M...
I've never felt worse killing an enemy in any game. Repeat sixteen, epic, heart pounding times. Enough said.
You can only play an open-world game for the first time once. GTA III was a revelation in its day, handing players the keys to an entire city which, at the time, seemed realistically structured, and the lack of loading times within each island was incredible. Sure, the shooting mechanics were a horrible mess until GTA IV came along, but exploring the cities in the three PS2 installments was not...
Metal Gear Solid for the original PlayStation changed my perception of what video games were. Despite the now-crude graphics and isometric gameplay, it remains one of the most quintessential cinematic games ever created. The PS2 follow-up turned up the graphic-quality more than a few notches, but it wasn't until MGS3 (Subsistence, with the new camera), that I forever fell in love with the serie...
Mass Effect 1 was my first introduction to a Bioware game. Yeah, I'm a horrible person. The series' reliance on dynamic conversations and a deep multi-game story arc scratched an itch I didn't know I had up to that point in time. While the games have their flaws, which have been well documented, the mixture of great voice acting, engaging action-based combat, and quests galore make this series...
With Fumito Ueda and Team ICO's The Last Guardian beginning to show up on people's radar, their older games, ICO, and Shadow of the Colossus, have also had the spotlight shown back on them. It's understandable that many people are just finding out about them now, especially with the upcoming HD remastered collection, but I was all up on this game launch day thanks to some very glowing previews...
Okay, shame time. I own the original Yakuza but have yet to play it. Thankfully, 2 & 3 have excellent story recaps to catch players up to speed. I'm a sucker for RPG quests (spoilers: Fallout 3 and Mass Effect are somewhere coming up on my list here), and the Yakuza series has these in spades. The action-oriented combat system also makes for a nice change of pace from your typical RPG, and . ....
Like Uncharted, I totally skipped the first Assassin's Creed based on luke warm reviews, but made sure to pick it up and play through it to prepare for Assassin's Creed II, which had reportedly fixed most of the complaints from the first game. I dug the slower paced combat and admired the recreations of ancient cities which Ubisoft crafted. I ended up loving both games from beginning to end, an...
I didn't play the first Uncharted until previews of Uncharted 2 begin claiming the sequel was the best thing ever in the history of the universe. I ended up enjoying both quite a bit, particularly for the well-acted characters and beautiful environments. Both games had their issues, though 2 was pretty close to perfect, especially it's still-to-be-topped set pieces. It's too bad the stories did...
While Jack didn't do squat for me, the entire city of Rapture is probably one of my top five game characters of all-time. And tell me that Andrew Ryan's treatment of himself didn't shock the hell out of you too?
I was late to the God of War party. Right around the time a friend loaned me a PS2 copy of the first game, the re-mastered PS3 collection was announced. I beat the first Hydra boss on the PS2 and was blown away, but then decided to hold off and play the whole series in HD. I thought the mix-up of action and puzzles was great and matched with a decent story, although, is Kratos not an absurdly m...
Okami was ashamedly my first Ocarina of Time-style game. I was drawn to it by the art style, but fell in love with the quest structure and awesome boss battles. This later led me to pick up LoZ: Twilight Princess as a Wii launch title, another great game. I would have included in my list, but it seemed less than genuine knowing there's better Zelda games out there that I haven't played yet.
So, I'm selfishly trying to hit the 20 blog post mark to complete a GB quest. I thought about cheating, but figured I'd try to do something that I could at least pretend is worthwhile. What follows are my top 16 games or game series. Hopefully this shit doesn't muck up the forums.
Shawn Elliott, Dan Hsu, and N’Gai Croal –all respected former or current members of the video game press– have coordinated a fascinating conversation with quite a few notable contributors in the on-line and print publishing industry regarding video game reviews . As a hack who is just now dipping his toe into those waters, I have found this first portion of their conversation intensely thought...
I'm picking up either Fallout or LittleBigPlanet when I get paid next, I think I'll have to flip a coin to choose.