Favorite game of all time?

[Various Varieties]

GoldenEye on the N64. The multiplayer is what most people praise the game for these days, but for me the single-player is just as worthy of praise. Little presentational details matter too: as far as I'm concerned, its time attack and cheats system, which added so much replay value, should be a standard feature of all modern FPSs - and yet a small team within Rare who'd mostly never made a game before got it right first time!

Nostalgia is definitely a big part of why I like it, in the sense that I doubt I'd care for the game if I was to play it for the first time today. But it's not nostalgia in the rose-tinted memories sense, as I still return to it fairly frequently: I find I don't have any problem switching from a modern twin-stick FPS with movement on the left stick and non-inverted aiming on the right, to GoldenEye's stick-for-INVERTED-aiming-C-button-for-WASD-movement control system. Even the embarrassingly low framerate and non-centred manual-targeting reticule don't put me off!

I can acknowledge that it's dated in pretty much every way, and that lots of FPSs have since surpassed individual elements of it. But none of them have combined the elements I like in an FPS quite so brilliantly. None of them had the impact that one did when I first played it - no other game has given me the same gloriously-addicted desire to hold the pad in my hand when I'm away from it. None of them have given me as many hours of pleasure.

Dated or not, those are good enough criteria for calling it my #1.

[Zelda007]

I can't just pick one end-all game for me. I'm going to have to do this thing on an individual console basis. Also, I'm only doing consoles I've owned.

SNES: Super Mario World
N64: Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time or GoldenEye
Gamecube: Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess or Metroid Prime 2
Wii: No More Heroes or SSBB

GBA: Pokemon Emerald
DS: The World Ends With You

PC: Dawn of War: Dark Crusade

[tgjensen]

I've always loved Homeworld. The atmosphere that it created with its beautiful graphics and soundtrack was just amazing, and I loved the ability to move around in true 3-D.

[BlazeOrangeDeer]

Portal, it's portal. With GLaDOS, and the companion cube.
Half Life 2, "Confiscation Field error", enough said.
Pokemon red, classic, addictive, exploitable glitches for the win(have you seen the mew glitch? ridiculous).
Fire Emblem 7, excellent party management and character development, awesome story, cool fight animations.
If I had to choose one, I might say... um... that would be hard.

[slightlydead]

games i loved so much i played multiple times because they were so much fun fire emblem 6x, golden sun3x, oracle of ages5x and pokemon gold 4x(transfering and saving my 'mons of course!)

[Fin Archangel]

NETHACKNETHACKNETHACKNETHACK I HATE YOU.

BUT I ALSO LOVE YOU.

[Lounge]

The original Legend of Zelda will never be topped for me. It was a time before the internet and guides and maps. Me and my father would make our own maps for levels, using gridpaper from his work. We'd have a key for which walls could be bombed, which walls could be passed through (invisible doorway style.) Where the compass was, where the key was, etc. etc.

It's timeless to me. I'm sure a lot of it is my memories of the game, and my experiences with it, but it will always be my favorite game ever.

I think when I sat down and thought about my top 5 games two of them were for the NES, and three of them were for the Genesis.

[stormbringer_951]

My favourite game: don't have one. I always get bored and restless of a game after a while. Some of the classics that I go back to time and time again are

- Nethack: Do I even need to explain this? It's Nethack. It makes cRPGs look like a crutch for the weak.
- Dwarf Fortress: The universe recreated in ASCII. WIth ax-crazy dwarves. And magma.
- Thief series: The best first person sneaker ever. Atmospheric, back before steampunk was mainstream and with a witty and cynical protagonist
- S.t.a.l.k.e.r: A great FPSRPG (although light on the RPG elements), with brilliant atmosphere and a great AI system. Mods make it better.
- Deus Ex: The greatest FPSRPG of all time; this was the first to get the balance right and it rocked. Cyberpunk for the win. Pity the sequel sucked.
- Total War: A mix of Risk-esque geostrategy and some beautiful battles. Also, with a massive mod community.
- Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines: A mediocre game on release, patched up to awesome by the community. It has a wry and dark sense of humour, and although the endgame was kind of shit it's a memorable experience

[TheGameboy]

I'm also going to do only systems i own.
NES: tie between Duck Hunt, Super Mario 3, or Tetris, maybe even Top Gun (mainly because i'm the only one i know who can pull off the landing sequence EVERY time i try)
SNES: Super Mario All stars
N64: Super Smash Bros
Gamecube: Super Smash Bros Melee
Wii: Mario Kart Wii (i only play online anymore, so any challengers (Non-hacked) are welcome)
PS1: Spyro 2 Riptos Rage
PS2: Namco Museum
Xbox: Secret Weapons Over Normandy
Dreamcast: Tony Hawks Pro Skater 2
Atari 2600: Berzerk
Genesis: Sonic The Hedgehog 2
GB: Tetris
GB color: Super Mario Bros Deluxe
GBA: Classic NES Series Super Mario Bros
DS: Game & Watch Collection (Club Nintendo WooT!!)
PSP: N+
Virtual Boy: Wario Land

well, these are my favorites, i still play most of them regularly, but a few of them, never played anymore, like dreamcast or xbox...

[Nande_Ebisu?]

Mario Kart 64, That game is timeless, my cousins, who are almost 10 years younger than me, used to love playing that game whenever they came over to my house (until the got Mario Kart for the wii (not as good imo! )

Contemporary game, gotta go with Portal. I suck at FPS's, but I'm awesome at puzzle games meaning I couldn't touch my roommate in halo, but laughed my ass off when he got stuck on some easy parts of portal

[PowPit]

killer7

Everything in this game completely captivated me. The stylish graphics, the great music, weird sounds, interesting gameplay and most of all: The absolutely insane and aweome story and atmosphere. This game is art.

[crucialityfactor]

Never met a version of Tetris that I didn't love, and subsequently beat into submission.

Seriously, can a game get more perfect? ANYone can play it, it's simple gameplay, but makes you think alot, requires patience and good forward thinking, and I dare you to find a more intense gaming experience than when you start getting to the really high levels where it just becomes reactions and partially good luck.

Plus, multiplayer is always a good time.

[Wyvern]

Ooh. I'm having a hard Time Deciding between Ocarina of Time and Fire Emblem 7.

Okay, definitely Fire Emblem 7. That game was just.... wow. I don't think I could ever be possessed to play through a 50 hour RPG seven times ever again.... that game is just that good. The characters felt so real..... it was heartbreaking whenever you messed up and somebody got killed. To see their dying words, watch them fade out of existence.... and have the game go on without them.... it really put some weight behind everything. I'd never played a game that was so realistically brutal like this before. Their lives were in your hands, and while sometimes there were events outside of your control, nothing could compare with that sickening feeling of when you knew that you just screwed up, and were about to pay dearly for it........


Yeah, I was probably way too young for this game when I played it. But I do think it was good for me.

[Munzapoppa]

By system:

PS1: Crash Team Racing or Spyro 3
PS2: Guitar Hero 2 or Tony Hawk's American Wasteland
PS3: Grand Theft Auto 4 or Rock Band 2
PSP: Rock Band Unplugged or Star Wars Battlfront Renegade Squadron
N64: Pokemon Stadium 2
Gamecube: SSB Melee
Wii: Wii Sports (havent played on this much)
Game Boy: Any Pokemon game

[RetSpline]

Morrowind is definitely my favorite game, ever, but MechWarrior 2 holds a nostalgic place in my heart as one of the first games I ever played. I recently got the music off the cd and listened to it. Brought back tons of memories and emotions =)

[kernelpanic]

Maniac Mansion (NES). I frankly can't find anything I don't like about it.

[SecondTalon]

That it had all the cool stuff edited out of it?

[Purky]

Mario Kart and Super Metroid on the SNES, Snatcher on the Mega-CD, Final Fantasy 8 on PS1, Monkey Island 1/2 on my old Commodore Amiga

[kernelpanic]

That it had all the cool stuff edited out of it?

Oh... I... thank you for ruining a childhood memory.

[kinigget]

Psychonauts. Two words: Telekinetic Bears. That and the amazing characters.

[Decker]

Need for Speed: Hot Persuit 2 is the most fun I've ever gotten out of a racing game.

[DreadArchon]

I like a lot of the games on these lists very much, but my favorite is still System Shock 2.

Infamous comes close, though.

[Lopsidation]

La-Mulana- for its music, atmosphere, difficulty, and most of all charm.
A close second would be Touhou: Imperishable Night, for most of the same reasons.

[Gears]

Command and Conquer - Tiberian Sun

TibSun for the win. I grew up with C&C. My favorite console game is Einhänder though.

[adanedhel728]

I've got five that I consider to be my all-time favorites, and I have a hard time picking a single one out of them. They're Suikoden 2, Silent Hill 2, Riven, Oblivion, and Chrono Cross. I would probably include Portal in that list if it weren't so short.

Suikoden is a really good turn-based RPG series by Konami. I've actually only played the first three because I haven't had the patience to play games much lately. Of those three, the second one was easily the best. A lot of people didn't like Suikoden 3, but I actually really liked it a lot.

Silent Hill 2 is a game that I think is just awesome. It love the way the story unfolds, I love the style, and the atmosphere is fantastic. I used to love the Resident Evil series, but when RE4 became such a disappointment (and, yes, I know that's a debate in itself), I started trying the Silent Hill games. Absolutely fantastic. Far better than even the pre-RE4 Resident Evil games.

I liked Riven because I was always compelled to keep going. I felt like I was accomplishing something. I mean, in reality, I was just sitting on my butt, but I felt like I was accomplishing something. And, like SH2, I loved the way the story unfolded. And I loved solving the puzzles.

Oblivion is just tons of fun. I guess the story isn't exactly a main feature, but it's just a lot of fun to travel around Cyrodiil. I tried Morrowind after Oblivion but had a difficult time getting into it because it's so tedious.

I love Chrono Cross because I just find the story fascinating. I probably would have enjoyed it just as much if it were a really long mini-series or something, lol. I also loved the music.

Edit:

TibSun for the win.

I'm kind of surprised to see that. I loved Tiberian Sun, but I was always under the impression that most people didn't like it. I thought it was a lot of fun, though.

[You, sir, name?]

Off the top of my head:

• Fallout
• System Shock II
• Deus Ex
• The Longest Journey
• Chrono Trigger
• Grim Fandango

[Ocean]

My favorite game of all time would be The Legends of Zelda: The Wind Waker, for the Nintendo GameCube. The gameplay and graphics were just so awesome, and don't get me started on the music =)

Second best favorite would probably Super Mario Sunshine, also for the GameCube, also because of the gameplay. I liked the puzzles an awful lot for sure!

[Pryomancer]

The original Metal Gear Solid. It played like a blockbuster movie, had a fantastic plot and had those little details that makes a game truely great.

[headprogrammingczar]

Yeah, but it wasn't as good as the original Metal Gear j/k. I would have to say Eternal Silence is my favorite, because it is so far the only game I have seen that fits into two genres at once and does both well.