JCC Gaming [It's Joever] The JCC's Top 100 Video Games of All Time - #5-1

I don’t feel like reposting my list again. Plus I goofed and accidentally put half like 2 at number 10 instead of 3 like I should have.

I was to lazy to fix it so yea.

number 1 was Fallout new Vegas though.

 

Ok I've compiled my list. I'll submit it with comments later on, soon. But this is objectively the best list of mostly story focused gaming

1. God of War (2018)
2. The Last of Us
3. The Last of Us Part II
4. Uncharted 4
5. Red Dead Redemption II

6. God of War Ragnarok
7. Knights of the Old Republic
8. Ocarina of Time
9. Final Fantasy Tactics
10. Marvels Spider-Man

11. Destiny 2
12. Uncharted 3
13. Mass Effect 2
14. Shenmue
15. Horizon Zero Dawn

16. Until Dawn
17. Mario Odyssey
18. Fire Emblem: Three Houses
19. Telltale The Walking Dead Season One
20. Perfect Dark

 

what's the deadline on this?

 

Yesss let's start a trend of including Final Fantasy Tactics on our lists!

 

In putting these on paper and ranking them, I kinda surprised myself a bit (didn't expect so many RPGs in the top ten). I'll list them here is reverse order, but they'll be in the right order on the Google form.

Honorable Mentions

Command & Conquer: Red Alert 3
Civilization V
Final Fantasy VII (and Remake)
Final Fantasy IX
Super Mario 64
Metal Gear Solid
Resident Evil 2 Remake

Spoiler

20 - Dynasty Warriors 4: This game is so stupid, but I don't care. I cut my teeth on DW3, but for whatever reason I spent an absurd amount of time on 4, grinding out almost every character to max stats, finding all the secret 4th weapons, etc, etc. Simple, goofy, addicting fun.

19 - Call of Duty: Black Ops: Yeah, overall I regret quite a bit of the time I spent playing CoD from 2007 to 2011-ish, but looking back, the first Black Ops was a standout. Between the solid campaign, the multiplayer that I think I spent the most amount of time in, and most importantly, the zombie maps, I had a really good time with this one.

18 - Cities: Skylines: If I'm not careful, I can easily lose 10 hours in the blink of an eye playing this.

17 - SSX 3: Countless hours were spent mastering the mountain in this absurdly great snowboarding classic. One of my fave game soundtracks ever, and I think I ruined two or three controllers with this one, just by holding down the buttons too hard in trying to land tricks.

16 - Batman: Arkham Asylum: I don't hate the Batmobile sequences in Arkham Knight as much as most, and Arkham City is absolutely phenomenal, but something about the streamlined experience of the first game in the series is just perfect to me. Having replayed the series about three years ago, the original remains the best, IMO.

15 - Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic: No other SW game even approaches my top 20 (though KotOR II would probably top this if it were given the proper amount of time to finish baking @LloydChristmas @Point Given ). This is SW forum, so 'nuff said here.

14 - Spec Ops: The Line: Utterly average gameplay and shooting mechanics, but this is a game that should be experienced by everyone. For the haunting storyline alone, this is the single best FPS I've ever played.

13 - Rock Band 2: I think I've put more hours into this game than anything else ever. A ton of great memories playing this with a lot of great people. I never could quite get the hang of the drums, though I got good/very good at the guitar/bass. But where I REALLY excelled? The vocals. Not because have some amazing sounding voice, but I am really, REALLY good at mimicking pitch. Which is what you need to rack up good scores on Rock Band vocals. I bet some of my top scores are still lingering around those old leaderboards, even to this day.

12 - God of War 3: Before GoW: Raganarok came around and was a big slog for me, really making me appreciate the more simplistic approach of the older games in the series more, this would have been a really tough call between 3 (remastered) and GoW 2018. But as it stands now, this is an easy call for GoW3. Best pacing, action and overall experience that I've had with any game in the series to date. Yeah, younger Kratos is more than a bit of a dip****, but whatever. This game is absolute rock 'n roll.

11 - The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past: I'm not a Zelda connoisseur, with my only two Nintendo consoles being an N64 and Gamecube, and the only games I've ever played in the series being this (thanks to the SNES Classic), Ocarina of Time, Wind Waker (never finished) and Twilight Princess... LttP stands out to me. Having gone back to it relatively recently, OoT suffers a bit from being in that prototype 3D stage. It did what it could (and is absolutely great), but LttP is pure, top down, 2D gaming perfection. A masterclass in game design.

10 - Uncharted 4: A Thief's End: Maybe part 2 could be considered the best overall game, but in a pinch, I'll give the nod to part 4 for being the best experience I had with the series and a perfect endcap to the main franchise. Now... please... just leave it alone. Let it rest. It's fine. Let the series stay as it is, and come up with something original if you need the cash that badly. Please. You ended it. It's over.

9 - Fallout New Vegas: Despite the bugs, this is the best Fallout experience I've ever had. The main storyline, the DLC, all of it excellent. All his fault aside, Mr. House is the way to go, btw...

8 - Skies of Arcadia: My vote for the best RPG that flew under most people's radar, being released and re-released on two consoles that didn't get much love (Dreamcast and Gamecube). Pushing back against the edgy/grimdark settings that most RPGs were going for at the time, this is just a fun, epic, lighthearted (not 100% of the time) romp that should get more attention nowadays.

7 - Mass Effect 2: Yeah. Mass Effect 2. 'nuff said. Best companion is Thane. Worst is Miranda. End of discussion.

6 - Final Fantasy Tactics: Something about this stuck with me the first couple playthroughs (even though I was too young to fully appreciate it until my last playthrough some 5 years back). Storytelling perfection. Even though I have a soft spot for the bad OG Engrish translation, it would be nice to a get a non-handheld re-release of War of the Lions that I could get my hands on and absorb. It was nice finally unlocking the Calculator this last playthrough and seeing what all the fuss was about.

5 - Castlevania: Symphony of the Night: Could this miserable little pile of secrets be improved upon with a "better" translation and some updated graphics...? Nah. It's perfect. Metroidvania games forever. And yeah, I've gone back and played Super Metroid as well. Wonderful game. Outstanding. But it doesn't have that nostalgia kick for me.

4 - Resident Evil 4: As of now, Original, not Remake. But that could change with another playthrough or two. My most replayed game ever. For now I still appreciate the over-the-top camp of the original game. "A senior moment, perhaps." "Incest lives don't compare to human lives!"

3 - Chrono Trigger: A perfect RPG, and yet somehow below two other perfect RPGs on my list.

2. Suikoden II: My favorite soundtrack, and also such wonderful, grounded story of two best friends being destined to oppose eachother in a war they both wanted nothing to do with. 108 recruitable characters, and somehow they manage to make you feel at least passing connection to every single one of them. A remaster is coming along fairly soon, I think. Experience it. Support it. The entire series is worthy (even IV, which is somewhat... mid).

1. Final Fantasy VI: This. As good as it gets. Just... everything. Greatest big bad, all that.

 

It's in the OP. You have at least a week, maybe more if we need more submissions. I'll make sure to give adequate notice if I extend the deadline or leave it at a week.

 

I'm sooooo glad I brought a laptop in holiday with me, doing this on the phone will be a challenge.


Lounge bar and drinks tonight then!

Gone Mobile

 

That's mine submitted. Thankfully I'd done a Favourite Games of All Time list on Backloggd so I didn't have to wrack my brain too much.

1. Final Fantasy IX
2. Destiny 2
3. Persona 5: Royal
4. Mass Effect 3
5. The Witcher 3: The Wild Hunt
6. Elden Ring
7. Assassin's Creed Odyssey
8. Final Fantasy VIII
9. Bloodborne
10. Stellaris
11. Mass Effect 2
12. Destiny
13. The Last of Us Part II
14. Dragon Age: Inquisition
15. Halo 3
16. Red Dead Redemption 2
17. Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic
18. Fallout: New Vegas
19. Football Manager 2006
20. Star Trek Online

 

My list was very close to just a list of every game I've played. If I'd just listed out everything it might have been 30 games.

 

I have a tough question. How do people rank games that are decades old? By how fun they were to play back then? Or by how well they compare now?

 

I ranked games by how much time I spent playing them. The only criterion.

 

I bought Halls of Torment last night on the advice of the 19 year old. That might have made the list a few weeks from now.

 

It tends to be on how they make me feel now. Looking at my list the older games are RPG's, or at least have a good story, so that aspect doesn't really get affected by time as much as mechanics do. If they have a good art style as well then that helps with the graphics ageing.

 

My list

1. StarCraft
2. Diablo II
3. The Witcher 3
4. Bloodborne
5. Fire Emblem Three Houses
6. Persona 5 Royal
7. Sonic Adventure 2 Battle
8. Paper Mario and the Thousand Year Door
9. Hollow Knight
10. StarCraft 2
11. Pokémon Sapphire/Ruby
12. Kirby Air Ride
13. Civilization 3
14. Fire Emblem Awakening
15. Pharoh
16. Tomb Raider (1996)
17. Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (1992)
18. Crash Bandicoot (1996)
19. NASCAR Thunder 2004
20. Out Of The Park Baseball 24

 

i'm just going by the impact they had on me when i played them, whenever that was. i couldn't pretend to make an objective list.

 

This. The problem was I have played so many fallout games (all of them) and so many Star Wars games (nearly all of the triple A games since 2000) it was hard to figure out games that weren’t Star Wars or Fallout, but I just managed it. I think I listed almost every game I have ever played other than Star Wars and fallout titles.

If anyone was curious the two fallout titles I listed were Fallout NV, 2 and the two Star Wars titles I listed were Jedi: Fallen Order and Survivor.

the only reason I even got 20 games was because I played like 5 different new games last summer.

Edit: just remembered I forgot to list Destiny 1 and 2 oh well.

 

my list is part normie and part very weird, but i'm pretty happy with it. still working on filling out the form with comments, but here's the list without comment.

1. super mario bros. 3
2. the legend of zelda: the wind waker
3. return fire
4. dragon's lair
5. left 4 dead 2
6. project zomboid
7. skate 3
8. the legend of zelda: ocarina of time
9. the beatles rock band
10. 720°
11. mario kart: double dash
12. tetris
13. tiger woods pga tour 12
14. dead island
15. diablo 3
16. madden nfl '94
17. borderlands 2
18. goldeneye 007
19. star wars: rogue squadron
20. mike tyson's punch out

honorable mentions;

chrono trigger (probably kind of obvious from my list that rpg's aren't really my thing, but i still had a lot of fun with this one)
the legend of zelda
the legend of zelda: a link to the past
star wars arcade
super star wars
rebel assault
galactic battlegrounds
gta v
super street fighter 2
time pilot
tony hawk pro skater 1-3
rocket league
mario golf: toadstool tour
jungle king
pitfall
river raid
and many more...

 

Dragon's Lair just missed my cut.

 

List has been posted with comments, can't be arsed to add them here too though (plus I've probably forgotten them now too)

1. Final Fantasy 7
2. Monkey Island 2 LeChucks Revenge
3. Guild Wars 2
4. Championship Manager 01/02
5. Horizon: Zero Dawn
6. The Witcher 3
7. Zelda Ocarina Of Time
8. Red Dead Redemption 2
9. GTA 5
10. Batman Arkham City
11. Final Fantasy 9
12. The Last of Us
13. FreeSpace 2
14. Street Fighter ex+Alpha
15. Civilisation 3
16. X3 Terran Conflict
17. Zelda Windwaker
18. Mario Kart 8
19. Sensible World of Soccer
20. Lotus Esprit Turbo Challenge


Honourable mentions
Cannon Fodder
Elite
KoTOR
Tetris
Simon the Sorcerer
Mario Galaxy
Goldeneye 007

I've been playing games since the mid 1980's so in all honesty, the honourable mentions list could be very long

 

Galactic Battlegrounds. That game was so much fun and so frustrating at the same time. I remember still building those walls slab by slab after I'd gone to bed.

 

Empire at war almost got a spot on mine because I still really enjoy the fleet battles. The ground combat doesn’t hold up though.

Battle for Middle Earth 2 was another one that almost made the list. Wish they’d rerelease the thing on steam or something.

 

I think it's a subtle cocktail of both. Some of the older games that are on my list are on my list because having played them or replayed them in just the last five years or so because of my History of Video Games project I found a lot of virtue specifically in their stripped down simplicity. By a lot of metrics, Space Invaders doesn't "compare" to all of the games that have come after it. Just Galaxian was a light-years jump in terms of graphics, enemy AI, etc, and that's before you even get to Galaga. But my favorite to play is still Space Invaders because there's just something so attractive about how stripped down it is. The enemies aren't doing interesting maneuvers or taking running dives at you or whatever; they're just advancing implacably, but it is exactly that implacability that makes them so menacing. Throw in that little four-note descending riff from Space Invaders and you have an absolutely sweat inducing game in my opinion. The mechanics are simple, but devilishly so; you learn them really quickly which makes your mistakes really sting. In Defender, for instance, you have a much more sophisticated game and one where the controls are much more difficult, but it all adds up to me to a situation that just isn't as tense as Space Invaders because it's just a foregone conclusion that I'm going to mess up and maybe my mind just can't quite wrap around all the directions you have to be pulled in. In Space Invaders, there's really no reason for the player to make a mistake once they've learned it. And yet you do . . . and then that one gets in your head and you make another one . . . and then another one . . . and then they're right on you, moving so fast and that riff is just pounding at you DUMDUMDUMDUM DUMDUMDUMDUM . . .

Anyway, that's why Space Invaders is my number 12 even though I only really played it seriously for the first time a couple of years ago. Some of the old games hold up like great art in all media holds up: because they can still get to the emotions. Space Invaders still gets my heart pounding. It's on my list in place of some much more sophisticated, much more complex, much more technical games because of that.

 

Doing this list made me realize how much I've not played as far as games lol. Okay, here goes.

1. Final Fantasy VII
This will always be my favorite game. The story, the characters, the music, everything was amazing. I never even actually played it, least not till completion. I watched my brother play the whole thing. I can't tell you how we looked at each other the first time seeing Sephiroth in his One Winged Angel form and hearing that music for the first time, and seeing Supernova. I still can't member who he beat him with, I know he used so many combinations. Tifa and Cid, Red XIII and Vincent; I think it was Tifa and Vincent/Cid. I still have a crush on Tifa and Aerith to this day, and they remain my among my favorite female characters ever. Aerith's death is still terribly sad to me, I'll forever hate Sephitroth but he still is an amazing villain. I still listen to Aerith's and Tina's piano theme music to this day, it's calming and everything. I won't bother putting the remake here, however I'll talk about it. I'll say hearing their voices in the remake is awesome. I know everyone blushes over Tifa and Aerith's voices, but just saying Barret's grievance at the carnage after everything goes wrong and he thought he lost his team, has always stayed with me, even when it was just text lines as a kid. Hearing it in the remake with an actual voice, is just mad me happy that they nailed Barret correctly in that. This game has been the most influential for my life, and always will hold a special place.

2. Doki Doki Literature Club
Another great influence on me, but more for emotional reasons and stuff. A horror game, but one with heart. Helped change my life for the better.

3. PUBG (mobile)
The longest game I've played on my phone, but one I'll always keep going back to.

4. Escape Simulator
Yes, I'm putting my favorite escape room game here, cause I want to. I love it lol.

5. Medal of Honor: Frontline
D-Day sequence opening, plus rest of the game. Took forever for me to beat the final level.

6. Medal of Honor: Rising Sun
I like WW2 games lol. But it was unique to me cause I never played one from the pacific side of the war before, and that whole Pearl Harbor opening was intense.

7. Mario Party (Nintendo 64)
I was really good at guessing which mini game came up lol.

8. Final Fantasy X
Always loved the Blitzball and stuff, again watched my brother play it. I would have put VIII here as objectively I do believe its better than 7, but my brother kept playing that FREAKING card game for hours, and it just left me bored with that.

9. Tetris
Puzzle game. Need I say more?

10. Battlefront II (original)
Played against my brother for hours. We never figured out how to do online play, but yeah. Fun times.

11. Soulcalibur II
Talim became my best to play as, Sophitia was next.

12. Starfox (Nintendo 64)
Still the best flying game, one of the best period.

13. Donkey Kong Country
Not even sure I beat this game, but was always fun to play.

14. Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty
Probably the only game I beat before my brother

15. Streetfighter
I don't member which, but arcade machines. I was good at fighting games.

16. Donkey Kong Country 2: Diddy's Kong Quest
Those tree levels haunt me

17. Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers

18. Mario Kart: Double Dash
We had the Cube, its what we had to play

19. Time Splitters 2

20.Burnout Revenge
The only other racing game I liked. I suck at racing games other wise

Honorable Mentions:
Pacman (I've only gotten to level 5 though...)
Legend of Dragoon
Spyro the Dragon

I've really not played much lol

 

For me it was based on memories for back then.

Sensi Soccer just doesn't compare with football manager but was a game I could and did play for hours. I look back on those memories and want to play a game that gives me those feelings again.

Others have had a recent refresh (Monkey Island) but in the main it's based in how much fun I had.

In many respects, if I was given the choice to play championship Manager now or go back and play SWOS, I'd play SWOS even though Champ Man is the far better game

Gone Mobile