The title says mostly all you need to know, obviously this is just my opinion, and I’m going to focus on what I think works really well with these games more than whatever problems they do have. There will likely be a second part to this article next week looking at the next ten, fifteen, or twenty games on my ranking, depending on how passionate I feel on the subject. If that isn’t next week’s article then I thought of something I’d rather do more, but know that I will revisit this topic by the end of the year.
Halo 2
Halo 2 is a masterpiece in my opinion, it shines in literally every lens you can look at it through. The campaign is fantastically fun in both single player, and co-op. The speedrun is even super cool. The multiplayer is peak shooter game, great maps, good gametypes, a custom game system robust enough to result in the early forms of zombies and swat, as well as a fantastic sandbox. The multiplayer shines in split-screen and online, and truly shines in LAN when you can yell at your opponents and teammates in the same room, I have fond memories of lanning this game. The gunplay is top tier, the additions from Halo: CE are great too, dual wielding while not good, was cool, and boarding vehicles is a staple we take for granted, but it was such an amazing feature at the time, plus a fully usable energy sword, and new weapons that helped to round out the UNSC and, more importantly, the previously weak Covenant arsenal. The last thing that really brings me happy memories is all the awesome glitches, super jumps, butterfly jumps, sword flying, various other out of bounds tricks and grenade jumps. This game is legitimately fun to just fool around in while also having a great story, the best shooter gameplay ever, and a deep competitive multiplayer than you can lose yourself to.
2. Mass Effect 3
Mass Effect 2 is the most popular game in the franchise by far, but honestly, as much as I love 2, I believe 3 is better. Mass Effect 3 is 99.7% a perfect game, perfect, but that last 00.3%, which is literally the last part of the game, is horrible, and one of the worst video game endings of all time. I really loved the scale that this game brings, it truly feels like a desperate galactic war against an overwhelming extra-galactic threat, like the Yuuzhong Vong war in Star Wars Legends. The cast is really good, and all the old aspects are mostly tied into the game in a satisfying way, although some things were left wanting, like the return of Miranda being so sparse. Another thing that I think is often overlooked here is multiplayer. The multiplayer in Mass Effect 3 is a sort of class based horde mode, which may seem tired by today’s standard, but the execution was fantastic, and there were a number of fun updates with new interesting classes and maps that gave it a longevity that most single player RPGs really struggle to find. Bioware has even tried this format again in Mass Effect: Andromeda and Dragon Age: Inquisition and has failed to execute it as well either time, which makes me inclined to say it was almost a fluke that the quality was that high.
3. Star Wars Battlefront 2 (2005)
Now I want to start by saying, I don’t hate the new Star Wars Battlefront 2, in fact, at the state the devs have finally left it at, it’s a pretty great game, another 6 major patches of work and it would maybe even be on this list, but it released poorly and that has to be factored in. Instead, the 2005 Star Wars Battlefront 2 released in a fantastic shape. It had a decently fun story mode where you played a clone in the 501st through all the major battles of the Clone Wars up through the Galactic Civil War, and it really got you into the gameplay. Then you have the instant action, where you can just play all the great maps in the game from both sides, sometimes even across both eras, just enjoying the star wars universe, grinding medals, and new to that game, playing as hero characters. One of the best parts of this game were the maps, they tend to be tighter and more claustrophobic, resulting in gunfights feeling big and epic even when only a few units were involved, and it made it quick to get into combat if you haven’t pulled the trigger in a few seconds. The mods while not something I am factoring into this game’s placement are also amazing, as was the post launch DLC which is actually now free, which adds in missing maps from the first game and a new hero and villain.
4. Pokemon Generation 3 (Ruby/Sapphire/Emerald/OmegaRuby/AlphaSapphire)
Generation 3 of Pokemon really works for me. It has one of the better sets of stories in the series, and with evil teams that change to a decent degree across games, each one actually feels fairly unique. The new pokemon added in, while not the best of all generation additions, were great and had many fan favorites like Blaziken, Salamence, Flygon, Gardevoir, and the 3 cover legendaries. I also think the map is actually fun, in spite of all the water, and the progression throughout the story is extremely well paced, which I have found to be fairly untrue in many pokemon games. Take all of this and give it the remake treatment in OmegaRuby and AlphaSapphire and you are looking at the best games in the series. A good battle tower added in, a fun additional post-game story, and the addition of mega evolution, which I didn’t realize was so cool until we lost it in Sword and Shield, all came together to make a fantastic pair of releases.
5. Final Fantasy 7 Remake
Hear me out on this one, Final Fantasy 7 is amazing and one of the greatest games of all time, hands down. The remake takes everything people liked in disc one of FF7 and reimagines it wonderfully, and makes really important changes that give it its own life apart from the original. The fleshed out cast of characters and side characters, the fantastic combat and returning materia system, and the wonderful graphics had me in awe for my whole first playthrough of this game. I don’t want to say much more because of spoilers, which yes, are relevant because this is different to the original, but the last few chapters actually blew my mind and were some of the most interesting story beats that I’ve seen in a game in the last few years.
6. Sonic Adventure 2: Battle
This game is not close to as well known and popular as it should be in my opinion. This is the peak of 3D Sonic, and it is so weird and diverse that it shouldn’t really work, but it does. The 3 stories that all come together to form a whole picture are great, and I honestly love all the level types, Sonic/Shadow, Tails/Eggman, and Knuckles/Rouge, and I actually have some Eggman levels in my favorites despite them being generally disliked. The bonus missions on each level add a lot of length to the game despite its age, and the Chao garden, well, to say it can take up a lot of your time and focus would be a severe understatement. There is also the battle part, the versus multiplayer, and yeah, it’s fun, shallow, but fun. The speedrun of this game is also incredible, every category of it. If you are looking for something different from what the current market offers, play this game, it’s on Steam so you don’t even have to work hard to find it.
7. Super Smash Bros. Melee
Another game that I just have so much fun sitting down with somebody and goofing off in, you can troll around or play super competitively, and it’s fun both ways. The various single player modes are all fun to play multiple times, Classic, Adventure, Event, and All-Star, as well as the wire-frame fighter modes, break the targets, and home-run contest. If you need a testament to that last statement, speedrunners are still trying to break records in almost every one of those categories on a daily basis, and the game has been out for decades. On top of that, the gameplay is so deep and intricate that the competitive scene is still figuring out new tricks and innovating on them constantly, trying to push the envelope, the peak of Super Smash Bros Melee still isn’t close despite so many hours being put in by so many people across all these years.
8. Star Wars: Jedi Academy
Have you ever wanted to experience the journey of becoming a jedi, but in the bounds of the old canon, with a good story, fun characters, awesome maps, and solid gameplay, but also wanted awesome multiplayer that you can do some amazing things with and can do so without any mods whatsoever? Jedi Academy is the only game to offer that, bar it’s predecessor Jedi Outcast 2, which does a decent job as well, and as great as Jedi Fallen Order is, it can’t come close to saying it checks all the boxes that Jedi Academy does. I have played this game many times, and probably will do so many more, and the hours lost to the multiplayer is something I don’t even want to talk about. Some of the most fun you can have is just setting up fun matches, like 3 jedi with lightsabers and full access to force powers against a team of stormtroopers that only have access to guns, or a crazy FFA filled with force power fueled lightsaber wielders just flipping around each other, it’s chaos, and beautiful. This game is supremely replayable despite the gameplay leaning towards simple, and I love coming back to it every time.
9. World of Warcraft
This isn’t an exciting pick probably, certainly not a controversial one, my only qualm was whether this should be here or swapped with where I have Warcraft 3, because they’re very intertwined for me. World of Warcraft though has done something that Warcraft 3, it’s the sole game in a genre that I like, normally I don’t like open-world MMOs, but I love WoW, whereas I love Warcraft 3, but I love many RTSs, it’s one of my favorite genres. World of Warcraft has a great open world, filled with charm and character, the quests aren’t interesting or innovative, but they do a good job of breathing some life into the world. The races and classes are well designed, and I enjoy playing all of them, even the ones that came through expansions, such as Worgen, Pandaren, Death Knights, and Demon Hunters. The place where this game truly shines for me is the dungeons, I love running the dungeons, they are lower pressure than raids but with all the fun of getting to see how a group of classes interact with each other in combat, and maybe even does a better job of that than raids. I also like grinding old content, such as outdated raids that I can solo for the chance at a rare mount, and exploring the world to get the exploration achievements.
10. Dota 2
The last game on this list is one that I was apprehensive to put here, but ultimately the number of hours I’ve spent playing it makes it a clear pick. Dota 2 is the standalone remake of a custom map from Warcraft 3, but instead of handled and handed off between a bunch of modders, with the full backing of Valve, and it is easily, by far, the best game in the genre. This game brings a certain amount of ease of access with a decent tutorial and really good bots that can actually help a newcomer gain experience and confidence before diving into the deep end, not that new players ever use the bots to grow a bit before throwing games, but they could. As much as there is that nice skill floor, that is admittedly higher than many other games, it’s the skill ceiling where Dota 2 really shines, this game is complex and constantly evolving at the highest level, with so many interesting things to learn about different heroes, items, and mechanics all the time. Another major highlight is that there are genuine meta shifts, not just different characters in the same roles, but straight up gameplay style changes, unlike basically any other game in the genre, and the balance team isn’t afraid to make huge sweeping changes every few months, and especially in their big post-tournament season patch, the map has changed hugely multiple times in my years of playing, as have the characters and items, and some mechanics have been added, and other removed that have really changed the way the game is played. This game is truly constantly evolving in a way that all its competitors should learn from and also do, but honestly, most of their competitor’s games are robust enough to hold up well through as much innovation, and that’s why Dota 2 is the best moba.
That’s it for the top 10, as I said I’ll revisit this topic later, likely next week, to expand on this list. Make sure to shoot me a follow on Instagram and join my discord to stay up to date on new articles, and let me know what your top 10 favorite games are too.
