The List
That's it folks. The top 3 are here, the best games I've ever played - and seeing as with age (=P) we tend to look backwards more and more - probably the best I ever will. You better be friggin excited, too - it took me a year to post this whole damn thing!
So, without any further ramble
#3 - StarCraft (1998)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Oh yeah, the good old SC, don't have to be a big geek to put that so high up in any list, you say. True, but honestly there was much consideration on this particular spot, and quite a few titles were actually supposed to occupy it. One of them I feel like I should mention - WarCraft, the spiritual predecessor (that later, until recently, somehow turned into a spiritual successor?) and the first star in Blizzard Entertainments' glossary that really shined throughout gaming history. WarCraft II, back in the day, was one of the first games I played as a kid, and most definitely the first real-time strategy, that since became my favorite genre.
But back to SC and why, still, it occupies the all around honorable 3rd place. No great emotional attachment here, I guess. Quite simply, StarCraft is the best strategy game I have ever played, better even than StarCraft II with all its' steaming-gleaming and intensely over-advertised brain-scorching action. Best strategy with a truly terrific plot. Plot I got so involved in that I... had to learn english. Quite like that indeed. I read english books in class about Lenin and the Bolshoi Theatre (yes I did!) so I could translate the dialogue (and sometimes, the objectives) of the current mission at home. More than that, I didn't just want to know what them characters were saying, I wanted to feel it in their own language, understand the intonations, slang and subtle punctuations, inadvertently lost in any translation. In short, I didn't want to understand their language, I wanted to speak it.
And slowly, very slowly, it started working. First words (aside from "socialism" and "red square") I learned by heart were "destroy", "build", "protect", "survive", "attack" and so on and on and on and on.. It was so terrific to understand that I felt actually "being there", almost a part of the game itself. It was sure as fun as playing, if not more. And it sure worked better than promises of great wealth and success to the ones who learned the language, which they fed us at school.
I hesitated some when choosing StarCraft as number 3 for this list. After all, it's not all that special, maybe, it might seem, not as special as half the other titles all the way down the list. But it somehow just always sticks out when thinking of the games that "have been there". StarCraft has sure been there. I played it alone, played with friends, played again later, and it always remained just as diverse, solid and authentic as it has always been (something that eludes many old titles). And for that I respect it. Me and some other ~50 million folks who own (or owned) it legally or otherwise.
So, without any further ramble
#3 - StarCraft (1998)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Oh yeah, the good old SC, don't have to be a big geek to put that so high up in any list, you say. True, but honestly there was much consideration on this particular spot, and quite a few titles were actually supposed to occupy it. One of them I feel like I should mention - WarCraft, the spiritual predecessor (that later, until recently, somehow turned into a spiritual successor?) and the first star in Blizzard Entertainments' glossary that really shined throughout gaming history. WarCraft II, back in the day, was one of the first games I played as a kid, and most definitely the first real-time strategy, that since became my favorite genre.
But back to SC and why, still, it occupies the all around honorable 3rd place. No great emotional attachment here, I guess. Quite simply, StarCraft is the best strategy game I have ever played, better even than StarCraft II with all its' steaming-gleaming and intensely over-advertised brain-scorching action. Best strategy with a truly terrific plot. Plot I got so involved in that I... had to learn english. Quite like that indeed. I read english books in class about Lenin and the Bolshoi Theatre (yes I did!) so I could translate the dialogue (and sometimes, the objectives) of the current mission at home. More than that, I didn't just want to know what them characters were saying, I wanted to feel it in their own language, understand the intonations, slang and subtle punctuations, inadvertently lost in any translation. In short, I didn't want to understand their language, I wanted to speak it.
And slowly, very slowly, it started working. First words (aside from "socialism" and "red square") I learned by heart were "destroy", "build", "protect", "survive", "attack" and so on and on and on and on.. It was so terrific to understand that I felt actually "being there", almost a part of the game itself. It was sure as fun as playing, if not more. And it sure worked better than promises of great wealth and success to the ones who learned the language, which they fed us at school.
I hesitated some when choosing StarCraft as number 3 for this list. After all, it's not all that special, maybe, it might seem, not as special as half the other titles all the way down the list. But it somehow just always sticks out when thinking of the games that "have been there". StarCraft has sure been there. I played it alone, played with friends, played again later, and it always remained just as diverse, solid and authentic as it has always been (something that eludes many old titles). And for that I respect it. Me and some other ~50 million folks who own (or owned) it legally or otherwise.