World of Warcraft named 10th best game of all time

[Soltsu]

wtfz !!1 no Call of Duty Q___Q

but, gz to Blizzard I say

[Deleted]

Here I thought that the Pokemon series was the biggest of Nintendo. It even keeps their handhelds alive, afaik.

[Deleted]

Top x or best of things should not exist because everyone has a different opinion. These gaming sites post them because no matter if you agree/disagree they gain views and with views comes money from all those annoying adds + they might have been paid by participants for the position...People should stop giving attention to these sites.

[BenBos]

For certain we could have. But we chose to play WoW - much less hassle haha. But I think you're right. WoW can't be anything else then nr1 if you look at mere hours spent in this game.

You know WOW surpassed the point of being "a game" for many at one point in their lives. You get perhaps over it after X time, but for most it lasts several years. But the personal view has to be restricted when evaluating things.

WOW already stopped being "a game" for many. It is like the Mona Lisa is far more than a painting in the "competitions" of paintings. So many lives have been wasted or influenced by WOW, that it is no longer in a competition for "best game", because it already long surpassed being merely "a game".

WOW certainly sits in the "legendary hall of cultural entertainment" these days as SO many people have played SO many hours of their limited life span on it, it is beyond reason really.

We live around 3000 weeks in full health and capacity (if lucky), I can't think of ANY other game where SO many have invested SO much time in an alternate world.

WOW consumes everything: from players, lovers and certainly haters. It is not normal that people devote MONTHS of their lives to invest in beating it up on forums.

Freigthening.

[Vaelorian]

You know WOW surpassed the point of being "a game" for many at one point in their lives. You get perhaps over it after X time, but for most it lasts several years. But the personal view has to be restricted when evaluating things.

WOW already stopped being "a game" for many. It is like the Mona Lisa is far more than a painting in the "competitions" of paintings. So many lives have been wasted or influenced by WOW, that it is no longer in a competition for "best game", because it already long surpassed being merely "a game".

WOW certainly sits in the "legendary hall of cultural entertainment" these days as SO many people have played SO many hours of their limited life span on it, it is beyond reason really.

We live around 3000 weeks in full health and capacity (if lucky), I can't think of ANY other game where SO many have invested SO much time in an alternate world.

WOW consumes everything: from players, lovers and certainly haters. It is not normal that people devote MONTHS of their lives to invest in beating it up on forums.

Freigthening.

I've wasted 450 days /played on my main alone... Thats for over a year on one game of my life. I know some people who have more then double my amount. WoW indeed wasn't just a game anymore. It became a lifestyle. A very bad one at that. I became fat and a slob. The house that I bought I never did anything on it. I moved in, put my pc where I wanted it - installed internetstuff and boom off we went. My house was a pile of filth basically for years. And then one day I met my girlfriend 1.5 years ago and everything changed

[Deleted]

Where is Golden Sun 1 & 2?

[Huehuecoyotl]

We live around 3000 weeks in full health and capacity (if lucky), I can't think of ANY other game where SO many have invested SO much time in an alternate world.

Farmville. Mafia Wars. hell, probably half a dozen Zynga games can boast more time played worldwide than WoW. time invested, or the number of people investing it, is no way to judge the quality of a game.

[BenBos]

Farmville. Mafia Wars. hell, probably half a dozen Zynga games can boast more time played worldwide than WoW. time invested, or the number of people investing it, is no way to judge the quality of a game.

You're kidding right. :-)

So MANY histories of players killing themselves, households broken up and careers wasted of too many hours playin ... a Zynga game ...

LOL you know : get a clue for once: Azeroth made a HUGE impact on more than gaming alone.

The games you cite are trivial at best to compete, both in alternate worlds (people lived in), adventures and of course ... general revenue AND the impact WOW even had on our economies (in both the good and the bad ways).

The fact you even come up with this kind of reply shows WOW haunts you - a non player - daily...

[Omega10]

"WoW has earned the spot, after 8 years of bringing people together from all over the world for brutal combat. Friends have been made, enemies have been made, careers have been made, life's have changed. But over all of this, memories have been made. I cannot think of any other game that has accomplished this. WoW is in the history books and is the "thing" that all current and future game developers will strive to create. Without a doubt one, if not the greatest game of all time."

This is also my opinion. The times I have spent playing WOW have mostly been happy ones. I play with my wife, and it is our "together" thing to do.

#1: WOW
#2 and below? who cares!

[BenBos]

I've wasted 450 days /played on my main alone... Thats for over a year on one game of my life. I know some people who have more then double my amount. WoW indeed wasn't just a game anymore. It became a lifestyle. A very bad one at that. I became fat and a slob. The house that I bought I never did anything on it. I moved in, put my pc where I wanted it - installed internetstuff and boom off we went. My house was a pile of filth basically for years. And then one day I met my girlfriend 1.5 years ago and everything changed

Well, your story is just one of many I guess.

But it proves WOW far surpasses the status of a "video game" for millions.

As such it doesn't even belong anymore in that category.

[YouAreAllWrong]

Not very impressed by this list to be honest. Loads of great games and even whole genres left out.
Games I consider in my top 10 were around 40-80.
I agree Link to the Past being that high though.
I do consider WoW to be one of the greatest games of all time, but not even close to the top 10.

[Schwert]

Where is Golden Sun 1 & 2?

My question exactly.

The list itself is probably one of the least bias I've ever seen but it still really is opinion.
I wouldn't have put Portal as the top spot myself - Games that niche just don't appeal to everybody.
I'm one of the few people ever who didn't enjoy it.

[Beat5beat]

You're kidding right. :-)

So MANY histories of players killing themselves, households broken up and careers wasted of too many hours playin ... a Zynga game ...

LOL you know : get a clue for once: Azeroth made a HUGE impact on more than gaming alone.

The games you cite are trivial at best to compete, both in alternate worlds (people lived in), adventures and of course ... general revenue AND the impact WOW even had on our economies (in both the good and the bad ways).

The fact you even come up with this kind of reply shows WOW haunts you - a non player - daily...

You missed his point. He isn't comparing the quality of WoW to the quality of Zynga games. He is pointing out that #hours played does not make a great game. While we don't have the exact statistics there are certainly games that have more total hours played than WoW, does that make them necessarily better than WoW? No. That was his point, you missed it.

[kingpinuk880]

one of the poorer lists i have seen in a while. The fact they have CS:S over 1.6 at number 30 is all you need to know.

[-Superman-]

1. Portal
2. Chrono Trigger
3. Super Metroid
4. Shadow of the Colossus
5. Wind Waker
6. BioShock
7. Super Mario Bros 3
8. Uncharted 2
9. Link to the Past
10. WoW

Beyond the list being VERY subjective, it also mixes genres and platforms. This is obviously personal opinion since there is no way on this green earth that a polling sample would EVER pick Portal as a #1. It would not even make it to the top 20.

[Deleted]

15 pages of "Those opinions are wrong, my opinion is right. My arguments are that you are fucking dumb"

Why do people never learn. Topics like this always result in a flamefest with trolls everywhere.

This should be closed asap to prevent even more trolling/flaming.

[DemoBytom]

How the fuck is Portal number 1? Wtf is this shit?

Why not? Portal 1 was and still is a brilliant game. It's close to a perfect game in fact in many categories.
From a design point of view it's one of the best paced game ever produced. Long enough to make you feel connected to the world and characters, to develop them (or most likely Her), to give you a reason to continue forward, while not turning it into a repetetive "do it again and again" artificially extended game. Every single test chamber, every level teaches you something new, every puzzle in the game is designed to slowly rise the learning curve in very natural, and nearly unnoticeable way. The game has no "tutorial", has no messages poping on your screen saying "press W to move forward", "put the box on a button", instead it teaches you all those mechanics simply by gameplay and relying on your own brain. This game doesn't have, and doesn't need long manual to be understood, it teaches you how to play just by the level design.
A simple example - game starts and you're introduced to portals. They give you enough time at start, before portals appear, to look around, find yourself in the world, notice you're in a "glass room". Then portals appear - they are placed in such a way that you see yourself in it - you immediately understand what it is and that they take you to other places, but within the same world. You learn that you can exit what looks like a closed room by utilizing the portals. That's ablity no1 you learn.
Next room, you're introduced to a button and a box, and you need to combine them to open the door, you also learn that both you and the box activate buttons. that's ability no 2.
In the next room both of those things are combined, you need to use the static portals to enter one room, take the box, bring it to other room, put it on button, get back to start and go to third room to exit the chamber. That teaches you that you have to combine knowledge you acquired, that portals are two way doorways, that you can change their placement.. From this point every test chamber brings new piece of information, new trait, new obstacle you need to traverse. It's a very simple idea, but so many developers fail at designing their levels in such way that no popup messages show saying "OMG SEE THAT BUTTON? PUT A BOX ON THIS!!".. There's hardly (if any) moments in the game where you just sit and say "WTF am I supposed to do now?", you don't need to seek help from someone who already beat the game, you don't have to look through 28313 page manual.

This is something older games used to have, but todays ones nearly completely abandoned it - the way to teach you how to play the game simply by advancing in it. Instead today we're given a tutorial sections so dumb that we feel it's made for 3 year olds..

From purely technic point of view this game is just very, very well done. It has mechanics that look simple (but are actually very hard and clever under the hood). If you go through the game with dev commentary you'll hear how much of a problem a simple calculating physics at the portal edges is (where gravity points can change in any direction), how momentum affects those calculations etc. It's a very, very genuine piece of tech, that affected many future game developers, the pinnacle of which is IMHO antichamber. They made you think outside the box in a non euclidean space, to connect points that shouldn't be able to be connected. They added a piece of an extra dimension you had to get into your brain and understand to beat the game. And they made it in such a way that you don't even see it. You don't see that you're solving pretty complex physics, that you think in a 4 dimensional space etc..

It has also everything the game needs to have to be enjoyable to play - tight and responsive controls, simple enough to not overwhelm you with buttons, while offering a very free and precise movement.

It's also a mix of franchises and and game types.. It's a FPS.. but not entirely.. It's a puzzle game.. but not entirely.. It's a thriller.. but not entirely.. It's an action game.. but not entirely.. It's a game that blends in between different types, showing that you can combine what doesn't look like it should be combined.

This is a great explanation about what I'm trying to say here:


From the story point of view - again pacing. It's perfect. Portal 1 is not a long game, but not a single minute of it is artificially extended. It gives you very good character progression - from a person who needs to learn how to put a box on a button, to a person who's able to move through the non euklidean space, solving complex puzzles requiring a high level of abstract thinking.
It also brings you a very well written antagonist, an AI that stays in your memories. AI that has very numerical, machine, way of thinking, while also having a charm and nearly human soul. Everything she does, way she speaks clearly shows Glados is a computer. She treats you like a lab rat, luring you forward, making you do the next tests, with a promised reward at the end. She does it in naive way of someone who completely doesn't understand human way of thinking, has no abstract thinking.
On the other hand we like how evil she is, and we like to wonder if she's really evil or just doing what she's supposed to do. Her humor (and the game's itself) is very sinister, very sarcastic and very appealing. Glados doesn't become a next comical, dumb villain. She's intelligent, we know she's prolly way more intelligent than we are - but she lacks the ability to think outside the box, she just computes and compares the possible results.
It's one of the best AI ever written in a history of not only video games.


Portal also showed something else - that small games, with very simplistic gameplay, that relay on pretty much one core mechanic can be as appealing if not even more appealing that big budget AAA titles. It was created as a tech demo for portal technology valve was working on. At the very beginning in was sold as an extra on the Orange Box (which was directed towards Half Life 2 and Team Fortress 2 players mostly).
It was changed into pop cultural fenomen. Nearly every gamer from current generation knows about this game, have seen the concept, have heard slogans like "thinking with portals" and "cake is a lie", those became part of our culture. It had an impact on society and IMHO was one of the steps that helped with today indie game market and design.
The game was built like current indies are - short, simple from the outside, with clever and interesting mechanic, that all gameplay resolves around. It helped popularize the steam service, as well as digital purchase - something that brought indie game development to the surface. It's also a pop cultural phenomenon that could only be compared to few oldschool games like Mario or Tomb Raider..

Should Portal be no 1 on that list? I dunno, I'm not sure. But what I am sure is that it deserves to be called one of the best games ever produced. A nearly indie game that made its way to the full, grown up franchaise, a pop cultural phenomenon, a design genius that should be taught in game design schools around the world as an example of pacing, of level design, of story progression, character progression an development. A game that showed that even if you're short, have one core mechanic, you can be extraordinary, something that will be remembered for long, long time.

[A Challenger!]

Well, your story is just one of many I guess.

But it proves WOW far surpasses the status of a "video game" for millions.

As such it doesn't even belong anymore in that category.

Are you on some sort of allergy medication? WOW surpassing the status of video game? That is insanity at its finest, WoW is a game and nothing else. Activision-Blizzard is far more incredible than WoW will ever be; their manipulation of the finer points in big business is impressive to say the least, as the company essentially single handedly brought MMO's into the same realm as shooters and whatnot; whether that is a good or a bad thing, is based upon the individual.

But if you want to play a real genre defining game, spend less time sniffing the farts of Activision-Blizzard employees and jerking to quarterly reports, and go play something like Ultima Online (the original) or DAoC. WoW is good for nothing but being a mainstream focal point, not quality experiences that truly define what a real MMO is.

It is akin to playing Call of Duty and claiming it to embody what makes a good shooter, nay, an art form. Successful? Maybe so, but there are far better examples of quality out there.

[Navitas]

How the fuck is Portal number 1? Wtf is this shit?

Because it's amazing. The only game I've ever seen/played that you can call: faultless. It's perfection in a game.

[Deleted]

As you said, it's all opinion based, but I've been playing WoW for 3 years and it's still my favourite game. I've only scratched the surface or PvP, raiding, and RP.