Best 5 year period of game development?

[Stevens]

Was with some friends last night and this topic came up.

If you could only play games from a period of 5 years, which span would it be and why?

I'm going to hold off on answering for now.

[Rob]

Easy. 1997-2001.

Peak of arcade shooters, lots of great 32-bit era games (innovative 3D, last hurrah for console 2D) and the Dreamcast. Not too familiar with PC, but also Half-Life, Deus Ex, etc.

[Obiwanshinobi]

2002-2006 - I tend to play games from that period most, "voting with my time" in a way.
P.S. Eh, 2002-2007 would be six years.

[Leandro]

94-99 for me

[Devdan]

97-2001

Melee, Third Strike, Shenmue, Jet Set Radio, Goldeneye / Perfect Dark, Halo 1, F-Zero X, FF7 and 8. Some of my all time favorites. They could've just stopped there, and I'd have been good.

[MESRecords]

Easy. 1997-2001.

Peak of arcade shooters, lots of great 32-bit era games (innovative 3D, last hurrah for console 2D) and the Dreamcast. Not too familiar with PC, but also Half-Life, Deus Ex, etc.

I feel like this is the 'correct' answer. This was the time where the shift to actually good 3D happened. Maybe include 1996 for stuff like Ocarina of Time. So many revolutionary games in this time frame. Wish I could go back.

[KAI]

Same here, 97-2001 is the best period ever. SNK and Capcom with their fighting games, Taito and Namco producing some of the best 3D games of the 32 bits era (racing games, simulators, FGs, etc), the PSX and all the rpg awesomeness from the late 90's, and the N64.

[iconoclast]

9/15/05 through 9/15/10

Spoiler

Action: Ninja Gaiden Black, Ninja Gaiden II, God Hand, Bayonetta, DMC3&4
STG: Espgaluda II, Mushihimesama Futari, Akai Katana, Deathsmiles 1 & 2, Dodonpachi Daifukkatsu, Muchi Muchi Pork, Mamoru-kun, Shikigami no Shiro 3, Raiden III & IV, Ibara Kuro
RPG: World of Warcraft at its peak, Demon's Souls, Nier, Valkyria Chronicles, Tales of Vesperia, Persona 3 & 4, Devil Survivor, Ys: The Oath in Felghana & Origin, The Last Remnant, Yakuza 1+2+3+4+Kenzan, Resonance of Fate, SMT: Strange Journey, Pokemon Platinum+SS/HG, Blue Dragon, Lost Odyssey, Half-Minute Hero, Mother 3, Operation Darkness
TPS/FPS: Earth Defense Force 2 & 3, Resident Evil 5, Lost Planet, Shadowrun, Halo 3, Team Fortress 2 before it went to shit, FEAR, Left 4 Dead
Misc: Ouendan 2 & EBA, Dead Rising, Fire Pro Wrestling Returns, OutRun 2006, Okami, Mario Kart DS, Wipeout HD, Ace Attorney series, Deadly Premonition, Lumines Live, Mega Man 9, Bionic Commando Rearmed, No More Heroes, Katamari, Trauma Center, Sin & Punishment 2, Shadow of the Colossus, Culdcept Saga

This period mainly wins because of Ninja Gaiden II & Futari, though. All those other great games are just a bonus. (´-ω-｀)

[Ex_Mosquito]

87-91 for me. My golden age of arcades/videogames. From 96 onwards was when it lost its magic for me personally and I pretty much stopped playing games for years.

[Obiwanshinobi]

Hard to sincerely vote for a "game development" period by the way. For example, aren't Shenmue's origins almost as old as the Saturn and its development - technically - unfinished to this day? Counter Strike has been developed ever since its original release, same with Minecraft etc.

[Stevens]

Yeah we pretty much all agreed on 97 - 01. Though at the end of the day it is a matter of opinion.

[null1024]

Honestly, 97-01 probably is the right choice. Most of the major PS1 games came out then, you get the early GC/PS2 stuff, you get nearly the entire DC library, you get the last great hurrah of arcade games. In terms of getting maximum breadth, this is it.
If I had to pick a different era, 86-91. Sega's golden-age in the arcade, Taito was still big, a couple of hard hitters from Namco, a couple of Data East classics, the NES, early Genesis, very early SNES stuff. There's a load of games.

admittedly, you could pick any set of years from 86 until 97 as the start and it'd probably be the right choice, I was about to make a good case for 91-96 and then overwrote it.

[Skykid]

Difficult to call for me, although I'm more leanimg to 90-95 because that's when the gold of late 8-bit and the cream of 16-bit console coincided with the arcade in prime time. Also the best classic magazines ran in that period.

So much good stuff ran to 2001 too, but my heart is with the best of 2D.

[trap15]

89-94, or 88-93.

[iconoclast]

I think I'd take 93-97 over 97-01. Just off the top of my head, that would include most of the best games on the SNES, Genesis, and Neo Geo, some early Saturn, PS1, and N64 games, as well as Dodonpachi, Garegga, RayForce, Raiden DX, Castlevania 68k, Rondo of Blood, Canon Dancer, a bunch of belt-scrollers, etc. Hard to beat.

[Xyga]

89-94, or 88-93.

[MintyTheCat]

Difficult to call for me, although I'm more leanimg to 90-95 because that's when the gold of late 8-bit and the cream of 16-bit console coincided with the arcade in prime time. Also the best classic magazines ran in that period.

So much good stuff ran to 2001 too, but my heart is with the best of 2D.

I have to agree with Skykid, it really felt like a big change occurred for the better from the early 90s onwards.

In those days, as you youngsters may not appreciate, we did not have 24 hour on the second news updates so Magazines were massively popular and important and in a way the whole thing felt underground.

It has to be said that 1992 alone had many great Shmups released.

Truly magical times and I doubt we will see that again. 1992-1996 as this encompasses the SFC and the release of the Saturn but hard to narrow it down to a single block of five years as we had lots of good Shmups in the late 90s to early 2000s.

[ChurchOfSolipsism]

Difficult to call for me, although I'm more leanimg to 90-95 because that's when the gold of late 8-bit and the cream of 16-bit console coincided with the arcade in prime time. Also the best classic magazines ran in that period.

So much good stuff ran to 2001 too, but my heart is with the best of 2D.

[Stevens]

In those days, as you youngsters may not appreciate, we did not have 24 hour on the second news updates so Magazines were massively popular and important and in a way the whole thing felt underground.

Looking back it was very much underground, or at least it wasn't the cool thing to do. If a teacher asked their class 30 years ago who had a game console maybe five kids would put their hands up. Same question now and five kids don't put their hands up.

Also OMG DID YOU SEE THE COVER OF GAMEFAN!?

I would get a new issue of any game magazine and read it from cover to cover repeatedly.

Truly magical times and I doubt we will see that again. 1992-1996 as this encompasses the SFC and the release of the Saturn but hard to narrow it down to a single block of five years as we had lots of good Shmups in the late 90s to early 2000s.

Hey man you forgot the MD! I don't know what it was like elsewhere, but here Sega launched a massive coup against Nintendo after getting stomped during 8 bit. Which would lead to their brief moment in the sun. Then the mistakes came and we all know how it ended, but at least we got the DC:D

I considered making it 10 years, but felt it would make it too easy. Although I suppose if people wanted to expand now they can.

[Shoryukev]

1994-1998 for me I think

[MintyTheCat]

In those days, as you youngsters may not appreciate, we did not have 24 hour on the second news updates so Magazines were massively popular and important and in a way the whole thing felt underground.

Looking back it was very much underground, or at least it wasn't the cool thing to do. If a teacher asked their class 30 years ago who had a game console maybe five kids would put their hands up. Same question now and five kids don't put their hands up.

Also OMG DID YOU SEE THE COVER OF GAMEFAN!?

I would get a new issue of any game magazine and read it from cover to cover repeatedly.

Truly magical times and I doubt we will see that again. 1992-1996 as this encompasses the SFC and the release of the Saturn but hard to narrow it down to a single block of five years as we had lots of good Shmups in the late 90s to early 2000s.

Hey man you forgot the MD! I don't know what it was like elsewhere, but here Sega launched a massive coup against Nintendo after getting stomped during 8 bit. Which would lead to their brief moment in the sun. Then the mistakes came and we all know how it ended, but at least we got the DC:D

I considered making it 10 years, but felt it would make it too easy. Although I suppose if people wanted to expand now they can.

Yes, we were decidedly 'not cool' back then and some things hardly change

I did not miss out the MD as that was 1988, October 31st - I think. NeoGeo was 1989 too but to be honest, and I know I will get spanked for this but.... no one cares about the hardware when the value of the system lies in its software and during the early days of most platforms you never get decent software with the better titles usually coming along later in a platform's life time. Glad I was there at the time of the 16-bit revolution though. the Saturn still feels 'new' to me, I am that old

It was a great time, I found out about games consoles when I had a Commodore 64 and you can well imagine how I yearned for a MD at the time Sonic the Hedgehog got me more into programming and I still feel that the STH music is bloody awesome to this day.

[Stevens]

NeoGeo was 1989 too but to be honest, and I know I will get spanked for this but.... no one cares about the hardware when the value of the system lies in its software and during the early days of most platforms you never get decent software with the better titles usually coming along later in a platform's life time.

It was a great time, I found out about games consoles when I had a Commodore 64 and you can well imagine how I yearned for a MD at the time Sonic the Hedgehog got me more into programming and I still feel that the STH music is bloody awesome to this day.

NG's price tag didn't win it any fans either. Do you know how many lawns I would have had to cut to afford that?

Also - huge fan of guys like Hubbard and Galway. They really knew how to make the C 64 sound amazing. Love chip based tunes, I think part of it is it reminds me of my childhood.

[LEGENOARYNINLIA]

Another vote for 94 to 99.

SSF2X, Fighter's History Dynamite, KOF '98, Real Bout 2 and Third Strike just to name a few reasons.

[Cagar]

-

[Shepardus]

Probably 1996-2000. Many great shmups such as Cho Ren Sha 68k (which is 1998 and not 1995 as people usually say, though the Windows port is unfortunately 2001 and thus doesn't fit in this range), Garegga, Batrider, Bakraid, Dragon Blaze (and all my favorite Psikyo games save Gunbird 1), Sexy Parodius, Dodonpachi, Dangun Feveron, G.Darius, Radiant Silvergun, and Kamui. Quake III Arena also falls in this range which pretty much fills any multiplayer need for me. Obviously lots of stuff I'd miss but it's hard to think of a better five-year range than that.

[broken harbour]

1991-1996

Encompasses most of the 16 bit era and all the classics from that time, plus the start of the then very exciting 32 bit era when the Saturn and PS1 were just coming to market, to me that's the golden age of gaming right there. Also PC gaming was transitioning to 3D at the time as well, lots of Duke 3D and Quake memories from that time as well.

Disclaimer: I was 9-14 years old during that time so obviously rose tinted glasses....plus it was the era of Gamefan.

[copy-paster]

1995-2000

Videogame at it's peak.

[Obiwanshinobi]

[Never mind.]

[iconoclast]

Those are all five years, even though it looks like four. 1997-2001 for example would be 97, 98, 99, 00, 01. 1996-2001 would be six years. That's why I included a start date (Fire Pro Wrestling Returns' release) in my original 2005-2010 post.

[Obiwanshinobi]

Yeah, it's my original 2002-2007 pick that was 6. Some wishful thinking there.