The Best Year of Gaming

[Blackbird]

We had a side discussion of this in the "Best Time to be a Gamer" thread, and it got me thinking. What would be the best single year of games, if you had to pick a specific year and play only the titles that were released within that year? Let's figure this out. I figure it will be a fun exercise, and also help us see how everything fits together chronologically.

Obviously, it would take more time than I'm willing to invest to comprehensively list every title for every year, so instead I've been compiling a list of "landmark" titles. Basically just grabbing the titles that were the most important in the grand scheme of things to highlight the best of each year. I'm not determining the best titles by going with any kind of hard ratings system or anything, but more examining them for qualities that make them important. When picking titles, I considered things like overall popularity, number of sales, if the game was significantly influential on future games, if the game had innovative qualities at the time of it's release, if the game has lasting value/longevity/has aged well/is timeless, how well the game compares to other examples within it's genre, etc. For franchises and long running series, I have generally tried to select the one or two titles that fans generally regard as the best or most representative title of that franchise. As an example, if you ask a Zelda fan what the best game in the series is, most will answer that the highlight of the series was either A Link to the Past or Ocarina of Time.

Citing an example we're all familiar with, Battle Garegga makes the list because it is arguably the apex of the shooting game genre, and was voted the best shooter of all time by the most hardcore fans of the genre. The people that love the genre the most believe it is one of the best examples of the genre, so it's a "landmark title".

I've populated the list with some examples that I think are important, but you'll need to help me fill it out. I'm not too familiar with the earlier years of gaming (pre 1990) because I wasn't born/old enough to be playing games then, so the folks that grew up with those games will have to help me there =D. I'm also not as familiar with extremely recent games, simply because I haven't had the interest, hardware, or time to play many of them. Therefore, I can't give a fair assessment on most newer games/years. I'm also less familiar with the fighting, sports, and racing game genres, so help me out there, too =P.

I've tried to keep the list objective and to represent as many different genres as possible, but obviously nostalgia and bias are going to skew the list a little. Gonna need more input for a fair list.

All platforms are accepted. If a game is on multiple platforms, list the date where it first came out, regardless of which platform it was on.

Without ado, here is the list. If you feel a title doesn't deserve to be on here, feel free to contest it; I can at least provide justification for why I put it on there in the first place. It'll probably be pretty bad at first, and better with more input.

After we've filled out a pretty comprehensive list, we can argue about which year was the best =P.


1978
Space Invaders

1979

1980
Pac Man
Missile Command
Zork

1981
Galaga
Centipede

1982
1983

1984
Pitfall 2
Tetris (Major influence in 1986 when it reached NA).

1985
Super Mario Bros.
Gradius

1986
Darius
OutRun

1987
Mike Tyson's Punch Out
Castlevania 2: Simon's Quest(?)
R-Type
Contra

1988
Tatsujin/Truxton
Gradius II

1989
Golden Axe
Megaman 2
River City Ransom

1990
Raiden
Thunder Force III
Super Mario Bros. 3
Super Mario World

1991
The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past
TMNT: Turtles in Time
Street Fighter II
Toejam and Earl
Super Castlevania IV
Streets of Rage

1992
Dune
Sonic the Hedgehog 2
Thunder Force IV
Streets of Rage 2
Contra III: The Alien Wars

1993
Raiden 2
Star Fox
Doom
Shining Force 2
Secret of Mana
Toejam and Earl: Panic on Funkotron
Megaman X
Day of the Tentacle

1994
Raiden DX
Final Fantasy 6
Doom 2
Super Metroid
Sonic the Hedgehog 3/Sonic & Knuckles
Virtua Fighter 2

1995
Warcraft 2
Yoshi's Island
Donkey Kong Country 2
Chrono Trigger
Descent

1996
Battle Garegga
Quake
Diablo
Heroes of Might and Magic 2
Mario 64
Civilization 2
Fire Emblem: Geneology of the Holy War
Command and Conquer: Red Alert
Nights into Dreams
Pokemon Red and Blue
Resident Evil
Metal Slug

1997
DoDonPachi
Star Fox 64
Goldeneye
Final Fantasy 7
Final Fantasy Tactics
Ultima Online
The Curse of Monkey Island

1998
Starcraft
Half Life
Baldur's Gate
The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time
Grim Fandango

1999
Planescape: Torment
Heroes of Might and Magic 3
Everquest
System Shock 2
Unreal Tournament
Team Fortress Classic
Counter Strike
Giga Wing
Homeworld

2000
Baldur's Gate 2
Diablo 2
Deus Ex
Mars Matrix
Skies of Arcadia

2001
Ikaruga
Civilization 3
Advance Wars
Golden Sun
Smash Bros. Melee
Halo: Combat Evolved

2002
Neverwinter Nights

2003
Fire Emblem
Advance Wars 2
Tales of Symphonia

2004
Half Life 2
World of Warcraft

2005
Civilization 4
Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance
Resident Evil 4

2006
Mushihimesama Futari
Persona 3
Gears of War
TES IV: Oblivion

2007
The Orange Box
Mass Effect

2008
2009
2010
Mass Effect 2
Mario Galaxy 2

2011

[Ed Oscuro]

1956

[Skykid]

No offence man, but I think the best time for gaming is already a good enough summary. It's kind of painful to start going into single years, since there are so many games not on your list, and so many different tastes to create variables.

16-bit was the best, let's just leave it there.

[Blackbird]

Eh, worth a shot =D. I had fun compiling the list because viewing it chronologically in this way gives you an appreciation for how gaming developed, and which games influenced which.

[PC Engine Fan X!]

If you go back to the year 1995, it was Atlus USA whom distributed such full kits of Cave's Donpachi PCB for the U.S. arcade scene. So yes, it was well known in the U.S. but for some reason, DDP wasn't officially released in the USA (despite Cave making an International Version of DDP to sell overseas in 1997). I would've like to have played DDP back in 1997/1998 if it was properly distributed back in those days.

Can't forget StarCom's landmark and groundbreaking LD arcade game of Dragon's Lair when it finally made it's dramatic debut in the arcades during the summer of 1983. Not to mention that arcade operators started charging fifty cents instead of a quarter per credit -- that's when it became truly expensive to play arcade games right there. Of course, it was really up to the arcade operator/owner to set the final pricing with the arcade games and pinballs...if priced reasonably, then the clientele will come. The old-school arcade gamers know all about this pricing issue, thus it forced you to try to learn said game with the fewest amount spent if the decision was made to try to master it back in the day.

Then when the Great Video Game Crash of '84 fiasco occured, then you saw plently of arcades shutting down for good because of oversaturation of having too many arcade games everywhere (i.e. -- inside dentists' offices, etc). So for some arcades to survive and still retain their paying customers, they'd resort to some crazy deals/tactics like having a special promotion: All games with a green colored star "2 credits for a quarter" type of deal. I recall seeing that particular type of deal at a local arcade (during a stagnant period of the arcades)...not only was it cool since if I hung around long enough, I could get to play some free games with the arcade games that sported a green star. It'd sure make my day right there.

I'm not even sure when Atari Inc. officially distributed Namco's Xevious cabs as the first time I saw it at a local arcade was back in '84 (despite it having a 1982 copyright date on the title screen). Yep, Atari even had their own arcade franchise known as Atari Adventure (with a huge location at the famous Pier 39 in San Francisco at one time) which were later sold to Namco and converted into their own arcades across the USA.

PC Engine Fan X! ^_~

[Moniker]

Best year of gaming was obviously 200X.

I didn't realize SMB3 & SMW came out the same year. I guess that's my year.

[UnscathedFlyingObject]

Some of my all-time classics.

1997
Castlevania SOTN
Final Fantasy Tactics

1998
Grim Fandango

2001
Devil May Cry

2002
Time Crisis 3

2003
Viewtiful Joe

2005
Devil May Cry 3

2006
God Hand

2007
Bioshock

2010
Vanquish

Please note Resident Evil 5 didn't come out in 2005. Re4 came out in 2005.

[linko9]

1998 for me.

Ocarina of Time
F-Zero X
Banjo-Kazooie
Dragon Warrior Monsters
Grim Fandangy
Rogue Squadron
Xenogears

And a LOT of great shmups came out that year, though unfortunately I didn't know it at the time.

[Gus]

2007.

Muchi Muchi Pork
Deathsmiles
Futari Black Label
HELLSINKER
Mountain of Faith