The Top 100 Games of the 21st Century

Ground Glass writes "Most top ten or top 100 lists are pure opinion, and thus a source of great debate as their objectivity is questioned by everyone with a personal favorite. Next Gen has chosen a different route — this is the top 100 games on PlayStation 2, Xbox, and Gamecube, calculated since the start of the decade by unit sales in America." As you'd expect, GTA, Halo, and Madden are in the top ten ... but did you know Smash Brothers Melee has sold 3.2 million units? Interesting stuff.

Comments

11 pages?

[linvir]

11 pages for one article? It starts at 100, and gives you no option to click through to the top ten. next-gen.biz are pageview whores, and deserve their ad-free printable version link to be published.

Re:Please.....

[vodkamattvt]

If Im not mistaken .. the MLB has copyrighted their statistics and the NBA has claimed copyright over the actual events in a game and challenged commentators in court.

Its stupid, yes, but as a business you look for any revenue you can. Better safe than sorry, copyright everthing under the sun, and then sue everyone who looks at you funny. Who knows? If your lawyer is scary enough you might get some free $$$ in a settlement.

Dont you love the litigious society we live in? Myself, it makes me want to puke.

Re:Wow, that was fast.

[Anonymous Coward]

It's 11 pages and contains screenshots.

NOTE: To view page, simply copy and paste the URL in your browser (it is blocking based on /. referrers)

Re:No PC games?

[Anonymous Coward]

Here's a list of PC games along with the consoles:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best_selling_ computer_and_video_games

Occasionally working Mirrordot cache

[spyrochaete]

Mirrordot cache: http://www.mirrordot.com/find-mirror.html?http://n ext-gen.biz/index.php?option=com_content&task=view &id=3537&Itemid=2

This link works sometimes but not others. I was going to paste the article but there's about 3 sentences X 100 listings so it's not really feasible.

Re:No PC games?

[richdun]

This is why I don't do 'awards'. They never explain why one thing is better than another

Top is a relative term, and the 21st Century is the last five years...and when in doubt, RTFA.

Here are some notes on how this list works.

• Stats, ordering and research: thanks to game publishers, retail analysis sources and NPD data.
• Games are ranked by units sold; then by revenue generated. This tends to favor games released earlier, rather than later, and games which have spent a long time at a lower price point have also done well, but we wanted to reward longevity and popularity across all audiences, not just hardcore.
• In the event of a tie, games are then ranked by 'most recently released' and then by Gameranking average review scores. Special thanks to gameranking, just for being an exceptionally well produced resource.
• Games are ranked according to the highest selling SKU only. Otherwise the list would be full of sports iterations and big brand spin-offs and sequels.
• Other platform versions of that game, and 21st century precursors or sequels are included under the 'franchise sales' but do not affect overall placing.
• This list is for the U.S market only.
• This list only features games released since the introduction of PlayStation 2, Xbox and GameCube. It does not include handheld games or PC games which will be featured in a separate list.
• Other Franchise Hits qualify if they use the same IP or character in broadly the same genre, and if they managed respectable sales of (roughly speaking) above 200,000 units.
• Franchise sales includes sales of top selling spin-offs, sequels and predecessors as well as other console versions of the same game.