Top 20 PC Games on Windows XP

ApacheVE writes "Voodoo Extreme has up a story called Generation XP: Top 20 Games of the Last Generation. They call out some of the best games released in the Windows XP era, to mark the passing into the 'next generation' of PC gaming this past week. Some favorites include Call of Duty, Unreal Tournament 2004, Civilization IV, World of Warcraft and other titles that helped shape the era." Any titles you see missing from the list? The XP years were truly great, as far as PC titles went; how long do you think it will be before Vista has enough market penetration to make a difference in gaming?

Comments

WARNING

[Anonymous Coward]

Article spread out over 20 ad-laden pages. Didn't see a print option. Lame.

Re:WARNING

[jpardey]

I have finally seen the light and installed ad-block. Sometimes I will turn it off for fun (and I might enable Project Wonderful ads because it is a somewhat interesting system) but it is a great firefox extension.

The Goods

[TriezGamer]

20) Rise of Nations
19) Halo: Combat Evolved
18) Rome: Total War
17) Unreal Tournament 2004
16) Medal of Honor Allied Assault
15) Neverwinter Nights
14) Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne
13) Command & Conquer: Generals
12) Guild Wars
11) Civilization IV
10) Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos
09) Doom 3
08) F.E.A.R.
07) Company of Heroes
06) Battlefield 1942
05) Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic
04) Call of Duty
03) The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion
02) Half-Life 2
01) World of Warcraft

Re:The Goods

[DeafByBeheading]

None of the Grand Theft Autos made the cut?

Re:The Goods

[Telvin_3d]

Well, GTAIII wasn't quite 'XP generation' and the others haven't been very groundbreaking compared to most of the list.

Re:The Goods

[Sosarian]

Thank you, 20 pages of barely readable text with 5 times more ads than story was not worth reading that.

Re:The Goods

[kestasjk]

Worms + Quake III = Soldat. Fast paced, strategic, looks great (a game doesn't have to be 3D to look good *gasp*), always loads of players online, doesn't need the latest computer, runs quite well in WINE, and free.

Re:The Goods

[I'll Provide The War]

GTA:VC is the second highest rated PC game of all time on Gamerankings and was released two years after the launch of XP. It is certainly better than most of the other console ports they selected.

Re:The Goods

[alshithead]

Where's Ms. PacMan dammit!?

Re:The Goods

[cephyn]

Too bad I'd still rather play worms or quake3 than soldat.

Re:The Goods

[Anonymous Brave Guy]

Hmm... I think I've played three games on that list: Halo, Warcraft III and NWN. Halo was fun. The latter two were dropped within hours, since watching paint dry was more entertaining. Coincidentally, I think the reason was similar in both cases: when you've played the BG series with a party of six, and RTS games with armies of hundreds of units, somehow you+henchman or "armies" with only a handful of units just don't seem spectacular or varied enough as drop-in replacements. You could certainly have games based on those ideas, but you'd need very different gameplay to what works with the larger groups, and for me, these titles just didn't have it.

I played a demo of Oblivion too, but while technically impressive, the gameplay just didn't inspire me enough to buy the real thing. There must be something to it given all the rave reviews, so maybe that was just a bad demo.

Disclaimer: my PC is about four years old now, so some of the games on the list are beyond my current kit, and will probably get tried when I've finished building the new box.

Re:The Goods

[ravenshrike]

The online aspect and the expansions to NWN were worthwhile, but the official campaign sucked ass.

Re:The Goods

[GreatDrok]

F.E.A.R. made it and Far Cry didn't? Give me a break. I bought both and Far Cry was amazing while F.E.A.R...... wasn't.

Re:The Goods

[RogueyWon]

Hmm... thoughts on each of these in turn:

20) Rise of Nations - yeah, ok, this seems fair enough. It's a nice concept and still a fun game to play. I may even have moved it a little higher up the list. Graphics are dated quite badly now, so a sequel wouldn't go amiss.

19) Halo - w... t... f... - sure, the Xbox version was great, even if its own sequel does comprehensively out-shine it, but the PC version always felt like a nasty hack at best.

18) Rome: Total War - reasonable pick and probably in about the right place on the list. Very solid game.

17) Unreal Tournament 2004 - this made me go "hmm" at first, but on balance, I think I could live with this here. It was definitely the best iterration of the series. I'm not quite sure how TFA manages to claim the original is better.

16) Medal of Honour Allied Assault - I guess you have to include one of the WW2 shooters and I guess this one is the obvious candidate. If this were the only one on the list, I could have been perfectly happy. Unfortunately, if you look further down...

15) Neverwinter Nights - ooooh, tricky one. On the one hand, the game as released, straight out of box, is pretty damned poor, with an original campaign that falls waaaaay short of the usual Bioware standards. The sequel is massively better in this respect. However, I will grant you that, with two solid expansions and a huge mass of mods available, NWN has grown way beyond what originally came out of the box.

14) Max Payne 2 - Can be completed in about 4-6 hours by an average player and has no replay value. No thanks.

13) Command and Conquer: Generals - Oh god no. Command and Conquer with a slight graphical facelift, but none of the production values that made the very early installments in the series great. Gameplay that was outdated compared to other RTSes even at release.

12) Guild Wars - not played it, so can't really comment.

11) Civilisation IV - frankly, the Civ games have never done it for me. However, I will grant that they do seem to push the requisite buttons for an awful lot of people, so happy to let this one stand.

10) Warcraft 3: Reign of Chaos - yeah, good pick. Probably the best of the small-scale RTSes from the XP era. I'm mystified as to why the article says the controls were tricky, though. They were basically the same as any other RTS around, if not slightly better due to the decent hotkeys system.

9) Doom 3: Yep, decent pick. I know a lot of people found fault with it, but this game scared the living shit out of me (at least for the first half of the game). I'd probably have put this in the bottom end of the list, though, given the lack of variety. I actually felt Quake 4 was better, so may just have substituted that altogether.

8) F.E.A.R: again, a decent pick just on account of atmosphere. Plus the graphics were beautiful and the AI probably the best we've seen in an fps.

7) Company of Heroes: Hmm... maybe. Personally, I'd have substituted Warhammer 40k: Dawn of War for this, though. They're basically the same game underneath but, particularly with the expansions, I find Dawn of War slightly deeper. Still, there's no denying that Company of Heroes is very, very pretty.

6) Battlefield 1942: Yes, I'd probably go along with this, on the proviso that all of the sequels and expansion packs are excluded. BF2 in particular was an utter crock.

5)Knights of the Old Republic: Yes, definitely. Proof that Lucas should have let Bioware write Episodes 1-3.

4) Call of Duty: FOR THE LOVE OF GOD NO. What the fuck is it with this game? Why the hell do it and its sequels continue to attact such plaudits. An inferior, dumbed down Medal of Honour clone which brought nothing new to the genre at all. On a related note, why do all these countless WW2 fpses only feature battles from the second half of WW2 which the Allies won (oh, and Pearl Harbour). I grow tired of the "inevitable march to victory" feel of these games and feel that it actually fails to do history justice.

3) E

Re:The Goods

[Olix]

Farcry started great, but then they introduced mutants and crappy indoor levels. Also, the plotline sucked a bit. It would have been so much better if they kept the whole game outside on that lovely island chain. I hope Crytek hire a decent script writer for Crysis.

I have to agree with your nomination of Dawn of War, though. wonderful game. Shame Dark Crusade is horribly unblanced - Nothing seems to be able to stop an attack move from a big mob of Necrons.

Re:The Goods

[Aladrin]

Thats the value of opinion, see? I found Far Cry to be just another FPS, where FEAR was an FPS that added a little mystery and quite a bit of atmosphere.

Re:The Goods

[megalomaniacs4u]

4) Call of Duty: FOR THE LOVE OF GOD NO.

Call of Duty is way better than any of the MoH games but was let down by sequels that are worse than any of the dire MoH sequels.

Re:The Goods

[GeckoX]

Oblivion better on 360? You have got to be kidding me.

Especially considering the reason you give.

The 360 version has massive control related issues. The resolution is a huge problem.

And the kicker: Show Stopper Bugs.

How can you possibly state that the bugs present in the PC version are a bigger problem than those on the 360? With the 360, you hit one of those bugs, and your game is over. And there are a LOT of these bugs.

On the PC:
a) patches. Patches fix bugs. Bugs go away. Gameplay gets better.
b) console. Console fixes or allows one to work around bugs and carry on with your game.
c) mods. Mods are what make Oblivion really shine.

You are the very first person I have run across that actually prefers the 360 version. That statement alone suggests I should take every game related statement of yours with a large dose of salt.

Re:The Goods

[RogueyWon]

The PC version doesn't just have bugs, it has huge, system-crashing bugs. The kind of system crashing bugs that I've never actually seen any other game manage under xp. I've replicated these bugs myself, under common conditions, on two of my own PCs, neither of which have stability problems in any other games I've thrown at them. I don't actually know anybody from among my series of friends who actually has the PC version running stably for protracted periods.

The 360 version... just works. There may be minor bugs in there, but I've yet to actually notice one that in any way obstructed gameplay. Besides, in case you hadn't noticed, MS quietly and informally ditched the whole "no patches via Xbox Live" thing months ago. Console games these days can and do get patched. That you don't know this... implies that you are arguing more from emotion than facts.

Control-wise, I'm fairly agnostic. If you don't like console fpses, or don't have much experience with them, you may find Oblivion on the 360 frustrating at first. I've long since gotten used to console fpses, so not an issue for me. As for mods? Personally, the only mod I'd like would be one to remove the auto-level-balancing thing. But I can live without that.

My own install of the PC version of Oblivion got vaped months ago. I don't miss it. The 360 version still gets booted up sometimes.

Re:The Goods

[A_Non_Moose]

19) Halo - w... t... f... - sure, the Xbox version was great, even if its own sequel does comprehensively out-shine it, but the PC version always felt like a nasty hack at best.

Agreed. Disaster on the pc until the hardware caught up, but still left a lot to be desierd.

17) Unreal Tournament 2004 - this made me go "hmm" at first, but on balance, I think I could live with this here. It was definitely the best iterration of the series. I'm not quite sure how TFA manages to claim the original is better.

Grfx and extra play styles made 03 "better" IMO, but some of the weapons (sniper rifle/jump boots)
were lost (then re-added, IIRC).

14) Max Payne 2 - Can be completed in about 4-6 hours by an average player and has no replay value. No thanks.

Partially true, as the start is "easy" and you've gotta work up to harder difficulty and at highest
the story changes. This makes some replay value, but the biggest thing that made the game a blast
was the "Dead Man Walking" levels (as well as add-ons).
Hours worth of fun, IME, especially if you enjoy a game like serious sam.

Doom3 and FEAR: Doom3 need such high brightness to even be halfway playable, and lots of tweaks
to run decently (30 second pauses between doors because of the 32M of level cache on levels
that boasted textures in the Gig range? Ouch). Once tweaked, good game, if aggrivating at times.

FEAR: WOW. Max Payne 2.9, with horror film elements and excellent story, twists and ending (IMO).

BF1942, especially Desert Combat: Played the hell out of it a year after release, set up my own
server and enjoyed it thouroughly for over two years after that. Still miss it sometimes, sadly
upload b/w on cable sucks ass, so I slowly gave it up.

Oblivion: Not my style, usually, but 7 months of hours of play per day. Addictive as hell.
However, you've got the "killer bugs" backwards. The PC version was fixed first by the mod community
rather quickly. "Stutter bug", "Guild game/story killers" and even down to minor glitches the
360 experienced as well, but had to wait for months vs weeks/days.
Heck check out the oblivion mod forums, the program updates were the base (memory, speed, compat)
but the actual game play fixes = mod community (PC).

Half-life2: Agreed that it had been over-hyped, but it was a good game, story and play but you are
right some of the missed bits and bobs made for raised eyebrows and some aggrivation (shooting
from gameplay cell, to a "display/movie" cell...the attacking walkers while you are on top of a
building).

Farcry: Demo vs Game difference, the style/difficulty changed and the granularity of the demo's
difficulty was lost in the real game. Either too easy, or too frustrating, IMO.
Didn't play it near as long as I did the demo. You are right, should have been on the list.

Re:The Goods

[Kalriath]

Actually, there was one quest on the 360 version which, when completed, resulted in complete show-stopping CRASH of your Xbox 360. I don't recall it ever being an issue on the PC. That was the quest with the dog statue. The name escapes me.

Re:The Goods

[SanityInAnarchy]

(shooting from gameplay cell, to a "display/movie" cell...the attacking walkers while you are on top of a building).

Interesting... Not sure exactly what your complaint here is. Is it that you move from gameplay to watching the walkers attack? Lazy bastard, when I was on that building (if this is what I think it is), I grabbed a rocket launcher and took them down...

Also: Episode 1 is awesome.

Re:The Goods

[SanityInAnarchy]

I agree with what you said about Doom 3, but:

Half-Life 2: I'd move this much further down the list.... While it was undoubtedly fairly good in places, it lacked the atmosphere of Doom 3 and the scope of Far Cry.

Haven't played Far Cry, but Doom 3 for atmosphere? Maybe at first, but honestly, Doom 3 has the exact same atmosphere for the entire game. Whisperings, slowly going insane, hell always just around the corner... I mean, yeah, it's creepy, and yeah, the first hundred zombies jumping out of odd places in the wall scared the living shit out of me. The next five thousand were just boring.

Half-Life 2 may not have had as intense an atmosphere, but it was subtler, more pervasive, and actually changed as you progress through the game.

The one point I'll give Doom 3 (and Quake 4) is a pretty petty one -- good Linux support.

Plus, I found it kept breaking my suspension of disbelief with respect to the setting quite badly. Having a mute Gordon (the guy's supposed to be a PhD and a charismatic resistance leader for god's sake) was a particularly sloppy decision.

Have you played Half-Life?

Giving Gordon a voice may have helped you, but it would've been a much riskier move. Consider that just about any voice they gave him would've been a disappointment for anyone who played through Half-Life -- just as any face they put to Master Chief would disappoint Halo fans.

There's also the element of atmosphere it provides: If Gordon never talks, and you never leave the first-person perspective, you can go on believing that it's happening to you, not Gordon -- that you are Gordon Freeman. For a powerful example of this, go play through the beginning of Episode 1...

Being a PhD doesn't mean you have anything to say, either. And who says he's charismatic? He's a resistance leader because he's a living legend, because he can fight. If anyone's "charismatic", it's Alyx. Or maybe Breen...

Further demerits for Steam.

Anything in particular?

I always hear people complain about Steam, and I don't really get it. I mean, philosophically, yes -- it embeds IE, and it gives them too much control. But the fact that they do Steam and don't do any kind of CD-based copy protection helps a lot -- it means I don't have to hunt for the actual CD, or try to crack Steam. It means I can easily transfer games between one computer and another, even if I have a hard drive failure and lose every physical copy of the game -- I can just re-download them. For that matter, it natively supports burning a backup DVD, which last I checked, can be restored to any account that has those games.

The only things I see as actual concerns are: Your game patches whether you want it to or not; You may have difficulty playing without an Internet connection; and Valve could go out of business or deny you access to your own games. That last one doesn't bother me so much; I've certainly got more than my $50 worth out of Half-Life 2 (and Counter-Strike: Source), so if everything stops working tomorrow, I'm happy. The other two are simply vague concerns in the back of my mind -- for whatever reason, I have never hit any steam problems, whatsoever -- even when I was playing on Linux, Steam was the last thing likely to go wrong.

As for my own picks, I think we're missing some indie games -- things like Darwinia and Lugaru -- and maybe some casual games, things like the Sims, even if I don't particularly like it.

And as always, as tricky as it can be to put them on this list, I think mods deserve some mention, at least. There are only two games that I can play for 8 hours straight and not get bored. One is an MMO (Nexus TK), and one is a Half-Life (1) mod (Natural Selection).

Re:The Goods

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh, there are patches you can get on xbox live? Great!

Hold on... xbox live, wasn't that this subscription based service, with a monthly fee and all that?
So you're basically saying that you can get your game patched if you throw some more money at it. Great.

Re:The Goods

[4D6963]

20) Rise of Nations - yeah, ok, this seems fair enough. It's a nice concept and still a fun game to play. I may even have moved it a little higher up the list. Graphics are dated quite badly now, so a sequel wouldn't go amiss.

Actually the sequel, Rise of Legends, has graphics entirely in 3D, and they're not bad, although I'm not so fond of the fantasy stuff. Glad this game made it to the list tho, it's my favourite RTS.

Re:The Goods

[ElleyKitten]

There's also the element of atmosphere it provides: If Gordon never talks, and you never leave the first-person perspective, you can go on believing that it's happening to you, not Gordon -- that you are Gordon Freeman.

I hear this all the time, but I'd prefer the main charactor speak because I am not going to be able to pretend a video game charactor is me. I am not a resistance fighter, a PhD, or whatever other traits a character might have (a video game about me would be rather boring) and adding "not speaking" to the list just makes them less like me. I much prefer a character talk and have a developed personality, because that way I'm better able to identify with them than if they're just a ragdoll that follows my commands.

Re:The Goods

[C0rinthian]

All 360s come with basic free Live! access. Just no online multiplayer.

Re:The Goods

[SanityInAnarchy]

I love your signature...

Also, there is a counterargument beyond that: In Jak & Daxter, Jak never said a word, it was always Daxter making the odd comments and Jak making facial expressions mostly along the lines of "whatever". In Jak II, Daxter is pretty much the same, but Jak does speak, and his first words are not at all a disappointment.

Yet, one big difference is that Half-Life 2 is an FPS -- first person. Your logic is fine, but I don't even make it that conscious -- the "not speaking" is rarely made an issue, and it's nice to pretend, at least for awhile, that if I were in those circumstances, I could do what Freeman did -- after all, how much of what we are is determined by circumstance? Of course, I'm out of shape and have never fired a real gun, so I'm kidding myself, but until I remind myself of that...

I guess I find it a lot easier for the main character to have a voice if they do it during a cinematic, and there's always the chance that during a cinematic, the character will do something I wouldn't -- or, for that matter, that the character will say something I wouldn't. So, it's not so much that I notice him not having a voice, it's that I don't notice him having a voice, and saying something stupid -- Duke Nukem is hilarious, but I'd never, EVER say "It's time to kick ass and chew bubble gum, and I'm all out of gum." Frankly, it's a lot easier to believe I could fire a weapon accurately -- even a "shrink ray" (and stomp on shrunken aliens) -- than to believe I'd say something so stupid.

There is another route, actually -- voice recognition. Maybe by Half-Life 3...

Re:The Goods

[Thraxen]

Oblivion's overrated crap anyway. Who cares which is better? I know people will disagree, but I can't stand the games. Ever since big MMORPG's hit the scene I find games like Oblivion to utterly boring and empty. Something is just missing when you don't have a bunch of other human controlled players with which to interact (join up for missions, fight, even just simply chat with).

That said, I don't play MMORPGs anymore because they are huge time sinks and amazingly addictive at the same time.

Re:The Goods

[gmb61]

I played EQ for years, and after having to deal with all of the ninja looters, immature 12 year old griefers, scam artists, etc., not to mention guild politics, I find a single player game like Oblivion to be a breath of fresh air.

Re:The Goods

[cttforsale]

Thanks for your post. I found it much more interesting than the original article. I don't agree with some of your choices, but still, a great critique.

Re:The Goods

[Anonymous Coward]

9) Doom 3: Yep, decent pick.

2) Half-Life 2: I'd move this much further down the list.... I found it kept breaking my suspension of disbelief with respect to the setting quite badly

You say Doom 3 is good, then slate HL2 for breaking your suspension of disbelief. I have one thing to say:

Monster Closets

This ain't hard, folks

[Anonymous Coward]

Go to your favorite torrent site, and run their Top NN list for Windows games.

19: Halo - what the hell?

[EvilCabbage]

Seriously. A bloody ordinary Windows port of one of the more dull console shooters I've had a tinker with in years. About halfway through I just couldn't fight back the tears of boredom anymore.

I'd imagine millions of people still play Solitaire, by the 'merits' Halo has, I'm fairly certain it deserves a spot in this arbitrary list too.

Re:19: Halo - what the hell?

[Mattintosh]

It took you until halfway through? Wow. I uninstalled it after playing in the first outdoor level for a few minutes. It was that dull.

Halo?! Doom 3?!

[ChaosDiscord]

Halo? A highly repetitive game that features midget aliens that ran around like toddlers on cocaine? A dark future where the elite special forces get issues crap guns by default? Sure, it was an exception FPS for consoles, but that has more to do with the high level of suck of FPSs on consoles.

Doom 3? A single trick pony, not that "sucks that in the future we'll forget how to attach lights to guns" is much of a pony to start with. It's gorgeous, but it's a crappy game. Game design has moved on since the original Doom.

It's not that there aren't better games. Where is Far Cry, which blew Halo's outdoor scenes away (It jumps the shark midway through, but there is still a lot of great gameplay)? How about Quake 4, which took Doom 3's amazing technology and coupled it with rock solid gameplay (and features the radical idea that a future military might issue its troops useful assault rifles!). NOLF2? Return to Castle Wolfenstein?

*Bah*

Re:Halo?! Doom 3?!

[MarcoAtWork]

they put (the entirely forgettable, purely eye candy, shallow as a puddle) Oblivion at #3, what do you expect? Still I can't believe they didn't put FarCry in there, easily should've been in the top-5.

Re:Halo?! Doom 3?!

[bigstrat2003]

Your comments were fine, up until you got to Return to Castle Wolfenstein. Seriously, wtf? That game's sole thing it had going for it was the Wolfenstein remake factor. It didn't have a very good plot, the gameplay was run-of-the-mill, the enemies weren't that good, even with the "satisfying to kill Nazis" factor, and the weapons were... ok, I lied, the game has 2 factors going for it. Wolfenstein remake, and flamethrower. But seriously, if Halo doesn't deserve a place on the list, RtCW sure as hell doesn't. I liked the game, but it just wasn't very great.

Re:Halo?! Doom 3?!

[Anonymous Coward]

Oblivion "shallow"?? Uh, yeah... right.. Troll elsewhere, ok?

Re:Halo?! Doom 3?!

[MWoody]

You're absolutely right. To call Oblivion "eye candy" is unfair and incorrect.

It looked like shit, too.

The List and My Commentary

[Bios_Hakr]

20 -- Rise of Nations. It was ok. I really liked the nukes.
19 -- Halo. WTF? It was great on the XBOX but not a good FPS by PC standards.
18 -- Rom Total War.
17 -- UT2k4. Why this version? All of them were really good. Sequels should be disqualified.
16 -- MoH Allied Assault. It was ok. I really hated the way the game cutscened a lot. And the fact that it forced a tutorial sucked.
15 -- NWN. Great game and very modable. Still play this after, what, 5 years.
14 -- Max Payne. Loved bullet time.
13 -- C&C Generals. Never played it.
12 -- Guild Wars. MMO without fees. Awesome.
11 -- Civ4. After Civ3, I was really not willing to buy another Civ game. I still play Alpha Centuari though.
10 -- Warcraft 3. Not a big fan of RTS. Never tried it.
9 -- Doom3. Never played it. Too dark. Duct tape mod really showed how dumb game designers are. And WTF with batteries that last 10 seconds?
8 -- FEAR. Stupid name but great game. The demo gave away almost all the scary parts though. Bullet time and the nail gun was awesome.
7 -- Company of Heroes. Very fun for a RTS. Still, never played it more than a few hours.
6 -- BF1942. Played the shit out of this at LAN parties. Once Desert Combat was out, played the shit out of it again. The follow-ups sucked bad though.
5 -- KOTOR. Another port from XBOX. It was fun. Loved the moddable lightsaber.
4 -- Call of Duty. I was really burned out on WW2 games at this point. God, can we get another war?
3 -- Oblivion. Something about a first-person RPG just sucks. After 10 minutes of not knowing where the last rat was, I gave up and uninstalled it.
2 -- Half-Life 2. I guess it was OK. I only bought it because of CS:S
1 -- WoW. This game is a lot of fun and very social. Most of my friends play this to extremes. Once I got high-level, I quit. I don't have time to do the same 6+ hour crawl 20 times to get the uber sword of pwnage. I really loved the fact that I get credit for *not* playing. Makes leveling much easier.

So, where was X2 or X3? Both were lots of fun. How about GalCiv or GalCiv2? Empire at War was a blast as was Hero Quest. Flight simulators (all sims really) were missing. GTR, Falcon Allied Force, Flight Sim X, LOMAC, and IL2 were a ton of fun. As was Silent Hunter 3. Realistic sims are, for me, what really keeps me updating my PC. Everything else can be duplicated on a console. The first time you complete the ramp start in Falcon, you'll know the PC is king.

Re:The List and My Commentary

[regular_gonzalez]

So, where was X2 or X3? Both were lots of fun. How about ... GalCiv2? .Flight Sim X, ... and IL2 were a ton of fun. As was Silent Hunter 3.

...

Sequels should be disqualified.

Cue Inigo Montoya: "I don't think that means, what you think it means."

Re:The List and My Commentary

[Anonymous Coward]

Mac fanboi during the XP era: "Get a Mac. For games, just get a console."

As your comment shows, Mac fanbois missed out on a lot of fun games.

Re:The List and My Commentary

[Anonymous Coward]

Oblivion had a third person mode, just push the button or scroll your mousewheel out.

The tutorial sucks balls and is not representative of the game, stick with it for an hour and you'll probably enjoy it...

Yeah, not a single racing game? Even Need For Speed: Can't Tell The Difference Any More is more fun than Doom 3.

This 20-page adfest is clearly a pageview grab throw up in 20 minutes anyway, there's no point in discussing it.

Re:The List and My Commentary

[kfg]

God, can we get another war?

Ask and ye shall receive, but don't expect to be doing much gaming after it's done.

KFG

Re:The List and My Commentary

[cephyn]

How about the 6 day war? Haven't seen any games on that one. Play as the arab alliance, see if you can win.

Or what about Gulf War II? Starts out as a war game, morphs into a military/city strategy game. A cross between command and conquer and simcity2000. See if you can stabilize Iraq before it can happen in real life.

Re:The List and My Commentary

[Bios_Hakr]

>>How about the 6 day war?

Janes' IAF was a flightsim based on that. Of course, you are no-so-much an arab in that one.

http://www.mobygames.com/game/janes-combat-simulat ions-israeli-air-force

>>Or what about Gulf War II?

Falcon Allied Force was about the first Bosnia invasion. Circa 1995. They got the title wrong, but whatever. These have been several GW2 games. A few flight sims and several shooters. None of them were any good. I'd love to see something like a driving sim in a humvee through the red zone. Or multiplayer with a driver and gunner.

>>A cross between command and conquer and simcity2000. See if you can stabilize Iraq before it can happen in real life.

Easy, cut the country up into three parts and move each tribe into a diff part. Pump the oil dry so they don't fight over who gets that part. Threaten Turkey to keep them from invading Northern Iraq.

Re:The List and My Commentary

[Stormwatch]

Mac fanboi during the XP era: "Get a Mac. For games, just get a console."

Mac fanboi during the 90s: "there's no first person shooter you can have on the PC that's as good as Marathon."

Re:The List and My Commentary

[atezun]

And there's still no FPS that beats Marathon, except you PC users can enjoy it now.

Re:The List and My Commentary

[GeckoX]

Don't bother responding. Anyone who claims to be an RPG fan, but only gives a game like oblivion less than an hour to prove itself, is not an RPG fan of any sort.

lets start the obvious 'missing' list.

[Anonymous Coward]

ok, winxp came out late 2001.

grand theft auto iii was released (for pc) early 2002.
grand theft auto: vice city was release (for pc) early 2003.
grand theft auto: san andreas (for pc) sometime 2005.

for anyone that hasn't played with them on pc... wow.
my favorite thing to do, in gta 3 at least, was set up key macros to spawn 100's of any vehicle (like, one of the race car type things). it would make them into a huge pyramid stacked in front of you, and they wouldnt catch fire. at least, not until you hit the 'spawn tank' macro. talk about one massive explosion. if you use over 50 cars, its guaranteed to crash the game.

oh, and playing it multiplayer.... http://mtavc.com/
multitheftauto, yo.

now i just play text twist. violence got to me after awhile :(

Re:lets start the obvious 'missing' list.

[Petrushka]

OK then, this would be my list for the top ten WinXP games, in alphabetical order. Judging from comments here, I think this list is fairly representative, though with a couple of extra contributions of my own --

• Civ 4
• Elder Scrolls 3: Morrowind
• Far Cry
• FEAR
• GTA 3 plus sequels
• Half-Life 2 plus mods
• KotOR 1
• NWN 1 plus mods
• ScummVM (OK, this one's kind of cheating)
• UT2k4

(I made up a list for 11-20 as well, with things like Psychonauts, Beyond Good and Evil, and Escape Velocity Nova, but I figured they were all way too subjective to bother listing here.)

Re:lets start the obvious 'missing' list.

[KDR_11k]

Why did you remove Company of Heroes?

Understated

[DogDude]

I got a used copy of Halo for my GF's XBox to see what all the hype was all about. Not only was it boring, but the graphics were terrible to the point of not being able to see what the hell you're shooting. The sound was a joke. The controls made me feel like I was perpetually drunk when I was playing, it was so sloppy. Halo was actually the worst FPS I've ever played, and luckily, I was able to return it. I don't know why people bought this piece of shit game. It was truly terrible.

Re:Understated

[Meatloaf Surprise]

The PC version of Halo was a lot of fun. The controls were just like any other FPS and the graphics were on par with other games made in that same year. My friends and I enjoyed playing Halo after ut2k4 became a bore and, in my opinion, it has a lot of great multiplayer maps (Blood Glutch, Sidewinder, and Death Island to name a few). There were many game types and had a decent number of hacks/mods to make the game interesting for quite a long time. If this list came out a few years ago, I would be shocked to not see the game within the top 5.

Saying the game should not be on the list of greatest PC games of all time because you didn't like the xbox version is complete BS. The controller issue you talk about is non-existent on the PC version and the graphics aren't that bad at all. It mainly sounds like your complaints are with the xbox itself and not the actual game.

Re:Understated

[DogDude]

Good point. My gaming rig is a PS2 for action games (GTA, etc.) and my laptop for strategy games (Warcraft 3, Civ 4, etc.). That was my first XBox game. Maybe you're right. Maybe the XBox just sucks. That could be true. I haven't played a lot of other XBox games.

Re:Understated

[Anonymous Coward]

My gaming rig is a PS2 for action games (GTA, etc.)

You liked GTA but hate Halo for reasons of gameplay? I call BS. Your entire post was nothing more than FUD. Anyone who's played these games knows exactly what I mean.

my laptop for strategy games (Warcraft 3, Civ 4, etc.)

Heh. Get a real laptop, my boy. I can play anything out there on my rig. Maybe your problem is crappy hardware instead of gameplay issues.

I love fucktards who expect the best while putting in the minimal amount themselves. No wonder PC users (and gamers) get so much bad feedback with how cheap they are.

Re:Understated

[Some_Llama]

"Maybe you're right. Maybe the XBox just sucks. "

No he's wrong, the PC port sucks ass, the graphics (for some reason) played like crap (on a Geforce4 compared to the Xbox's Geforce2), the mouse control was incredibly slow even with acceleration and set to level 10, this combined with the overall boring gameplay (why were all of the levels identical within a "chapter"?) made a truely craptasic game.

The multiplayer wasn't even that inspiring, Quake/Doom/UT style gamplay with crappy weapons (spray "cone" physics for an assault rifle?!?!?!), ugh...glad I didn't pay for that one.

Win 98 FTW

[regular_gonzalez]

The Vista era was good, but nothing compared to the Windows 98 era (though I don't know that using OSes as a quantitative factor for determining gaming eras is particularly valid). I'll stack up Half-Life, Unreal Tournament, System Shock 2, Deus Ex, Planescape: Torment, Starcraft, Diablo 2, Baldur's Gate 1 and 2, and Grim Fandango against the best games from *any* era.

Re:Win 98 FTW

[thebudgie]

There should be some Command and Conquer in your list of games. The C&C games have shaped the RTS genre for a long time- but then again you might not like that type of game. For the XP generation it should include some of the Total War series, more highly ranked than Rome was, and maybe the first warhammer game.

Re:Win 98 FTW

[CastrTroy]

I don't think that C&C gets enough recognition in the RTS genre. It's my favourite series, and I really don't get why more people don't like like it. My biggest problem with most of the other ones are too many resources. In C&C you had tiberium, and that's all you had to collect. In Warcraft 2, you had wood, gold, and oil, and you need varying amounts of each for building units. Then there's games like starcraft where you have to constantly click around your base figuring out which buidlings you can finally upgrade, and which ones you can start doing research on. On C&C everything could be controlled on the right hand part of your screen. No reason to click on your barracks to build a soldier, or you factory to build a jeep.

Re:Win 98 FTW

[DarkJC]

Hear hear. I think that's why Generals was such a letdown to me. I might have been a notable game on its own, but it was NOT a C&C game. Everything that defined the C&C series was ripped out of Generals. The sidebar where you controlled everything? Replaced with a starcraft-esque bottom bar, which was not only a step backwards, but was badly designed. You could only stack up to 9 units in a build order at once. The universe of Generals had nothing to do with any of the other C&C games. FMV? Gone. Storyline/plot? Gone. I'm hoping EA at least accomplishes something with C&C3.

And for those RTS fans who have not had the privilege of trying the beta, Supreme Commander is indeed supreme. I have not had more fun with an RTS since...I can't even remember. This is going to be a keeper RTS fans, so on February 20th, march over to your local game store and pick up a copy. The only thing that might keep you from it are the system requirements...they're quite steep.

Re:Win 98 FTW

[Chris Mattern]

Having to coordinate different resources is the *point*. Having only one resource is too simplistic. As far clicking on buildings are concerned, I don't like clicking on the map or on the menu; both are too slow. If I had my druthers for Starcraft, you'd have a hotkey to cycle through buildings, or better, several hotkeys to cycle though different classes of buildings.

Chris Mattern

Re:Win 98 FTW

[FreeGamer]

Play Dune II then get back to us on why people don't like C&C. C&C did nothing but give a new image to an existing game. That's all Westwood have done for years with that. Even 10 years later with Dune III then gameplay was identical to Dune II and the inbetween C&C releases. Honestly, the unoriginality of Westwood has disgusted me for years and I'm mystified as to how the majority of the gaming community has failed to realise this.

Re:Win 98 FTW

[Anonymous Coward]

maybe 'cuz dune II was such an awesome game, people can't get enough of it?
however, even though the gameplay changes from dune to c&c were rather.. incremental, they weren't nonexistant.

Re:WoW? WTF?

[Anonymous Coward]

Not limp. Whatever that means. Smart. Most people are too smart to play any MMORPG. They recognize them for the time and money wasters that they are. They suck. hardcore. Although, I must say I do like them. Not to play mind you, but to suck up the time and mony from morons. That way there's a lower chance of dealing with them in the real life.

No Starcraft or Fallout 2? Forget it!

[Anonymous Coward]

Yah, I know those are old games now, but damn I have had a lot of fun playing them. I enjoyed Space Rangers 2 also...I guess I enjoy RTS/RPG games. Call of Duty/COD2 were not bad, either, but I did not burn myself out on WWII games. I also noticed that Warhammer 40k is not included which is too bad, I thought that was a lot of fun. How much repeat playability/moddability does a game have to have to be considered a classic? Maybe to be fair to this list we can have a comprehensive list made that shows game popularity by year (lets start with Atari 2600 games and work our way to the present)

Sure Halo repeats itself, but you then again so did lots of games; Wizardry is a fine example of kill, heal, repeat. And that piece of software is over 25 years old now.

I didnt read the article (this being /. of course) so I wonder what this list is based on, overall sales or overall ratings?

(and I'm posting AC since im too lazy yo log in and karma whore or whatever.)

ps, I am currently playing around with KOTOR again..fun game!

Re:No Starcraft or Fallout 2? Forget it!

[Anonymous Coward]

Note how this is titled "Top 20 Games on Windows XP". While both good enough games (although personally I've always felt Starcraft was madly over-rated and even close to Total Annihilation), both of those games are firmly in the Win 95/98 camp. Yes, they run fine on modern PCs, but they weren't released during the XP era.

Re:No Starcraft or Fallout 2? Forget it!

[tbannist]

This may be redundant, but Starcraft and Fallout 2 were generation '98.

So while they are way, way better than some of the games on that list, they just didn't meet the age requirements for consideration.

Where's the good stuff?

[Black-Six]

What happened to games like MechWarrior and Fighters Anthology? The only game on that list that I think deserves to be there is COH. We need better game players to pick all time favorites IMHO.

Re:Where's the good stuff?

[Anonymous Coward]

MechWarrior 2 was the last great MW game in the series. After that, FASA sold/gave (something) the license to Microsoft and MS made the games too user friendly, removed a lot of customization options and made the game very easy compared the the activision MW:2, Ghost Bear Legacy, and Mercenaries.

MW had lost its fan base, with the license change, and I think FASA also went under as well. That is what happened to the series.

I still laugh at MW:4 or 3 where I didn't need to put any armor on the head piece since it could not get hit no matter what.

HL2 is free?

[Anonymous Coward]

Bundled with Counter-Strike: Source, Half-Life 2 is consistently one of the most-played, free games currently available. Emphasis added.

Re:HL2 is free?

[Profound]

I think they meant to play online.

The most popular - WoW - has subscription fees.

Let's face it - XP was terrible for games

[Conrad Mazian]

Consider the real classics - like Zork. Or Reach for the Stars. How about Bards Tale, or Pool Of Radiance (the original, not the crappy sequel). How about Trade Wars? How about the original Warcraft, or Wing Commander:Privateer? There were some absolutely beautiful games in the old days, that still have not been beaten for game play and fun. Really out of all the games specifically designed for XP, the only two that I enjoy are Star Fleet Command:Orion Pirates and Neverwinter Nights.

The rest are mostly junk. I know that a lot of people lover WOW - heck, my three kids are addicted, but it leaves me cold. Same with Warcraft 3.

Yeah, the graphics are nicer - but that's like putting a Dior suit on a 500 pound human. The colors and style are neat, but what's underneath can't run, can't jump, and one flight of stars will kill them.

Oh, and for anyone who wants to criticize me - I'm 6 feet tall, weigh 250 pounds. I have lost 30 pounds in the last 7 months, hope to be down to 230 by summer. And considering how much better I feel at 250 - well I'd expect anyone who weighs 500 is going to have a rough time.

Re:Let's face it - XP was terrible for games

[Anonymous Coward]

best slashdot comment ever.

Re:Let's face it - XP was terrible for games

[Gabrill]

The problem with those games is not gameplay. It's not graphics. It's not entertainment value. All those qualities were and are completely adequate to the awsome games that they are. The real problems with those games, and why new people don't hold them in the same awe is this: The don't play on new hardware. From hardware cycle timing to obsolete graphic modes, they just don't play the same as they did. God I wish we could have decent ports to current OS's.

Re:Let's face it - XP was terrible for games

[Anonymous Coward]

Take off the rose colored glasses. 99% of games were crap then too. The only reason you think they were better is because those are the ones you remember. It's just like the oldies station on the radio. You'd think with 30 years of music to choose from you'd hear a lot more variety. But you don't. Music as a whole wasn't better in the 60's, 70's or 80's. They just only play the good stuff. It's hard to find today's good stuff because it's hard to separate wheat from chaff. Give it ten years and you'll be amazed at what survives from today and you'll be lamenting the games of the twenty-teens as being inferior to those turn of the century classics. I think you've already found some. You named 7 games from two decades and then lamented there were only two from the past 5 years.

Re:Let's face it - XP was terrible for games

[Stormwatch]

Yeah, the graphics are nicer - but that's like putting a Dior suit on a 500 pound human. The colors and style are neat, but what's underneath can't run, can't jump, and one flight of stars will kill them. Oh, and for anyone who wants to criticize me - I'm 6 feet tall, weigh 250 pounds.

I'll criticize you for not using the metric system.

Re:Let's face it - XP was terrible for games

[KDR_11k]

I haven't played the other ones but Warcraft 1 is total trash by today's standards in EVERY respect. It was neat back then but its interface is cumbersome, its gameplay uninteresting. Compare that to Company of Heroes (it's on that list) and you'll notice that today's games have improved in much more than graphics. Many old classics play like shit because gameplay has improved since back then and today the goal of a game designer is not to make a game as impossible to beat as they can. Stupid lever puzzles where you have to guess the correct combination? Having to do something in the very early game or you get stuck at the end with no way to return and do what you forgot? Traps you couldn't figure out without trial and error? Save points five hours apart, if present at all? Having to beat the next level to get the password to go to this level?

Re:Let's face it - XP was terrible for games

[TheViciousOverWind]

Amen.

I woret he same rose tinted glasses for a long while, but after I tried a lot of the really great games I remembered from years ago, I have to say that most aren't that good. They were great then, but now they're not worth the effort.

There's still (as you say) some pure classics which can stand the test of time, but most of the games that you remember as good games, you'll be dissapointed to try out today..

Re:Let's face it - XP was terrible for games

[Don_dumb]

Offtopic I know, but kudos to you, I lost 23kg (or ~3.5 stone [or 49 pounds]) over the space of around 2 years, down from 93kg. Even if getting down to 230 doesn't happen as fast as you like, don't lose hope. It really is worth getting in shape, especially I would imagine for a father.

Best game of the generation?

[MotorMachineMercenar]

Best game of the XP generation: Nethack. And Windows ME, 2000, 98(SE), 3.1, MS-DOS, DRDOS, 4DOS, not to mention Macs, Unixes, Linuxes, WinCEs, Amigas, etc. And the only game that literally has survived a human generation - I remember playing it 20+ years ago for the first time. And I still do.

Nethack, the best game of this, past and probably future generations.

Re:Best game of the generation?

[JoshJ]

Nethack was a great game for its time, and everyone that's interested in serious gaming should play it at some point.
Why?

Because Nethack has so many ridiculous game design flaws it isn't even funny.

Every single game designer out there should be forced to play Nethack nonstop until they ascend. That's the only way we'll get the shitty game design elements from roguelikes out of games forever.

Re:Best game of the generation?

[nomadic]

Amen. I love nethack but there are serious issues with the entire structure of the game.

Re:Best game of the generation?

[RedWizzard]

And the only game that literally has survived a human generation - I remember playing it 20+ years ago for the first time. Have you heard of Tetris?

Re:Best game of the generation?

[CronoCloud]

I like Nethack even though I suck at it, and would like to know which game design flaws/elements are you referring to? (Not saying that Nethack is flawless mind you. To be flawless it would have to be less frustrating)

Re:Best game of the generation?

[MotorMachineMercenar]

Yes.

Re:Best game of the generation?

[RedWizzard]

Well Tetris has been around as long as Nethack, and is much more popular. So Nethack is not the only game to have survived a generation.

Re:Best game of the generation?

[Anonymous Coward]

Ehh, there are some ways in which you always die, or something. Addicts know them all. Google is your friend.

Re:WoW? WTF?

[Anonymous Coward]

Not limp. Whatever that means.

Are you really that stupid?

Smart. Most people are too smart to play any MMORPG.

Yeah, you really are that stupid. Not to invalidate your own dislike for MMORPG, that's fine: to each their own, but the question was why does a certain MMORPG get so much notice when there are better ones. Your response is that MMORPGs are smart even though you think they're stupid? Man, you must be fucktard of the week.

XP?!

[iminplaya]

Hasn't everybody upgraded to Vista by now?

Re:XP?!

[orkysoft]

Funny, the games on the list that I played, all worked fine on Windows 98SE, even though at least one of them (Civ IV) said it required Windows 2000/XP. It's very stable on 98 for me.

You wouldn't think I'd keep falling for the "we'll fix the issues in Windows this time, really" trick after the 95->98 transition, huh? Fool me once, shame on me. Fool me twice... can't get fooled again!

It seems like with Windows, you can choose either crashes (9x) or viruses (nt/2k/xp). I much prefer crashes, especially since I only use Windows for games nowadays (when I have time).

I guess I'll have to get something newer (or get Wine/Cedega working) when I get a computer with more than 512 megs, though...

Re:XP?!

[Spike15]

You wouldn't think I'd keep falling for the "we'll fix the issues in Windows this time, really" trick after the 95->98 transition, huh? Fool me once, shame on me. Fool me twice... can't get fooled again! Well they added USB support in Windows 98. I should also point out that fixing every problem in a multi-million line piece of code is hard... ...I don't think that this has occurred to anyone on here. You try debugging an operating system with the complexity of Windows. When you can do it, then we'll take your complaints about Windows seriously.

Re:XP?!

[moloko_synthemesc]

Yeah, I hear ya man. Buncha ungrateful S.O.B.'s. It's just like when I left a few tiny instruments in a patient while performing surgery once. He had the nerve to complain to me about it, and I told him that when he could perform a quadruple bypass that I'd take his complaints seriously. Or back before med school, when I worked at a Jiffy Lube. I changed the brake pads on this guy's car, but...

Re:XP?!

[Geoffreyerffoeg]

Hasn't everybody upgraded to Vista by now?

This soon? I don't know about you, but I'm still waiting for the progress bar to move past 47%.

Re:XP?!

[Geoffreyerffoeg]

It seems like with Windows, you can choose either crashes (9x) or viruses (nt/2k/xp). I much prefer crashes, especially since I only use Windows for games nowadays (when I have time).

Ahem.

XP is pretty good about not having viruses or worms if you apply the proper precautions, the first of which is turning on a firewall (default in SP2) and only opening ports when you absolutely have to. And if you don't download sketchy software or mount sketchy disks. I run XP semi-frequently directly on the public Internet (meaning not behind a router, although that helps a lot and is encouraged if you can), and I haven't had problems; I keep the firewall on and I run Windows Update.

Windows 98 probably has a bunch of vulnerabilities (the WMF exploit is the first that comes to mind; Messenger Service is the second) that haven't been patched thanks to it being end-of-lifed; I'd be really worried about running it on a regular basis, especially if outside a physical firewall/NAT.

Re:XP?!

[orkysoft]

No, I only run it to play games now and then, and then it's always behind a NAT router.

Re:XP?!

[C0rinthian]

I should also point out that fixing every problem in a multi-million line piece of code is hard... ...I don't think that this has occurred to anyone on here. Consumers don't care how hard it is, nor should they.

You try debugging an operating system with the complexity of Windows. When you can do it, then we'll take your complaints about Windows seriously. If we could do it then microsoft would be out of business. They are a software company that sells an operating system. People pay them money for said OS, so they don't have to make their own. By your line of thinking we should all be doctors/mechanics/engineers/developers/etc before we can expect quality from others.

Woo hoo!

[JoeCommodore]

Perfect score, I never played any of them! (Ok, really not that hard since I only use Mac and Linux OS on modern machines).

Re:Woo hoo!

[Duke Machesne]

Haha I was thinking the same thing.

Well, I tried Civ4 for a few minutes but my onboard nForce video wasn't nearly good enough to handle it.

Re:Woo hoo!

[moranar]

Warcraft 3 and Starcraft run just fine on WINE, and from what I know, WoW works on Cedega. Games from ID Software usually have Linux binaries. NWN has a Linux binary, too. Try again, it might surprise you.

Re:Woo hoo!

[Proud like a god]

Yep my Quake4 disc has never suffered XP, NWN works great and Epic's Unreal Tournament series also has a linux installer on the discs.

Re:Woo hoo!

[Blondie-Wan]

I just checked the list out to respond to another post, and it turns out 13 of the 20 games on the list have made it to the Mac.

Re:Woo hoo!

[rtb61]

Sounds like a M$ fluff piece, what the hell did M$ or XP have to do with creating the top games. M$ stealing other peoples thunder yet again, trying to make itself look good as a result of the growing problems with vista, as well as, trying to reinforce the idea of the compulsory necessity of switching to vista.

Why?

[mqduck]

What the heck is the point of the premise of this article? Why in the world would you group games by what the latest version of Windows was when they were released? Unlike many Slashdotters, I'm not one to bitch about the job the editors do, but it seems to me that they were seriously trolled by these 20 pages of ads.

The meteor and My Commentary

[Anonymous Coward]

Cage match: Dinosaurs vs Cavemen. Two go in, one leaves.

Re:The meteor and My Commentary

[cephyn]

if it's a T-Rex, then the caveman just has to stand still, and the T-Rex will leave. Jurassic Park taught me that, and I hear they really did their research on that one.

Re:The meteor and My Commentary

[Anonymous Coward]

OK, so T' Rexes couldn't see very well ... but haven't you ever considered they were probably able to smell pretty well?

Re:The meteor and My Commentary

[cephyn]

They couldn't in Jurassic Park. Hollywood never lies.

GalCiv II

[cephyn]

GalCiv2 should really be on there. It's better than of the strategy games on that list, save for maybe Civ4. And it's close. It's the most well thought out 4X game of the WinXP generation, hands down.

Re:GalCiv II

[Anonymous Coward]

And don't forget that they did not treat us like criminals. (CD check)

Far Cry

[SlayerDave]

Where was Far Cry? In my opinion it was significantly better than the other FPSs on the list, with the possible exception of HL2. Doom 3 above Far Cry? I don't think so.

Re:Far Cry

[erbbysam]

You couldn't remotely compare Far Cry to Doom 3. In my opinion the gfx in Doom 3 were just about as good as HL2 but the gameplay was a bit repetitive and I'm personally not a huge fan of horror video games. Having played all 3 games fully online and offline Far Cry is the lowest on every list. Having just recently gotten the urge to go back and play Far Cry the graphics look old and outdated on my new system and yet still slow it to a crawl, sure you can have huge scenes but what's the point when you just have to stare at the ground every two seconds to get you framerate back up? Besides that it's a very solid FPS but isn't anything remarkable or groundbreaking like HL2 and Doom 3 were. I fell like Far Cry gets vastly overrated by people who have never played other games (ie. Battlefield 2 or 2142 or even just 1942 for gameplay).

Re:Far Cry

[SpecialAgentXXX]

I finished HL2 w/ no cheats. I finished FarCry using cheats for the last couple of levels - I really wanted to play to the end. I'm not even halfway through Doom 3 and quit. I enjoyed the "spooky/scary" factor, but it got a bit dull. FarCry should have been in the top 20.

Re:Far Cry

[Judge_Fire]

I'd put Far Cry above HL2 and D3 in my list.

Far Cry allowed exploration and variation in moving around and solving scenarios. The latter two tried to be interactive movies, where story kept you from stepping outside the preset ride, sometimes in really ugly ways. They must be nice as a first FPS experience, but they're not about playing so much as shooting on que.

Far Cry had a crap story with great gameplay and I love it :)

Re:Far Cry

[stewbacca]

HL2 and Doom 3 are just pretty technology demos. I would suggest that the original Half Life is a better "game" than HL2. Far Cry was much less repetitive than both HL2, and D3. Far Cry also at least tried to put new things into the game that weren't purely graphical tricks.

Windows XP games? Really?

[Anonymous Coward]

How many of these games are available for OS X? And Linux? Granted, a lot of these games came out on Windows XP first, but in the end, which games were also available on other platforms or even consoles? Most people will know that Warcraft III and World of Warcraft came out on both Windows and OS X at the same time. Heck, World of Warcraft can even run on Windows 2000.

Funny how Microsoft kinda screwed OpenGL on Vista to prevent easy porting from Windows/Xbox to OS X, Linux, Wii and PS3.

Re:Windows XP games? Really?

[Blondie-Wan]

I don't know about Linux, but more than half those titles are available for Macintosh, actually:

20) Rise of Nations
19) Halo: Combat Evolved
17) Unreal Tournament 2004
16) Medal of Honor Allied Assault
15) Neverwinter Nights
13) Command & Conquer: Generals
11) Civilization IV
10) Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos
09) Doom 3
06) Battlefield 1942
05) Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic
04) Call of Duty
01) World of Warcraft

So, thirteen of the twenty are available for the Mac, I'm surprised and pleased to say. If only I had more money and time for games...

Re:Windows XP games? Really?

[ZombieRoboNinja]

Yeah, currently I've got my schedule full with

1. World of Warcraft

Hopefully when my guild dissolves in another couple years, I can start checking out some of these other so-called "computer games"...

These are just more of the same.

[j741]

This list sucks. It's just more of the same old crap rehashed with newer graphics, physics, maps, AI, etc.

What about the games that actually tried (and succeeded) to do something a little bit different, like Grimm Fandango, Hitman, GTA, and so forth?

Diablo and/or Diablo II?

[NJVil]

I suppose that there's only so much love that can be had for Blizzard, and WoW was a no-brainer.

Zonk are you retarded?

[Anonymous Coward]

What exactly did the shift from 2000 to XP do to change game design? That's right - exactly nothing. So it will be with Vista. Hardware affects game design. Not the OS, or the graphics API, when they all (Mac, Windows, Linux) do pretty much the same things.

Vista?

[Anonymous Brave Guy]

how long do you think it will be before Vista has enough market penetration to make a difference in gaming?

Is that a trick question?

I'm guessing there is a lot of overlap between the kind of person who buys the latest and greatest games and the kind of person who finds Vista's DRM, signal degradation, product activation, upgrade-unfriendliness and such offensive. Anyone with the dough to buy a system that can run Vista sensibly could use the same money to buy all three of the latest gen consoles, all of the big name titles for each of them, and enough takeaway for several weeks of gaming with the change. Not much of a geek/supergamer market, then.

As far as I can see, the only technical advantage Vista has over XP for most home users is DirectX 10. AFAICS, exactly no current games on the planet are anywhere near using current video hardware and DX9 to their full capabilities yet. Moreover, DirectX as a whole is a nasty vendor lock-in that's never popular with game vendors who also want to support the much larger console market (and may even be considering support for other desktop platforms, given the bad press Vista has been getting). Put that all together, and I can't see DX10 being worth more than the advertising it gives to $500 video cards that no-one can take advantage of, at least not for several years. Meanwhile, numerous compatibility problems are already being reported between big name graphics cards, drivers, and Vista. Doesn't look like the software support is going to drive Vista adoption, either.

And finally, there is simply no compelling reason for most home users to upgrade their hardware any more. Any desktop bought in the past five years is going to cope with your average e-mail, web browsing, word processing, and so on in its sleep, and most will do things like photo editing and video editing for those with digital cameras/camcorders too. In other words, while previous versions of Windows have benefitted from users buying new PCs fairly often and upgrading by default, I don't think that's going to happen to anything like the same extent in future. Games and serious multimedia editing are the only major software that might stretch a current PC (apart from running Vista, of course), and the gamers can more cheaply buy a console, while the multimedia people are probably nervous about the artificial limitations in Vista and giving Apple a renewed interest. That pretty much rules out high uptake through the new hardware channel. Strike three, Microsoft: you're out.

So the short answer is: I doubt Vista will ever have enough penetration into the serious gaming market to make a difference.

(Final amusing anecdote, reported in local press, for the benefit of doubters: our local PC superstore opened two hours early on 30 January, so the gagging hordes could get their Vista upgrades. They sold exactly zero upgrades for Vista all day, and while Vista was supplied preinstalled on their new PCs from that date, there was no significant increase in sales of new PCs that day either.)

Re:Vista?

[Tim C]

Anyone with the dough to buy a system that can run Vista sensibly could use the same money to buy all three of the latest gen consoles, all of the big name titles for each of them, and enough takeaway for several weeks of gaming with the change.

Bull. I spend £600 on upgrading my current system a year ago, and it'll run Vista just fine. True, I "only" bought 2 250GB drives, Athlon X2 4400, motherboard, 7800GTX, 2GB of RAM and a 500W PSU, but for another £300 or so I could've thrown in case, monitor, optical drive, sound card, keyboard/mouse and speakers then, and could definitely get it all now for less than £1000. The PS3 is slated to cost about £450, the Wii costs £180 and the XBox 360 is £280, for a total of £910 *if* you can find the Wii and PS3 for retail and don't have to get scalped on eBay.

I've read the "Vista capable PC + Vista = all three consoles + games + change" thing a few times, and it's simply wrong.

Any desktop bought in the past five years is going to cope with your average e-mail, web browsing, word processing, and so on in its sleep, and most will do things like photo editing and video editing for those with digital cameras/camcorders too.

Now, I'm impatient, but transcoding an hour-long home movie of my daughter's birthday (or whatever) takes too damn long on my PC for my liking. I don't do it enough to warrant a serious investment in hardware for it, but a 5 year old desktop is going to absolutely suck for it.

So the short answer is: I doubt Vista will ever have enough penetration into the serious gaming market to make a difference.

I remember when people said the same thing about XP. There was no reason to upgrade from Win 2k (or even 98), WPA was an egregious violation of privacy, etc etc. A quick look at Valve's Half Life 2 survery results shows that 88% of HL2 players are running XP SP2; XP is used by 97% of players.

Now I don't know whether or not Vista will gain a significant share of the gamers market, but I do know one thing - it's far too early to be predicting that it never will. Serious gamers are well used to dropping serious money on serious hardware, and mostly have a serious thing for eye-candy and modding their machines. If there's one thing Vista definitely supplies, it's eye candy. Any "serious" gamer already has a machine that's perfectly capable of running Vista, so that won't be an issue.

Re:Vista?

[siDDis]

I agree. The only ones who will play games on Vista is those with money for new hardware and OS. There have not been many great games for the PC compared to the consoles in the last years. This is due to the extreme piracy on the PC platform and WoW which own the PC market alone. I'll still play on my consoles and pick up a few of the upcoming games for the PC as long as they can run on XP/Linux and DX9 hardware. Why can't someone use the same technology as those Linux Live CD's for games? Just put in a CD and start playing. No need for Vista, and yet they should have a chance to use a very effective copy protection which doesn't hurt those who are honest. Oh no I forgot, they still save more money by developing it on a Windows platform. Piracy doesn't hurt them enough.

Re:Vista?

[Threni]

> Anyone with the dough to buy a system that can run Vista sensibly could use the same money to buy
> all three of the latest gen consoles, all of the big name titles for each of them, and enough
> takeaway for several weeks of gaming with the change. Not much of a geek/supergamer market, then.

You don't need much more power to run Vista than to run XP. 1 gig of ram instead of 512. Wow, that's a big expense, isn't it? I've had 1.5 gigs for years now (and it was cheap then). The tiny CPU requirement is laughable. You need a graphics card you can buy in a bargain bin - that is, unless you want to turn off all the eye candy (as I will be doing). Upgrading to Vista seems to be about the same cost as upgrading to any other Windows OS was. Not saying it's an argument for upgrading - I won't be (at home - I get Microsoft stuff for free from work) until I have to, but that's no argument against it.

> I doubt Vista will ever have enough penetration into the serious gaming market to make a
> difference.

From now on, people will be gettin Vista on their new PCs when they buy them, and they'll expect to be able to play games. How many new PCs are going to be bought this year? A *lot*. And next year, and the year after. You wouldn't release a game that's just for 95,95,me,nt,2000 today - you'd not be able to shift it. It's got to work on XP, and in a year or two it'll *have* to work on Vista too.

Re:Vista?

[Anonymous Brave Guy]

I've read the "Vista capable PC + Vista = all three consoles + games + change" thing a few times, and it's simply wrong.

Perhaps it is, but I find it odd that someone who thinks they can put together that kind of system for under £1,000 can't find also the consoles for less than RRP.

I remember when people said the same thing about XP. There was no reason to upgrade from Win 2k (or even 98), WPA was an egregious violation of privacy, etc etc.

I don't much care what "people" said. I personally never made the same claim about XP. For a start, there was nothing like the level of competition from consoles then, with PCs hosting most of the best games while today the consoles dominate the gaming market in the most popular genres. For seconds, XP was a significant technical improvement over the Win98SE or WinME platforms that were the mainstays of PC gamers until that point. Neither of these advantages applies to Vista.

Re:Vista?

[Anonymous Brave Guy]

How many new PCs are going to be bought this year? A *lot*.

Interesting claim. Got anything to back it up?

IME, while businesses continue their three-year upgrade policies because far too many CIOs remain too stupid/naive to question that policy, almost no-one is buying new computers at home at the moment. In fact, the only person I know who is considering getting new kit in the near future is me, and I have specific reasons for upgrading now that are entirely unconnected with Vista.

Re:Vista?

[Threni]

> Interesting claim. Got anything to back it up?

It's not a claim, it's a statement of fact. You can trivially discover its truth by finding a chart of PC sales over the last 15 years and see. Hundreds of millions of PCs are sold, in addition to ones put together/resurrected from the dead using millions of CPUs, hard drives etc annually.

In case you really are that lazy:

http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,121858-page,1/ar ticle.html

> almost no-one is buying new computers at home at the moment.

Irrelevant. The home market isn't very significant.

Re:Vista?

[Threni]

> In case you really are that lazy:

PS: sorry - didn't mean to be rude.

Re:Vista?

[Anonymous Brave Guy]

> almost no-one is buying new computers at home at the moment.

Irrelevant. The home market isn't very significant.

Sorry, I think we've lost the plot here. We're talking about the potential impact of Vista on the gaming market, are we not? In that case, surely the home market is the only thing that is significant!

A Good Hint For Games

[MogNuts]

I know this could be considered off-topic, but it is game related and a good hint I wanted to share: to get the most out of your video card and computer in gaming, instead of buying a new LCD use the money for a CRT (21" for example). Get it with a high refresh rate (easy on the eyes, > 85hz IIRC). This way, you can play Oblivion at 800x600 on an aging card at say 60 FPS instead of at 1280x1000 (I forget the exact resolution) at say 10 FPS.

NOTE: for those uninitiated, LCD's only clearly display their native resolution. Otherwise, it will scale the picture and appear blurry. For example, displaying a 800x600 game full screen on a 1024x768 native LCD looks blurry and unclear (because it basically blows up the picture). Of course I would imagine playing a game in a window at 800x600 on a 1024x768 LCD would fix that problem; I just don't like playing games in a window, but that's me.

Re:A Good Hint For Games

[Anonymous Coward]

Agreed. I literally spent more on a crappy ebay 15" Dell LCD than I did to get my two 21" CRTs (also ebay, but are astoundingly good quality). For anyone who complains about all the excess desk space taken up - you can buy another desk with the money you have leftover and still be ahead..

Re:A Good Hint For Games

[PachmanP]

I happen to like using my space limited desk, and am a fan of not getting hernias when I have to move my stuff. Honestly I haven't really noticed any problems running games at non-native resolutions on my LCDs, and if you're bumping down to 800x600 to play a game I doubt that graphics quality is gonna be a deal breaker anyway.

Re:A Good Hint For Games

[Txiasaeia]

Some people are extremely sensitive to the high pitched buzz that *all* CRTs emit. I went LCD as soon as I could and haven't looked (heard?) back.

One thing.

[Anonymous Coward]

RTCW had the first truly decent teamplay factor since Tribes. Teamkillers were mostly just wasting their time, not being able to adversely effect the other players or the objectives, and hacks or "cheating" are relatively rare, unlike in most other multiplayer FPS'emups, such as CS.

Re:One thing.

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, and Enemy Territory is even 100% free to play (and ported to Windows, Linux AND Mac!). I think with the release of Quake 3 engine, it is even open source now.

The game is still often played. I played it past years and I've seen tons of crowded servers. The really nice thing about RTCW and RTCW: ET are the teamplay aspects. You have to collaborate very well with your teammates in order to win.

Sequel heaven!

[yroJJory]

Why is it that over half of the games (11 out of 20) on the list are sequels?

• Halo: Combat Evolved
• Unreal Tournament 2004
• Medal of Honor Allied Assault
• Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne
• Command & Conquer: Generals
• Civilization IV
• Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos
• Doom 3
• The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion
• Half-Life 2
• World of Warcraft

Re:Sequel heaven!

[Anonymous Coward]

Halo: Combat Evolved

Not a sequel.

World of Warcraft

Also not a sequel.

Re:Sequel heaven!

[moloko_synthemesc]

Because great original games, like Psychonauts, don't sell. Even when people get the rare chance to show that they want something new or different, they prove that they don't. Drones.

Re:Sequel heaven!

[Kjella]

On a wild shot, because the games that are most innovative normally have some rough edges fixed in a sequel? Civilization 4 for example is an iterative development going all the way back to Civilization long, long time ago and while hardly revolutionary in any way it's a damn good and polished TBS game. I was tired of C&C Generals before it even got out, but I know it was better than the C&Cs I played. Warcraft III was also a really well made game. Loved Oblivion, except it brought my hardware to its knees. UT2k4 was again a game I'd tired of before it even it the shelves. I guess the overabundance of FPS games just shows that there's plenty people playing FPSs, I missed several games in other genres more deserving IMO.

There's nothing really wrong with being the very best within your genre, and that's your niche. As much as I'd like to say that I got as much time to play now as I did in my teens and early 20s, I don't. Neither does any of my friends, and judging by the general population in games like GW and WoW, I'd say that's pretty common. If I had a wife and kids (at least I'm not living in mom's basement) I don't see how I'd have any time "at all", judging by earlier standards. What does that mean? That you're constantly selling to a new generation that doesn't know Civ1,2,3 but only your latest and greatest offering for what it is.

Re:Sequel heaven!

[Anonymous Coward]

Halo: Combat Devolved is not a sequel. Doom 3 is not a sequel in any meaningful sense of the word, naming conventions notwithstanding. World of Warcraft likewise. Likewise C&C: Generals, but in a bad way.

Re:Sequel heaven!

[DoctaWatson]

Since when is Halo 1 a sequel to anything? Or World of Warcraft, for that matter?

Re:Sequel heaven!

[Dark_MadMax666]

I think having an awful marketing also hurts. I heard about psychonauts many times but never really had any urge to buy/play it as it looked like some fancy name stupid arcade platformer. It turned out it was an arcade platformer, though very good and innovative at that ,and in no way stupid . - But thats only after I picked it up for some $4.99 in sales bin ,not before.

  That game was barely marketed at all, let alone marketed well.

Re:Sequel heaven!

[Sibko]

Uhhh.... Halo: Combat Evolved isn't a sequel.

Re:Sequel heaven!

[Fedarkyn]

world of warcraft is a sequel. All the stories of the previous games have consequenses in wow. (the player built scholomance and destroyed the brackrock mountain in wacraft2, for example )

Re:Sequel heaven!

[Anonymous Coward]

Did that happen to Wolfenstein 3D or Dune 2? Oh, right...

So...

[FlyByPC]

Every. Last. One. of them involves violence and combat?

Wow. That's sad.

Re:So...

[PachmanP]

Ummm that's the what you do in a video game. If I wanted to make happy fun fun that didn't involve violence and combat I'd just go outside and interact with real people. Video games allow you to run around and shoot things whereas doing that is looked down on outside video games.

Re:So...

[Stormwatch]

Go play Myst.

Re:So...

[Mattintosh]

Allow me to name a few types of games that don't involve shooting and/or killing.

- Sports: This includes about 80 hojillion subgenres like golf, tennis, football, the other football (I'll let the reader determine which they want to think is "the other" one), baseball, basketball, and many more, along with hybrid genre-hoppers like golf course builders and simulations, and more recently, there's been a coaching-only NFL-style football game. I guess you still "shoot" in a basketball game, though.

- Sims: With a few notable exceptions, you can't kill people in a simulation (realism be damned). Shooting is almost entirely unheard of (though I've heard gunshots in the slum streets of my sim cities).

- Puzzles: Aside from tacked-on themes, no violence is done in puzzle games. Your goal in Tetris, for example, is NOT to land giant blocks on top of innocent people below (though that would be kinda fun in an evil sort of way).

- "Other": Then there's that lovely catch-all genre called "other". Things like Harvest Moon fit here. It's not a sim, it's not an RPG, it's not a puzzle, and it's not a sport, but it has elements of all of them. You mostly see these games on Nintendo systems. Mostly. Katamari, I'm lookin' at you.

Re:So...

[Anonymous Coward]

I find it fascinating that almost all videogames, a giant proportion of movies, and TV and even rap songs feature military or paramilitary activity, when the proportion of Americans in the military or paramilitary forces is so low. Honestly, after years of the Army, FPSs bore me to tears - it would be like a coding simulator for a programmer...

Re:So...

[RzUpAnmsCwrds]

Every. Last. One. of them involves violence and combat?

Wow. That's sad.

Most video games do, particularly high-budget games which are likely to win awards. It's difficult to add depth to puzzle/card/city-builder games (though there have been some notable exceptions), so most high-budget games are those which simulate "reality" (either our world or a fantasy world). Once you've done that, the question becomes: what do you do in this dream world? The answer is simple: you do something you can't do in the real world. You fight an alien invasion, become a special agent, complete mythical quests, engage in futuristic arena combat, steal cars, or build an empire.

Non-violent games generally fall into a few categories: sports (Madden is one of the top selling games, year after year), racing (GT3 is the best selling PS2 game), card/casino (Hold 'Em is insanely popular online, and Solitare is the most distributed and played video game ever), builder/tycoon, and puzzle.

Sports games don't do well on PCs. They play better with controllers and on a big screen with friends. Racing games - ditto - few have a wheel, and no one wants to play a racing game with a keyboard. Card/casino and puzzle games are unlikely to make a Top 20 list (not that they are bad, they just aren't typically deep big-budget titles). As for builder/tycoon games, there have been some standout titles (Sim City, for one), but there hasn't been anything spectacular in the last 5 years - mostly just sequels and rehashes.

So, what does that leave? RTS, FPS, RPG, and MMO games. Guess what? They almost always involve at least a minimal amount of violence.

We did leave one insanely popular PC game out, though. The Sims is the best-selling PC title of all time, and it isn't really violent at all.

Re:So...

[Kingrames]

Complaining that there aren't any nonviolent games in this list is like complaining that there aren't any comedy films nominated for Oscars.

Re:So...

[Anonymous Coward]

The Sims is the best-selling PC title of all time, and it isn't really violent at all.

Yep. That is the game women buy. My nieces love to play it.

An analysis

[Anonymous Coward]

YOU GUYZ = TEH SUX045

No GTA?

[4D6963]

Not a single GTA? Sounds like either of the 3 last one was pretty important, and GTA:III on its own was quite a breakthrough, not to mention the commercial success and popularity of each episode.

A while

[Kuvter]

...Vista Drivers

Last Generation

[nick_davison]

Generation XP: Top 20 Games of the Last Generation

Given there's one DX-10 card line out there - nVidia's - and they're facing a class action lawsuit because their Vista ready card isn't Vista ready... Given that Vista takes away several audio features from Creative's line of sound cards... Given that the best known technical name in the gaming industry says it's not worth bothering with...

Can you really call the most current generation that actually works "Last Generation"?

As things stand, I was under the impression that all Vista does for gaming is disable features you have under XP. Oooh... And give you a couple of exciting menus for games and game specs.

Thank God You're Here!

[Anonymous Coward]

...I don't think that this has occurred to anyone on here.

Man, we'd never have thought of that all by ourselves! I bet you went to school and everything.

Well, here's a better idea...

[Anonymous Coward]

Buy a high-res 1600x1200 LCD panel.

That way, you can play your games at 800x600 with no blurring whatsoever, and still have uber resolution for viewing that por^H^H^H - er, editing those word processing documents, when you need it.

That's because of the exact 1:2 ratio of image pixels to hardware pixels, of course! So every "pixel" in your image is actually made up of a block of four from the LCD.

Of course, you'll still get blurry pixel interpolation with anything in between 1:1 and 1:2 image to screen resolution...

And if you like to play games at higher res, then go buy one of those 1920x1200 or 2560x1600 panels floating around. Then you've got the option of playing 960x600 or 1280x800 modes, too!

Re:Well, here's a better idea...

[Anonymous Coward]

Who pays, you or me?

Medal of Honour

[AmiMoJo]

MOH:AA is a truely excellent multiplayer game, no doubt about it. Shame hardly anyone plays it any more...

Back in the day, you could log on and have a really excellent game. Plenty of people on there, good ping times etc. Now, there are far fewer players, and far more of them are part of a clan which means there is little chance of them working with you. I suppose that was one of the best elements. There are plenty of multiplayer shooters, but few managed to get people to co-operate in an ad-hock kind of way like MOH:AA did.

Re:WoW? WTF?

[KDR_11k]

Perhaps most people don't appreciate the annoying features of normal MMORPGs and don't like "challenge" that means losing more progress if you die in a mind-numbingly boring battle?

Morrowind?

[Odin_Tiger]

Morrowind was FAR more a PC game than Halo, and Oblivion owes it's success exclusively to Morrowind. I can't believe Halo got in instead...it was a PC game as an afterthought at best.

Re:Morrowind?

[Mattintosh]

Halo was an Xbox game as an afterthought too. After Microsoft thought to buy Bungie, development stopped on the Mac version and was switched to the Xbox.

Only one...

[MaXimillion]

Only one MMO on the whole list? Where are EVE, Co(H/V), second life, or any of the others? It's sad that, in the era of MMO boom, only one of 20 best listed games is an MMO (Even if it is #1)

Oh, and like a few others said, Far Cry should definitely be on the list.

Re:Only one...

[MrCopilot]

Only one MMO on the whole list?

I was going to retort what about Guild Wars with a wikipedia link but...

Guild Wars shares many features with massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPG). However, it was called a CORPG by its designers to emphasize the differences in its approach to online role-playing compared to other games in the MMORPG genre. Primarily, Guild Wars is one of only a few commercially produced and distributed online role-playing games to eschew subscription fees, instead offering unlimited playing time on the game servers.

Oh.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guild_Wars

SEOJ

[Anonymous Coward]

Search Engine Optimized Journalism - http://slashdot.org/articles/07/02/03/0542243.shtm l/

13 FPS Games?

[pugugly]

I'm finding something odd that 13 of the 20 'great' games are basically first person shooters and none of them are from small companies.

This is like a review of beverages that argues between coke and pepsi, or musical talent that's really concerned about whether Britney or Christina are better.

Not that some of these aren't good games, but he doesn't even show any variation in taste in the FPS games - he's got, what, four FPS's about "Let's go kill the aliens", and Thief or No one lives forever didn't make the list?

I'm sorry submitter, but your gene pool license has been revoked - you're no longer allowed to reproduce. Remember, just because we're making you eligible for a Darwin award doesn't mean it *has* to be fatal.

Not if you cooperate.

Pug

Re:13 FPS Games?

[Luminus]

I can't agree more. I am in general sick of FPS, and I have been since I got through with Goldeneye for the n64. That FPS is the new side-scroller makes me want to puke, because it severely limits gameplay (although perhaps it doesn't have to) in the majority of games, and certainly in the majority of these 13. Pick any other era where there was a dominant game genre and you will undoubtedly see mountains of individuality in the top 10 games of that style, but in FPS, I can't get over the feeling that I've done it all before. I imagine these games are the greatest not only because of the big companies that produced them, but also because the big companies put a lot of time into making them "good" (how often this translates to unimaginative copies is the sad part). Which is why I don't play PC games near as much as I do console games. Wii the rescue!

Re:13 FPS Games?

[Kalriath]

Well, IGN isn't known for benevolence towards small game developers. Srsly.

Also, the submitter is the administrator of the site TFA is on. (In case noone noticed ApacheVE may in fact be Apache from VE3D, who happens to have ve3d.ign.com as their /. website link)

My top 5 Windows games

[Anonymous Coward]

5. Spybot Search and Destroy
4. Norton Internet Firewall
3. AdAware
2. Task Manager

And the number one game is...
1. C-A-D -> Shutdown and Power Off

Battle for Middle Earth

[lymond01]

I'd have to add Battle for Middle-Earth to that list. It was Real-Time Strategy like so many others, but it was fun. The individual physics of each troop member made the excitement factor rise over pretty much all the others. A troll wading into a group of soldiers and swatting them away; cavalry riding over a troop of orcs, not just flattening them, but bouncing off the horses; the wings of the Nazgul blowing troops aside; and the Balrog exploding from the earth, tossing anything nearby away.

It had true castle defense and sieging mixed with standard RTS fare: and it was all Lord of the Rings. Just a really well-made game that took RTS to another strategic level.

Doom 3

[Skuld-Chan]

At least with doom 3 you got cool visuals, and they delivered what previous versions of doom delivered. I wasn't surprised - I bought the game because I wanted a shoot-a-thon. I liked it for that :) - plus its one of the creepier games I've ever played - especially later on when they introduce those floating heads.

Re:13 FPS Games? All the rest are The Sims

[WillAffleckUW]

Not only is it amusing, but in reality, The Sims 2 comprises half of the top twenty PC games if you look at game rankings, so FPS only wins by ignoring the fact that The Sims 2: Night Life and The Sims 2: Open For Business are lumped together as if they were just one title.

You could lump all the FPS games together under the I Have A Gun category ... to make it fair.

Top sellers

[SageinaRage]

Did they just pick all the best selling pc games of the last couple years? There's pretty much nothing on here that wasn't a big name best-seller. Even ignoring whether they're good games or not, it pretty much nullifies any kind of claim of validity on this list.

I think you missed the point.

[DoctaWatson]

Grim Fandango predates the "Windows XP generation" by three years.

Not many on Linux...

[SanityInAnarchy]

These are the ones I know:

17) Unreal Tournament 2004 -- ships with a working Linux installer. My brother has found an insane number of mods for this game, and was up to some 20 gigs of space for just that game and its mods before we both migrated away from that Linux install -- me to another computer, him to a new hard drive and Windows. Surprisingly, when I installed and fully patched the Linux version last week, it has a native 64-bit binary.

15) Neverwinter Nights -- Never played the game, but it does seem to have a native Linux version, and a Portage ebuild.

09) Doom 3 and Quake 4 both have decent Linux ports. They are also the only two id games to date that have not released full source code -- and, in fact, there is at least one decent mod for Quake 3 which is completely free now that they can compile the engine themselves and distribute the mod without requiring one to buy Quake 3 first.

And some guessing -- I think these will work under Wine:

10) Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos
01) World of Warcraft

Blizzard uses Linux to run the WoW servers, and WoW is OpenGL. I imagine this isn't a recent development, so it seems likely that Warcraft III would also use OpenGL -- and most OpenGL games work out of the box, even on vanilla Wine (without Cedega). I do know Starcraft works very well under Wine, and has for years.

There are also a couple of games I imagine do not work well at all:

19) Halo: Combat Evolved -- simply because it has always been a DirectX game and a Microsoft game. Kind of a shame, really -- I hear Bungie had planned Linux and OS X ports before Microsoft bought them.

02) Half-Life 2 -- I know this one kind of sucks. Basically, fonts look bad, even on the HUD. The game itself mostly looks OK, but runs slower, and the embedded ActiveX crap mostly does not work. This is one reason I keep an XP partition around. It's amazing how clean you can keep a Windows when you only boot it a couple of times a month for a LAN party. It's also worth noting that the original Half-Life engine works well under Wine, and Steam is tolerable, but I figure I may as well stick to one copy of Steam.

So, not great... On the other hand, it is forcing me to discover all kinds of great indie games -- Lugaru, Uplink, Darwinia, Nexus TK... Also, Wine does generally run older programs better, as they really can't program entirely by-the-spec, and so both the wine hackers and wine config tweakers have to work from real programs -- which means the older a program is, the more likely it is to be figured out -- thus, I'm discovering all kinds of great games that I missed.

As for Microsoft screwing OpenGL on Vista, is that still an issue? My first impression was that ultimately, driver vendors would be able to provide good or bad OpenGL support at their own discretion -- and that it would not be a good PR move if QuakeWars plays better on XP than Vista. But really, I don't think this was ever an issue -- the PS3 will always be hard to port to, and DirectX made it easy to port to the Xbox and the 360, and people weren't nearly as concerned with Mac and Linux ports as they were with a particular dev kit, and if that kit supported the consoles people want.

As for Win2K, of course. I doubt many games require XP -- in fact, I imagine most of them work in Win98, some better there than Vista due to the whole UAC thing (and maybe OpenGL).

Re:Not many on Linux...

[aikouka]

I'm a bit curious on your WoW is OpenGL remark. I thought WoW was coded in both Direct3D and OpenGL with Direct3D as default. As I recall there being a switch that you can put in the shortcut command to load WoW with OpenGL instead. I remember doing this when I was having a weird opaque screen issue with WoW in Direct3D with 4xAA (any other AA setting removed the opaque screen fill problem).

Re:Not many on Linux...

[SanityInAnarchy]

Maybe. I do know there has to be OpenGL in there somewhere, as there is a Mac version -- so no reason not to include support for OpenGL on Windows, really.

Re:Not many on Linux...

[Anonymous Coward]

Why would a WoW _server_ run OpenGL or DirectX?

Re:Not many on Linux...

[Blondie-Wan]

19) Halo: Combat Evolved -- simply because it has always been a DirectX game and a Microsoft game. Kind of a shame, really -- I hear Bungie had planned Linux and OS X ports before Microsoft bought them.

There is an OS X port, actually. I never heard about a planned Linux port, though (but Bungie had licensed a Linux port of Myth II: Soulblighter prior to their sale to MS; perhaps you're thinking of that?)...

Another great ZONK slashvertisement.

[Anonymous Coward]

Another great ZONK slashvertisement. Heres to more years of being slashdots worst editor zonk you faggot!

The bitter PC gamers on Halo

[Anonymous Coward]

I am tired of hearing from so called "PC gamers" about how terrible Halo is. Their arguments:

"It was good for a console FPS only because console FPSes suck."
Total BS. The game had great gameplay elements that were groundbreaking, worked well, and have been copied in subsequent games. It used excellent storytelling techniques, and had a noteworthy Sci-Fi story to boot. It had a great score, for any game, and the sound design was top-notch. The AI is still some of the best (read: not brute-force cheap) to date. The use of meelee combat, with real tactical advantages, in an FPS was successful, FUN, and has since been copied BECAUSE IT WORKS WELL IN A GAME.

"I can't pick up and carry all TEN weapons AT THE SAME TIME. WAAAAAAHHH!!!"
It's called constraint. It makes the game dynamic, not to mention better at persuading the player to "willingly suspend disbelief", which is important in fiction, unless the player is critical in the wrong places and blind in the wrong places.

"I can't cheatsave my way through this FPS like I can most others. WAAAAAAHHH!!!"
It's called constraint. It makes you earn your progress with consistent, competent play, rather than luck and cheatsaves as with Doom-types. Sure the hardware now allows quicksaves, but they should probably not be implemented by a game designer anyway. The Xbox is certainly technologically capable of quicksave functionality, but the game designers wisely chose to make the player play the game without providing a blatant shortcut.

"The PC version was a lousy hack-ed port of the Xbox version."
Again, total BS. Functionally, it was identical to the Xbox version, but with the addition of official online support (surpassing the Xbox version) and some new content (also surpassing the Xbox version). I've played through the game multiple times on both Xbox and PC, and the "look and feel", all the mechanics, and all the minutiae down to level and texture porting were faithful. Except that you get to use a MOUSE AND KEYBOARD in the FPS, which is huge! Yet you ignore this in order to complain!?!

"The performance of the PC version is inexcusible."
I agree. Probably a half-hearted optimization effort, or Microsoft trying to trump up the perceived capabilities of their struggling Xbox, or both. The ball got dropped on this.

"The level design is repetetive."
I'll only concede that on the (deservedly) infamous "Library" level. It's the exception that proves the rule. Trudging around "Alien Corridors" bores you? You say that about Halo but turn around and perjure yourself saying Doom 3 is less repetitive than Halo. Any (non-library) repetitiveness in Halo is motivated by the plot, and the player's role in it. There are 10 levels in Halo, and every one of them offers a different feel from the others. Even Library offers something relatively new to the player, though it's far too long and repetitive. As bad as The Library is, it's about par for FPS games nowadays, and especially at the time it was released for Xbox in 2001 and PC a bit later. Remember: Halo was released on the gaming world only one month after Windows XP itself!

"I got so bored playing it and had to put it down it's so dumb."
Sorry you didn't like the game. For what it's worth, all video games bore me too; that's why I play them. I have played hundreds of games, and they are all so boring and easy and stupid I just can't stand it. I beat them on the hardest difficulty setting, with my eyes shut, in about 45 minutes, and wonder why I took time out from my life as a millionaire playboy to sample their putridness. Seriously; just because you don't like something doesn't mean it's garbage, and saying it's crap when it isn't makes you sound less, and not more in-touch and intelligent. If you're that blind, you wouldn't know a good game if it beat you up in broad daylight.

There's just too much about the game that's done right for any of the mud slung at it to drag it down. Saying you didn't like it is fine; you may legitimately dislike the game. Saying "it'

Re:The bitter PC gamers on Halo

[AbRASiON]

Halo IS over-rated - it's not bad but nothing special - not even close.

AGREED!

[crhylove]

Agreed strongly!! Especially if you consider San Andreas Multi Player, which is INORDINATELY fun, and should be even better with the release of .2.

San Andreas is arguably the greatest game of all time, not just on one platform, either....

rhY

Re:AGREED!

[4D6963]

Don't forget MTA:SA Race and the upcoming MTA Deathmatch. I think when MTA:SA DM and when SA-MP 0.2 will come out (I think they'll both be released at about the same time, which should be no later than next summer) I think MTA will show more potential and quality than SA-MP. At least for now SA-MP is the only one that allows us to get out of our cars, in spite of its numerous bugs and it's advancement far under MTA DM's current betas (but hey, they're not releasing it until the editor's done..). About its bugs, I think that they have a strong impact on who fun it is, meaning it's half as fun as it could be (mainly shooting someone but not harming him although he doesn't cheat, or the poor collision handling of two vehicles in movement)

Re:AGREED!

[crhylove]

I dunno... So far MTA has been total crap, but SAMP has been a blast (though buggy as hell). I'll judge the new releases on their respective merits.... :D

rhY

Re:WoW? WTF?

[C0rinthian]

What do you consider a better MMO and why? Or are you simply trolling?