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Christmas Cheer Entertainment Games

30 Greatest Games of 2005 158

Posted by Zonk from the that's-a-lot-of-good-games dept.
Next Generation continues its end-of-year celebration with a treatise on the 30 finest games of the year. From the article: "Some may remember 2005 as a year of financial shortfalls, rising game production costs, depleted Xbox 360 stock, political soap-boxing, or over-exertion in Korean Internet cafes. Forget all that stuff for now. 2005 wasn't a year to be remembered for one great gaming breakthrough or innovation, but it did produce some remarkable products. It was a year marked with some of the best games of the fading generation. "
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30 Greatest Games of 2005 More

30 Greatest Games of 2005

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  • Easier to read single page URL ... (Score:5, Informative)

    by xmas2003 ( 739875 ) * on Friday December 23, 2005 @06:36PM (#14329632) Homepage
    Submission links to the 10 page article - here's the one page printable version [next-gen.biz] "sorted by their genre and release dates (there is no order of merit)."

    Christmas Lights for Celiac Disease [komar.org]

  • And I thought pay-per-impression advertising was dead. Worst article layout ever.
  • And the mirrordot host links back to the next-gen page.
  • And I'm sorry, the fact that Gun didn't even make it into the top 30, when Nintendogs did, is a pretty pathetic summary. Thanks Next-Biz for confirming that I should never read your video game reviews again.
    • I'll second that.

    • Re:Gun? (Score:5, Informative)

      by iapetus ( 24050 ) on Friday December 23, 2005 @07:35PM (#14329952) Homepage
      Checking on gamerankings.com, Gun received an average of 80% or so in reviews across all platforms (the shoddy XBox 360 port being about 5 percentage points below that). Nintendogs received an average of 85%.

      Just because you don't like a game (and I personally have no intention of buying Nintendogs) doesn't mean it's not good.
      • Except isn't that the point of a review? You read opinions from other people to see what they thought of the game.

        • Re:Gun? (Score:4, Interesting)

          by iapetus ( 24050 ) on Friday December 23, 2005 @08:42PM (#14330225) Homepage
          And, in the case of a good review, why they thought it. And that's why numerical scores will always be the bane of good videogame journalism.

          But there's no such thing as a 'definitive' review - you see games getting a wide range of scores because of the personal preference of the reviewer. As always, the best thing you can do is find a reviewer whose personal tastes match yours.

          That's moving away from the point I was making, though. There are games that get a lot of acclaim (critically and popularly) that you may not rate as highly. I know there are for me - Halo and Panzer Dragoon Saga probably being the biggest names among them. That doesn't mean that those games don't belong in a list of good games. Nor does it mean that games I prefer to them should be ranked more highly. I'll bow to popular opinion and accept that these are good games that I did not like personally.

          In this case, a game which had better reviews than one that the original poster enjoyed made it into the top-30 list. That doesn't invalidate the list in any way. Even if the 'worse' game according to the average review score had made it in it wouldn't invalidate it - it's all a matter of personal preference anyway.

          And like it or not, Nintendogs was almost certainly a more important game than Gun this year. It spurred huge hardware sales because it appealed to a different demographic than more traditional games.

    • Re:Gun? (Score:3, Informative)

      by Burpmaster ( 598437 )

      Um, take a closer look and then don't overreact. They broke thier list down into genres and came up with three games for each genre. If you think Gun belongs on the list, then it would have to be better than one of the three games in the FPS category. Is it better than Brothers in Arms, Battlefield 2, or F.E.A.R.? Alternatively, if you categorize it as Action/Adventure, it has to be better than Resident Evil 4, God of War, or Shadow of the Colossus.

      For the "other" category, they listed six titles. If Ninte

    • And I'm sorry, the fact that Gun didn't even make it into the top 30, when Nintendogs did, is a pretty pathetic summary.

      Aw, come on. Gun is a neat game, but it's not groundbreaking in any way. It wouldn't be wrong to put it into a Top-X-List, but it isn't wrong to leave it out, either.

      Nintendogs, on the other hand, single-handedly proved that the DS is more than just a gimmick, sold hundreds of thousands of consoles, showed that games can be successfull outside the hardcore gaming market and pretty much

      • Nintendogs, on the other hand, single-handedly proved that the DS is more than just a gimmick

        I disagree. At best, all it did was prove that a gimmick is enough to sell DSes. It's unfortunate, because I really rather enjoy my DS, but an overhyped Tomagatchi has nothing to do with that.
        • "an overhyped Tomagatchi"

          If I had to guess, I'd say you don't own the game. And based on your spelling, I'd say you've never owned a Tamagotchi, either.

          Either way, if you think Nintendogs is nothing but an overhyped Tamagotchi, surely you can see that Gun is nothing more than a cheap westernized copy of GTA, right?

          • If I had to guess, I'd say you don't own the game.

            Correct. I have a real dog and cat to play with (Imagine my shock that a full grown cat would actually like playing with its owner!).

            2 minutes with Nintendogs on the display unit was enough to make me wonder about people all over again.

            And based on your spelling, I'd say you've never owned a Tamagotchi, either.

            Not the "official" ones, no. I had one of the Digimons, that you could connect with the other ones and fight it out. :)

            Either way, if you think Ninten

            • 2 minutes with Nintendogs on the display unit was enough to make me wonder about people all over again.

              Wouldn't you agree that dismissing a game after playing it for 2 minutes - especially a game which got an average rating of 85% (per gamerankings [gamerankings.com]) - could be just a tad premature?

              Look, you can't possibly have seen more than a few % of the game after playing it for 2 minutes, and that's not even taking into account that the whole idea of Nintendogs is that you buy, name, train and play with your own dog

              • Wouldn't you agree that dismissing a game after playing it for 2 minutes

                Nope. If the game bored me after two minutes, then I'd say buying it would be a bit foolish.

                especially a game which got an average rating of 85% (per gamerankings) - could be just a tad premature?

                Hardly. Gamerankings is an aggregation of game rags' reviews, which have about nothing to do with my buying decisions. I'm sure as hell not going to value gamerankings over the fact that the game bored me. Hell, The Sims got 89% on GR, and that

                • Wouldn't you agree that dismissing a game after playing it for 2 minutes

                  Nope. If the game bored me after two minutes, then I'd say buying it would be a bit foolish.

                  Well. I don't know how to put this without insulting you, but really... dismissing a game - any game - after two minutes of playtime is just stupid.

                  Especially if it's a game like Nintendogs. When playing Nintendogs for two minutes, you either didn't get to the real game (as buying a dog takes quite a bit more than two minutes) or you pla

                  • Especially if it's a game like Nintendogs. When playing Nintendogs for two minutes, you either didn't get to the real game (as buying a dog takes quite a bit more than two minutes) or you played with a dog somebody else "set up", which makes the whole thing pretty pointless to begin with as the dog couldn't possibly have been able to recognize your voice.

                    Or I just realized that the concept was boring and a waste of my time. A lot of times it doesn't take that long. Had the same experience with the abortion

                    • Or I just realized that the concept was boring and a waste of my time.

                      Oh well, I think it's pointless to discuss this particular idea any further. If you think that you can judge a universally acclaimed game like Nintendogs after playing it for two minutes on a system somebody else set up, more power to you. The rest of the world pretty much disagrees, but whatever floats your boat.

                      That's nice, but it doesn't change the fact that all magazines seem to agree that this game is better than most other

                    • The people writing the reviews usually don't even know if the studies involved with the games they're reviewing have bought ads in the mag, until the actually read the mag after it goes to print.

                      No, but they're sure to know whether, say, Bioware is buying ads. Rip on NWN enough, and the result is predictable.

                      But you're just proving what I said. Lunar is a bad game. They wrote a bad review and gave it a rating which is below most of their ratings. So the reviewing process works.

                      No, they gave it a review that

                    • No, but they're sure to know whether, say, Bioware is buying ads. Rip on NWN enough, and the result is predictable.

                      Look, if you're claiming that ads influence game ratings at major sites or magazines, you need a bit more than "the results are predictable". Do you have any evidence at all?

                      But you're just proving what I said. Lunar is a bad game. They wrote a bad review and gave it a rating which is below most of their ratings. So the reviewing process works.

                      No, they gave it a review that said es

  • Best Games of 2005 but not released in 2005 (Score:5, Interesting)

    by lorelorn ( 869271 ) on Friday December 23, 2005 @06:47PM (#14329697)
    None of my favourite games of this year were actually released in this year, and I'm pretty sure I'm not alone.

    2005 was not an especially good year for PC games, with most of the attention on sequels that you can play in your sleep they are so similar to what is already out there. Consoles and portables got some innovative titles, while PC gamers get left with sequels that play the same, but have a hard time running on modern hardware (I'm looking at you, Civ 4).

    Rome: Total War, Diablo 2, UT2k4, and Ranarama (old game) took most of my attention this year, plus multiplayer Call of Duty. Nothing came out this year to take my attention away from games I was already playing.

    • News to me, seems to run very well on my system and it's fairly modern, but only last couple of years. P4 2.4ghz and a Radeon 9800 Pro and it seems to run quite well with all details maxed. Nothing stellar compared to what you can get these days, in fact I'm looking at upgrading it soon.

      Speaking of good sequals, Pirates is wonderful. Same basic game as the first two, but hell, I would still play Pirates Gold in DOSBox sometimes and this is a wonderful update.
      • Seconded. AMD64 3000+ and a 6600GT, runs fine. Both sites are slasdotted, so it's hard to say, but I know of a LOT of people that liked nintendogs. Perhaps they weren't all hardcore gamers (I bet *I* for one, would HATE nintendogs), but that doesn't make them not great. On the other hand, one of the only reasons that it was so popular was because it pretty much came stock with any DS purchase. Then again, perhaps that's why the DS was so popular... It's hard to say.
    • Ranarama! haha brilliant! Haven't played that since my old Amstrad 6128 packed in. emu/rom site here i come!

    • Re:Best Games of 2005 but not released in 2005 (Score:5, Informative)

      by mj_1903 ( 570130 ) on Friday December 23, 2005 @07:23PM (#14329907)
      Civ 4 patch 1.52 was released yesterday. It fixes many of the hardware problems associated with the original release and has much improved performance.
    • I bought Civ 4 for about $55. I have a generic 128 MB video card in my game machine, which should be enough for any modern development... especially a not-real time, turn-based game. Civ 4 told me that I needed to buy a card that was Brand X or Brand Y. Those cards run about $150. What a load of shit. Apparently, kids who program commercial software these days know *nothing* about optimization. It's all bloat. Suffice to say, only an idiot will pay $150 for a video card to play one $55 game. The gam
      • Apparently, kids who post on Slashdot these days know *nothing* about looking around and purchasing a $50 FX5200 card with 128MB, which runs it just fine.

      • Re:Civ 4 got returned by me (Score:5, Interesting)

        by Dun Malg ( 230075 ) on Friday December 23, 2005 @09:25PM (#14330361) Homepage
        I have a generic 128 MB video card in my game machine, which should be enough for any modern development.

        128MB should be enough? Who says? I upgraded from 128 to 256 two years ago, for less than $100, and my Asus GeForce FX 5700 runs Civ4 just fine. The thing about progress is that it depends upon things progressing. Among other things this means that at some point your video card is going to need to be replaced with something newer. Civ4 is just the first of many games that you won't be able to play. You just gotta accept that your video card is Old News. An FX5700 is like fifty bucks on ebay. Suck it up and upgrade like a man.

      • Re:Civ 4 got returned by me (Score:2, Interesting)

        by Anonymous Coward
        First, a 128mb card isn't that much. The primary reason, however, that games like Civ IV (which I love) have the "requires ATI radeon 7500 or NVIDiA Geforce 2 or better" is because those card series support the necessary features, through inclusion of DirectX and/or OpenGL versions required at the card level. Also note, whenever a game requires "ATI radeon whatever or NVIDIA GeForce whatever or better" it doesn't mean the actual card itself was assembled and designed in final form by that company. For insta
    • while PC gamers get left with sequels that play the same, but have a hard time running on modern hardware (I'm looking at you, Civ 4).

      Or, more specifically, run like a quad amputee through frozen molasses on double the reccommended system requirements.

    • Civ4 runs great on my latitude D800 (Pentium M 1.6, 1GB Ram, 7200RPM drive, Geforce 4go 32MB). This isn't even modern, it's old now:) Well, old from a Can't upgrade RAM or Video card without some uber-bucks.

  • Civilization IV - Released Way Too Eearly!! (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Pavan_Gupta ( 624567 ) <`pg8p' `at' `virginia.edu'> on Friday December 23, 2005 @06:49PM (#14329707)
    So, here I am, a user of Civilization IV (the highly acclaimed game from Firaxis), and I can tell you that you do NOT want to buy this game right now. The game was clearly released before the holiday season to take advantage of gullible users (hmph, me.. =\) who needed to spend their hard earned cash on a game that was only half developed.

    Civfanatics.com is an extremely good resource for people crazy about Civilization IV, and you can immediately see there are some serious problems with the game. There have already been two patches (25 megs and 45 megs a pop) in the first couple months of the release, and things are still terrible with the game. Basically, the memory usages generally runs in the territory of unbelievable (600-800 megs), with the game basically unplayable after a certain point. You don't actually experience some of the most interesting parts of the game because things are just that amazingly slow.

    But don't take my word for it, read the posts on civfanatics.com.

    This is just another reason why corporations bastardize the faith that users have in them. Firaxis, shame on you.
    • i've been playing since even before the first patch, and have never had any problems--even in the late game. Things get slightly slower, but it's barely noticable. ANd this is on a 3 year old 2 GHz computer with 1 gig of RAM. My brother plays on an ever older/shittier computer, and his gameplay is fine as long as he keeps the graphics toned down.
    • Massive bonuses for meeting release date (something like doubling your salary I hear) certainly can't be to blame.

    • What's so unbelivable about the RAM usage? (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Sycraft-fu ( 314770 ) on Friday December 23, 2005 @07:00PM (#14329782)
      Why not? RAM is cheap these days. Last I checked, it was like $80 for 1GB of quality, Corsair, lifetime warantee DDR2 RAM. It's not an expensive component. Also Civ 4 is hardly unique in needing lots of RAM. Most MMORPGs really need a gig to work well. World of Warcraft will technicly function with 256MB, but is near unplayable, with 512MB it works ok but lags, with 1GB it's nice and smooth. Starwars Galaxies is about the same.

      I've played all the way through a few games on my system and it works great. It gets slow in the end but still easily playable and no slower than the other Civs. Hell, I remember waiting 5-10 minutes for my computer to finish calculating all the AI turns on Civ 2 per turn late in the game.

      • RAM (Score:2)

        by snuf23 ( 182335 )
        Yeah I just said the hell with it and dropped 2 more gigs in my system for a total of 3. Overkill? Well I play World of Warcraft a lot AND I like to multitask, so I typically have web browsers and a newsreader loaded at the same time. This would work on a 1GB system but alt-tabbing to the desktop took a couple minutes to swap everything around. Now it takes a second.
        I've found Battlefield 2 to be a crazy RAM hog as well, and it performs much better with over a gig of RAM.

        • Re:RAM (Score:5, Insightful)

          by Sycraft-fu ( 314770 ) on Friday December 23, 2005 @07:25PM (#14329911)
          I have 2GB in mine since I do work with modern samplers and, damn, talk about RAM hogs. But when you have single instruments that are 3GB in total (yes, really) what do you expect? At any rate I've found that many performance complaints I hear just don't apply on my system, and I have a sneaking suspicion having lots of RAM is a big part of it.

          In fact I've ALWAYS liked to go overkill on the RAM on my computers. I generally seem to have about double what you'd find in a "high end" box, despite the rest of my components being older. Perhaps because of that, I find that I don't need to upgrade my CPU all that often.

          I think the problem is that computer makers tend to skimp on RAM since it's not a stat most people think about. They are worried about CPU speed and maybe HD space, but to hell with RAM. Well, since modern OSes can deal with low RAM fine (though slowly) peoiple don't realise it could be better.

          For comptuers these days I'd say 512MB minimum for office type work, 1GB minimum for games, and 2GB if you want to be nice n' safe. Given that 2GB is only like $180, less than most new graphics cards, I think it's hard to justify having a blazing dual core CPU, a new video card, and then starving your system RAM-wise.
          • Our minimum for office machines is 1GB when we order new units. The cost difference between 512MB (that would have to be upgraded within a year) and a full 1GB is negligible. My almost 4-year-old laptop has 1GB (which tells you how long we've standardized on 1GB minimum).

            My game machine has 2GB and runs Civ4 just fine (even on large/huge maps). Civ4 is eating up 800MB on those maps, so if you're trying to play huge maps with less then 1GB, you're shooting yourself in the foot.

      • $80 of RAM just to move squares around a grid? What a piss-take.
      • Lucky you. I happen to have made the extreme mistake of purchasing a Dell three years ago which uses the expensive RDRAM variety because they chose the wrong side in the RDRAM versus DDR2 battle at the time. Cost me $200 for two 256 MB sticks when I wanted to upgrade recently. I was lucky to find anyone that still sold it.

        So I suppose my point is that not everyone has the luxury of being able to upgrade their RAM so inexpensively.

    • Re:Civilization IV - Released Way Too Eearly!! (Score:5, Funny)

      by chris_eineke ( 634570 ) on Friday December 23, 2005 @07:01PM (#14329790) Homepage Journal
      Looks like the EA model of development (release early, release often, around Christmas) is finally catching on to the developer world.
      • Blame it on the PHB's. Since they don't really care or understand the process fully, it's the money that matters. Since people are inherently more likely to purchase ANYTHING at Christmas as they feel pressured, guilted, and duped into doing so, it is also the best time to release sub-par games. Unfortunately this is very unlikely to change until Christmas loses its recently obtained consumerist nature. Stores don't really care what you buy, so long as you buy, buy, buy, and it's been the mentality for
    • Just remember that this is not everyone. In fact, most problems lies with older computers, laptops and some(most?) ATI cards. Me and my friends had absolutely no problems with the game. In fact, I haven't patched the game yet with either patches.

      After following tons of game releases in the last 2-3 years, there is AWALYS a backlash about compatibilities and other problems outside of the game itself. There are tons of people posting that games doesn't work, but you have to take that with a grain of salt, sin

    • Alpha Centauri is still better (Score:4, Insightful)

      by vitalyb ( 752663 ) on Friday December 23, 2005 @07:19PM (#14329890) Homepage
      I played Civ4 for a bit and found it quite enjoyable, BUT merely because it got another step closer to the perfection of SMAC (Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri) [gamerankings.com] .

      With each new Civilization game they add "new" features that were in 1999 in SMAC: Borders, technology quotes, complex diplomacy, UN.

      Everything was done before and better and it is really a sad year when Civ4 gets picked by IGn as game of the year.

      I just wish Brian Reynolds would do another SMAC2 :(.
    • Amazon.com user ratings are very poor too. Civ4 is total crap. Don't buy it! I sold my 'Collector's Edition' copy on eBay because the store wouldn't take it back... it's that bad. I've been playing Civ since it came out. This was a huge rip-off.

    • I agree, but... (Score:5, Interesting)

      by mister_llah ( 891540 ) on Friday December 23, 2005 @07:29PM (#14329925) Homepage Journal
      I agree, the RAM usage is insane, and if you play with a Huge map, you can forget about ever reaching the end of the game without a few gigs of RAM to play with....

      However, it wouldn't be so upsetting if this game wasn't so well done in every other aspect.

      Simply amazing. If they had put the extra months into it, this wouldn't be a 9.0, the game would be as close to 10 as I think we're capable of reaching as imperfect beings...

      Flaws aside, I still play it.
      • However, it wouldn't be so upsetting if this game wasn't so well done in every other aspect.

        Simply amazing. If they had put the extra months into it, this wouldn't be a 9.0, the game would be as close to 10 as I think we're capable of reaching as imperfect beings...

        The interface still needs work.

        - You can't esc -> quit until end of turn, a major pain.
        - You can't *easily* set your custom game settings as a preference.
        - I haven't figured out how to disable the 'clouds' layer when zooming far above the worl
    • If you're able to get the game to run (that's a big if), and then keep it running, you'll find that it's not that big of an improvement over previous civs when it comes to game play. I have a brand new computer with a top-notch ATI card that runs _every_ game I throw at it... except civ4.
    • It runs fine on my year and a half old laptop quite well, although any map size above standard makes the game does run at a crawl. For whatever reason I haven't been having the stability issues a lot of people have been having, so I can't really comment. But as far as gameplay itself goes, I consider it to be almost as good as my favorite game of all time, Alpha Centuri, and I considered CivIII to be a travesty. The interface has be streamlined incredibly, with all sorts of game information at your fingerti
    • the memory usages generally runs in the territory of unbelievable (600-800 megs)

      I haven't put together a PC since 2001 with less than a gig of ram. I find more and more "off the shelf" companies using 512 as a standard for their home user machines. Gamers know to expect a bit of a rougher ride. This isn't really unreasonable. I normally run this on my HP ZD7260 with a gig of ram on a regular basis with no real problems.

      Should they have held off longer? The patches do make it look bad, I sympathise, but i
    • I still have not even patched with any patches yet, and I have ran it for as long as 12 hrs. in one stretch with no problems/slowdowns. Using athlon 1800 ( I think @1.4GhZ), 512 MB PC2100 RAM, nVidia 5200 SE 128 MB @ 8X AGP, 80 GB PATA 100 HDD, Win XP Pro SP2, with Avast Anti-virus and Spybot SD "teatimer" running in background. I would suggest maybe checking msconfig to see what all services and start-up app's you have going- some of the default services can really bog a default install down quite a bit. I

  • Duke Nukem Forever (Score:3, Funny)

    by DiGG3r ( 824623 ) on Friday December 23, 2005 @06:53PM (#14329727)
    Best Game of The Year 2050.

  • 30 good games? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by guaigean ( 867316 ) on Friday December 23, 2005 @06:58PM (#14329764)
    I imagine this would have been a difficult task to list, as I can't even imagine 10 games in the last year that even impressed me. Plenty of clones, but very little real innovation. Overall it seems like the game industry is closely mimicking the movie industry; make sequels and avoid risk.

  • Already Slashdotted... (Score:5, Informative)

    by NickNiel ( 456061 ) on Friday December 23, 2005 @07:10PM (#14329843)
    Here's text only version - very slow site:

    30 Greatest Games of 2005

    By Kris Graft
    Let's end the year on a positive note. Next-Gen.Biz has picked through the year's best games, by genre, and come up with the 30 stand-outs. You know, these past 12 months really did host some very fine games.---
    Make sure you start your working day with Next-Gen.Biz - the essential read for game industry professionals.
    ---

    ImageSome may remember 2005 as a year of financial shortfalls, rising game production costs, depleted Xbox 360 stock, political soap-boxing, or over-exertion in Korean Internet cafes.

    Forget all that stuff for now. 2005 wasn't a year to be remembered for one great gaming breakthrough or innovation, but it did produce some remarkable products. It was a year marked with some of the best games of the fading generation.

    Here are 30 of the year's best games, sorted by their genre and release dates (there is no order of merit). Let the hatemail flow like the black blood of a colossus.

    Note: This list is for mainstream console platforms, handhelds and commercial PC. We'll be looking at the best in mobile and 'casual' entertainment in a separate feature.

    Action/Adventure

    2005 was a banner year for the action adventure genre. It started out with a huge bloody bang, the spring season ushered in a tormented Greek soul, and fall introduced some truly colossal characters.

    Resident Evil 4
    Publisher: Capcom
    Developer: Capcom
    GC: Jan 11, 05; PS2: Oct 25, 05

    Resident Evil 4 revitalized the stagnant franchise with quicker enemies, more responsive controls and an improved over-the-shoulder camera. It took what we love about the franchise and improved on it, doing away with what we hate in the process.

    God of War
    Publisher: SCEA
    Developer: Sony Santa Monica
    PS2: Mar 22, 05

    Incog's God of War sets the standard for action games, period. With an excellent story, fluid and brutal fighting system, lovely enemies and great visuals, God of War will be remembered many years after '05.

    Image Shadow of the Colossus
    Publisher: SCEA
    Developer: SCEI
    PS2: Oct 18, 05

    Superb boss battles defined Shadow of the Colossus. Forget Bowser and Mother Brain, SotC's bosses are the most insanely huge and powerful enemies you'll encounter. Just stop with the comparisons to Ico. SotC is a stellar game on its own merit.

    Other notable entries in action adventure this year are Splinter Cell Chaos Theory, Ninja Gaiden Black and The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap.

    Role-Playing Games

    The year in RPGs was respectable. Bioware tried its hand at the martial arts with excellent results, a new quality MMORPG arrived with no subscription costs, and American gamers are reminded why traditional Japanese RPGs can still show the way.

    Jade Empire
    Publisher: Microsoft Game Studios
    Developer: Bioware
    Xbox: Apr 12, 05

    From a galaxy far, far away to mystical ancient China, Bioware has proven that its got major RPG chops. Jade Empire combines action and RPG elements and manages to give both aspects due respect. Bioware knows kung fu, and delivered the best RPG on Xbox this year.

    Guild Wars
    Publisher: NCsoft
    Developer: ArenaNet
    PC: Apr 26, 05

    Guild Wars gives you much more than what you pay for, which is nothing. Outside of the initial retail cost of the game, there are no monthly fees for the MMORPG. Guild Wars boasts combat that's actually fun, great graphics and entertaining online play.

    Dragon Quest VIII: Journey of the Cursed King
    Publisher: Square Enix
    Developer: Level-5
    PS2: Nov 15, 05

    Dragon Quest VIII is the latest title from the developers of the Dark Cloud series. The latest game got the full Level-5 treatment with an enamoring presentation, accessible and fun combat, a good story, and dozens of hours of gameplay.

    Other notable entries in RPGs this year are X-Men Legends II, Freedom Force vs. The Third Reich and Digital Devil Saga II.

    First-Pers
    • I haven't played all the games on the list (only console I own is an N64), but I can comment on a decent amount of them.

      Freedom Force vs. The Third Reich
      A fairly good sequel using the original engine (graphics aren't much better than FF). I liked this game and played it to completion, but its not as good as the first one. It didn't add very many new characters to the freedom force, and none of them were introduced using the storyline (they would just show up as available for hire). If you haven't played Fre
  • Why does this story get the Christmas tree?
    NetBSD v3.0 is my early Christmas present.
  • then in 2007 top 100
    then 2008 top 250 games

    Is it just me or does the top 30 games just seem a bit much.
    Pick the top 5 or 10 even but 30 ?
    What is is do they get paid by the game ?
    • They only picked a few games in each genre, which works out because the one article can work for people who only play a few genres. A lot of people (myself included) will probably have time and a bit of extra cash this time of year to play a few new games. It's pretty annoying when you look at list thinking of getting some pointers on games to pick up and 8 of the 10 games are from genres you don't care about (for example, most lists tend to be heavy on FPS, Racing and Sports games. Since I do not play a
    • No, these are the thirty GREATEST games of all year!! I mean, that's gotta mean they are damn good. I know I plan on spending $49.99 * 30 this Christmas!
    • To me it screams "we're too terrified to make a decision, so here's some of the top sellers for you to discuss. At least we'll get a /. hit out of it"

  • from the that's-a-little-bit-of-overkill dept (Score:5, Insightful)

    by schabot ( 941087 ) <s,chabot&gmail,com> on Friday December 23, 2005 @07:26PM (#14329916) Homepage
    Next Generation continues its end-of-year celebration with a treatise on the 30 finest games of the year.

    Come on now. Treatise?

    That is not a treatise, that is an article. These [amazon.com] are [amazon.com] treatises [amazon.com].

    treatise
    a systematic exposition or argument in writing including a methodical discussion of the facts and principles involved and conclusions reached


    I wouldn't call a list of video games a systematic exposition.

  • Guild Wars... (Score:3, Informative)

    by mister_llah ( 891540 ) on Friday December 23, 2005 @07:34PM (#14329948) Homepage Journal
    Guild Wars was alright but as a MMORPG, I have to say, it was lacking in replayability in the extreme. Diablo 2 at least had random levels and such (and I classify the game as a 'MMORPG' insofar as Diablo 2 was... since it was essentially Diablo 2 without random levels, a much less impressive magic item system, and completely BEAUTIFUL graphics...) ... but once you get through once, it's just not fun.

    To be honest, what makes it not fun is the MMORPG aspect... there is no single player, and a lot of the players are the sort you'd expect to find in this sort of game... idiotic kids who are just out for themselves... the game accounts for it by making treasure specific to random players in the party (no one else can pick it up) ... but you can lure agg mobs (to use MUD terminology), exit once you are in the mission (especially annoying in the middle of a mission) ... and the other people who have to restart the mission. This is EXCEPTIONALLY annoying when people decide to grief play on missions that take 30 minutes to do. ... I played it for a couple of months... and I had a griefer every other day, sometimes more, sometimes less... it really made the game undesirable, to me, on top of the fact the replayability was null...

  • Also, Phantom Dust (Score:3, Funny)

    by mister_llah ( 891540 ) on Friday December 23, 2005 @07:46PM (#14330006) Homepage Journal
    "Immersive environments", it's a BLOODY CARD GAME for crying out loud... Guild Wars, that's immersive... playing with cards, not immersive.
    • I'd mention the fact that they classified Phantom Dust as Strategy and Guild Wars as Role Playing so you can't really make a comparison between them, but then I'd come off as a troll.

      Did you even play Phantom Dust, because it really did have an immersive universe.

  • out of step (Score:4, Interesting)

    by spoonyfork ( 23307 ) <spoonyfork@NosPAm.gmail.com> on Friday December 23, 2005 @07:59PM (#14330064) Journal

    I've been playing games since the old 8bit Nintendos. I was that college kid in the early 90's pulling all-nighters on a MUD. However today I don't consider myself a "gamer" but I do spend multiple hours a week playing some sort of game on the Windows compy or PS2. I find it interesting that of all the games I've played this year and have enjoyed very much.. none of them are on that list. That isn't to say I didn't play any of those or that they aren't any good to begin with. I just find it interesting when I'm that far out of sync with a popular culture market. It warms my heart in a certain south of market way. :)

    Happy War on Christmas everyone!

  • And in the UK we're still waiting...... (Score:3)

    by MrBandersnatch ( 544818 ) on Friday December 23, 2005 @08:00PM (#14330070)
    Shadow of Colossus and We Love Katamari would possily have gained my vote except THEY ARNT OUT IN THE UK YET!!

    I SERIOUSLY hope that the PS3 and Rev arnt region coded since having to wait forever for releases from other territories really IS rediculous. Whats worse is quite a few really good titles never make it over here; and for the bad titles, it would increase their sales. My 8 year old seriously wanted the Neopets game but Santa has had to tell him no becase daddy was a good little consumer and never chipped his PS2...come to think about it though daddy hasnt got a PSP because he was ***** off at Sony trying to ban the import so they could rise the price a few quid (*****).

    Its been a terrible year for games though with very little managing to grab my attention (Guild Wars and Day of Defeat has been about it) and I in fact have spent more time retrogaming on my X-arcade (Magic Drop 3 rocks!!!).

    Cant wait for next year where the best game is going to be watching Sony and Microsoft go WTF as the Rev outsells them both ;)

  • No Meteos? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by MilenCent ( 219397 ) <(johnwh) (at) (gmail.com)> on Friday December 23, 2005 @08:17PM (#14330142) Homepage
    Where's Meteos, aka The DS Lumines? Harsh.

    Ah well, at least Advance Wars DS did get mentioned. The time we've put in on that is just surreal. Once upon a time it took me 55 hours to finish FFIII/VI with all subquests completed. The game clock on the history screen on my copy of AWDS currently reads 180 hours. That's split between two people, true, but we easily put in five times as long on AW2. That's some good gameplay!

  • There were 30 great games in 2005? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by gweihir ( 88907 ) on Friday December 23, 2005 @09:03PM (#14330293)
    I honestly did not notice. And I observe what gets published. If there were 30 great games in 2005 I am sure I would have noticed more than 4 or 5 of them....

  • We need more games like... (Score:1, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward
    this: http://www.monkkonen.net/notrium.php [monkkonen.net]

    Small, free, interesting and original.
  • ...ome of the best games of the fading generation.

    What does that mean? Is this yet another "PC is dead" barbs?

    /K

  • Other thing it fails to mention. (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Lumpy ( 12016 ) on Friday December 23, 2005 @11:36PM (#14330856) Homepage
    Nintendo DS's are flying off the shelves. It's damn hard to find any right now. but everyone has a Pile of PSP's and are not moving.

    Why? Granted The screen and overall look of the PSP is damn sexy. But when I can buy 2 DS's for the price of 1 PSP and the games seem to be going at the same rate.... (I can buy 2 DS games for the price of 1 PSP game) Guess which one the parents are grabbing for the kiddies. And yes, the chat function is highly desireable to kids... something that the PSP should have had in some fashon.

    MarioKart DS is flat out super fun. (yes I am playing my kids toy before christmas... so shoot me!) and the fact that someone else can play me on the same game cart without them having it is absolutely killer and makes the PSP look like crap right there. (Sony would have NEVER allowed such abilities in the PSP.)

    I do believe that nintendogs will make people dumber, but it's cute for kids and that is what sells usually. I personally cant wait for Super Monkeyball DS.

    To heck with the top games, let's talk top gaming platforms.
    • and the fact that someone else can play me on the same game cart without them having it is absolutely killer and makes the PSP look like crap right there. (Sony would have NEVER allowed such abilities in the PSP.)

      Erm..they did. It's called "Game Sharing", and as a game example, Burnout: Legends uses it. I understand the DS is really nice, and that we hate Sony for the rootkit, but at least give them the small things they DO include that are nice.
    • PSP Homebrew, while illegal in a sense, allows me to play the entire GoodSNES collection of 6000+ SNES games, along with NES, Genesis, Gameboy, and Gameboy Color games, on the go.

      That feature alone was worth the $250 out of my pocket and made the PSP inestimably more valuable than the DS.

  • I know Linux is a leper with this crowd... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Hosiah ( 849792 ) on Saturday December 24, 2005 @03:04AM (#14331387)
    But something happened for the first time this year: A Linux game impressed me. Because I downloaded the http://wolvix.org/ [wolvix.org] Wolvix Gaming Edition CD, and then later installed the http://www.pygame.org/news.html [pygame.org] pygame library on Mandriva so I could run some of the games I'd been introduced to. While Linux gaming *still* isn't where it should be, these two elements this year show a strong sprint to bring up the rear, at least. I am especially impressed with how smooth the pygame apps run, and how incredibly easy it is to program in given the alternative of running up your own in C++. Be interresting to see where it is in five years.

  • GT4, anyone? (Score:2, Funny)

    by rbinns ( 849119 )
    So Gran Turismo 4 (released March 05) does not make this list? I think this game was extremely well done and should be considered at least on par if not better than Forza. Maybe this game was on the 04 or 03 list and I missed it (release delays).

    • Re:GT4, anyone? (Score:2, Informative)

      by bleaknik ( 780571 )
      GT4 seemed like just another rehash of the series to me. Don't get me wrong, graphics were excellent for the PS2, and the controls were tight, but I didn't see much in terms of improvement over the previous incarnations...

      But then again...I can't say Forza was that great of a game either...

      What I do know... is that Mario Kart DS rocks, and next gen got one title right anyway!

    • Re:GT4, anyone? (Score:3, Informative)

      by Mitaphane ( 96828 )
      *ahem* read the article again. It WAS considered...

      Other notable entries in the driving genre this year include Gran Turismo 4, Project Gotham Racing 3 and Wipeout Pure.

      I too found it strange that GT4 didn't make the list. But I have yet to play it or its contemporaries so I can't say whether or not the other games deserve the title more or not.

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