Aggregate of FAVORITE all-time games lists

Hey guys, if you happen to be a "list-whore", you might find this interesting.

Almost a 1,000 gamers have participated in this All-Time FAVORITE games list so far.
When a gamer makes his/her Top 25 (a Top 10 is also fine), the results are updated in real-time and you can rank any games (as obscure as it can be)!

This list is an aggregate of all gamers lists/opinions, so if you don't like it you can always play around with the demographic filters to see the results from a female perspective or just the people from Portugal (or wherever).

Doom currently ranked 134. Still a pretty good result I guess, considering that most top 10 games are post 2000.

EDIT: before I register - is it possible to just give my 25 points to Doom, or do I have to complete a whole 25 games list? To be honest it would take some time and I have neither time no patience for that... but I'd gladly help Doom if I could choose just that :D

There are already similar websites out there where you vote. So many that I can't even find the specific one I was a part of.

But I guess those aren't owned by Spike TV / MTV.

It would be mildly interesting to see such a list with something like over 100,000 participants and then looking at how older titles fare against currently popular modern titles. Right now the first game in the rankings from my top 20 would be Fallout 2 at rank 84. :P

If there's mostly newer games in the top numbers I will definitely die inside.

It's interesting how when such lists are compiled for movies/music, the concept of "all time classic" is never challenged, e.g. you never see "big names" of the past disappear under heaps of music/movies made in the last decade. This doesn't happen even for more technically-oriented rankings, e.g. "the best cars of all time": you'll regularly see old classics there, too.

Like it or not, video games don't seem to generate the same kind of mainstream "all-time classic" response as does a classic movie, an old song, or even an old car, but they are treated more like clothing and hair fashion: once something goes out of fashion, it's over.

Looking at the games listed there, there's Zelda OoT, Super Mario World, Final Fantasy 7, Shadow of the Colossus, Chrono Trigger in the top20. Those games show up pretty reliably in "top favs" lists; "too mainstream for my blood" people may sneer, but those are old games nonetheless. Sure there are much older games, but video games were still in their infancy. You don't see many people listing the silent Chaplin movies in their favorites, nor do you see that many people naming music from the Greek era as their favorite; and video games are much more complex both in design, in interpretation and in widespread appeal even to this day.

Maes said:

Like it or not, video games don't seem to generate the same kind of mainstream "all-time classic" response as does a classic movie, an old song, or even an old car, but they are treated more like clothing and hair fashion: once something goes out of fashion, it's over.

You can't really compare video games though, since they're so much newer as a form of media. You have to consider the fact that games are still a growing media, and lots of the people voting new titles in lists such as this have never even played NES classics because they were born in late 90's. Just take a look at this, for example, and see how many of the top-selling titles were released in fairly recently: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_video_games#All_platforms
They aren't on that list because they're really that fucking good, they're on that list because they were released during a time when their potential market was so much bigger.

The best way to tell Sonic is a flop is that Sonic 2 did half the sales of Sonic 1. Sonic 3 did a 6th. Yet somehow he's so fondly remembered.

Also looking at games sold for SNES vs games sold for Genesis should put the debate to rest.

Jodwin said:

They aren't on that list because they're really that fucking good, they're on that list because they were released during a time when their potential market was so much bigger.

OK, but again bringing cars into the analogy, even a novice driver dreams of someday having the chance of driving at least one classic supercar -some of which may be made before he was born- even if his daily driver will be a much more recently produced car. After all, even the old car still has 4 wheels, 3 pedals, a steering wheel and a shifting stick.

There's also a lot of cultural bias/references in movies, and cars often appear as status symbols, cool props etc.

OTOH, video games are seen as a frivolous item, like a particular series of e.g. GI Joe action figures. Other than dedicated collectors or nostalgics that used them in their childhood, they have limited appeal to someone belonging to a younger (or older) generation.

Similarly, one cannot claim to be a "music lover" or expect his opinion on music to be even remotely respected by ignoring anything made before he was born.

Such video game lists have all the "weight" of a "What's your favourite star?! <(^_^)>" weekly poll posted in a magazine for teen girls: of course you're only gonna get only recent boy bands or romantic singers in the "charts".

Patrol1985 said:

before I register - is it possible to just give my 25 points to Doom, or do I have to complete a whole 25 games list? To be honest it would take some time and I have neither time no patience for that... but I'd gladly help Doom if I could choose just that :D

No, you don't have to finish your list. Doom will get your 25 pts as soon as you rank it.

Well, to talk about cars specifically, any "Best cars of all time"-lists would be fundamentally flawed since very few people have ever driven enough different cars to have a say on such a poll. Compared to a video game list, you can be fairly sure that very few people will vote for games they've never played on the basis of hearsay or reviews or something else alone.

As for music, it's also a media that's far easier to consume. Maybe you've got a classic rock radio channel on while driving to work and suddenly you've heard a bunch of old songs you had never heard of before. With games, though, you'll have to actively go and buy that ages old FPS game from 1993 instead of something newer and possibly more attractive. And even if accessing games would be easier *cough* you'd still have to spend more time on "tasting" older titles than with music. You can't play Doom on the side while doing homework, now can you?

Papissama said:

No, you don't have to finish your list. Doom will get your 25 pts as soon as you rank it.

Great. May I suggest a small forum game / challenge then? We only need 65 people (I assume there are as many active users here) who will give Doom 25 points, without awarding other games on the list and then Doom can claim the first place :D

"What for" you will ask? For FUN and trolling :D Imagine those guys' faces when they see "some game from 1993" taking the first place, even if only for a brief period of time.

Who's with me? :D

Patrol1985 said:

Great. May I suggest a small forum game / challenge then? We only need 65 people (I assume there are as many active users here) who will give Doom 25 points, without awarding other games on the list and then Doom can claim the first place :D

"What for" you will ask? For FUN and trolling :D Imagine those guys' faces when they see "some game from 1993" taking the first place, even if only for a brief period of time.

Who's with me? :D

That site requires you to post your votes on twitter or facebook. Even if you'd use fake accounts you won't get enough people willing to do that on DW. :P

Jodwin said:

That site requires you to post your votes on twitter or facebook.

No, it doesn't.

If you look at the "Listed in" tab, Doom is listed 1st in the Favorite games of 1993 list already and 10th in the 1st person shooter genre.
http://www.favslist.com/pages/Doom/5722

These kind of lists are always the same and are always equally pointless. They should keep it with "most popular games from last year on this platform" instead of pretending to be all-time favorites.

Generally I find that these lists are completely flooded with console games I've never played and have barely heard of, while the games that I did enjoy are hidden away somewhere in the bottom 5% of the list along with other PC titles.

Now I've signed up for favslist and ha. This is the same site I was thinking of from years ago. But now it has a different name and they retooled it for everything and not just games. I think that I first heard about the site from doomworld, because Doom was #6 or something.

Gez said:

They should keep it with "most popular games from last year on this platform" instead of pretending to be all-time favorites.

And that's what I really liked about a poll I had mentioned in some other thread, which was organized by a (now defunct) Polish gaming magazine. The Internet wasn't popular back then so people actually had to make an effort and send their votes by a traditional mail and, surprise surprise, it was as "legit" as such a list could be. I think the poll was organized somewhere around 2000 and Civilization took the first place with Doom taking the second.

Ok, I did it.

yukib1t said:

Ok, I did it.

Thanks to you, Doom is ranked 106th now :)

yukib1t said:

Ok, I did it.

I did it too and for a few days the obscure games I listed were trending. Plus various versions of Doom are the best PC games. Not a very used site. The old version had a few thousand people.

Jodwin said:

As for music, it's also a media that's far easier to consume. Maybe you've got a classic rock radio channel on while driving to work and suddenly you've heard a bunch of old songs you had never heard of before. With games, though, you'll have to actively go and buy that ages old FPS game from 1993 instead of something newer and possibly more attractive.

Not to mention the effort needed to get an old game to run, DosBoxed, emulated or otherwise.

Order of magnitude more complicated than getting a DVD re-release of a classic movie.

Seems to be missing a few indie games, can't find Gimbal or King Arthur's Gold on there yet. Just bumped Doom and Diablo II up a place.

I believe you can add things that aren't there. For example I added Ian Malcolm from Jurassic Park and Jerec from Dark Forces II for a character list.

Adding bands was a bit of a pain in the arse, had to create new pages for pretty much all of the bands I listen to. I didn't think my taste in music was *that* obscure, heh.

DooMAD said:

Adding bands was a bit of a pain in the arse, had to create new pages for pretty much all of the bands I listen to. I didn't think my taste in music was *that* obscure, heh.

You might be proud of being the page creator of those pages one day :p

My all-time fave 5 are:

1.) Star Wars - Movie Series
2.) DOOM - Videogame Series
3.) Sailor Moon - TV Series
4.) The Prodigy - Music Band
5.) Sonic The Hedgehog - Videogame Series

Clonehunter said:

I believe you can add things that aren't there. For example I added Ian Malcolm from Jurassic Park and Jerec from Dark Forces II for a character list.

I tried to add Sailor Jupiter but she wasn't listed. Infidels!

Let's judge the list of whoever has the last post and tell them what you think the best game in there is and why. Then (hopefully) someone will do the same for you.

I'll start things off with my own list. Be gentle...

870 people have a made their list so far and Mass Effect 2 is in the lead.

>skyrim is 2nd most popular game
casuals detected.