i was browsing around the internet and came across some guys that made a list of their top 20, so i thought to myself.. "i know what my top couple games are.. but what are all my top favorite games of all time.. there are so many games that i've played over the past 20 years.. could i possibly remember them all?".. well i think i have, and i assembled a list that i think is a perfect representation of my top 20 games of all time..

you may notice that my list is 21 games, and not 20.. well, after making my list of games i forgot about Gran Turismo, so i had to add it in there somewhere and i just couldn't knock off my 20th game.. i'm sure i'm missing some games too.. anyways...

21. Ultima Online: The Second Age - Origins / PC / 1998

i just couldn't bump it off the list.. it's the first MMORPG i played, and i loved it quite a bit, even though all i did was mine ore north of britania all day long, and then occasionally go on adventures. i had some great times, playing with my friends from art college, although i never got into PK'ing people as much as they did.. one time they came back with a house deed. oh man, a few moments i felt bad for that poor schmuch eager to make his home amogst the forest.. but that went away when we made that home our home ^_^.

20. Fzero GX - Sega/Nintendo / Gamecube / 2003

Racing has always been a favorite genre of mine.. thanks to wipeout and gran turismo.. although, for me, that genre was brought by games like Need for Speed and Test Drive.. games based on the action aspect of racing, rather than depth. although Fzero is similar to NFS and TD, the action, graphics and enviroment add to atmosphere and topped with excellent music ^_^. Fzero GX brought life back into the sub genre of futuristic racing where Wipeout Fusion had failed..

I loved this game from the very start, but it wasn't a soft love.. this game had such learning cliff, must people never played it for too long because they couldn't get anywhere in it. Even though i failed numerous times, i had a blast.. so i kept getting better, inch by inch passing the games little tests. This was a game you had to work at, and i loved every minute.. even the times i couldn't withstand how pissed i was for getting knocked off the course at the very end of a grand prix. ^_^

19. Ikaruga - Treasure / Gamecube ver. / 2003

Another game that was tough as nails.. One that you had to work at and understand in order to play it to the best of your ability.. It a beautiful mix of complexity and chaos, where patterns exist, and deciphering the patterns is just the first part of learning the game..

The first time i played this game was thanks to #five, who burned it for the dreamcast. tough as hell.. when the 'ol spamm house played this game, we couldn't get past stage 2. although it wasn't until i played it during the christmas break on the gamecube that i really got into it, as i did just a little better than i remember.. stu and i played the game the whole weekend trying to get just a little bit further, and a little bit further.. we were hooked ^_^.

18. Megaman 2 - Capcom / NES / 1989

this was the first megaman i played.. and also the first megaman i beat.. although i never owned it, i rented it on at least 4 seperate occasions.. the whole robot theme fighting other robots appealed to my nerd nature, and i fell in love ^_^.

17. Rez - Sega/UGA / Playstation 2 ver. / 2002

earlier on in the decade, i used to check NCSX everyday to learn of imports, and other various games of the japanese nature.. This game showed up one day, and i had no idea what it was.. it came out in japan for $80.. just a bit too pricey for me at the time, so after half a year passed by and saw it on the release date list at eb, i picked up their last copy the day it came out.

this game had the familar style of panzer dragoon, but overwhelmed me with the vector sytlized graphics and deep organic electric music.. this game was a unique gaming experience that i only come close to feeling with the wipeout series.. it was magic ^_^.

16. Megaman 3 - Capcom / NES / 1990

following Megaman 2, i caught wind that megaman 3 had just been released thanks to nintendo power. my parents actually bought it for me, even though they never buy anything.. whoo hoo.. since i actually owned the game, i played it much much more than megaman 2..

15. Sonic the Hedgehog 2 - Sega / Genesis / 1992

back in the day.. i loved the side scrollers.. i saw the commercials for the sega genesis all the time.. and then the sega genesis included Sonic the Hedgehog.. it was at this point, i was able to convince my parents to buy me one ^_^.. although i played the first one to death, Sonic the Hedgehog 2 had all the elements of the first game with the addition of the ring world, super sonic and much more memorable music.. overall, i loved this game alot more than the first ^_^.

14. GoldenEye 007 - Nintendo / Nintendo 64 / 1997

I played this game all the time with my best friend.. we were absolutely equal in skill at this game, and we played for HOURS.. school would be the morning, and then we'd work at Toys R Us in the evenings.. we'd get off work at 10pm and then go back to his house, and play Goldeneye into 2 or 3am in the morning on a school night. we'd do this just about every night. it was a regular daily event.. Truly one of my fondest gaming memories ^_^.

13. Toe Jam and Earl - Sega / Genesis / 1992

my favorite genesis game.. yet another title which i played so much that i'm sure my old genesis controller are slightly warped from overplay ^_^. it featured kooky characters who pretended to be idiots. and since they were aliens, it appealed easily to my nerdy side ^_^. i used to doodle toe jam and earl while in class

12. Wip3out - Psygnosis / Playstation / 1999

wipeout 3 is probably the most beautiful racing game i've ever played.. it featured simplistic polygon graphics, solid racing gameplay, and a soundtrack arranged and written by my favorite DJ sasha.. the wipeout series with some help from stu is what got me into electronic music. wipeout 3 took the idea of wipeout and rounded it all together in a harmonic package, rather than the darker grittier wipeout xl.

11. Chrono Trigger - Squaresoft / Super Nintendo / 1995

Final Fantasy was pretty fun, but with Chrono Trigger beat it out in numerous ways. Chrono Trigger was non-linear, featured better music (in my opinion), slightly better battle system, etc.. I had a lot more fun with Chrono Trigger than Final Fantasy VI.. for some reason.

10. Gran Turismo 3 - Polyphony Digital / Playstation 2 / 2001

back in high school, i used to play Racing quite a bit more than i do these days, and when i first saw the realistic looking graphics i couldn't wait to play it. The thing that set Gran Turismo apart from other racing games was the in-depth management of cars. all other racing games were just about the racing, and even gran turismo took that a step further with realistic play control. and took the graphics a step further as well. the first complete racing simulation.

Gran Turismo 2 took the management one step further, but the graphics weren't that much better. I played both games quite a bit, but i didn't love it quite as much as Gran Turismo 3 because at that time i had friends much more into gaming. We all got the game when it came out and played it all simultaneously. every couple of days we'd get together and race each other with our cars we've been using ^_^. no other racing game could compare to Gran Turismo 3.

unfortunately my over playing of Gran Turismo 3 tainted me for Gran Turismo 4. i was so hyped for GT4, that i bought all the GT Concepts, and GT4 Prologue, and i loved those games, but when GT4 came out, it was just GT3 all over again.. and unfortunately i was burnt out, and no friends to compete against either. sadness

9. Return to Castle Wolfenstein - iD software / PC / 2001

One weekend back at the beginning of college, Stu came to visit and brought a new game with him.. Wolfenstein. We installed it on my computer and didn't leave the room for 2 days after.. The multiplayer aspect was addictive and engaging, but the best part was that everybody sucked at the game. it was new and everybody who played the game was new at it.. it wasn't full of people who would kill everybody and then not get scratched. we were all on the same level, which only added to the addictivity.

after that weekend, i picked up my own copy and played constantly ^_^. i eventually joined a clan and we picked off several lesser clans.. unfortunately, i got out of the game when the summer came around and i no longer had the strong connection to the internet the school provided.. i tried playing again since then but couldn't get back into it... sigh..

8. Final Fantasy VIII - Squaresoft / Playstation / 1998

known to many as one of the worst final fantasies. i fell in love with this game the moment i heard of it's existance. I played Final Fantasy VII quite a bit, but FFVII retained a cartoony nature that didn't set the game in reality. When i first saw screenshots of FFVIII, i was blown away. A Final Fantasy where the characters actually look like real people..

Everytime a little bit of information was released about the game, i ate it up. I imported Brave Fencer Musashiden, so that my friends and i would have the first glance at the game in action, and we were not dissapointed at all. It had a slightly more futuristic feel than FFVII, the character's had more substance.. i eventually beat the import at the Arts Institute, when i brought it in to show off.. ^_^

Overall though, the game was pretty bad. the story was absolutely terrible, and the gameplay was so radical to ever work correctly. it was the characters and the setting that won me over.. it's the idea that makes it my favorite final fantasy, and certainly not the game itself.

7. Chrono Cross - Squaresoft / Playstation / 2000

As a sequel to Chrono Trigger was announced, i watched the news closely to everything that was leaked little by little. and when i finally got a hold of the trailer, i was blown away by the graphics, the characters, and most of all, the music.. I imported it the day it came out, and loved it. The graphics were the best i had seen on the playstation, and the music flowed through me as i played the game. there were times, i just set down the controller and just listened.

the story was interesting, and made you think. The characters were beautifully concepted, as well as some of the enemies. this game was in it's own world, and that set it apart from Final Fantasy or any other RPG i've played before. I think Chrono Cross is the RPG that i've played through the most.. i played through the japanese version twice, and then the american version a time and a half.

It scares me to think that one day Squaresoft was will Chrono Break, and it will suck so bad that all creditibility of the Chrono series will die off.. Yoichi Wada has ruined that company enough.

6. Wipeout XL - Psygnosis / Playstation / 1996

This was the first wipeout i played, and it blew me away.. i mean, i played Fzero before but it was nothing like this game.. Wipeout was futuristic racing in the deep dark dirty future.. The environments you faced in had the dirty industrial feel of the over industrialized future.. and had music to match. The featured music was the perfect example of the growing underground music scene. it was so wicked. It brought about such an underground feel to the game itself, especially when featured in the hit movie Hackers. ^_^

5. Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time - Nintendo / Nintendo 64 / 1998

The 3D make-up of my favorite 2D game at the time, did not dissapoint me. ^_^

4. Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past - Nintendo / Super Nintendo / 1992

I played alot of side scrollers, and other action type games earlier on in my life, Zelda was one of my first experiences with an overhead type adventure, which i thought was much more expansive than your typical side scroller, and on top of that wasn't as 'kiddy' as super mario, it was a true hero's adventure.

this was also the first Zelda i played as well, i went back and tried to play the original and zelda II, but they couldn't compare against the 16bit juggernaut which had more options, side-quests, story elements, and better graphics.

overall, i think Zelda Minish Cap is a better game, for the same reasons i think Zelda 3 is better than Zelda 1, however playing through Minish Cap was really just an updated version of the original sprite based adventure. You can change the story all you want, the best part of Zelda is the true quest of the Master Sword v. Ganon.

3. Tetris - Nintendo / Gameboy / 1989

There's no other game that i have as much respect for than Tetris. Tetris is the chess of the video gaming world. (well.. probably more like checkers, really). It has been around since the mid eighties, and these days is still one of the biggest tests of gaming ability.

Back in the day, i used to play the gameboy version all the time (much like all these games, really).. i'd take it somewhere and play. sometimes another kid would have one with and i would battle against him ^_^, usually winning.

These days, i still play Tetris the Grand master on MAME, but i'm not as great as the greatest players in the world.. maybe i should work on that ^_^. They need to release a GOOD recent console version of one of the arcade games. Tetris the Grand Master on PS2. c'mon, port it already!!

2. Dance Dance Revolution Extreme Import - Konami / Playstation 2 / 2003

Dance Dance Revolution is one my favorite games, and my favorite DDR game has got to be DDR Extreme Japan.. no other home version has this many songs crossing this many genres.. there is something for everyone. i've made friends playing this games, and have had some of my favorite times in college playing this game with these friends ^_^. ontop of that, there has been no other game that has come close to the amount of time i've spent on this game.. i've played it for almost two years straight.. lost weight, toned leg muscles.. and i still play it today every now and then when i get bored of ITG.. no other game has changed my life, the way this one has.

1. Snatcher - Konami / Sega CD / 1994

When i first played this game, i was blown away.. there was nothing else like it that i had experienced.. the story was the most unique take on andriods possing as people, much like terminator.. (at the time, i hadn't heard of blade runner).. gillian seed was so interesting, and the voice acting just astounded me. and the music, my god the music was something i had remembered for so long..

originally i borrowed it from a friend, and hadn't seen it since.. i could not find this game no matter where i looked, and still have not found a copy to this date. but some of you know that i came across the playstation import at a preplayed earlier this year, and played it a little bit.. after which i searched through the internet, i came across the ROM. and played it twice through immediately after.. ^_^. the graphics are beautiful for a decade old game, the story and characters are so rich.. all the memories came right back.

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there you have it ^_^. i actually spent quite a bit of time writing this post as well.. took me about a day, to first collect all my favorite games, rank them, and write a little paragraph or two about the game and reasons why it is my favorite..

There are quite a few games that i still consider my favorite but i couldn't put them in the top 20, games like final fantasy vii, final fantasy tactics, vagrant story, perfect dark, earthworm jim 1 and 2, katamari damacy, crazy taxi, dr. mario, animal crossing, pikmin, nights, virtua tennis, metal gear solid 3, tenchu, ssx 1, zelda minish cap, other ddr mixes like ddrmax usa and others i'm sure i'm forgetting.
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It's not as easy as it looks ^_^, but it's fun at the same time, making it a challenging little exercise. i'd like to see what your top 20 games of all time are as well, so feel free to come up with your own list.