40: Legend of Legaia
- Year: 1998
- System: PS1
Legend of Legaia changed the formula a little. Instead of completely battling via menus, Legend of Legaia had this fun combo system. You would build up a spirit bar and then string together a combo pressing a direction representing each arm and leg. And if you choose a specific combo, it would do extra damage.
The story is a classic, "young boy in a village must save the world cause some otherworldly force bonded to him." And you run into the sheltered girl and the combat monk guy and god on an adventure resurrecting these magical trees that hold back the evil. The sound track is great, the color pallet really beautiful and bright, and it doesn't overstay it's welcome like other games.
39: Half Life 2
- Year: 2004
- System: PC
No one new what to expect from Half Life 2. Half Life 1 was a game changer. We had never played 
anything like it. Half Life 2 was an unknown quantity.
And it blew away expectations.
The first time you used the gravity gun and realized you could turn almost anything into a weapon. The first time you turned a corner in Ravenholm and saw one of those creatures. The first time you came up against a Strider and it stepped over you and most of your squad on it's way across the map, knowing at some point you would need to fight one.
The reason why people have been clamoring for Half Life 3 for 16 years is because Half Life 2 was so good.
38: Ape Escape
- Year: 1999
- System: PS1
A mad scientist created a hat you could put on apes that gave them personalities and made them smarter... and they of course escaped. So it was your job to capture them.
Each ape had a personality. You would need to scout out information about them and learn the best way to capture them.
37: Dino Crisis
- Year: 1999
- System: PS1
In many ways, Dino Crisis is more interesting in Resident Evil. Instead of being at some old haunted 
mansion that somehow still existed in 1998, you're infiltrating a high tech military base that has gone quiet.
Resident Evil introduced the first scare in the opening scene. You see your first zombie about 10 minutes into the game. Dino Crisis built to the first encounter. There was something wrong. And just based off the title, you knew it was dinosaurs, but you didn't know when or how.
The puzzles are great, the enemies are smart and fast, and the story just inconsolably difficult to understand. But I loved it.
36: Lost Odyssey
- Year: 2008
- System: Xbox 360
Blue Dragon is a great game on it's own, but the other major title Lost Odyssey is a thing of art. Sakaguchi brought his talents from the giant collection of Final Fantasies he worked on. It was a love letter to the RPGs of the past, but upres'ed for the current generation of consoles.
Lost Odyssey was funny, it was sweet, and it was heartbreaking. Following an immortal who deals with the apathy that comes along with seeing all of his friends die over and over again.
35: Star Wars: Tie Fighter
- Year: 1994
- System: PC
Tie Fighter let me play my power fantasy of being in the Star Wars universe by putting me in control of 
a Tie Fighter that was controlled by roughly 18 different keys on the keyboard.
It was exhilarating to get into a dogfight with an A-wing and to divert power from my sheilds to get a little more thrust, keeping the reticle centered long enough to get a lock on, or staring down a rogue Star Destroyer.
Some missions had you simply scanning cargo containers for contraband. Some had you escorting VIPs. And some were all out space battles.
Tie Fighter gave you the scope of the Star Wars universe. It was a deep plot of betrayal and promotion up the ranks.
34: Mario Kart 8 Deluxe
- Year: 2014
- System: Switch
There were some Mario Karts that took a few races for a novice to be able to jump in and be a threat. Mario Kart 8 has this balance where you can go in not knowing anything, and maybe you won't win a 200 cc race, you can keep up.
And then you start picking up nuances. You first master the start of the race boost. Then you figure out the jump boost. Then there's the drifting boost. Then there's the short cuts. And then when you think you own the world, you get your ass equalized by a blue shell coming from the back.
33: Scorched Earth
- Year: 1991
- System: PC
Scorched Earth is perhaps the most interesting edu-tainment game that has never been used to educate. 
Ultimately, it's Geometry and Physics the game.
You boot the game up and are presented with a an arms store. Maybe you want a Mirv, a cluster bomb, or maybe a Nuke. After you're armed, a randomly generated landscape is drawn, and you take turns firing missiles at each other.
This is where the geometry and physics come in. You look at wind speed, you pick and angle, and you try to hit a tank across the map. Maybe the tank is hard to get to, so you think about how you could carve through the mountain, or even better, cause the enemy to be buried under dirt.
32: Player Unknown's Battlegrounds
- Year: 2017
- System: PC
But what PUBG did was give you a sandbox of chaos.
You created the stories. I can't remember how many times a squad of three would pen another team down, have a shootout, they would win, but we would immediately hit the Discord channel to talk about how awesome it was. Every encounter felt meaningful. Every death felt justified.
31: Dead Space
- Year: 2008
- System: Xbox 360
The best character in Dead Space is the ship Ishimura. The silent protagonist is just a vessel to see the 
impressive horrors and technology.
Like all good sci-fi, man tried to fly too close to the sun, and by that, they fucked with aliens they didn't understand and unleashed them. There's probably 50 lines of dialog in the entire game, and that's fine, that's all we need. This is the peak of environmental storytelling.
This game did so many things right. It's iterated on the Resident Evil 4 aim style. It created a 3D map HUG that actually worked. It didn't rip off any monsters from well known sources.
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