• Top 100 Video Games

  

  Written by Zeromage 225 Comments
  Last Updated:: February 1, 2009

  What’s happening? What’s going on? Is this some sort of sick game? The answer to all of these questions is: YES BEOTCH. We’ve held out this long to weed out the suckers and prune our rose bushes. It’s hard for us to believe we’ve actually done it, the top 100 video games of all time list. We’ve separated ourselves from the pack by freely admitting that the only science behind this list is our cumulative gigantic brain. You’ve read the sales charts, you’ve formed your own opinions, now you are ready for the truth…the OLD-WIZARD TRUTH. If you don’t like the list, yell at us and we’ll undoubtedly yell back. So without any further ado: The Top 100 Video Games of All Time Ever in the Universe List!!!

  100. Donkey Kong (Arcade)

  Staring at the screen, littered with ladder type structures, you found yourself wondering if the person who designed this arena had ever heard of a tool called the level. You then realize that this area is totally out of whack because of the huge ape that has decided to climb up top and jump around a bit. Taunting you with what appears to be an easy question of “how high can you get?” Donkey Kong seems like a piece of cake. It’s in this game that you are first introduced to Jump Man, who’s a little rough around the digital edges. He moves at a rate slower than year old molasses and his jumps also leave much to be desired. Later in his life, this character gets an upgrade to the much loved Mario, who is much more agile. As for Donkey Kong, your only goal is to reach the girl at the top of each level, while avoiding falling barrels and flames. The barrels follow random routes, sometimes falling down a ladder, and sometimes just continuing onto the end of the screen. The randomness of the barrel’s path adds to the frustration and poor visual quality of this game. Overall this was a great game for its time, and most importantly it introduced us all to Mario.

  99. Rampage (Arcade)

  Rampage is one of the most popular games in the coin-op industry to come to the NES, missing nothing of the greatest of the former. In this game you get to choose between a giant gorilla (George), a dinosaur (Lizzie) or werewolf (Ralph), and knock down buildings, and each other! Like all great fighting games, the option of throwing your ostensible partner in the river gives the game an always welcome tension with the 2nd player. I myself always geared the entire game towards knocking my partner off a building right when he thinks that I’m stopping the mayhem on him. The levels are numerous (North American cities) and so are the enemies. Tanks, Helicopters, Boats, Taxis, and even residents of buildings try to stop you from wreaking havoc on the innocent cities (although it’s a stretch that a dinosaur could be hurt by a coffee cup). When you are out of energy you turn into a little man wanting to escape the carnage, the perfect time for the 2nd player to eat you and gain some energy. All in all, this is an extremely fun game to play. Once again, this game shows that simplicity and playability always make for the best gaming experiences.

  98. Wonderboy in Monster World (Sega Genesis)

  Wonderboy in Monster World is the definition of a “lost classic”. Released for the austere Sega Genesis, it is often forgotten because it was never played. Don’t let the puerile title fool you though, because this game is massive and sophisticated. Much like the great adventure RPG’s of the Zelda series, Wonderboy combines real-time fighting with journeys to all parts of a massive world. All the towns in Monster World are filled with their collective indigenous people properly embodying their own diction and dress code. You especially feel at home in the Ice world and Jungle town welcoming the Wonderboy in with a sweet mellifluous soundtrack that makes you want to hang out in the town for the rest of the day rather than moving onto the actual fighting. Beyond the towns and into the actual fighting, the landscapes are filled with variegated puzzles and incandescent bosses. The mushroom king of the forest takes up your whole screen and the dragon of the volcano world takes up 3 whole screens! All the bosses are a perfect difficulty level being neither too easy nor too hard. Beyond the boss’s and the towns, you meet mystic gods and wise animals who help you throughout your journey. Like all the enemies in Wonderboy, they are incandescent beyond belief for a game that has been appropriately deemed as “lost”. Poseidon takes control of the screen with his underwater words of wisdom and the elder dragon of the mountains endows the Wonderboy with the sword to take on the final quest. In general, there is much to talk about with this game. It’s easy on the eyes, ears, and mind as it embodies all the greatest qualities needed to make for an amazing RPG adventure.

  97. NHL 94 (Sega Genesis)

  NHL 94 for Sega Genesis is one of EA sports first forays into the hockey world. The game was a genuine success that it led to annual installments up to the current year of ‘08. The controller movements are perfectly fluid, the teams are represented by an accurate ability for each specific player, and the difficulty is just perfect for entering into a season or playoff race. Also in this installment of NHL 94, four players could play on the same team or on opposed teams using a specific four player adapter for the Sega Genesis. This is a game like Mario Kart that one could get extremely good at, to the point where no one wants to play with you, especially when you learn the “behind-around the goal” trick of scoring goals. Within two minutes you can have the other player pinned down to a 15-0 lead and have him wondering why he ever agreed to play with a nerd who spends all his time thinking of ways to dominate his friends in video games. Another addition to NHL 94 is being able to play a shootout mode for more of an ephemeral challenging. Who could forget the most conspicuous addition to this vigorous EA series, breaking the glass when checking your opponent into it? This was a sure fire way to have tempers flared in the virtual realm. The best sports games can be played over and over and over again. This is a perfect exampleample of a game that transcends all tastes in video gaming.

  96. Advanced D & D (Treasure of Tarmin) (Intellivision)

  Intellivision games came with a 17 button controller. Each game came with a plastic card you slide into the controller that describes that game’s button configuration. I think the system wasn’t more of a winner because it was stupidly complex for the graphical interface…unlike the 2600’s one button/one stick genius. The D&D series for this system was colour coded, later to be ripped off by Pokemon games. I was too young to care much for back stories, so the manual went unread. I inserted the cartridge and toggled the power on. The game started with me in a lo-fi quake style 3-D setting. Before I could press a button a huge purple blob with horns appeared in front of me, a purple lightning bolt flashed across the screen, game over. Holy crap, this game is worse than ET for 2600! It turns out, you never play the same game twice. The levels are completely random, each level descending further into Hades a-la the circles of Amsterdam in “The Stranger.” Sometimes the game would be 60 levels long, and your arsenal would be so deep that defeating the game was a snap. Other times, like my first time, you meet the purple Satan as soon as you enter the game. The replayability of this game was original, and the 3-D interface was unprecedented. I really wish my Intellivisions still worked…

  95. Ecco the Dophin (Sega Genesis)

  In the battle between 16 bit systems, the SNES for the most part dominated the Sega Genesis because of the sheer amount of memorable games that the SNES produced, and because SNES had a little company called “Squaresoft” on its side. One of Sega’s best attempts at competing with the creativity in SNES games was from Ecco the Dophin. It had a deeper instinct to it than the “hip” and “cool” Sonic the Hedgehog. It also had an aggrandized storyline in it not seen by the likes of many of the games made for Sega Genesis. Ecco the dolphin is an illustrious game that was easy on the eyes and ears. You were a dolphin communicating with your family and other pods in your own “ecco” language. Your journey takes you up to the northern artic ocean to find “Big Blue” who tells you of the disaster of all the marine life being sucked up by sprouts and storms. The main enemy in this game was your breath support, as being a dolphin, you needed to jump for air periodically. Also, this game was more of a puzzle game in which you had to collect clues from other families of dolphins facing the same immanency. Storylines of time machines and food-scarcity evolve as you rush to find the cure to all the seas problems. This game always keeps you on edge and keeps you disposed towards saving that which is bigger than yourself. Sega had trouble making meaningful games like the SNES, but “Ecco” stood out as one of it’s most memorable accomplishments.

  94. Dig Dug (Arcade)

  Dig Dug, was a simple game. You dig underground and destroy the monsters underground. That’s about it. Like Pac-Man, the game does not need to be elaborate to make one want to play it 24 hours a day, meaning, that it was an 80’s arcade game. Dig Dug, like Pac-Man represents what a great arcade game could do; have hardly any programming technicality, but still earn its creators mansions on the coasts of Iceland. The music was always the same, the sounds were always the same, the enemies were always the same. It seems like the work of a beginning programmer who gets excited about making their first elementary game. If the idea is there though, then you have something more than just the technical prowess in making video games, you have the ingenious ability to make players addicted to your creation. Often, the most addicting games were the most simple, because the player knew he only had to master a limited amount of skills. It’s with this in mind that there begins to be players who are freakishly good at the game, where random people stand around the person in the arcade gasping at the fact that the player is at level 228 using 2 quarters. Those tendentious towards the Coin-op industry only need to look at its original history in games like Dig Dug, to understand the sway it used to hold.

  93. Gears of War (Xbox 360)

  Gears of War for the X-Box 360 is one of the truly great sci-fi, non-first person shooter video games out there. This game alone made me want to get an X-Box 360. Unlike almost every other action game on the market, in this game crouching isn’t enough to avoid getting shot. You have to move from one piece of cover to another, just like if you were playing paint ball. In my mind, this game really simulated what it would be like to be on a battlefield. Then again, I’m probably not the best ones to be asking about reality. Anyway, this is a game that could be potentially beat in 5-6 hours, but because of the fact that you have to keep hiding behind cover, grinding your way from area to area, it takes more time. Whether the bad guys were coming straight at you, or dropping from the ceiling like raindrops, you are always on your toes, waiting to duck behind cover. And sometimes I found myself with no bad guys at all and still going with the cover system, diving from door frame to door frame, or hiding behind a jersey barrier. All in all, I really liked it, my only complaint being that it went really slow, which irks me, because sometimes you just want to run around like an ass nugget in berserker mode, shooting everything in sight.

  92. Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars (SNES)

  Would Mario be able to make the jump to a true Final Fantasy style RPG? Play Super Mario RPG for more than a half an hour and you will see how seamless the transition was. The graphics are effulgent with the best use of 16-bit 3d imagery and the tasks that Mario has to encounter are exorbitant following the greatness of the traditional RPG format. The story line is much more sophisticated and involved than the other Mario’s and all the indigenous habitants of each town made you feel at home as you actually wanted to go around and talk to everyone. The new Mushroom Kingdom was how it always should have been; a large, story-bookesque world with incandescent princess’s and nefarious dragons (Bowser) who you would actually befriend as the game moved on. Staying consistent with the best RPG’s for the SNES, Super Mario RPG would have many side games to build up the levels of your players and areas you didn’t need to visit unless you felt you wanted to at the time to see all that this beast of a game had to offer. Smithy would be the true enemy of this game taking on the role of the best RPG final boss’s that were always shape shifting and transmuting at every chance of defeat. Some of the weapons that Mario and his friends were able to use were creative and simple at the same time. You felt powerful with a simple hammer, especially as you started to get the best hammers in the game and knocked out an enemy in one shot. The types of magic acquired would both be interesting and consistent with the Mario theme being able to usher in a constellation of stars at your enemy for example. The game’s length is perfect finding a mid point between a traditional adventure game (Zelda) and a more robust RPG (FF3). In the end, Super Mario RPG is incredibly fun to come back to and keep playing over and over again. This is the mark of a great RPG; when it’s not too long and tedious to want to play over again.

  91. Super Dodgeball (NES)

  Super Dodge Ball created by Technos (Double Dragon, River City Ransom) was one of the more fun multiplayer games for the 8 bit NES. You could play both elimination and team/tournament dodge ball, both perfectly conceived for hours of extraneous beat downs on a 2nd player. The tournament style dodge ball was the main game consisting of choosing a team from a variegated choice of hegemonies. Each nation had its own idiosyncratic abilities from the superlative catching abilities of China, to the home court advantage of Iceland and their ice rank you had to slip all over. As you traverse the nations in an Olympic style tournament, Russia was always reserved as your last opponent with good to great stats on all of the abilities in the game. Along with the unique playing abilities for each nation, each nation also retained an indigenous aesthetic appearance further showing the games convincingness in the care projected by its creators. The melee “every man for himself” game was just as fun as the tournament dodge ball, with the screen moving mellifluously on the exact movement of the dodge ball. This game was addicting for 2 players in need of a high energy game to play when the conditions outside were not conducive to their expenditure. With the trilogy of Double Dragon, River City Ransom, and Super Dodge ball, Technos would go on the be considered one of the more successful makers of early video games.

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225 Comments

1. #1 Bladerunner says:
   November 7th, 2009 at 4:09 pm

   Terrible list imo.I realise this list is your opinion, and i respect that. Im just pointing out that my opinion differs from yours vastly

   1) Its a whore-fest of old games, lots of true modern classics were ignored. No half life 1,2, gta, resident evil, call of duty, fallout, civilization? Seriously???!!

   2) Toe jam and earl? give me a break….

   3) Not a single fricking N64 game? Majoras mask?! Mario 64?! Goldeneye?! Perfect dark?! OCARINA OF TIME?!!!!!! sheesh

   3) Just ONE ps2 game in the entire list? no shadow of the colossus? no okami? no gran turismo? no god of war? OMG

   4) Correct me if im wrong, but i dont think i saw a single racing game in there… wtf?

   I do agree with most of the top 20 though. Chrono trigger, Castlevania:SOTN, Zelda LTTP…. epic games
2. #2 Dopeycunt says:
   November 7th, 2009 at 9:36 pm

   Seems like the author does not have a whole lot of experience playing catalogs of games on different systems, and probably stuck to Nintendo systems when he was a kid. Only the big-name (obvious) Sega titles are here, and a distinct lack of PSX, XBox, and PC games.
3. #3 Wolf says:
   November 7th, 2009 at 10:12 am

   …dodgeball beat DigDug?
   already bad things happening and im only on page 1
4. #4 Wolf says:
   November 7th, 2009 at 10:20 am

   Ducktales made the top 20?…
5. #5 dude says:
   November 7th, 2009 at 12:19 am

   while this list may not be well rounded (at all), it makes for a pretty good reference on which old roms I should be investing my time in.
6. #6 pd says:
   November 7th, 2009 at 9:45 pm

   so your saying nhl 94 and a dodgeball game are better then say castlevania iv and contra 3 bullshit and there two games off the top of my head.
7. #7 Justin says:
   November 7th, 2009 at 3:45 am

   I didn’t know N64 was such a crappy system.LOL.What an ass list and an ass website. Terrible what you are putting into these viewer’s heads.
8. #8 Justin says:
   November 7th, 2009 at 3:50 am

   Oh and I also forgot to LOL @ having Madden 2004 on there without NFL 2k5.Props for putting Star Craft on there though,best game ever made.
9. #9 Azelfknight says:
   November 7th, 2009 at 8:44 pm

   Zelda 2 is the worst Zelda ever…just saying.

   This list is okay, but with way to many old ripoffs of each other in the platforming department. A link to the past is one of my favorite games and glad others recognize it too, but so many good game aren’t on this list that it makes me shake my head. Here are games that deserve more credit, in no order, Halo, Ocarina of Time, Fallout 3, WOW, Mario Kart 64, and more…
10. #10 pelham123 says:
    November 7th, 2009 at 11:05 pm

    It’s nice to see a more personal top 100 list for a change, an enjoyable read. Cheers!
11. #11 Fedricco Rabaya says:
    November 7th, 2009 at 2:31 pm

    Hey people can someone tell me the Mario game when the story is about a dream of Mario? There are 4 characters to choose from: MArio, Luigi, Princess and the Mushroom kid.
12. #12 Salo says:
    November 7th, 2009 at 2:48 pm

    Super Mario 2.