My top ten favourite computer games
See Getting personal: A few top ten lists for the background on this series of top ten posts (this is the fourth post in the series).
The best way I know to make my mind off the troubles of the world and relax from everyday work is to play a computer or video game that really requires my full attention. Despite being very intense, I find that gaming helps me to sort of cool down my brain. And there are many, many computer games that have helped me relax through the years.
What may come as a surprise to many is that I play a lot of computer games despite being a Mac user. That’s right, there are computer games for the Mac! I bet you didn’t know that unless you are a Mac user too ;-). Yes, yes, there are many more games for Windows than for the Mac, but I’ve found that the number and quality of games available for the Mac is good enough for me. I wouldn’t mind more games being available for the Mac, but it’s not like I have time to play all the games that already are available, so I don’t find it that big a problem.
Anyway, the games on this list are not Mac only, so Windows (and in some cases Linux) users will recognise them as well.
The list is ordered alphabetically, which means I have not ranked these games. Picking ten is hard enough as it is.
- Baldur’s Gate 2
- Diablo 2
- Doom 3
- Halo
- Icewind Dale
- Marathon
- Neverwinter Nights
- Quake 2
- Starcraft
- Unreal
Note: All links are Amazon affiliate links.
There are loads of other games that are great and might have been on this list if I had compiled it on a different day. A few worth mentioning are Call of Duty, Medal of Honor, Soldier of Fortune, Warcraft, Myst, Civilization, Age of Empires, Myth, Dark Forces, Descent, Rune, Return to Castle Wolfenstein… I could go on.
Now it’s your turn – which are your ten favourite computer games? If you want to share, do so either by posting a comment with your list or by posting a link to your own blog.
- Previous post: My top ten favourite novels
- Next post: My top ten favourite console games
Information, sponsorship, and externals
About the author
Roger Johansson is a Swedish web professional specialising in web standards, accessibility, and usability. More about me and this site.
Latest articles
- Validation statistics from Nikita the Spider Comments off
- An analysis of the sites crawled by the bulk validation tool Nikita the Spider during March 2008.
- Authentic Jobs API and Affiliates program Comments off
- The Authentic Jobs job listing service now has a public API and an affiliate program.
- What does Acid3 mean to you and me? Comments off
- Opera and Apple have announced that their web browsers pass the Acid3 Browser Test, but how will that help web designers and developers?
- Designing Web Navigation (Book review) Comments off
- Learn the fundamentals of navigation design and design better navigation systems for large and small sites as well as for web based applications.
- DOMAssistant bundle for TextMate Comments off
- To save keystrokes and speed up development I have created a DOMAssistant bundle for TextMate.
- First impressions of Internet Explorer 8 Beta 1 Comments off
- My impressions after trying out Internet Explorer 8 Beta 1 for a couple of days.
Comments
Our lists are very similar, You need to try Counter Strike Source .. its build on the Half Life 2 Engine and its phenomenal.
http://www.amazon.com/Electronic-Arts-71608-Counter-Strike-Source/dp/B000AOJ7FK/ref=pdbbssr_1/103-2961064-0719063?ie=UTF8&s=videogames&qid=1184182661&sr=8-1
Wow, did not think you would be a D&D fan. =) My list is a lot different because I'm a console gamer (especially a Nintendo one), not a PC gamer.
Without further ado:
Currently I own a Wii, a DS and an XBOX 360. I have no plans on buying a PS3, even though I wont be able to play FF13 or MGS4.
Hmm, I think I have to go across all types of platforms to come up with some games.
Medal Of Honor: Allied Assault
Diablo 2
Pirates (Amiga)
Player Manager (Amiga)
Chip's Challenge
Minesweeper
Singstar (on PS2)
Super Mario Bros (NES)
How lovely to see another BG 2 fan - it's a really great game. Like some of the other game on your list as well - think I own half of them practically but haven't played them all really.
Some other games that I like are Deus Ex: Invisible War, GTA: San Andreas and TES 3: Morrowind, especially Deus Ex is a masterpiece - such freedom is amazing!
Such fond memories of marathon network StarCraft games after returning from dinner in college...
Remember guys, there's going to be a post for console games too. So save up your Top 10 for some PC/Mac goodness :P
Mine are mostly PC but the Wii has won me over recently.
Gonna get Hellgate: London? Made by the guys that did Diablo 2.
Right now i'm into Half-Life 2, Counter-Strike: Source, and Vanguard: Saga of Heroes, and of course, Zelda: Link to the Past on the Wii.
Philip has some good advice: there will be a separate list for console games :-).
What, no Half Life 2? For shame...
@Kevin, me too. The Wii erm... kicks ass.
Of course, now I have to apologise to everyone for using the phrase 'kicks ass'. I truly am deeply sorry.
Man i couldn't get a copy of baldur's gate 2 or throne of bhaal to work on my macbook pro! :( i'm going to keep trying
What, no Battlefield 2 or 2142???
I'm big into FPSs so that's most of my list... with some odd exceptions:
System Shock 2
Deus Ex (but NOT Invisible War which was hugely disappointing)
Half-Life (1 & 2)
Loderunner
Lego Star Wars (both)
Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic
Grim Fandango
Descent
Quake
World of Warcraft
Not many. I tend to try and get huge, universally loved games and play them to destruction. So, over a lifetime, it's pretty much been:
I am terrified about Spore coming out. Any chance I had of achieving anything worthwhile in the world will be gone.
To me, computer games start and end with Alpha Centauri. I think I lost a year and a half of my life to that game.
I'm going to show my age a bit and pick some of my all time favorites, picked due to amount of time spent playing them:
I haven't played any games in ages now though.
We have the same choices aside from a couple. Not in order of course, they're all good, IMO.
Wow, many reminders of good games here... Deus Ex, System Shock, Alice, Fallout...
The reason some games mentioned in the comments are missing from my list is that they aren't available for the Mac (Half-Life and Counter Strike to name a couple). I've never bothered to buy a PC just for gaming, and I haven't tried running any Windows games on my Macbook pro yet.
That's interesting. Apart form Marathon and Doom 3 that could also be my list.
oooh so good to see Starcraft up there and good ol Diablo 2. We can now be friends. haha
I wonder why Fallout 1/2 isn't on the list. :)
Again, I'm not big on top ten lists. However, if I were to make one, Half Life 2 would definitely be on the list. I play through that game at least once a year.
At the moment NetHack 3.4.3 purely for the challenge.
You played Myth?? I don't think I've come across anyone in RL or online in years who's played Myth: The Fallen Lords! It was the first online game I played and it was tonnes of fun.
I played the demo to death. My favourite multiplayer option was Last Man on the Hill on the For Carnage Apply Within map.
Marathon(s) Halo(s) Diablo(s) Descent SplinterCell DukeNukem RollerCoasterTycoon Civilization(s) Command&Conquer(s) Warcraft(s)/StarCraft
One of the greatest games for Mac is the free Unreal Tournament 2004 demo. The demo gives you 4 or 5 game types on multiple levels, online with others. The perfect game for someone who just wants to sit down and blast away for 30 minutes!
What? No Sims 2? ;)
This is a composite of all-times and current faves (which kind of distorts things), so some of these games may seem ancient:
These are all, of course, PC Games, and I think that a separate list for console games, as suggested, is a great idea.
Hey Roger
Cool post. I'm replaying BG2 as we speak. On my 22 inch monitor on 1024x768 (high for this game) it rocks more then ever. The amount of detail in the settings in awesome.
Hm think I'll kill some ogres before I go to sleep :-)
Other great games I played:
Yay! for Macgaming :) (although I have a Winbox for games as well as browser testing). I've wasted too much time in:
Pretty funny to see so many webpeople are gamers as well!
I responded on my blog.
It's actually fairly impressive that the original list by Roger was centered around games available for the Mac. Can't wait to see the console lists come out.
In no particular order (if this is PC, and not console gaming we are talking about):
My list of all-time favorite PC games: * Warcraft III - still playing custom maps online every few days * Unreal Tournament 2004 - great game with some amazing mods (Alien Swarm to name one) * Ghost Recon Advanced Warfigher 1&2 - very fun, especially when playing co-op with some friends * Call of Duty 2 - good campaign and lots of fun with friends * World of Warcraft - yeah, I played it for almost two years * Metal Gear Solid - fantastic game * RollerCoaster Tycoon - great fun when I was about 12-14 * Final Fantasy VII - the PC version obviously * Red Alert - one of the best RTS's around * Rainbow Six: Vegas - nice campaign, the multiplayer was a little dodgy though.
My list of all-time favorite PC games:
My top ten list (in no specific order).
Marathon
Fallout 1-2
Duke Nukem 3D
Quake 1-3
Unreal
Deus Ex
Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis
Diablo 1-2
Warcraft 2-3 and WoW
Return to Castle Wolfenstein
Other games that I could mention is Unreal Tournament, most scumm Lucas Arts games, Alice, Wolfenstein ET, Medal of Honor, Call of Duty, Silver, Tomb Raider 1-2 and many more that I have forgotten. :D
//Rob
PS. And StickMUD. ;-)
I see several people have mentioned Red Alert - that's another great game.
Robert: Woo, Nethack... man, did I spend many hours on that back in the early nineties.
Tony: Yeah, I really enjoyed Myth after struggling in the beginning.
Rob. E: StickMUD was on my first draft of this list actually ;-).
I see that I have slightly different tastes in games than most people here ;-)
In general I prefer story driven games to frg fests although I have played Doom and Quake a lot in the 90's...
For a few years I've been fascinated by the universe in games like Thief and Legacy of Kain (Soul Reaver, Blood Omen). There's definitely an element of combat in those games (especially LOK, Thief not so much) but what I love about them is the rich story and history behind them.
The LOK series also has elements of time travel which I absolutely love (you revisit the same places at intervals of sometimes a thousand years apart or more).
Thief is really starting to show its age in terms of how it looks but it's still a very immersive game for me and an active players community as well as very creative fan mission designers has helped it live on to this day and I still play it regularly. I didn't have a powerful enough computer to play Thief 3 Deadly Shadows until last week but I'm waiting delivery of the game now and it will surely make the top 3 of my list...
Lords of Midnight (Spectrum)
Attic Attack (Spectrum)
Quazatron (Spectrum)
Sensible Soccer (Atari ST)
Elite (Atari ST)
Unreal Tournament (PC and it works on Linux)
Neverwinter Nights (PC and it works on Linux)
Half Life (PC)
Half Life 2 (PC)
Guild Wars (PC)
at all CS rox :)
I just got a hold of Soldier of Fortune Platinum Edition a few weeks ago. Playing it brings back some good memories. It's got to be one of the best games from pre-2002.
Ugh, how can I forget Ultima VI and VII, Wing Commander and its sequel!
There are too many games, a top 10 list ain't really enough. Probably a top 10 of top 10 games lists! :P
Not in any particular order.... some are new, some are really old skool
Diablo 2
nothing else.
Oh man, Stuntcar Racer - thanks Florian! I had forgotten that one - me and a mate used to lug our STs over to each others houses to link them up via the serial ports to play head to head. Classic game!
HALF LIFE!!!
No brainer there:
I will only mention those not already mentioned in the original post, since I mostly agree on those. Other games worthy of attention:
I'm quite the 'story junkie', which is what really hooked me with BG1 and LBA. I will generally rather play a poor game with a great story than a great game with a poor story.
Games I'm looking forward to:
Wow, no one put Contra on their top 10?? That game was well ahead of its time.
Sorry, I take that back...wrong list.
Woohoo! =} MY list!
Go baby go! =}
Sorry, comments are closed for this post.