My Top 10 Video Games Ever
- Gilad Meiri
- Mar 19, 2019
- 5 min read
I've been a gamer for as long as I can remember. In the 80's, all I needed was a couple of pixels shooting another pixel back and forth and I was happy. Things, however, have evolved, and so has my taste in video games. To me, the most important thing in a single player, narrative driven experience, is ambiance. The atmosphere coming across in your surroundings that makes it feel like you're inside that world. That's why my top 10 games excel in that field.
This list is NOT the kind where my number one is the best of them all. Evolving tastes, playing across platforms and various other factors have made it so that sort of ranking would not be possible. I honestly cannot say which one I enjoyed the most. This list is by alphabetical order. If the game is part of a series, then the first letter taken into account is the title for that specific game. Here are my ten favorite games of all time.
1) Batman: Arkham Knight - Very few games make you feel as badass as this one. It is graphically breathtaking and the side missions intertwine beautifully with the main ones, making you want to take them all on. You glide around Gotham, taking down baddie after baddie, eventually taking on the two antagonists; The Arkham Knight and Scarecrow, with the deceased Joker being a sort of alternative conscience. With the exception of the overused Batmobile and Riddler's often annoying missions, this game is a must for all superhero fans.
2) Beyond Two souls - Starring the incredible Ellen Paige, this choice driven experience takes you through the life story of Jodi, a girl who has a gift; she has an invisible friend who can perform supernatural acts for her when required. The game tells you her life story from her being a little girl who's looking for understanding in a world that won't accept her, all the way to being a special forces soldier/CIA operator behind enemy lines. The amount of enjoyment I got from this game stayed with me long after I finished it.
3) Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood - The AC series is a huge franchise, and I make it a point to play pretty much every title in that epic series. Until this day, Brotherhood has been my favorite. 16th century Rome is presented with majestic detail and great atmosphere. Ezio Auditore Da Firenze is a great protagonist, coming into his own as an expert assassin. On top of that, the game lets you build your own little army of assassins to help you along the way. An immensely enjoyable game.
4) Far Cry 4 - Featuring one of the video game industry's most wonderful antagonists, Pagan Min, this first person shooter puts you in the fictional (yet magnificent) country of Kyrat. You land right smack in the middle of a civil war between the ruler, Pagan, and the resistance, made up of two characters who will constantly blab in your ear about how their way is the best. Be forewarned - not all is as it seems and the good guys aren't always that good. I particularly enjoyed dispatching enemies with a bow and arrow. What a rush!
5) Grand Theft Auto V - Take a homicidal-yet-surprisingly-clever psycho, an FBI informant who faked his death and can't stand his kids and an up-and-comer with great driving skills - and you've got yourself a hell of a crew to pull all (and I do mean all) kinds of heists. Boat heists, bank jobs, government building infiltrations, underwater robberies and so much more. Here's your chance to commit every kind of illegal rush job you can think of. An absolute blast of a game with insanely colorful characters.
6) Horizon Zero Dawn - One of the finest PS4 exclusives known to man, this game redefined exquisite open-world graphics, with fantastic gameplay mechanics to boot. You're a skillful young woman who takes on mechanical beasts in a post "post-apocalyptic" (not a typo) world, where humans have reverted back to tribes and nature has reclaimed the environment. While discovering your origin story, you'll take on every kind of mechanical animal there is, including gigantic dinosaurs, and you're guaranteed to have the time of your life doing it.
7) Spiderman - Another fantastic PS4 exclusive, this game draws clear inspiration from the Batman Arkham series with plenty of unique touches to make this an absolute must for Spidey/Marvel fans. New York has never looked so good and swinging around Manhattan was never this satisfying. Add good stealth, wonderful combat mechanics and some kickass boss fights, and you'll be thanking your lucky stars you got to experience it.
8) The Last Of Us - You've never experienced a story like this before. It will rattle you inside out and leave an impression on your soul. You're a weapons dealer (of sorts) who is forced to take a sassy-yet-resourceful teenage girl across a post-apocalyptic U.S, so she can be the cure for mankind after a virus has decimated everything you've ever known, and changed humans into flesh eating monsters. On the way, you'll have a hard time deciding who's more dangerous - The zombies or the hunters. (Both want you dead.)
9) Tomb Raider - Stranded on a Japanese island full of deities and bounty hunters out to get you, you play a naive, inexperienced young explorer, thrown in the middle of an environment that is basically impossible to survive in. You'll navigate your way around shanty towns, unforgiving landscapes and ancient tombs, all in an effort to get the hell out, while a deity that controls the weather does everything possible to keep your stranded. It's a thoroughly engrossing thrill ride you cannot afford to miss out on.
10) Watch Dogs 2 - After a relatively (and I can't stress that word enough) disappointing opening title, Ubisoft came up with a real winner of a game. You play Marcus, a hacktivist who wants to take down 'big brother' that controls the informational infrastructure around San Francisco. You'll deploy drones, quadcopters and more, while remotely controlling vehicles and disabling power grids, all while visiting SF's most famous sites and taking great selfies. Fighting the power has never been this fluid, fast and satisfying.
When compiling a list like that, you're bound to come up with more games you've forgotten along the way. They are just as good and memorable as the ones on the list, so without further ado, here are two extra games that made me happy to be a gamer.
1) Crysis 3 - Probably the most intense, tactical and graphically magnificent first-person shooter I've ever played. The satisfaction you get from taking down enemies silently with a bow and arrow is amazing, and the environments are detailed and lush. On top of that, the game always gives you the feeling that you're not some unbeatable super soldier, but a fallible operative that should remain hidden as much as possible. The thrill of being hunted makes it a must-play.
2) Half Life 2 - The oldest game on my list, but also widely considered one of the greatest video games of all time. Aliens have taken over the planet and have enslaved humanity, and you join forces with rebels, hell bent on taking earth back. The strength of the game is in its atmosphere and the way humanity's despair is conveyed. You will be sucked into an experience like no other. You will fight aliens, monsters, zombies and whatnot, all in creepy environments that add to the unprecedented thrill this game delivers.
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