So, you should not expect my top 100 to resemble a ranking of objective quality. I am not very good at ranking things in the first place, so trying to set up such a list would be incredibly difficult for me. And I have not played a lot of video games in general. To add to this, I decided to let nostalgia tinge my decisions, which means that you are going to see a lot of games that I played as a kid that probably do not hold up! But I am excited to share some of the games with you all that meant a lot to me, and I am sure there will be at least one or two that you have never heard of before.
The breakdown of my top 100 by platform will give you an idea of what kinds of games I grew up playing:
PC: 31
Playstion 3: 24
SNES: 10
Playstation 2: 9
Playstation 4: 6
Playstation: 4
Nintendo DS: 4
GBA: 4
Nintendo 64: 3
Wii: 2
Game Boy: 1
GameCube: 1
Xbox: 1
For games on multiple platforms, I listed the version that I preferred. I had a pretty effecient time cutting things down to 100 games, but there are a few games that did not quite make the cut that I want to each honor with a mention. But before I do, there is one game that I need to talk about first.
DISHONORABLE MENTION: Billy Hatcher and the Giant Egg (Nintendo GameCube, 2003)
Fuck Billy Hatcher and his chickenshit egg. This game is the biggest disappointment in my life, and I've gone through a divorce. You see, I grew up in a poor family with a father who, bless his heart, could not hold a job to save his life. And new video games cost quite a bit, especially back before the days of endless steam sales. The first console that my two teenage brothers and I bought with our own money was the GameCube, and after that initial outlay, we had to choose our games carefully. One of the first games we got was Sonic Adventure 2: Battle, which we really, really liked! So when we saw Sonic Team putting out another game exclusively for the GameCube, we were excited to buy it sight unseen.
What the fuck were we thinking? What a piece of shit game, and like, looking at the cover art, of course it was! Look at this fucking dingus.
What an asshole, and he's smirking because he knows he tricked you into paying $50 for a pile of rotting garbage. "Good morning!" my ass. I remember like yesterday playing the first few levels and getting that sinking feeling that we made a huge mistake. Realizing that some imbecile thought it would be fun to have a game where all you do is make this jackass shove around a rotten egg, but boy was he ever wrong! Experiencing the anguish of knowing that hours of manual labor, the scrimping and saving for weeks, all resulted in such fetid rubbish. Now I know better. Never pre-order anything, and especially if it's made by fucking Sonic Team.
And if any of you even think about putting Billy Hatcher in your top 100, you can go fuck yourself. I'm pretty sure that this game is the reason my grandfather died an early and painful death.
***
Well, now that we have that unfortunate negativity out of the way, here is something a little more uplifting.
Honorable Mention: Half-Life (Microsoft Windows, 1998)
Half-Life was a watershed moment in video games. It was the first game I played where I felt truly "immersed" in the world. A truly first-person game where you never take a look at your character from the outside, and a compelling shooter besides. The game established a formula that other story-driven shooters attempted to copy for years and years. My brother and I would take turns playing every night, and I can still remember the chills that the alien enemies gave me.
Looking back while making this list reminds me that I need to go try out the fully updated Black Mesa at some point. Would be a good way to experience it all again after 20 years.
At least your mother tipped well