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NNTP-Posting-Date: Wed, 22 Jan 2025 17:04:51 +0000
From: Spalls Hurgenson <spallshurgenson@gmail.com>
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.action
Subject: Yet Another 'Best Year In Gaming' Thread
Date: Wed, 22 Jan 2025 12:04:46 -0500
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So, here's another thing to discuss:

"14 reasons why 2007 was the greatest year in video games"
https://www.xda-developers.com/2007-greatest-year-for-video-games/

Those reasons being, in part, stuff like "Metroid Prime 3", "Crysis",
"God of War 2", "Bioshock", "Halo 3" and "Team Fortress 2". It's that
sort of article.



Which, regardless of whether you like those games or not, do suggest
that 2007 was an influential year. Greatest year? That's debatable. I
don't really agree, but I see the point. But it's not really the
debate about whether 2007 was _the_ year that I thought was
interesting so much as _what year_ you might give that title too.

Myself, I'd disqualify 2007 just because it was already deep in the
era of sequels that still afflicts the industry. A lot of the
mentioned games were great, sure, but they were More Of The Same. If I
had to point to a "greatest year", I'd like it to be one that took
more chances; a year where there was more change and innovation. And
2007 doesn't stand out to me in that regard.

But then, which year does? That's much harder to say. There are a lot
of years that stand out, but which gets the nod as 'greatest'? 



- 1993, maybe, the year of "Doom" and "7th Guest"; other hits include
"Mortal Kombat", "SimCity 2000", "Wing Commander Privateer", "Gabriel
Knight", "Syndicate", "X-Wing", "Sam and Max", "Master of Orion",
"Cannon Fodder", "Mega Man X", "Dark Sun", and "Day of the Tentacle".
It was a great year.*

- Or 1997: the year of "Blood" and "Bladerunner", of "Fallout", of
"Grand Theft Auto", "Resident Evil", "Outlaws", "Doom 64", "Quake II",
"MDK", "Dungeon Keeper", "Myth", "Theme Hospital", "Tomb Raider",
"X-Wing vs TIE Fighter", "Riven", "Final Fantasy VII", and "Shadow
Warrior".

- Certainly 1998 often gets the nod: it's the year of the original
"Half Life!" But also "Descent Freespace" and "Baldurs Gate", and
"Ocarina of Time", "Policenauts", "Xenogears", "Spyro the Dragon",
"Banjo Kazooie", "Rogue Squadron 3D", "Diablo", "Tribes", "Pokemon
Red/Blue/Yellow", "Starcraft", "Thief", and "Unreal.

- Similarly, there's 2004. "Half Life 2" dominates, of course, but
we've also "Chronicles of Riddick", "Doom 3", "Rome: Total War", "Red
Dead Revolver", "Halo 2", "Killzone", "WH40K: Dawn of War", "Star Wars
Battlefront", and "Metal Gear Solid 3 Snake Eater". (although you can
already start to see the curse of the sequels starting to creep in)

I could go on...


(No really, I could. But I won't. You can thank me later).


The point is, it's /really/ hard for me to choose a best year.
Honestly, it might be easier for me to pick a /worst/ year. But 2007
isn't likely to be it. Of those I listed above, its probably 1997 that
seems the best choice; it had a bunch of great games, but was also
smack-dab in the middle of an era of experimentation, as the rapid
change of technology and processing speed suddenly enabled entirely
new types of games.  I'm not sure I'd put it as "greatest year of all"
but in the limited selection above? It'd rank high. But ultimately, I
could probably point to any year prior to 2007 and give good argument
for why it was one of the best.

But by 2007, a lot of the problems of modern gaming were either
already set in stone, or being aborn. It just doesn't seem the best
choice to me.


What year would you put as "greatest in gaming"? Or is it a fool's
choice?













* I'll admit that a lot of the games in these selections are biased
towards the PC, but what can you expect from a self-avowed PC gamer
writing on a PC gaming forum? Anyway, I tried to dribble a few console
games in there too. Feel free to point to other 'best years' using
console titles as your proofs, if you should so desire. I won't mind
;-)