Listology 3.0: 15 Years of GOTY

If you’ve been on Twitter in the last week, you might have seen a lot of tweets in your timeline where people listed their favorite games from the past decade and a half. The “15 Years of GOTY” trend has highlighted a lot of great games going all the way back to 2004, but what does the Video Game Canon have to say about some of the choices?

Using Version 3.0, I was able to sort out the best game from each of the last 15 years as ranked by their C-Score (how each game is ranked by the 53 Best Games lists that currently make up the Video Game Canon).

As you might have guessed, in some years the answer was obvious (Half-Life 2 in 2004, The Last of Us in 2013), but in other years it wasn’t (Braid barely squeaked above Fallout 3 in 2008 while Okami leapfrogged The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion in 2006). In the end, Sony and Capcom shared the trophy for most-honored publisher, as both can lay claim to the “Game of the Year” in three separate years.

Take a look at the game with the highest ranking from each of the last 15 years (and the runner-up) after the break.

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Bite-Sized Game History: Immortalizing Ralph Baer, Erasing Puck Man, and Capturing Neil Young’s Game Boy Camera

If you can believe it, Blizzard is just as well known for franchises like Diablo and Warcraft as it is for the monstrous statues that tower over the desks at its Irvine campus. It’s even become something of a tradition for newly-hired employees to pose in front of The Orc Statue on their first day.

But how do you immortalize an even more epic figure in video game history? How about with a nice park bench in the middle of New Hampshire…

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Celebrate the 35th Anniversary of Tetris With A Look Back at its History

I think it’s fair to say that most video game fans are at least a little familiar with the basic beats behind the creation of Tetris. Alexey Pajitnov, a technician with the USSR’s Computer Centre, programmed the puzzle game in his spare time using only the text display of an Electronika 60. After porting the game to IBM-Compatible PCs with the assistance of his co-workers, Pajitnov’s supervisors would go on to sell the international rights to the game to multiple companies, creating a legal mess that would drag on for years.

In time, Pajitnov would move to the United States and regain the rights to Tetris after partnering with Henk Rogers to form The Tetris Company in 1996. Since then, dozens of developers have put their own stamp on Tetris, including the eye-popping VR effects of Tetris Effect in 2018 and the hyper-competitive multiplayer of Tetris 99 in 2019.

Today is Tetris‘s 35th Anniversary, and if you’re unfamiliar with the story behind the game’s creation (or just want to hear it again), there’s no better time than now to dive back into this fascinating story.

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Behind-the-Scenes With A Few PlayStation Classics

Sony’s film division has been attempting to adapt the Uncharted franchise for the big screen for quite a few years now. In that time, a large number of writers and directors have cycled through the production, and several very different actors have signed on to play Drake at one time or another (Spider-Man‘s Tom Holland is currently slated to play a younger version of the character in a film that’ll serve as a prequel to the game franchise).

That protracted process is likely part of the reason why Sony Interactive Entertainment decided to bring their next set of game adaptations in-house under the new PlayStation Productions banner. The studio was formed earlier this week, and its inaugural task will be to create a television show based on the Twisted Metal series, but that won’t be the first bit of filmmaking to bear the PlayStation logo.

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Bite-Sized Game History: Charlotte’s Web: Pig of Persia, Plants Vs Zombies’s 10th Anniversary, and the Unproduced Super Mario Bros. Super Show Spinoffs

The road to a finished product is long, and inspiration can often come from the weirdest places. But if you follow that muse, you’ll often come up with something amazing. And even if you run out of gas, you’ll always have people wondering what could have been.

For this edition Bite-Sized Game History, let’s look at two games that tapped into those odd ideas, and one television adaptation that sadly stayed on the drawing board.

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World Video Game Hall of Fame’s Class of 2019 Includes Super Mario Kart, Mortal Kombat, Windows Solitaire, and Colossal Cave Adventure

The World Video Game Hall of Fame has welcomed four new games into the fold, as the inductees from the Class of 2019 were announced this morning in a special ceremony. This year, three games that practically defined gaming in the 1990s lead the way, while a groundbreaking text adventure from the 1970s also made the cut.

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2018 GOTY Scoreboard: God of War, Red Dead Redemption 2, and More

It takes a special game to sweep all five major year-end awards and Sony Santa Monica’s God of War was just such a game. It’s brutal combat was praised by critics, but it also managed to do the impossible by transforming Kratos, previously portrayed as an instrument of pure rage, into a gruff (and almost lovable) father figure.

In addition to its five-for-five run at The Game Awards, the DICE Awards the SXSW Gaming Awards, the GDC Awards, and the BAFTA Games Awards, God of War handily won “Game of the Year” honors from dozens of publications and topped a handful of Reader Polls for good measure.

In any other year, Rockstar’s Red Dead Redemption 2 would have easily galloped away with some of those accolades, but it had to make do with a smaller (though still quite impressive) haul.

Interestingly, the publications that didn’t click with Kratos or the cowboys cast a wide net when making their “Game of the Year” selection. Matt Makes Games’s Celeste, Epic’s Fortnite, Capcom’s Monster Hunter: World, Insomniac’s Spider-Man, Nintendo’s Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, and many others all earned the admiration of at least one publication.

You can see more of last year’s most-acclaimed titles (and what awards they won) in the 2018 GOTY Scoreboard after the break.

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God of War Wins “Best Game” at 2018-2019 BAFTA Games Awards

It’s a clean sweep for Sony Santa Monica’s God of War. The highly-acclaimed title collected the “Best Game” statuette at this morning’s BAFTA Games Awards ceremony, and the developers can now add it to a stuffed trophy shelf that also includes “Game of the Year” honors from the GDC Awards, SXSW Gaming Awards, DICE Awards, and the Game Awards.

The British Academy of Film and Television Arts bestowed four more awards on Kratos’s latest adventure throughout the ceremony, including “Audio Achievement,” “Music,” “Narrative,” and “Performer” (to Jeremy Davies for his portrayal of The Stranger).

Nintendo marched to the stage multiple times during the 2018-2019 BAFTA Games Awards to collect statuettes for Nintendo Labo in the “Game Innovation” and “Family” categories. Lucas Pope’s Return of the Obra Dinn also won two awards, “Artistic Achievement” and “Game Design.” And this year’s BAFTA for “Best British Game” was given to Playground Games’s Forza Horizon 4.

The complete list of winners and nominees from the 2018-2019 BAFTA Games Awards can be found after the break.

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Bite-Sized Game History: Atari Vs the World, Pac-Man Vs Superman, and Alien Vs Predator (on the Football Field)

When you look back at video games in the 1970s, there’s really only one name… Atari.

From Pong to Breakout to Asteroids, Atari filled the smoke-filled arcades with a parade of classic cabinets, and charged into the next decade on top of the world. We all know they didn’t stay there, but this edition of Bite-Sized Game History looks back at what the company was doing just before it all came crashing down.

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Zelda: A Link to the Past is #1 in Popular Mechanics’s 2019 Update to Their “100 Greatest Video Games of All Time”

Just a few months after Popular Mechanics revealed “The Best Video Game the Year You Were Born” (which they plan to update on a yearly basis), the publication’s editors are back with an update to their “100 Greatest Video Games of All Time” list, which was first published in 2014.

This time around, Nintendo’s The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past earned the #1 spot, dethroning BioShock, which had to settle for #7. Link’s third adventure is actually in some familiar company, as aside from Irrational’s shooter, the majority of the Top 15 is heavily populated by a slew of games from the 1990s. Ready?

There’s Super Mario Bros. 3 (#15) from 1990, Super Mario World (#2) and Street Fighter II (#6) from 1991, Super Mario Kart (#11) from 1992, Doom (#13) from 1993, Final Fantasy VII (#4) and GoldenEye 007 (#10) from 1997, and The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time (#12) and Metal Gear Solid (#14) from 1998.

Outside of the Top 15, Popular Mechanics is the first publication to give Epic’s Fortnite (#34) a spot on their “Best Games” list, and believe it or not, they’re also the first to include car combat classic Twisted Metal (#87).

The Video Game Canon’s Version 3.0 Update was published just a few weeks ago, but you can be sure that Popular Mechanics’s “The 100 Greatest Video Games of All Time” will be included in the next revision.