The Official UKFF Top 50 Games List

[Joe_the_Lion]

I didn't nominate any CPC464 games because I genuinely have founf gaming over the past decade to have been infinitely more enjoyable than anything that has gone before. I genuinely think we are in golden age of gaming at the moment.

[Chest Rockwell]

Nice to see a mention for Unreal Tournament there. I spent a lot of time stubbornly playing that on my own online when all my friends tried to get me to play whatever the name of that really popular Quake II mod was... Counterstrike..?

[Devon Malcolm]

Skool Daze was one of the most annoying games I've ever played. It was as hard as HTBACB.

 

Bonus points if you know/remember HTBACB on the speccy.

 

Is that the one where you could eat shampoo?

[Keith Houchen]

Skool Daze was one of the most annoying games I've ever played. It was as hard as HTBACB.

 

Bonus points if you know/remember HTBACB on the speccy.

I had a copy of it, word got round school and I had loads of new "mates". Being a Speccy owner though, I was already one of the cool kids so the CommoBores could go fuck themselves.

[NEWM]

So, nobody played and loved Worms enough to give it some votes? Everybody I knew jizzed all over that game, me and my mates had some epic clashes.

 

Unreal Tournament was a near miss in my top 15, really surprised it didn't make the Top 50.

[Majik]

Purely to annoy everyone, here are mine, as sent in word for word to Black2.

 

On a side note, I was disappointed a little with the lack of arcade games, and think Goldeney is pish. My number one never even got a sniff...

 

1) The Bard’s Tale (Amiga) – the first truly EPIC role playing game, Interplay managed to recreate the heroic task of taking utterly rotten level one fodder through a blockbuster storyline to become veritable Gods. Party members fell on the journey, and there were desperate times rushing through the streets of Skara Brae to find a temple without encountering any beasty that didn’t let you “Flee”. The Bard’s Tale will have a special place in my life as the first game I ever stayed up all night playing, or to be more accurate, two nights playing down Simon Tam’s house whilst his Mum and sister were on holiday in Cyprus. One huge TV (it was 22” of incredibleness!), a kitchen full of snacks and 50 hours straight of Bards Tale (and reams of graph paper for mapping out the dungeons, ofcourse) produced hallucinations, but more importantly, it got us to THAT gate. We just couldn’t work out how to get in it. Heaven and hell in a single game, and I don’t think I’ll ever be so involved in a video game ever again as I was that balmy weekend in the summer holiday of 1989.

 

2) The Secret of Monkey Island (Amiga) – the single funniest game ever. Now, don’t get me wrong – I’ve played some funny games in my time (Sam and Max, Leisure Suit Larry, Discworld) but this was the first game to reduce me to a gibbering wreck, sliding off my dining room chair (I didn’t have any decent seating for my desk at the time) and happily collapsed on the floor; the particle board making a beech coloured roof for my proverbial padded cell under the counter. It was the small things which always amused me most – the little comments by the supporting cast, and the animation when you finally achieved a goal (cannon fire, anyone?). A seriously challenging game, like a lot of games on my list, the hours I spent thinking about it was probably treble the hours I actually spent playing it. However, there was nothing like suddenly realising a connection between two objects in the middle of a Maths lesson, bearing in mind that Mr Black, as hard as he was, was also playing through at the time.

 

3) Elite (Amstrad CPC) – the game with no end. It is with some sadness that I know that there will never be another game like Elite, and there will never be a group of players like Elite players. No online play to up the action, just pure strategy and….*drumroll*… vector graphics. For anyone that has never experienced it, it is VITAL you search youtube for the Elite opening credits.

 

4) CounterStrike (PC) – I got dragged, kicking and screaming into a “clan” at Coventry and Walsgrave NHS Primary Care Trusts’ IT support department. Strangely, there was a lack of white hoods and burning crosses though. There was, however, the costliest PC game I have ever come across. My PC was never fast enough – overclocking became an obsession (peltier cooling for me~), twin CPUs, and my front room buzzed constantly with our very own server. God bless [HH-STM] Huge Hole – Spank the monkey!!! The worst clan ever.

 

5) Eye of the Beholder (Amiga) – wait a moment… You mean I can play Dungeons and Dragons WITHOUT the stale odour of unwashed bully fodder in the room? What a result! Wandering monsters, high powered magic items, and a seemingly endless supply of dungeons filled many years of my life. I even bought a disc drive to speed things up. Beat that.

 

6) Tetris (Gameboy) – I was the King. Actually, I was the King, Jack, Joker and every other badly transposed male card icon. I was an authorised and verified 999999 pointer.

 

7) Gauntlet (Arcade) – I get the feeling that arcade owners everywhere owed the creator of Gauntlet at least a reasonable night of hot ass action. Up and down the country, whenever I arrived at an arcade, my skinny hand full of 10p pieces ready to kick ass as the warrior, there was always a queue on the Gauntlet machine. Without fail, there were snot nosed kids (me being one of them) hovering around the seemingly giant machine, awaiting their turn to shoot the fire breathing demons and run like shit buggery from Death. Incredibly simply game that I spent a small fortune on. In my castle, there will be a Gauntlet arcade machine.

 

8) Street Fighter 2 (SNES) – Now, I was never any good at SF2, but I didn’t care. All my mates were, which meant we were the rulers of everything down Quasar in Cov City Centre. Plus, my mate Sui Wing Sang won the SF2 tournament down Holyhead Road Currys which was hosted by Dominic Diamond! (Sometimes, it frankly stuns me I’ve ever had sex)

 

9) Ultimate Fighting Championship (Dreamcast) – Twist. Turn. On top. Underneath. Catch fist. Turn. Mount. Reversal. Double leg nelson. Roll through. Catch foot. Takedown. Inside guard. Catch fist. Catch fist reversal. Take the back. Choke. Yes, yes, yessssss!!!!!!!!! Undisputed can suck my balls. This was one on one fighting at it’s very, very best.

 

10) Shenmue (Dreamcast) – Before this, I’d never really connected with a video game character on any kind of level, but Shenmue was kind of …real. He did normal things, and brought me along for the ride. I got to fight with him, gamble with him and foil the bad guys with him, whilst beating off the ladies with a stick. Incredible storyline, incredible graphics and about ten years ahead of its time. What a game.

 

11) Crazy Taxi (Dreamcast) – The soundtrack to my flat for some time came in the form of Offspring and Bad Religion. Hilarious and addictive, you could tell a good player a mile off by the routes he took. The bottom of the hill caf

Edited July 6, 2009 by Majik

[Gwailofilms]

Skool Daze was one of the most annoying games I've ever played. It was as hard as HTBACB.

 

Bonus points if you know/remember HTBACB on the speccy.

Had it on my old Amstrad. I was about ten and it was funny cos it was rude. The weird two-viewports-at-once-to-"replicate"-three-dimensions messed with my head.

 

Oh, and to jump on the bandwagon...

 

1) Street Fighter II Turbo (SNES) - I'll freely admit I suck at this, but I absolutely love it. I can't explain the lure, but I think it's the one Capcom got "right". SFII was too slow and felt limiting in terms of character selection and many of the SF games beyond this just went too far in terms of tweakage, but this is Street Fighter perfection for me.

 

2) WWF No Mercy (N64) - It was a toss-up between this and VPW2, but this wins out due to the variety of match modes, number of characters, tweakable variables and just plain being able to pull off a shooting star press from the top of a ladder set up in the ring onto an opponent on the floor. Eight years on and wrestling games still haven't managed to top this.

 

3) Fallout 3 (360) - My current drug of choice. Yes, it's flawed (why are those books floating above the shelves? Why is that body part floating at eye-level?), but it's massive, engrossing and easily the game of 2008. I'm 45 hours into my second play-through and still haven't started the main quest. If I was stuck on a desert island, I'd want a 360 and Fallout 3. Awesome.

 

4) Rock Band 2 (360) - Some games you have to be in the mood for, this I can just pick up and play. I'll probably never get onto "Hard" and there's no way I'll ever be able to play a real guitar, but every time I boot this up, I'm a rock star. Even better with a bassist, drummer and willing/drunk singer. The ability to import 95% of the RB1 tunes, plus the massive amount of DLC means it'll never get boring.

 

5) Perfect Dark (N64) - Sacrilege I know, but I prefer this to Goldeneye. I found that once I'd played PD with it's longer story, huge multiplayer and provision for two-handing any of the weapons, I rarely went back to Bond. Practising your multiplayer skillz against a whole ton of bots rocked too. Towards the end of my N64's life, when I had tired of all my other games, I still played this for many, many hours.

 

6) Portal (360) - How can you not love Portal? Brain-bending physics puzzles, a fantastic twist, the birth of a new classic video games character and that song. The sequel can't come fast enough.

 

7) Robocop (Amstrad) - My first computer was an Amstrad CPC 6128 and I loved this game to death. Great graphics, synthesised speech, cool music, the glitch in level seven which meant you'd occasionally fall into some weird underworld, three types of gameplay and "playing" an 18 certificate movie at age 8. Brilliant.

 

8) Tetris (Gameboy) - A mistake Nintendo repeated with the Wii: don't bundle your best game with your console! I have an original 1989 Gameboy and I still play this today.

 

9) Mario 64 (N64) - Nintendo perfected the 3D platformer with this game and everybody else is still trying to play catch-up. Gob-smacking at the time and still superb today.

 

10) GTA: Vice City (PS2) - I had nearly 40 PS2 games an this is the only one that makes the list. For me, the pinnacle of the 3D GTA generation. San Andreas and GTAIV are both great games, but VC is the perfect storm or characters, setting, action, music and feel. You mean I get to "be" Ray Liotta? Where do I sign?!

 

11) Virtua Cop 2 (Arcade) - There's only one way to play this and it's reason I've listed it; "Chow Yun-Fat Mode". OK, so it's not an official mode and it'll cost you two quid a pop, but next time you see one of these machines, give it a go. The premise is simple: play two-player mode by yourself with a gun in each hand. So much fun.

 

12) ActRaiser (SNES) - The SNES is probably my favourite console ever and home to so many amazing games. ActRaiser has no hope of making the official 50, but I have to list it. A fantastic convergence of genres (God game and side-scrolling platform slasher; imagine Sim City meets Golden Axe) in which both just "work", some beautiful sprite work and an amazing score.

 

13) Mario Kart (SNES) - One reason: all-night multiplayer Mario Kart parties 'round Craig's house. "He's got the red shell!"

 

14) Bomberman 2 (SNES) - See "Mario Kart", but with four players. A great game in its own right, but this is here more for the memories it evokes of cramming a shitload of friends into someone's living room and just using utter bastard tactics on one-another. Bomberman went downhill after this, but like GTA:VC, I consider this the peak of its respective franchise.

 

15) Royal Rumble (SNES) - Man, this got played to death. You got to play as cool wrestlers like Bret Hart and Shawn Michaels instead of idiots like Hulk Hogan, hit people with chairs, do top rope moves, tag teams, the Rumble. Get me a SNES, stat!

 

 

[Astro Hollywood]

Surprised there's nothing from the Spectrum or C64. Could it be that I'm just fucking old?

 

Only 25 votes were recorded for Spectrum, C64 or Amstrad.

 

That's part of the point I was making earlier; people voting on this list are in part voting for something that occupied their time in younger days.

 

Sickwoy, you and I are probably seven or eight years older than the average age on the forum - this will have something to do with it.

 

I'm sure it is down to that. At 30, the games that got me into gaming all pre-dated the Megadrive, and those are the ones that stay with you. The most nostalgic thing in the world for me is the cover of Ant Attack, the first game I ever played, but the fetuses around here won't have heard of it.

 

Skool Daze was one of the most annoying games I've ever played. It was as hard as HTBACB.

 

Bonus points if you know/remember HTBACB on the speccy.

 

Am I imagining that you could actually wee into a houseplant?

 

Tremendous thread though, wild applause for Black2's efforts.

[Mr. Baxter]

Thank Christ GTA didn't win.

 

Incidentally, can't remember (or be bothered finding) all my nominations, but as I recall Sonic 3 and Knuckles was #1, closely followed by Broken Sword 1, Monkey Island 2, Jet Set Radio and Rocket Knight Adventures.

[MRMIdAS]

Nice to see a mention for Unreal Tournament there. I spent a lot of time stubbornly playing that on my own online when all my friends tried to get me to play whatever the name of that really popular Quake II mod was... Counterstrike..?

 

if you're going for the zinger I think you are, then yes, half life, and thusly counterstrike, are built off the Quake engine.

 

heavily modded quake engine, but quake engine nontheless, that's why you can still bunnyhop.

Edited July 6, 2009 by MRMIdAS

[Chest Rockwell]

9) Ultimate Fighting Championship (Dreamcast)

Edited July 6, 2009 by Chest Rockwell

[NEWM]

9) Ultimate Fighting Championship (Dreamcast)

[Majik]

9) Ultimate Fighting Championship (Dreamcast)

[Onyx2]

Top 25 by series (that is, all games of the same series counted together):

 

1. Grand Theft Auto

2. Mario

3. WWE THQ

4. Sonic The Hedgehog

5. The Legend of Zelda

6. Street Fighter

7. Mario Kart

8. Final Fantasy

9. Metal Gear Solid

10. GoldenEye 007

11. Resident Evil

12. Championship Manager

13. Streets of Rage

14. Pro Evolution Soccer

15. Guitar Hero

16. Tetris

17. Broken Sword

18. Sensible World of Soccer

19. Pokemon

20. Halo

21. Fallout

22. Call of Duty

23. Tekken

24. ISS

25. Silent Hill

[Joe_the_Lion]

I'm sure it is down to that. At 30, the games that got me into gaming all pre-dated the Megadrive, and those are the ones that stay with you. The most nostalgic thing in the world for me is the cover of Ant Attack, the first game I ever played, but the fetuses around here won't have heard of it.

 

 

I really don't have the same feelings. I think one major factor for me is that I 'got out' of gaming for a good 3 years or so - I stopped playing games at about 14 and didn't start again until I was pretty much 18 IIRC - so a lot of the stuff I played as a child can't have had the same meaning for me as it does for others because if it did I wouldn't have stopped playing for long.