Pretty balanced (at least on the surface) when it comes to games I've played:
ABNorman
Deus Ex (PC, Mac)
DOOM (PC)
Dungeon Keeper (PC)
ElloSailor
Bioshock (PC)
Age of Empires 2: The Age of Kings (PC)
Deus Ex: Human Revolution (PC)
That's a bit deceiving: I came to Doom a bit late after playing Quake, Dark Forces, and a bunch of Doom clones, so it wasn't fresh and new to me; I definitely didn't play through to the end. I remember playing a lot of Dungeon Keeper, but I am pretty sure it was a demo--one of those discs that came with PC Gamer where you could play for 2 hours or something like that. Still a lot of fun, but never got too too deep into it. SO ElloSailor's team jumps out to an early lead: AOE II was a phenomenal game, and I barely played the campaign! The escort missions and keep-so-and-so alive missions drove me nuts, so for the most part I would play those gigantic random maps and sink hours into waging war. Bioshock is such a great game from top-to-bottom: atmosphere, writing, gameplay mechanics...it goes on and on. I played it late in the PS3 cycle and somehow the "reveal" wasn't spoiled for me, which is nice. DE:HR I played on my MacBook, which I feel like isn't the ideal experience, but I still had a lot of fun with it.
But I've got to circle back and talk about the original Deus Ex for a minute. I don't remember where or how I first heard about this game, but I do remember being enthralled from the very start. I must have gotten it for my 16th birthday, if I'm remembering it correctly, and I sunk days and days and days into it. I'd never experienced the sort of freedom the game offers with the different paths to completing the same objectives, the way you could choose non-lethal over lethal, the way you could select augments to make yourself into the superhuman you wanted to be. I know role-playing games had existed for years, but this was my first foray into anything like that, and it made me feel an unprecedented level of control over my own storytelling--the idea that you could kill major characters early in one playthrough and let them live in another one was groundbreak (to me)--and I played this through multiple times, something I rarely ever did and still rarely do. I watched a Let's Play on YouTube in the past few years and, I have to admit, the voice-acting was mostly awful and the storyline begins to veer into late-series X-Files "let's put every conspiracy theory in a blender and hit GO," but that sense of possibility was still there--15 or more years later, I watched someone else play and thought over and over again, "Woah! I didn't know you could do it that way." An all-timer for me.
So strictly on games I've played, it comes down to an all-time great and 2 great/1 very good game. That is a tough choice. Looking at the games I haven't played, there isn't much on my to-play list: I want to get into Grim Fandango, even have it downloaded, but just don't have the time. I remember watching people playing FF7 and getting promised a turn, but never getting one--fuck those people. The whole Dark Souls phenomenon has mostly gone over my head, and while I like a challenge, its reputation as an extremely difficult game turns me off a little. Was a Team Fortress guy, not a Counter Strike guy. Played Diablo and liked it okay, but not Diablo II (or maybe I did? can't really remember, which shows what kind of impression it left). Nothing else is standing out.
It feels weird, but I want to be consistent with how I vote: I am voting for the better team, not the one with my favorite game, and going with ElloSailor.
