OldBoy

1. Resident Evil 4 (Gamecube)
2. Bionic Commando (NES)
3. Halo (XBOX)
4. Red Dead Redemption (XBOX 360)
5. Eternal Darkness (Gamecube)

honorable metnions:

cruzness

System Shock 2 - PC great unique FPS RPG with a unique story
Final Fantasy VII - PS1 - It blew me away and brought me back to the word of RPGs
NBA Jam - Genesis - Good times talking smack in the arcades and at home with friends
Goldeneye - N64 - Me and 3 friends were gettignready to go out and party when we saw my 9 year old brother and his friend playing splitscreen. We stopped, watched, played and never made it out that night.
Call of Duty 4 Modern Warfare - PS3 - changed my attitude sabout online multiplayer. I went from "who cares?" to "I need that crack NOW"

All these games changed my tastes in what I wanted in a game and are some of the most memorable experiences I ever had. Honorable mention to Metal Gear Solid.

Dan

For one reason or another, these 5 were incredibly enjoyable. They may not be the best games of all time, but they're all special:

1. Mortal Kombat 3: I actually beat this game in an arcade once. At one time, I could do nearly every character's special moves and fatalities. It wasn't the best MK, but it was definitely the most fun for me.
2. Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past: The last Zelda game I played all the way through. Beautiful and brilliant.
3. Grand Theft Auto 3: All of the GTA games have been a blast, but this is the one that "changed everything" so to speak. I'd love to revisit it.
4. Fallout 3: My favourite RPG, and maybe even my favourite game of all time.
5. Deadly Premonition: Sinner's sandwich, Zack, mouth-fisting zombies, FK. So says Mr. Stewart.

Honourable Mentions: All of the Burnout games.

shizawn

All PC

1. Civilization
2. Star Control II
3. Ultima VII: The Black Gate
4. X-Wing
5. Fallout 2

The first three were easy. I had to do some elimination to round out the top 5. Just missing out are X-COM: UFO Defense, Syndicate, Tie Fighter, Planescape: Torment, Day of the Tentacle, Civilization II, Diablo.

Edit: Dune II, I forgot about Dune II. I'm not sure whether it'd crack the top 5, but top 10 for sure.

kgrogers1979

No particular order.

1. Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past (SNES)
2. Baldur's Gate 2: Shadows of Amn (PC)
3. Civilization IV (PC)
4. Deus Ex (PC)
5. Fallout 2 (PC)

boredsilly

1. Red Dead Remption. It feels odd putting this at number one, because I've only played this once. However, for my money Red Dead is the best game of this generation, and is one of the first that was able to create a truly believable world and set of characters that actually made me care about what I was doing in a dramatic sense.

2. I'm going to cheat and list all of the N64 wrestling games together,but WCW/NWO Revenge and No Mercy specifically. These games are very simple, but deliver exactly what I want in a wrestling game, and none of the modern games, with all their bells and whistles, come close to the pure fun I had with these older games. I really wish we could get an uploaded version with the same AKI engine as a downloadable title.

3. Yoshi's Island. This is my favorite platformer of all time. Super Mario 3 or World may get more attention, but for my money Yoshi's Island is where it's at. Perfect balance of control, level design, and aesthetics.

4. Batman Arkham Asylum. This game, simply put, was a dream come true for me. As a life long Batman fan, it has been painful waiting for the game that got Batman right. There have been decent side-scrolling beatem ups, and some decent games based on the Animated series, but Arkham Asylum was exactly the game I've always wanted. Not to mention I think it was the first game to implement that brilliant rhythmic fighting engine.

5. Freedom Force. Before Arkham Asylum, this was the best superhero game ever IMHO. It's such a wonderful game. The reverence it pays to comics from the 60s is pitch-perfect, but then the game has this wonderful level of subtle complexity that makes clearing any given level very satisfying. It's essentially a dungeon crawler, but not as mindless as something like X-Men Legends (which is a game I really loved -- so not hating).

Honorable mentions just because of the amount of time spent playing these games: Beetle Adventure Racing, Tekken 3, SSX 3, NBA Street vol 2, Jet Grind Radio, and all of the Nintendo and Genesis games I'm forgetting.

Maxflier

1. Anarchy Online (PC)
2. Left 4 Dead (PC)
3. Fifa 13 (360)
4. Grand Theft Auto 3 (PS2)
5. Red Dead Reemption (PS3)

tonyc3742

No order -
Streets of Rage 2 - Sega Genesis
Final Fantasy Tactics - PS1
Borderlands - X360
Fallout 3/New Vegas (ok cheating a bit, loved them both) - X360
Shining Force - Sega Genesis

mhg83

1.Mario 3
2.Resident Evil 2
3.GTA San Andreas
4.Tetris
5.Skyrim

DthRdrX

5. Mortal Kombat 2
4. Still Life
3. Alone in the Dark
2. Silent Hill 2
1. KOTOR

Gdrlv

GTA Vice City (PS2)
Uncharted 2 (PS3)
Tekken 2 (PS)
Final Fantasy IV (SNES)
Skyrim (PS3)

Dragon Fly

Chrono Trigger
Super Mario World
Final Fantasy X
Skyrim
Portal

Probably top to bottom in that order. To be honest there are far too many games to list. It's hard to pick based on genre, mood, time played, etc. So many games come to mind for certain experiences they offer. Gotta say though, Chrono Trigger to this day has remained my top game of all time. Nothing beats it. I could play that frigging game forever (I owned it on SNES, PS, and DS 100+ hours logged into each incarnatioin).

edstein

No order:

Diablo 2
Halo
Fallout 3
Bioshock
Borderlands

Moopher

Chrono Trigger
Zelda: A Link to the Past
Chrono Cross
Zelda: Link's Awakening
Bomberman Live

whoopdido

No particular order

Mike Tyson's Punch Out--NES
Zelda: Ocarina of Time--N64
Freelancer--PC
F-Zero--SNES
Mario Kart--N64

superdeluxe

Baseball Stars - NES
Street fighter 2 - Super NES
No Mercy - N64
Bakdurs Gate 2 - PC
Fallout 2 - PC

foxdvd

not in order...

Baldur's Gate 2---actually if I was forced to pick a number 1 this would be it...

Final Fantasy 3---screw everyone who wants to call this Final Fantasy 6...it will always be 3 to me

Fallout 3---had so much fun just going around and looking for stuff

Red Dead Redemption---I have a feeling GTA5 is going to blow me away because of the lessons they learned from 4, and implemented in this game...

Mass Effect ---Just the perfect balance of combat/story.

beavis69

Not in order

1. Resident Evil 2-PS1
2. Legend of Zelda Ocarina of Time-N64
3. Grand Theft Auto San Andreas-PS2
4. Mario Kart-Wii
5. Metal Gear Solid-PS1

That was alot harder than i thought. Was suprised to find how many N64 games i really loved, how many 360 games i liked but not enough to call my top all time, and how few 8 and 16 bit games i feel have stood the test of time.

Michael Corvin

Hmm, tough to narrow down 30 years to 5 games but here goes:

1. Ms. Pac-Man
2. Bioshock

the rest in no order:
Borderlands
Super Mario World
Zelda: Ocarina of Time

Honorable Mention: Halo (rather give a nod to Mario & Zelda than having 3 shooters in there)

dan30oly

Galaga (arcade)
Super Mario Bros (NES)
Legend of Zelda (NES)
Metroid (NES)
Resident Evil (ps1)

wlj

I have a definite #1, but the others are in random order:


1. DARK SOULS -- by far the best game i have played in 34 years and i have played ALOT of games across ALOT of consoles

2. Ninja Gaiden Black -- i have played through this a million times, extremely fun combat and a good challenge

3. Goldeneye (N64) -- I played this game to death with friends back in high school. We probably had 1000s of hours in the multiplayer. I have so many fond memories. We also strove to beat all of the difficulties in the campaign

4. Doom 3 -- one of the most immersive games i have ever played, I am also one of the few that prefer the flashlight or gun gameplay technique. I wish I could choose the old way in the new BFG edition

5. Super Mario Bros (NES) -- there really isn't much to say...masterpiece

Kedrix

Yeah no doubt, I'm in the same exact boat. I have played thousands of games...and I'm supposed to pick 5 ...yeah...so, hrmm.

Here we go...I'll probably kick myself half an hour from now that I did not include something.

Honorable mentions: Wolfenstein 3D, Doom, Final Fantasy I, Touken Retsuden 3 (PS1), Lego Harry Potter series (they both are awesome).

5. Duke Nukem 3D (PC)
4. Skyrim (360)
3. Galaga (Arcade and multiple iterations)
2. Fable II (360)
1. River City Ransom (NES)

SmackDaddy

Phantasy Star (Sega Master System): First RPG that I was compelled to finish.

Half-Life (PC): Changed FPS's forever.

KOTOR: First RPG that I felt compelled to finish since Phantasy Star.

San Francisco Rush 2049 (Dreamcast): We would spend hours playing split screen stunt mode.

Uncharted Series(PS3): Finally, you get to play a movie!

starseed1981

Tough to pick a top 5 but....

05. Chrono Trigger – SNES – Simply awesome beginning to end.
04. Metal Gear Solid – PS – The most cinematic game I’ve ever played. To this day I’ve never felt more like I was part of an action movie.
03. Final Fantasy VII – PS – It was everything I wanted and more. I still consider it far and away the best RPG I’ve ever played.
02. Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne – PC – I’m not a PC gamer but this game took my life over in college. There was a time where I could literally play as any class. I literally had to sell the game off to stop playing it. Four years later I got the game again and had to repeat the same process. And then this year I bought the battle chest version….sigh. I do remember that my blizzard.net account record (in 2002-3) was something like 1235-289
01. Tetris DX - Gameboy Color – Even after owning this for over 12 years I will still randomly get bored and pick it up and play for hours on end.

jdpatri

There's a #1. After that they're interchangeable.

Super Metroid

Metal Gear Solid
Ms. Pac-Man
Civilization (or Civ IV)
X-Wing vs. Tie Fighter

....and that list made me feel old. Pisser.