From Decker's thread on returning to PC gaming:

It is difficult, but I think it would be interesting to hear people's respectful opinions. No nostalgia votes, either, unless you really think Wolf3D and Doom are better than the newest crop of FPSes... if you do, please elaborate.

Overall FPS - either Deus Ex or MOH:AA.

Deus Ex, for the amazing plot, tons of surprises, and the ability to customize your character, among other reasons. MOH:AA for the way it transports you back to the 1940s and the world at war... hard to describe.

Tactical FPS - SWAT 3

I love the "commands on the fly" way you interact with your troops. No need to plot out your waypoints before the level, no need to switch to a command map during the level... aim the cursor at the door, tell your squad to breach, bang, and clear the room, and they do... all while you're still in the first person perspective. I love getting to play with all the tools of the trade, too... flashbangs, lightsticks, mirrors, etc. I just started up Ghost Recon, though, so that may give SWAT 3 a run for its money.

Jedi Knight 2 is good... but I almost don't put it in the same category as the other FPSs, because FPS = First Person Shooter, and much of your time in JK2 after you get the lightsaber is spent in 3rd person. Well, at least for me it is. *makes lightsaber noise*

Overall FPS - Deus Ex
Tactical FPS - Rogue Spear or Ghost Recon

I think Clive Barker's Undying deserves an honorable mention. I probably would have enjoyed it more but I was too scared to. System Shock 2 is in the same boat.

I'm sure MOHAA's gonna get a lot of votes but I don't think it deserves them. I love WW2 so there's no way I could dislike the game but I thought it was very flawed.

I'm actually torn between Half-Life, Halo, Goldeneye, and MOH:AA! Those are my favorite FPSs, just wonderfully constructed and pure fun!

BTW, we are just talking PC games here right? Otherwise I would have to say Golden Eye is the best FPS ever. In a lot of ways it's not very impressive but it's a damn fun game.

Goldeneye and Perfect Dark.

I'm only a casual FPS fan, I hate PC gaming and haven't played Halo enough to rank it, so my opinion obviously isn't as informed as others.

I personally think FPS are more fun online. There's something about having that "human" opponent that the bots can't match. That being said, the Half-Life Mod - Day of Defeat takes the cake for me.

If you're talking about single player though, the water gets much muddier. When HALO comes to PC (or if HALO comes to PC) it will rule the pack. Until that time, I guess I'll vote for Medal of Honor.

I wouldn't consider Deus Ex a FPS.. I'd say it's more of an action RPG with a first person perspective. Comparing it to traditional FPS's isn't really fair.
But.. for multiplayer gaming, I think Quake II is the best FPS ever, mostly because it's the one that introduced me to online gaming, but it's still fun when I play it now.

I've been looking at Swat 3 a lot. How is this game?

For single player FPS's I'd have to go with Deus Ex. It added a lot of unique features to the genre and best of all, didn't dictate how you had to play the game in order to solve the various problems you encountered. Freedom to do what you want is always great in my opinion. As for console FPS's, I'd go with Halo hands down. The AI and physics systems provide a unique experience every time I play that game. You can spend hours just messing around with the physics of grenades, vehicles etc...

I still think of Deus Ex as a first-person shooter that just blew away everyone's (okay, at least my) expection about what an FPS can be.

And I have nothing but praise for SWAT 3, especially considering that you can find it for $20 or less right now, I think. A very intense experience, and I really liked the police aspect... you get more points for saving lives rather than taking them. I picked up SWAT 3 and Return to Castle Wolfenstein on the same day... I played RTCW for about twenty minutes, and I was like, "Eh, this is okay... let's see what SWAT 3 is like." Four hours later, when I finally shut down SWAT 3, I thought, "Okay, this is a great game."

deer hunter

QUAKE

Now theres a man who makes sense. quake owns.

I would rank half-life and it's many mod's second, since you can get a lot of different game play off that one game.

Wolfenstien is fun, but you must play with other people you know well online if you ever want to get healed from a medic or ammo from a lt. thats what I hate about it, it's very closely based on teams and well.. if you don't play as one, you are screwed.

Wolfenstein and Doom II for historical purposes.

The Quake series for their online multiplayer explosion as well as mods, etc.

Daikatana and Blood II and Sin for the uh... Nevermind.

My vote goes to the original Unreal but that's my own personal opinion and it's also the FPS I got the most enjoyment out of, ever.

Wow, I've never had my own spin off before Thanks, Static!
As I mentioned in the original thread, I've been out of the loop fro over three years. Before I went "underground", I really enjoyed Half-Life. On the PS2, I thought Red Faction was pretty good, but as I said I lack a good frame of reference (but it was certainly better than Timesplitters, NOLF, and some of the other PS2 FPS I've rented including the wildly overrated MOH:Frontline).
I bought Deus Ex GOTY today with free shipping from Best Buy.com. I couldn't find it in any local store or I would have bought it already. I'm glad to hear that it's a great game. I can't wait to play.

BTW: Any word on a PC version of Halo? It was supposed to be in the pipes for a long time, now. If I have that and Morrowind for the PC, I can forget about buying an Xbox for a while.

best FPS.. well all you really need to enjoy the game is 30 FPS in just about any game.

One of my favorites is No one lives forever. Not to many people seem to have played this one even though it won quite a few awards.

I also have to go with Half-Life too.

No votes for Unreal Tournament ???
This and the original Unreal are my all time favorites!

Thats pretty much true. If you get in any game early enough before everybody knows the maps like the back of their hand it seems more fun. More skill based. Ive been playing the hell out of the Gore Demo that came out this week and its not that good. But its a blast online. Its not like theres a kid on there thats already logged 300+ hrs on it.

For me,
Single player: Goldeneye
Multi player: MoH:AA

Online Multiplayer FPS: Unreal Tournament (many other games have come, gone and been deleted, but this still occupies space on my hard drive)
Single Player FPS: MOH:AA and RTCW (maybe just because they're recent...)

Thief (hey, bows are shot, too!)
System Shock 2
Goldeneye
Half-Life

Gotta go with Halo..

Never got into a FPS before, Halo changed that...

dont play much PC in terms of games, used to play up until about Quake, which kind of turned me off of FPS...

Quake series, especially with the rocket arena mod...just never gets old to me for some reason