On one of my recent livestreams, this topic came up. (By the way, we do livestreams now—though ironically for this topic, they do not involve me playing video games. Instead, they’re full of exciting things like me signing books. Find the past ones on my YouTube channel.)

My goal with this section of the newsletter is to let you get to know me better. I thought it would be a fun experiment for me to talk about my favorite video games. You shouldn’t consider this a “best of all time” list, though I do recommend these games. I’m not saying these are the best; merely they are my favorites. Think of this list more as an insight into who I am and the things I like.

Since picking favorites is generally tough, I decided to weight the list toward a few factors. First, if the game is part of a series, I decided I should generally like the whole series to include it here. I’ll mention my personal favorite game for each item, but in general, this is a “favorite franchise” list as much as it is a favorite game list.

Second, the game or franchise should be one I’ve gone back to multiple times throughout my life, rather than being just something I loved when I was young. Nostalgia will play a part in the list, but I want it to be more than just “teenage Brandon’s greatest hits.” Finally, I’m eliminating games I or my friends made—so no Infinity Blade, for example.

I should also note to some of my younger readers that some of these may not be appropriate for all ages. There are a couple that even I played with a few mods to tone down some of the graphic content. (I really don’t need to see that many head explosions, Fallout. Really, I’m good.)

Anyway, counting down from ten, here is my list as it sits right now.

10: Katamari Damaci

I love things that make me look at the world in a new way. Katamari did this in spades. It is an imaginative, bizarre vision with unique gameplay. It is like nothing else in the world and I love it for all its strangeness and occasional lack of gameplay polish.

I was transfixed the first time I played it, and have looked forward to it being remade and rereleased on multiple different consoles. I love the cute—and somehow creepy at the same time—storyline. It feels like a fever dream more than a game sometimes, and is probably the closest I’ll ever get to understanding what it’s like to do drugs.

9: Undertale

This is an oddball on this list because I think it’s the only game that is not a franchise from a major studio—but is instead an indie game, which I believe was originally funded on Kickstarter.

I loved how this felt like a novel as much as a game. It was one person’s vision; a single story told really well, with a huge amount of personality. The humor was just my kind of wonderful/terrible, and I was instantly enamored with the characters.

That probably would have been enough, but it is a nice deconstruction of video games as a medium—and has not one, but multiple innovative gameplay mechanics. Together, the package left me enamored. This is a work of genius that I feel everyone should at least try, even if it ends up not being for them.

8: Fallout: New Vegas

I have played all of the core Fallout games, and I was one of the (it seems few) who was really excited when it moved from turn-based tactics to first-person shooter. While Fallout 3 was good, it didn’t have the charm of the first two.

New Vegas delivered on everything I was hoping to see. The charm was back, the writing sharp, the quests imaginative. The gameplay was engaging and branched in a variety of directions, the gunplay was solid, and the atmosphere immersive. I of course love the first two games in the series—but New Vegas combines everything I like in gaming into one package. (As a note, I own the Outer Worlds, and am looking forward to digging into it. Consider this item on the list a recommendation of other Obsidian games—like Knights of the Old Republic Two—regardless of genre, as I’ve found them universally to be superior to their contemporaries.)

7 Super Mario World

When I was eleven, I flew (alone, which was very exciting to me) from Nebraska to visit my uncle Devon in Salt Lake City. Before I left, my father gave me $200 and told me to pay for my own meals while on the trip—but of course, my uncle didn’t allow this. At the end of the trip, I tried to give him the money, which he wouldn’t take.

I mentioned my dad would take the money back when I got home, but that was okay. Well, my uncle would have none of that, and drove me to the local mall and made me spend it on a Nintendo Entertainment System. (This uncle, you might guess, is an awesome human being.)

Since that day of first plugging it in and experiencing Mario for the first time, I was hooked. This is the only platformer on the list, as I don’t love those. But one makes an exception for Mario. There’s just so much polish, so much elegance to the control schemes, that even a guy who prefers an FPS or an RPG like me has to admit these are great games. I picked World as my favorite as it’s the one I’ve gone back to and played the most.

7: The Curse of Monkey Island (Monkey Island 3)

I kind of miss the golden age of adventure gaming, and I don’t know that anyone ever got it as right as they did with this game. It is the pinnacle of the genre, in my opinion—no offense to Grim Fandango fans.

This game came out right before gaming’s awkward teenage phase where everything moved to 3-d polygons. For a while after, games looked pretty bad, though they could do more because of the swap. But if you want to go see what life was like before that change, play Monkey Island 3. Composed of beautiful art pieces that look like cells from Disney movies, with streamlined controls (the genre had come a long way from “Get yon torch”) and fantastic voice acting, this game still plays really well.

This is one of the few games I’ve been able to get my non-gamer wife to play through with me, and it worked really well as a co-op game with the two of us trying to talk through problems. It’s a lovingly crafted time capsule of a previous era of gaming, and if you missed it, it’s really worth trying all these years later. (The first and second games hold up surprisingly well too, as a note, particularly with the redone art that came out a decade or so ago.)

Also, again, this one has my kind of humor.

6: Breath of the Wild

I never thought a Zelda game would unseat A Link to the Past as my favorite Zelda, but Breath of the Wild managed it. It combined the magic of classic gameplay with modern design aesthetic, and I loved this game.

There’s not a lot to say about it that others haven’t said before, but I particularly liked how it took the elements of the previous games in the series (giving you specific tools to beat specific challenges) and let you have them all at once. I like how the dungeons became little mini puzzles to beat, instead of (sometimes seemingly endless) slogs to get through. I liked the exploration, the fluidity of the controls, and the use of a non-linear narrative in flashbacks. It’s worth buying a Switch just to play this one and Mario—but in case you want, you can also play Dark Souls on Switch… (That’s foreshadowing.)

5: Halo 2

Telling stories about Halo Two on stream is what made me think of writing this list.

I’m sometimes surprised that this game isn’t talked about as much as I think it should be. Granted, the franchise is very popular—but people tend to love either Reach or games 1 or 3 more than two. Two, however, is the only one I ever wanted to replay—and I’ve done so three or four times at this point. (It’s also the only one I ever beat on Legendary.)

It’s made me think on why I love this one, while so many others seem to just consider it one of many in a strong—but in many ways unexceptional—series of games. I think part of this is because I focus primarily on the single-player aspects of a game (which is why there aren’t any MMOs on this list.) Others prefer Halo games with more balanced/polished multiplayer. But I like to game by myself, and don’t really look for a multiplayer experience. (Though this is changing as I game with my sons more and more.)

I really like good writing—which I suppose you’d expect. But in games, I specifically prefer writing that enhances the style of game I’m playing. Just dumping a bunch of story on me isn’t enough; it has to be suited to the gameplay and the feel of the game. In that context, I’ve rarely encountered writing as good as Halo 2. From the opening—with the intercutting and juxtaposition of the two narratives—to the quotes barked out by the marines, the writing in this game is great. It stands out starkly against other Halo games, to the point that I wonder what the difference is.

Yes, Halo Two is a bombastic hero fantasy about a super soldier stomping aliens. But it has subtle, yet powerful worldbuilding sprinkled all through it—and the music…it does things with the story that I envy. It’s kind of cheating that games and films get to have powerful scores to help with mood.

The guns in Two feel so much better than Halo One, and the vehicles drive far better. The only complaint I have is that it’s only half a story—as in, Halo 2 and 3 seem like they were one game broken in two pieces. And while 3 is good (and Reach does something different, which I approve of in general) neither did it for me the way Two did, and continues to do.

3: Final Fantasy X

You probably knew Final Fantasy was coming. People often ask if the way these games handle magic was an influence upon me. All I can say is that I’ve played them since the first one, and so they’re bound to have had an influence.

On one hand, these games are really strange. I mean, I don’t think we gamers stop quite often enough to note how downright bizarre this series gets. Final Fantasy doesn’t always make the most sense—but the games are always ambitious.

Ten is my favorite for a couple of reasons. I felt like the worldbuilding was among the strongest, and I really connected with the characters. That’s strange, because this is one of the FF games without an angst-filled teen as the protagonist. Instead, it has a kind of stable happy-go-lucky jock as the protagonist.

But that’s what I needed, right then. A game that didn’t give me the same old protagonist, but instead gave me someone new and showed me I could bond to them just as well. Ten was the first with full voice acting, and that jump added a lot for me. It has my favorite music of the series, and all together is what I consider the perfect final fantasy game. (Though admittedly, I find it more and more difficult to get into turn-based battle mechanics as I grow older.)

2: Bloodborne

Those who follow my streams, or who read other interviews I’ve done, probably expected this series to be at or near the top. The question wasn’t whether Souls would be here, but which one to pick as my favorite.

I went with Bloodborne, though it could have been any of them. (Even Dark Souls 2—which I really like, despite its reputation in the fandom.) I’ve been following FromSoftware’s games since the King’s Field games, and Demon’s Souls was a huge triumph—with the director Hidetaka Miyazaki deserving much of the praise for its design, and Dark Souls (which is really just a more polished version of Demon’s Souls).

As I am a fan of cosmic horror, Bloodborne is probably my favorite overall. It really hit the mix of cosmic and gothic horror perfectly. It forced me to change up my gameplay from the other Souls games, and I loved the beautiful visuals.

I am a fan of hard games—but I like hard games that are what I consider “fair.” (For example, I don’t love those impossible fan-made Mario levels, or many of the super-crazy “bullet hell”-style games.) Dark Souls is a different kind of hard. Difficult like a stern instructor, expecting you to learn—but giving you the tools to do so. It presents a challenge, rather than being hard just to be hard.

If I have a problem with Final Fantasy, it’s that the games sometimes feel like the gameplay is an afterthought to telling the story. But in the Souls games, story and gameplay are intermixed in a way I’d never seen done before. You have to construct the story like an archeologist, using dialogue and lore from descriptions of in-game objects. I find this fascinating; the series tells stories in a way a book never could. I’m always glad when a game series can show off the specific strengths of the medium.

In fact, this series would be #1 except for the little fact that I have way too much time on Steam logged playing…

1: Civilization VI

This series had to take #1 by sheer weight of gameplay time. I discovered the first on a friend’s computer in the dorms my freshman year—and I can still remember the feeling of the birds chirping outside, realizing I’d been playing all night and really should get back to my own dorm room.

That still happens, and has happened, with every game in the series. I have a lot of thoughts on this series, many of them granular and too specific for this list. (Like, it’s obvious AI technology isn’t up to the task of playing a game this complex—so could we instead get a roguelike set of modifiers, game modes, etc. to liven up the games, rather than just having a difficulty slider that changes a few simple aspects of the game?)

I’ll try not to rant, because I really do love this game series. A lot of people consider IV to be the pinnacle of the series, but after V unstacked units—and VI unstacked cities—there was no way I could ever go back. If for some reason, you’ve never played this grand patriarch of the 4X game genre, it’s about starting with a single stone-age settler who can found a city—then playing through eras of a civilization, growing your empire, to try to eventually get offworld with a space program. (Or, if you prefer, conquering the world.)

It’s a load of fun in the way I like to have fun, and I feel like the series has only gotten better over the years. My hat is off to the developers, who keep reinventing the series, rather than making the exact same game over and over.

Now, about that request for difficulty modes…

RUNNERS UP

Any list like this is just a glimpse of how one feels right now, and can’t possibly contain everything that deserves to be mentioned. I expect a lot of you to say, “What about…” to get an opinion on it. So for what it’s worth, here are my next ten in no particular order. Depending on my mood, any of these could have replaced some on the list above.

The Elder Scrolls (Morrowind being my favorite)

You might assume open world epic fantasy to be a slam dunk for me—and it is. These are great games—though admittedly, most of the series (until Skyrim) had a very clunky leveling system and had problems with repetitive gameplay. Still, they’re great.

Mass Effect

I have only played the first game, which I know is heresy. But it was very good, and I hear the second is better. I’m waiting for a remaster to try it. It couldn’t make the list, I felt, without playing more of the series.

Bioshock Infinite

This was a very impressive mix of gunplay, philosophy, and worldbuilding—with an excellent ending. But I can’t justify it on the top ten since I haven’t played the other games in the series. (I did try the first one, and it didn’t click for me, despite the brilliant worldbuilding.)

Doom

I have played a ton of ID games in all their varieties, and they probably deserve a place in the top ten for sheer frenetic fun. One of my claims to “fame” is beating Doom 2 with only the chainsaw. The latest installments are fantastic, and another example of a series that managed to reinvent itself.

Symphony of the Night

An excellent game, best of its genre, that I discovered late and have only played once.

The Witcher

I’ve only really played the third game, and while it was awesome, I haven’t replayed this series enough yet to meet my criteria. That said, this is the single best game based on a book I’ve ever played.

Shadow of the Colossus

One of the most original games I’ve ever played, with extremely compelling minimalist storytelling. But I’ve only played it once, and so was excluded from the top ten.

X-Wing

One of my favorite games when I was younger, and had hours upon hours of time invested. I still think it’s great, but I played it again as an adult, and it doesn’t quite hold up enough to be in the top ten.

Braid

Another beautiful piece of work—one of the greatest arguments for games as art I’ve ever experienced. But I’ve only played it once, and I’m not enough of a platformer fanatic to do it again.

Ys books 1&2

One of my favorite gaming experiences when I was younger, this game still holds a special place in my heart. It’s like a Zelda game mixed with an RPG, and was the first CD game (with voice acting and orchestration) I ever played.

So, why didn’t your favorite game make my list? Well, again, this isn’t a “greatest of all time” list. It’s a list of things I love. Because of that, my biases have a lot to do with what I picked. Since I don’t play a lot of multiplayer, most Blizzard games or team arena FPS games are things I enjoyed, but really never got into a ton. (Diablo II almost made the list though.)

There’s another category of games I got into at the wrong time, missing them during the formative years when they really grabbed other people. Games like Pokémon, Minecraft, Half-Life, Chrono Trigger, or Planescape: Torment.

Some games just have the wrong mechanics for me to love. For example, I don’t love stealth games. So while I played the newer Deus Ex and Batman Arkham games, I don’t love them like I love the games on this list. (Though I admit they are really well put together.)

Because I have Doom and Dark Souls on this list, you might think I like a dark or violent aethetic—but I really don’t. I really enjoy a game that can be cartoonish and fun about it, or a game that is careful about it, but many games are just too dark for me. This is the same reason I don’t love A Song of Ice and Fire, despite admitting it is extremely well written, because of Daenerys’s plot in the first book.

I’ve chosen, for example, not to play God of War, Grand Theft Auto, Red Dead Redemption, or Last of Us for these reasons. (And there are others, like the Shadow of Mordor, that left me with too much of a dark feeling to keep playing.) It’s possible I’ll change my mind, but for now that’s a call I’ve made.

I recognize some of you will think this is a tragedy, but we all have our own lines, and they aren’t always clear. One thing I try not to do is be judgmental about where other people’s lines are—for example, I know there are some that have put down my books for similar reasons. In my opinion, it’s okay to like one thing but not like another thing that is similar—at least when it comes to art.

Anyway, that was me rambling way too much about video games. Maybe I’ll do something like this in the future for things like films or books, though lists like those are much harder for me. Video games are easier for me to divide out, I think, because there’s gameplay to add to the narrative.