Peter Suciu

List Makers, What Goes Into A Best-Of List
April 28, 2008

Last December I took the time to write about how the video game industry has so many end-of-the-year Best and Worst lists. But actually in truth the industry has lists throughout the year. At any given time one gaming magazine or another, or Web site or blog, seemingly posts the “Top X” of something game-related. It can be the Top 100 Adventure Games, or the 100 Most Innovative Controllers or in some cases the 15 Best Digitally Rendered (and overly endowed) Female Sidekicks. 

Of course the game industry isn’t limited to lists. Various business magazines provide annual lists of everything from individuals’ wealth to environmentally friendly companies. Entertainment magazines list the “power” of entertainers as well as those behind the scenes. So why shouldn’t video games be ranked? 

And in fairness, this reporter is a typical list maker. For MSNBC I recently had the privilege of ranking the top strategy games overall. I actually was able to write about top real-time strategy games a few weeks ago (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24166146/), and this sub category allowed me to pull out a few more deserving games.  

I feel I’m up to the task of compiling these lists in part because I actually have more than two decades of strategy gaming experience (in other words, I’ve been playing games a long time). My experience with games over the years has allowed me insight to what works, what doesn’t work and, more importantly, what works and is fun. This is especially true in strategy games, which has been a genre I’ve enjoyed more than others.  

But narrowing it down to the top five of anything isn’t easy. Try to narrow down a top five and you’re likely to come up with six or seven nominees before you know it. So coming up with the top five strategy games meant looking back at decade’s worth of games. For every game that made the list I could name five more that didn’t make it. This is the downside of lists (and every year people must guess what would have been Oscar nominees had the lists been six nominees instead of five). 

My top strategy games included games old and new. Some of my choices were no doubt expected, and a few were unique. 

For example, in my real-time strategy list I didn’t include Dune II, the game that is arguably the first true RTS – some would say that honor belongs to M.U.L.E., but truth be told many of the elements introduced in Dune II remain staples of the RTS genre today. Without Dune II we probably wouldn’t have gotten Command & Conquer, Warcraft, StarCraft, Age of Empires, etc. Dune II is not among the best real-time strategy games because improvements refined the genre, but because Dune II started the whole thing I feel it is simply one of the best overall strategy games.  

Likewise, my choice of Sid Meier’s Colonization is probably a brave choice. Most gamers would argue with me that Sid Meier’s Civilization probably deserves the spot in the top five. I disagree (obviously), because while Civilization spawned Civilization II, Civilization III and even Civilization IV — not to mention the clone series Civilization: Call to Power and Call to Power 2 (the latter not having the Civ moniker in the name at all) — I must point out that Colonization was so close to turn-based perfection that it didn’t need a sequel or a revision.  

Maybe Colonization isn’t to games what “Citizen Kane” is to movies (let’s hope no one remakes “Citizen Kane”), but the fact remains that it worked the first time. OK, so maybe fans of Civ could argue that Colonization wasn’t good enough to garner a sequel too. But I would counter that Colonization offers a better endgame than Civ. With Civ you practically know you’ll win the game long before you make your last turn. With Colonization — where you found a colony in the New World and slowly lead it on a path towards independence — the last act involves a revolution against the motherland. You can do everything right and still have a real challenge on your hands. This actually changes the game from one of exploration and expanding to a wargame. Talk about innovative … too bad more people didn’t appreciate it. 

Of course appreciating games is subjective. Many game reviewers could come up with their best of lists, but I hope that they could take the time to consider why the games are on the list. Popularity and familiarity shouldn’t be the deciding factors. My list may not agree with all tastes, but I feel confident I can defend each and every entry.

Posted by Peter Suciu on April 28, 2008 | Comments (0)