Doom 3 took its whole 'backstory' element from System Shock 2 (though not as well) and Bioshock was certainly nice, but not better than its predecessor. So how is that not on the list? Maybe they're going by sales figures here, as I know SS2 had/has more of a cult following than it did market impact.

Also Battlefield 2, to add to Marinara's list, which remains popular today.

Deus Ex and System Shock 2 definitely belong on the list. They should put the console-based FPS and PC-based FPS in their own separate lists, I would surely agree with Goldeneye being number one for consoles in that case. PC FPSs would need at least 10 more spots so as not to exclude the sheer bulk of great games we've had over the years. ScrewAttack is very console centric so yeah not surprised.

Bioshock? Crysis? Call of Duty 4?

To be brief in my responses:
Bioshock was the spiritual successor to System Shock 2, which if I hadn't played, would probably have been a sequel I enjoyed (beyond the aesthetics). It was much more dilute than it's predecessor in the RPG game mechanics aspects and far more linear in the level design. The fact that there wasn't any real specialisation or player classes made things like the psychic powers effectively just more reskins of shotguns and rocketlaunchers.

Crysis is exactly the sort of thing I'm referring to. It looks amazing, yes... But it boiled down to being another scripted on-rails ride once you got used to the graphics. It was fresh in Doom 1/2 and even as far as Duke3D, but beyond that, the innovation really stagnated (another e.g. is Prey)

Call of Duty 4 isn't one i've played yet, but I am very keen to try for the multiplayer aspect. Like Battlefield 2, your soldier improves with experience, unlocking new abilities/weapons/etc. This is what makes the game replayable, giving a sense of acheivement and status in a community. Which is why I carefully noted 'Single player FPS' as being the dead genre. The single player part of CoD4 I can pretty much assume is like I've mentioned above

Tags for this video have been changed from 'SHODAN, System Shock 2, brown trousers time' to 'SHODAN, System Shock 2, brown trousers time, spoilers' - edited by ant

What interesting is that the audio logs is the only character interaction you have really, at no point do you meet anyone in person. Not a bad decision considering the graphics were pretty bad in terms of models.

I must say BioShock failed to impress me entirely even though it attempted to follow in System Shocks footsteps, I guess it just wasn't nearly cerebral and more geared to the Xbox market.

On paper, 2007 seemed like a really great year: Half-Life 2: Episode Two, Portal, Team Fortress 2, BioShock, Mass Effect, Call of Duty 4. But only Episode Two managed to make it into my all-time top 20. Maybe it's just too soon for the other games to bump older favorites.

I'd probably have to pick 1995 as the best year, when Chrono Trigger, Command & Conquer, and X-COM: Terror From the Deep (my introduction to the series) were released. It's hard to pick just one year, though. The best "era" I would say was 1997-2000, when my top 5 all-time favorite games came out (Deus Ex, System Shock 2, Half-Life, Fallout 1 and 2).

10/10 and the best game in the last decade? Better than Deus Ex, or System Shock 2, or Half-Life? I seriously doubt it, but I'll still throw money at it... when the PC version comes out.

If you're going to give a number rank to the obvious choices of Wolf3d/Doom at least mention, as an aside, the original (especially innovative for it's time)System Shock and/or Marathon too fer chrissake!

>> ^shuac:
>> ^Xax:
...And I agree with Thylan; System Shock should be on that list.

Yes. Was there an earlier FPS/RPG hybrid that "did it right?" I don't think so.
"Look at you, Hacker."


Ultima Underworld?

Dare I say there was nothing innovative about Halo. It was just a really well done, well polished implementation of things that have been done before... like WoW.

I thought the same, that it's odd they'd point out Body Harvest but act like id's Hovertank 3D and Catacomb 3D had nothing to do with Wolfenstein 3D. Doom had more to do with the FPS explosion than any of them, anyway.

I'm not sure "The Sims" should be on here as much as the "Sims" should... SimEarth, SimCity, SimLife and The Sims. Mechanics of all of these will be coming together in Spore this year, and I think there's enough of a conceptual overlap to warrant grouping them together.

I think they should have titled this differently. This is really a list of the 10 most innovative and influential games. These games were not only innovative, but had a massive effect on the industry. System Shock, while unique and innovative, has not (for better or worse) changed the market.

>> ^Xax:
...And I agree with Thylan; System Shock should be on that list.


Yes. Was there an earlier FPS/RPG hybrid that "did it right?" I don't think so.

"Look at you, Hacker."

Regarding Super Mario 64, "the now classic camera control"? The shitty camera control is why I hated it... innovative my ass. And I agree with Thylan; System Shock should be on that list.

Half Life 2 was an epic sci-fi masterpiece. Episode 1 was excellent. Episode 2 is the simplest and most contrived of the three. It lacks the atmosphere and re-playability of HL2 and HL2 EP1. The 'scenes' are way too simple. There aren't enough engagements with the combine. The hunters are just plain annoying. The big battle at the end is a terrible mess.

And Bioshock, seriously, where is the gameplay? All you need to play it is one brain cell and one finger to click the mouse. It has the most horrible railroading of any FPS I've ever played. It's essentially a rolling graphics engine.

System Shock 2 didn't impress me much either, mainly because it was one of the first PC games I had ever played, and I'd just completed 3 player co-op Hired Guns on the Amiga which is one of THE most atmospheric, challenging and fun games I've ever played. SS2 tasks consisted mainly of 'go here, hit switch, open door, go here, get key, open door...' which gets extraordinarily dull after a few hours.

Deus Ex and HL2 are still the best FPS PC games if you ask me. The storyline of Bioshock that everyone raves on about isn't a patch on the storyline of either of these games.

(ducks)

I think that running around and keeping you in the dark was on purpose with EP2, and it will all be revealed in EP3.
As far as Bioshock - well, I've never played System Shock, so to me, it was a fantastic game.

Bioshock was simply System Shock 2 with all the complexity cut out for it for dumbed down gamers who got used to playing Halo 2 on the Xbox 360s.

Half Life Episode 2 besides Portal was again a disappointment, the HL2 set pieces are the same as before, the game length is even shorter then Episode 1, even though they promised more content. The plot? Well what plot? All running around again with mysterious allusions that never get revealed (alot like Lost actually).

Yes they were good games, but they alluded to being so much more then they turned out to be. I would rather have had a full direct upgrade of System Shock 2 then Bioshock and Half Life 3 instead of these piece meal expansion packs that are supposed to be released sooner then a year apart... I mean wasn't that the whole point of episodic content?