Best Ever Games

"Nintendo made a game about isolation and called it an adventure."

"A boy holds a girl's hand and leads her through a castle—Team Ico's 2001 debut reduced gaming to its most essential gesture and created something closer to poetry than product."

"Konami flipped a castle upside down and invented a genre."

"Namco made a game about inflating monsters until they explode, and somehow it's adorable."

"Capcom invented competitive gaming by accident and changed arcades forever."

"Valve's 1998 debut made the radical argument that shooters could tell stories without cutscenes—and that silent protagonists could be more present than any voice actor."

"Fourteen playable characters, an opera scene that still produces tears, and a villain who actually destroys the world—Square's 1994 masterpiece remains the high-water mark for narrative ambition in the 16-bit era."

"Capcom burned down their own franchise and built something new from the ashes—the 2005 reinvention that made survival horror into action horror and influenced everything that came after."