Talk:List of video games considered the best/Archive 10

This is an archive of past discussions about List of video games considered the best. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Archive 5

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Archive 8

Thoughts on including all-time lists from readers-choice polls?

It could help round out the article a bit, even if it doesn't change much. It's also not unprecedented for an article like this to include audience opinions, since List of films considered the best features some notable ones. DJ (XTheBedrockX) (talk) 04:55, 22 October 2022 (UTC)

It'd be best for you to start this off with an argument on why we should include it, beyond OTHERSTUFF. As well as the exact criteria for a reader poll to be included. -- ferret (talk) 13:28, 22 October 2022 (UTC)

@Ferret For a start, per what I said in the above discussion: if they come from a major pop culture/gaming website, and not just random strawpolls/Metacritic or Steam user review scores/real-time online ranking sites, etc." since lists from publications are more stable and (usually) not as vulnerable to brigading or vote-stacking. The reader choice reference list can be included in a separate heading (like Publications) if necessary. DJ (XTheBedrockX) (talk) 14:19, 22 October 2022 (UTC)

The problem is that user polls are inherently WP:USERG. -- ferret (talk) 16:08, 22 October 2022 (UTC)

Yes. This is why I suggested narrowing them down to just reader polls that show up in magazines or trusted websites. The WP:USERG policy states:

"Content from websites whose content is largely user-generated is generally unacceptable. Sites with user-generated content include personal websites, personal and group blogs (excluding newspaper and magazine blogs), content farms, Internet forums, social media sites, fansites, video and image hosting services, most wikis and other collaboratively created websites. Examples of unacceptable user-generated sites are Ancestry.com, Facebook, Fandom, Find a Grave, Goodreads, IMDb, Instagram, ODMP, Reddit, TikTok, Tumblr, TV Tropes, Twitter, and Wikipedia (self referencing)."

When I mention reader polls, I'm explicitly not including polls that don't fall within these guidelines. That narrows it down to just user polls published by magazines and the like (of which a handful exist). DJ (XTheBedrockX) (talk) 20:05, 22 October 2022 (UTC)

Hi, thanks for the suggestion, but I'm going to oppose this. Since this is a list of games considered the best, the question of who is doing the considering is relevant here, and for that purpose, critics and industry experts hold much more weight than a tallied number from random, anonymous readers. With critic/expert lists, we can always say, for certain, that they reflect the real considerations of specific people; with random reader polls, we cannot. Hence, this page focuses on lists crafted from critical opinions, rather than those tallied up from popularity contests. Phediuk (talk) 14:43, 22 October 2022 (UTC)

Honestly, any listing that ranks popular media based on how "good" it is (and not something arguably more tangible like sales numbers) will always be inherently arbitrary, one way or another. WP:VG/BROADPOV dictates that sourcing should (within reason) be broad enough to reduce POV issues. As long as they're from reliable sources and clearly designated as reader polls, I don't think it would be too much of a problem for them to be here. DJ (XTheBedrockX) (talk) 19:52, 22 October 2022 (UTC)

I think what Phediuk is getting at is that you're conflating your data when you include reader polls. The list as it exists now is based exclusively on rankings carefully thought and compiled by industry experts. Reader polls are inherently different types of rankings that will disproportionately favor games that more people have played, rather than those with the most critical merit. TarkusAB^talk/contrib 21:21, 22 October 2022 (UTC)

Combining reader polls with the rest of the data is probably messy and unhelpful overall, I'll admit to that. With that being said, if the #1 game from each reader poll is listed under a separate heading, would that be acceptable? (the # of acceptable listings I've found is small enough that they could probably be represented here in point-form without it looking too cluttered). DJ (XTheBedrockX) (talk) 21:44, 22 October 2022 (UTC)

I believe it's better to keep the article's claim narrow and its scope limited. This page does not aim to incorporate every top-game list ever, but only those that represent verifiable critical opinions regarding which games are the best of all time. Adding in popularity polls from random people will muddle the page's purpose, and so I believe they should be excluded. Phediuk (talk) 22:19, 22 October 2022 (UTC)

Even if the polls come from WP:VG/RS? DJ (XTheBedrockX) (talk) 22:34, 22 October 2022 (UTC)

Also, not for nothing, but per WP:OOS: "Use the most general scope for each article you can. Since Wikipedia is a general encyclopedia, it's supposed to summarise essentially all knowledge. Hence accidental or deliberate choice of a limited scope for an article can make notable information disappear from the encyclopedia entirely, or make it highly inaccessible." DJ (XTheBedrockX) (talk) 02:42, 23 October 2022 (UTC)

Hi, just a few things to clarify here. First of all, WP:OOS is an essay, not a guideline; an article's scope is governed by consensus, not by any given rule. Second, the essay warns primarily against limiting scope to push a POV; such a concern would apply to this page only if it excluded certain lists of critical opinions to manipulate the page's entries, which is something this page does not do. On the contrary, this page maximizes its scope within its defined topic, i.e., of lists of best games of all time representing verifiable critical opinions; it includes as many such lists as possible, and has continually expanded to include more. Third, the essay says, "The lead, ideally the introductory sentence or at least introductory paragraph, of an article, should make clear what the scope of the article is." The lead sentence of this page does, indeed, define the page's scope right off the bat, clarifying that it's about critical opinions of best video games. Popularity polls based on tallies of unverifiable, random people fall out of scope for the stated intent of the page. When I recommended to keep the page's scope limited, I meant limited in the sense of not going beyond its defined topic, which is a practice that WP:SCOPE advocates: per the essay, "What reliable sources say about material that is out of scope for the decided-upon subject is largely irrelevant to that article and can be removed or moved to another article." Thank you; I hope this clears things up. Phediuk (talk) 05:47, 23 October 2022 (UTC)

I genuinely feel like we're talking past each other here. Maybe it's just my temperament, but I didn't feel like it was unreasonable to feature any reader polls. (which I have repeatedly stated that I was fine with just limiting them to the few that come from reliable sources - from games media - and not just randos in comment sections or Metacritic reviews).

I am fully aware of how many games critics play through, and that they probably know what they're talking about when it comes to this stuff. But:

A - I know some games media folks themselves have discussed the fact that the nature of their job doesn't always let them get a fully cohesive picture of the games they play, since the outlet they work for might encourage a policy of quantity-over-quality; but much more importantly,
B - Me saying this article could include examples of reader polls is not an attempt at trying to make this a "Public vs. The Critics" thing. I know the critics are not Always wrong, and the public is not Always right (or vice versa, for that matter). I know journalists and critics are, in fact, people like you and me. I don't need that explained to me.

DJ (XTheBedrockX) (talk) 06:21, 23 October 2022 (UTC)

I'm not sure I understand what you're getting at. I understand you are just talking about polls from reliable sources, and that they would be listed in a separate table. I also understand that you are not attempting to make it a critics vs. players thing. I believe you are acting in good faith, but you're missing the core of the issue, which is that they are popularity polls disguised as "best game ever" polls. Newer games and popular franchises will get more votes, so consequently, Dune II will not score as high as the latest mediocre Pokemon game. They are fun to read but that's about it. There's no merit in them, and no place in an encyclopedia for them. TarkusAB^talk/contrib 07:44, 23 October 2022 (UTC)

Adding onto this, the critics and industry experts that decide upon the lists are people who have played hundreds of games across a variety of genres, whereas reader polls can be voted on even by someone who has only played a dozen games or so. Anonymouseditor2k19 (talk) 04:47, 23 October 2022 (UTC)

Option to sort by most media outlets?

Maybe for the list, we could add an option to order games by the amount of sources that list them as "one of the best of all time". It seems to be a logical expansion on the list concept. Thoughts? DecafPotato (talk) 16:01, 26 October 2022 (UTC)

This has been suggested at least three times before. – Rhain ☔ (he/him) 16:10, 26 October 2022 (UTC)

After looking through the previous discussions, it seems that "amount of times this was listed" wasn't liked very much because, as seen in the frequent talk page discussions, new decades-old sources are still being dug up. Which I think is a fair point.

However, possibly an "average ranking" would be better? It doesn't claim that "12 sources consider Video Game: The Movie: The Game one of the greatest games ever", but rather "Video Game: The Movie: The Game has an average placement of 19th for lists of the greatest games of all time", which is more free of original research.

One claim used to dispute both of these suggestions are that "WP:SYNTH states 'Do not combine material from multiple sources to reach or imply a conclusion not explicitly stated by any source'". However, each source is explicitly referring to each mentioned game as "among the best ever made", and numerical summarization is not synthesis, and thus is not original research. DecafPotato (talk) 21:10, 26 October 2022 (UTC)

Hi, thanks for the suggestion, but I'm going to concur with prior discussions on this matter. Since page is not a tally, it deliberately does not claim any kind of meta-ranking for the games listed, and does not seek to create one. Averaging out disparate rankings into a singular meta-ranking is particularly problematic, as many lists are unranked. With that said, you can still infer, fairly easily, how many lists a given game is on by just scrolling down to the Notes section. Phediuk (talk) 23:35, 26 October 2022 (UTC)

I think that might be the problem, though. I struggle to see how "go to notes and count them" is any different than "here's the exact same information but counted for you". DecafPotato (talk) 06:39, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

One is something you choose to do of your own volition, with your own interpretation. The other makes it seem like we're keeping an official "tally" that holds meaning where it infact, does not. -- ferret (talk) 13:10, 27 October 2022 (UTC)

I think "average rating" carries similar problems to number of lists. Not all of these lists are ranked, nor are they all the same size, and as already noted, not all games are on all lists, so the statistical value of an average gets really murky.

For instance: Game X and Game Y are published at the same time (eligible for the same number of lists), and both meet inclusion criteria. Six different lists each put Game X at #15 and Game Y at #1. A seventh list puts Game Y at #100, and doesn't list Game X at all. In that case both would average out to around #15, with Game Y actually slightly higher (i.e. worse)—even though Game Y is agreed on by all sources which are directly comparing them to be the better game. It'd also be impossible to determine whether the 7th list considered Game X at all (you could read it as either "Game X is not in the top 100" or "Game X was just never considered by these editors"). Obviously this is a contrived example, but it demonstrates that "average rating #15" isn't really communicating clear information. Working around this is non-trivial (and a more complex statistical method starts to feel like it's no longer covered by WP:CALC).

It's valuable to say "these are video games widely considered to be among the best" but extremely hard to go beyond that and create some form of absolute ranking. Alternatively, the article provides dozens of links to online sources where critics have done just that, so anyone wanting a ranked list of the best games of all time will have no trouble finding one from this page. Dylnuge ^{(Talk • Edits)} 04:44, 28 October 2022 (UTC)

Requested move 21 October 2022

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: not moved. (closed by non-admin page mover) — Ceso femmuin mbolgaig mbung, mellohi! (投稿) 22:54, 28 October 2022 (UTC)

List of video games considered the best → List of video games considered the best by media outlets – Per WP:PRECISION. Considering the very specific criteria of inclusion this page has, and that all of them involve listings from journalists/magazines/media outlets, I think it might be better to make it clear (right out of the gate) what this page is about. It could reduce confusion in the future for why XYZ game isn't included on the list, etc. DJ (XTheBedrockX) (talk) 22:13, 21 October 2022 (UTC)

Hi, thanks for the suggestion, but such a move seems unnecessary to me. The first sentence of the article already clarifies what the page title means, and "by media outlets" seems redundant to place in a Wikipedia article title because it generally goes without saying that WP articles draw their information from secondary sources. In short, I believe there's no need to move. Phediuk (talk) 22:30, 21 October 2022 (UTC)

According to the FAQs: "Lists must also be editor-chosen and not reader/fan polls."

Obviously, garden-verity internet polls aren't very reliable, so using secondary sources makes sense. But sometimes gaming culture sites like Eurogamer have, for example, done "readers choice" lists for the best games of a given year according to the website's readers. By definition, the FAQ disqualifies these.

If polls from reliable sources were included, I could see while sticking with the broader name. If not, though, then it should be made it clear from the get-go that this page is specifically about editor-chosen listings. DJ (XTheBedrockX) (talk) 23:35, 21 October 2022 (UTC)

Oppose. In theory, all of Wikipedia should work like this; this is basically like adding "according to reliable sources" at the end of other articles. Note that 1001 Video Games You Must Play Before You Die is a book, and reliable, non-independently published, notable books are valid sources too, just less common for this. SnowFire (talk) 23:19, 21 October 2022 (UTC)
Oppose. The same idea applies here as with a reception section (no formal guidelines, but see WP:CRS)—it's valuable to capture "critical consensus," and the easiest way to do this with reliable sources is to use sources from reliable media outlets (e.g. those listed at WP:VG/RS). I can't see a reason to break up the topic into "by media outlets," "by fan polls," etc, nor one to move the page. That said, I'm not opposed to a discussion about this article also including reader surveys from reliable sources (note though that the Eurogamer article you linked isn't quite suitable for this, since it's restricted to a specific year, but a poll covering all-time seems like it could be). That said, I don't think it'd drastically change the list, if at all—this list covers a lot of different sources and the editors/reviewers at game media outlets are, generally speaking, also people who play and enjoy video games. I think no matter what people will complain that X game doesn't appear on the list, but that's in the nature of all lists; we could have a list with every game ever published except E.T. and there'd be four die-hard fans of that game asking why it's missing. Dylnuge ^{(Talk • Edits)} 23:57, 21 October 2022 (UTC)
I certainly don't expect the page to be radically different if all-time reader surveys are included, and I don't doubt at all that many games media types are folks that love video games. I made this move request on the assumption that the strict "no reader/polls" was just how this page operated (and it wasn't my intention to create a WP:POVFORK, and I apologize if that was the impression), but seeing the clear response against the move so far, I guess I assumed incorrectly. I would definitely be interested in a possible inclusion of reader polls from reliable sources (as long as they fit the "all-time" criteria, of course). DJ (XTheBedrockX) (talk) 00:31, 22 October 2022 (UTC)
@XTheBedrockX Per signature policy please change your signature to include a clear reference to your name. -- ferret (talk) 01:01, 22 October 2022 (UTC)
@ferret done (thanks for pointing it out) DJ (XTheBedrockX) (talk) 01:29, 22 October 2022 (UTC)

Honestly I'm pretty opposed to integrating all reader polls if it came down to it. While I agree that ideally, the perception of general audiences is an important factor to consider, most of these reader polls are done online nowadays and can be manipulated to produce unreliable results. Anonymouseditor2k19 (talk) 08:48, 22 October 2022 (UTC)
i can understand not all reader polls being included, but some integration, I think, can be a good thing. Especially if they come from a major pop culture/gaming website, and not just random strawpolls/Metacritic or Steam user review scores/real-time online ranking sites, etc. DJ (XTheBedrockX) (talk) 13:01, 22 October 2022 (UTC)
Oppose Per Phediuk, SnowFire, Dylnuge. I'm not sure there's much more to say. -- ferret (talk) 00:00, 22 October 2022 (UTC)
Oppose – over disambiguating. It's like of like List of tallest buildings in the world, as in the world is not needed (so far there are no skyscrapers on Mars). cookie monster 755 03:21, 22 October 2022 (UTC)
Another problematic example: List of eSports players was once moved to List of notable eSports players under a similar idea because the list criteria was "must be notable", see Special:Diff/792307323. It was a double issue because "Notable" in this context is Wikipedia guideline, not the common use of the word. -- ferret (talk) 03:46, 22 October 2022 (UTC)
Oppose Assumed based on Wikipedia policies. First line of the article clears up any possible confusion. TarkusAB^talk/contrib 08:01, 22 October 2022 (UTC)
Oppose. Adding "by media outlets" or "by fan polls" just makes the list more based and thus subjective. Hansen Sebastian^Talk 07:29, 25 October 2022 (UTC)
Oppose per basically everyone else. DecafPotato (talk) 14:24, 26 October 2022 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Speedball 2: Brutal Deluxe is simultaneously developed and released for both the Amiga and Atari ST

[1]https://readonlymemory.vg/the-making-of-speedball-2/ 178.164.222.232 (talk) 20:56, 29 October 2022 (UTC)

The article indicates the ST version was released earlier, per this quote: "‘The entire thing simply oozes a class and quality that is rarely found,’ declared C+VG, awarding the initial ST version 95%. ‘Dan Malone’s graphics are nothing short of spectacular.’ Two issues later it would bump that score to 97% for the Amiga version, recognising the new pitch and sound effects." Phediuk (talk) 21:45, 29 October 2022 (UTC)

The following games have won plenty of accolades

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/What_Remains_of_Edith_Finch en.wikipedia.org/wiki/That_Dragon,_Cancer en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dance,_Voldo,_Dance Bigchupachups (talk) 02:13, 6 November 2022 (UTC)

Please refer to the FAQ at the top of the page for the inclusion criteria. Cat's Tuxedo (talk) 02:15, 6 November 2022 (UTC)

Would the Top 100 Games Podcast count?

I'm not sure if Kinda Funny is considered a reliable source, and I know that no. 35-1 have yet to be determined, but I'm just wondering if we can include it, and Jared's list, as a sort of Sight & Sound Critics vs Directors, Alena 33 (talk) 17:46, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

Hi, thanks for the suggestion. Kinda Funny's reliability has yet to be evaluated over on WT:VGRS, so you should open up a thread there first. I can't speak to the new list they're doing (is there a link?), but they did also make a Top 100 list in 2016. However, that list outright excludes PC games from discussion, and there doesn't seem to be a real, finalized list from what I can tell; it's more like them shooting some ideas around, and they end up with 169 games by the end. So, no to that one, at least, but we'll need to see the new one before we can say if it meets the criteria. Phediuk (talk) 18:59, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

Oh, I misread your post; you mean the Top 100 Games Podcast, hosted by Jared Petty. I'm going to vote no to that one, because it does not claim to represent the best games; the opening minutes of the first episode clarify that the games are just whatever the guest that week wants to talk about, for whatever reason. The suggestion is appreciated, though. Phediuk (talk) 19:05, 24 December 2022 (UTC)

Shacknews Hall of Fame

Shacknews updated their Hall of Fame recently. Is that already included? We may need to update everything. Alena 33 (talk) 19:20, 29 December 2022 (UTC)

No, the Shacknews Hall of Fame is not included, as it does not claim anywhere that it represents the best/greatest games, but rather, "the games that have influenced the direction of our industry and shaped our favorite hobby." Thanks for the suggestion, though. Phediuk (talk) 01:14, 30 December 2022 (UTC)

Spreadsheet error

Alien: Isolation is listed twice as “Alien Isolation” and “Alien: Isolation” 76.90.197.156 (talk) 19:30, 28 December 2022 (UTC)

Fixed. Thanks for pointing the error out! BenSPVE (talk) 07:38, 29 December 2022 (UTC)

No problem! Morphogenetic Hamon (talk) 05:56, 1 January 2023 (UTC)

Dan Ryckert

He has worked in game journalism for 15 years, and he just came out with a new edition of his list, which is available on Twitch Alena 33 (talk) 22:14, 3 January 2023 (UTC)

Not from a publication. Anonymouseditor2k19 (talk) 00:48, 4 January 2023 (UTC)

GamesMaster, 1994

At last, I have acquired a copy of GamesMaster's "All-Time Top 100" from issue #21 (Sept 1994), which I've been trying to get for some time. It is a 16-page booklet separate from the issue itself, which is the reason it took me so long to track it down. The front cover says it lists "The Best Ever Games of All Time", and the preamble says it's about "the top 100 games of all time on all formats", as determined by the editors. As it meets all criteria -- RS, staff-chosen, explicitly about the best games, and unrestricted by platform/genre/era -- I'm going to incorporate it. I will provide scans soon (EDIT: scans are here), but for now, here is a transcription of the list:

GamesMaster, 1994

1. Mortal Kombat II 2. Super Street Fighter II 3. Doom (1993) 4. Sensible Soccer 5. John Madden Football (3DO) 6. Tempest 2000 7. Super Mario Kart 8. Micro Machines 9. Super Bomberman 10. Super Mario All-Stars 11. Stunt Race FX 12. Syndicate (1993) 13. FIFA International Soccer 14. Theme Park 15. Dr. Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine 16. Simcity 2000 17. Super Mario World 18. Tetris 19. Wario Land: Super Mario Land 3 20. Cannon Fodder 21. Contra III: The Alien Wars 22. Gunstar Heroes 23. Sonic CD 24. The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past 25. Wolfenstein 3D 26. Donkey Kong (Game Boy) 27. The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening 28. Lemmings 2 29. NBA Jam 30. Rock n' Roll Racing 31. Star Fox 32. Virtua Racing 33. R-Type III: The Third Lightning 34. Super Metroid 35. Pinball Fantasies 36. Rocket Knight Adventures 37. The Secret of Monkey Island 38. Sam & Max Hit the Road 39. Populous II 40. Rainbow Islands 41. Samurai Shodown 42. Defender 43. Pop'n TwinBee: Rainbow Bell Adventures 44. Jungle Strike 45. Zombies Ate My Neighbors 46. Secret of Mana 47. Desert Strike 48. Smash Tennis 49. Pete Sampras Tennis 50. Pinball Dreams 51. Axelay 52. Smash TV 53. Cybernator 54. NHL '94 55. Ganbare Goemon 2: Kiteretsu Shougun Magginesu 56. Hellfire 57. Sub-Terrania 58. Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story 59. Aladdin (Genesis) 60. Thunderhawk 61. Striker 62. The Jungle Book 63. Another World 64. Super Star Wars 65. Indy Car Racing 66. Flashback 67. Lemmings 68. Alien 3 (Genesis) 69. Parodius 70. Batman Returns (SNES) 71. Prince of Persia 72. PGA Tour 2 73. Super Pang 74. Ecco the Dolphin 75. Mechwarrior (SNES) 76. Shadowrun (SNES) 77. Kirby's Pinball Land 78. Gunship 2000 79. Toejam & Earl 80. Monster Max 81. Super Sidekicks 2 82. Walker 83. Speedball 2: Brutal Deluxe 84. The Chaos Engine 85. Monkey Island II: LeChuck's Revenge 86. The Lost Vikings 87. Alone in the Dark (1992) 88. Pong 89. Myst 90. The 7th Guest 91. Llamatron 92. Crash & Burn 93. Elite 94. Frontier: Elite II 95. Cool Spot 96. International Karate + 97. Actraiser 98. Silpheed 99. Lethal Enforcers 100. Plok

Once this list is incorporated, Samurai Shodown and Theme Park will be added to the main page. Phediuk (talk) 21:54, 4 January 2023 (UTC)

Done. I have also added the 1994 GamesMaster list to the omnibus data. Phediuk (talk) 22:04, 5 January 2023 (UTC)

Visualised omnibus data also updated. BenSPVE (talk) 00:03, 6 January 2023 (UTC)

Nice, I was hoping someone here would find a copy of it.--Alexandra^IDV 21:30, 5 January 2023 (UTC)

List of Top 100 Games by number of referenced Sources

(Titles that have same amount of references are ordered by age, with the older title taking preference)

1. Tetris - 58 2. Super Mario 64 - 50 Street Fighter II 48 GoldenEye 007 47 Doom 46 Metal Gear Solid 46 Super Metroid 45 Final Fantasy VII 45 The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 44 The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past 43 Resident Evil 4 43 Castlevania: Symphony of the Night 41 Super Mario Kart 40 Chrono Trigger 40 Half-Life 2 39 Shadow of the Colossus 39 Super Mario World 36 World of Warcraft 35 Silent Hill 2 34 Metroid Prime 34 Super Mario Bros. 3 33 BioShock 33 Half-Life 32 Mass Effect 2 32 Final Fantasy VI 31 Diablo II 31 Sonic the Hedgehog 30 Counter-Strike 30 Uncharted 2: Among Thieves 30 Red Dead Redemption 30 Tomb Raider 29 StarCraft 29 Grim Fandango 29 Deus Ex 29 Halo: Combat Evolved 29 Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare 29 Minecraft 29 Portal 28 The Last of Us 28 SimCity 2000 27 Ico 27 Pac-Man 26 Super Mario Bros. 25 Mega Man 2 25 Pokémon Red and Blue 25 Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time 25 Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater 25 Portal 2 25 Journey 25 Space Invaders 24 Donkey Kong 24 Secret of Mana 24 Super Mario World 2: Yoshi’s Island 24 Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic 24 Ōkami 24 Grand Theft Auto V 24 X-COM: UFO Defense 23 Ms. Pac-Man 22 Super Smash Bros. Melee 22 The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim 22 The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt 22 Pong 21 Day of the Tentacle 21 Braid 21 Dark Souls 21 Batman: Arkham City 21 The Secret of Monkey Island 20 Lemmings 20 Star Wars: TIE Fighter 20 EarthBound 20 Final Fantasy Tactics 20 The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker 20 Fallout 3 20 Civilization II 19 The Sims 19 Advance Wars 19 Grand Theft Auto III 19 Resident Evil 18 System Shock 2 18 Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas 18 Persona 4 18 Bloodborne 18 Elite 17 Gauntlet 17 Mike Tyson’s Punch-Out!! 17 NBA Jam 17 Myst 17 Fallout 2 17 Planescape: Torment 17 Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 2 17 Burnout 3: Takedown 17 The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild 17 Asteroids 16 Defender 16 Galaga 16 The Legend of Zelda 16 SimCity 16 Monkey Island 2: LeChuck’s Revenge 16 Donkey Kong Country 16 Soulcalibur 16 184.21.125.211 (talk) 23:37, 28 October 2022 (UTC)

Could you update this with the 1994 list being added now? Alena 33 (talk) 03:06, 17 January 2023 (UTC)

Tekken 3 Release Date

Tekken 3 is currently in the 1996 section, but shouldn't it be 1997? S3kt0r359 (talk) 18:50, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

Never mind. I see in the article, it had a limited release in 1996 before it's main release in 1997. I guess I can see the argument for keeping it in 1996 then. Pardon my suggestion. S3kt0r359 (talk) 19:00, 23 December 2022 (UTC)

I could also see the argument to going to the full release, as we don't list Minecraft as being from 2009. ~ Dissident93 ^(talk) 16:50, 29 January 2023 (UTC)

Hades; Persona 5

I've located at least six publications that list these games under "Top" or "Best" lists. Not sure if all of these publications will be considered a "reliable source", but I'll submit them here.

2604:2D80:9006:9E00:BC62:FEFD:F06F:8F2E (talk) 03:18, 28 January 2023 (UTC)

SVG is unreliable and IGN is listed twice, so I'm afraid they're still not ready for inclusion. Not sure about Yardbarker either. – Rhain ☔ (he/him) 03:23, 28 January 2023 (UTC)

Would the following qualify as a reliable source?:

https://www.gamingbible.com/features/games-the-greatest-video-games-of-all-time-60-41-20201201

If so, Persona 5 and Hades are also in this list. 173.21.142.43 (talk) 00:00, 30 January 2023 (UTC)

GAMINGbible has been discussed three times before, and the general consensus is that it is not reliable. Hades only appears to be on four lists and Persona 5 on three, so it wouldn't make a difference anyway. – Rhain ☔ (he/him) 00:06, 30 January 2023 (UTC)

The Yardbaker list is actually a brand-new top 100 from Sports Illustrated, so it's good to go as a RS. The list is called "The best 100 games of all time", so it is clearly about the best games, in addition to being staff-chosen and not limited by platform/era/genre. Since it appears to meet all criteria, I'll incorporate it, if there are no objections. Here's a transcription:

Sports Illustrated, 2023

1. Shadow of the Colossus 2. Castlevania: Symphony of the Night 3. Metal Gear Solid 4. The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt 5. The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild 6. The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim 7. Pokemon HeartGold and SoulSilver 8. Resident Evil 4 (2005) 9. Elden Ring 10. Persona 5 Royal 11. Minecraft 12. Disco Elysium 13. God of War (2018) 14. Chrono Trigger 15. Celeste 16. Final Fantasy VII 17. Hades 18. Tetris 19. Starcraft II: Wings of Liberty 20. Red Dead Redemption II 21. Doom (2016) 22. Half-Life 2 23. Bloodborne 24. Bioshock 25. Mass Effect 2 26. League of Legends 27. Super Smash Bros. Melee 28. Xenoblade Chronicles 29. Dragon Age: Origins 30. Super Mario 64 31. Earthbound 32. Dishonored 2 33. FTL: Faster than Light 34. The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 35. Grand Theft Auto V 36. Age of Empires II: The Age of Kings 37. Stardew Valley 38. Dark Souls 39. Nier Automata 40. Heroes of Might & Magic III 41. Sonic 3 & Knuckles 42. Portal 43. Hitman 3 44. Return of the Obra Dinn 45. Super Mario World 46. Unpacking 47. Alien: Isolation 48. Civilization IV 49. XCOM: Enemy Unknown 50. Hollow Knight 51. Shovel Knight 52. Fable 53. Yakuza 0 54. Ori and the Blind Forest 55. Thief II: The Metal Age 56. Hotline Miami 57. The Last of Us Part 1 & 2 (dual entry) 58. Fire Emblem: Awakening 59. Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag 60. Super Metroid 61. Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney 62. Resident Evil 7 63. Kirby Super Star 64. Undertale 65. Old School Runescape 66. Suikoden II 67. Final Fantasy XIV (2010) 68. The Secret of Monkey Island 69. Journey 70. Rocket League 71. Wii Sports 72. Uncharted 2: Among Thieves 73. Silent Hill 2 74. Apex Legends 75. World of Warcraft 76. Slay the Spire 77. Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2 78. Goldeneye (1997) 79. Deus Ex 80. Pokemon Emerald 81. Skies of Arcadia 82. Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory 83. Invisible, Inc. 84. Genshin Impact 85. Dead Rising 86. Fallout 3 87. Batman: Arkham Knight 88. Streets of Rage 2 89. Devil May Cry 3: Dante's Awakening 90. Sly Cooper and the Thievius Raccoonus 91. The Binding of Isaac 92. Mega Man 2 93. Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare 94. Fortnite 95. Crusader Kings III 96. Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne 97. Medieval II: Total War 98. Battlefield: Bad Company 2 99. Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc 100. Among Us

Assuming there are no objections to this list, Heroes of Might and Magic III, Skies of Arcadia, Fire Emblem: Awakening, FTL: Faster than Light, Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag, Alien: Isolation, Ori and the Blind Forest, Dishonored 2, and Fortnite will all be added to the main page. Phediuk (talk) 16:25, 28 January 2023 (UTC)

Okay, hold the brakes here. While I was incorporating the list, it became clear that the Sports Illustrated list is based on the 2022 USA Today list, being authored by at least one of the same people (Georgina Young), who is part of "GLHF", the journalist collective explicitly credited in the USA Today list and also named in the video on the Sports Illustrated page. Many of the writeups in the SI list are new and some games have been swapped out or reordered, but it is overall similar to the prior list. Nonetheless, the two are published in different places, by different publishers; the list has not, strictly speaking, been double-published. Even so, I think we should list the "publication" here as dually USA Today/Sports Illustrated. This would mean that only Fire Emblem: Awakening will be added to the page now. Any objections? Phediuk (talk) 01:36, 29 January 2023 (UTC)

None so far, it seems. Anonymouseditor2k19 (talk) 01:48, 29 January 2023 (UTC)

Okay, I've determined which games were swapped out from the 2022 list, and, conversely, which were added for the 2023 list. There are 18 entries that differ between the two. They are below.

Entries in the USA Today (2022) list removed from the Sports Illustrated (2023) list

15. It Takes Two 16. Resident Evil 2 (2019) 24. Half-Life: Alyx 31. Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain 41. Super Mario Bros. 3 43. The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening 48. Deathloop 49. XCOM (no game specified; series?) 51. Need for Speed Underground 2 52. Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos 54. Papers, Please 64. Metroid Dread 66. Outer Wilds 69. Into the Breach 77. Subnautica 78. The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind 90. Firewatch 99. Marvel vs. Capcom 2

New entries for the Sports Illustrated (2023) list
14. Chrono Trigger 22. Half-Life 2 24. Bioshock 31. Earthbound 42. Portal 45. Super Mario World 46. Unpacking 49. XCOM: Enemy Unknown 51. Shovel Knight 53. Yakuza 0 58. Fire Emblem: Awakening 60. Super Metroid 65. Old School Runescape 68. The Secret of Monkey Island 77. Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2 80. Pokemon Emerald 90. Sly Cooper and the Thievius Raccoonus 99. Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc

I can confirm that Fire Emblem: Awakening will be the sole game added to the main page now, since I will not count any repeat entries. Phediuk (talk) 02:10, 29 January 2023 (UTC)

Done; the USA Today and Sports Illustrated list share one publication slot, and the similarities between the two (as well as their shared authorship) should be obvious from the citations. I have also added the SI list to the omnibus data. Phediuk (talk) 17:49, 29 January 2023 (UTC)

What a complicated time we live in :P -- ferret (talk) 22:00, 29 January 2023 (UTC)

Certainly. Omnibus Data Visualised should be updated to correctly reflect this though haha. BenSPVE (talk) 14:53, 30 January 2023 (UTC)

List of Top 100 Game by number of referenced sources (updated)

(As before, the older title takes preference when two or more titles have the same amount of referenced sources)

Tetris 60 Super Mario 64 51 Street Fighter II 49 GoldenEye 007 48 Doom 47 Super Metroid 47 Metal Gear Solid 47 Final Fantasy VII 46 The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 45 The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past 44 Resident Evil 4 44 Castlevania: Symphony of the Night 42 Super Mario Kart 41 Chrono Trigger 41 Half-Life 2 40 Shadow of the Colossus 40 Super Mario World 38 World of Warcraft 36 Silent Hill 2 35 Metroid Prime 34 BioShock 34 Super Mario Bros. 3 33 Mass Effect 2 33 Half-Life 32 Final Fantasy VI 31 Diablo II 31 Uncharted 2: Among Thieves 31 Sonic the Hedgehog 30 Deus Ex 30 Counter-Strike 30 Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare 30 Red Dead Redemption 30 Minecraft 30 Tomb Raider 29 StarCraft 29 Grim Fandango 29 Halo: Combat Evolved 29 Portal 29 The Last of Us 28 SimCity 2000 27 Ico 27 Pac-Man 26 Mega Man 2 26 Journey 26 Super Mario Bros. 25 Secret of Mana 25 Pokémon Red and Blue 25 Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time 25 Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater 25 Portal 2 25 Grand Theft Auto V 25 Space Invaders 24 Donkey Kong 24 Super Mario World 2: Yoshi’s Island 24 Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic 24 Ōkami 24 X-COM: UFO Defense 23 Super Smash Bros. Melee 23 The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim 23 The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt 23 Pong 22 Ms. Pac-Man 22 The Secret of Monkey Island 22 Dark Souls 22 Lemmings 21 Day of the Tentacle 21 EarthBound 21 Braid 21 Fallout 3 21 Batman: Arkham City 21 Star Wars: TIE Fighter 20 Final Fantasy Tactics 20 The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker 20 Civilization II 19 The Sims 19 Advance Wars 19 Grand Theft Auto III 19 Bloodborne 19 Elite 18 NBA Jam 18 Myst 18 Resident Evil 18 System Shock 2 18 Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 2 18 Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas 18 Persona 4 18 The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild 18 Defender 17 Gauntlet 17 Mike Tyson’s Punch-Out!! 17 SimCity 17 Monkey Island 2: LeChuck’s Revenge 17 Fallout 2 17 Age of Empires II 17 Planescape: Torment 17 Burnout 3: Takedown 17 Civilization IV 17 Asteroids 16 Galaga 16 The Legend of Zelda 16 2605:A601:AE99:A300:ACA6:1E4F:624B:BE97 (talk) 04:07, 1 February 2023 (UTC)

Total Games Network, 1999

Here’s something. In 1999, at least four Paragon Publishing magazines –- Dreamcast Magazine, Play, PowerStation, and 64 Mag -- in association with Paragon's Total Games Network, held a “Millennium Games Awards” poll to determine the “best pieces of software ever made on all formats”. Although the voting was put to the public, the relevant part for us is that the editors-in-chief of the four magazines also submitted their own picks, which are listed in the scans linked. Despite each of the publications involved focusing on a specific platform, the voting was explicitly unrestricted by platform or era, and the editor choices reflect this freedom. Since these editor picks fulfill the criteria – RS, staff-chosen, about the best games, no platform/genre/era restrictions – I see no reason not to incorporate them here. I have transcribed all of the staff picks below:

Total Games Network, 1999

Outrun Metal Gear Solid Gun Fright Pac-Man Bubble Bobble Rick Dangerous Super Mario World Dynamite Dan James Pond II: Robocod San Francisco Rush Goldeneye (1997) Gran Turismo ISS Pro Evolution Starcraft Skool Daze Sensible World of Soccer Tekken 3 Tomb Raider (1996) Laser Squad Worms Resident Evil 2 (1998) Sonic the Hedgehog Arkanoid Kid Chameleon Back 2 Skool Wonder Boy Street Fighter II Robotron 2084 Quake II deathmatch Elite Defender Ancipital Super Mario Kart Tempest 2000

If there are no objections, I will incorporate this list shortly. Since the awards were advertised in all four magazines simultaneously, I’ll credit the publication as “Total Games Network” and cite one of the specific issues in which the editor choices appear. Once these picks are incorporated, Arkanoid will be added to the main page. Phediuk (talk) 07:23, 1 February 2023 (UTC)

Done. I have also added the Total Games Network list to the omnibus data. Phediuk (talk) 01:51, 2 February 2023 (UTC)

Visualised data updated. BenSPVE (talk) 02:46, 3 February 2023 (UTC)

Fallout: New Vegas

@GeneralHamster: As discussed on your talk page, Fallout: New Vegas does not meet the criteria for inclusion here. Of your 14 sources, two are unreliable, five are "best of the decade" lists, one is a "best RPGs" list, two have not been assessed here (and would not be included anyway), and two aren't even lists. Once again, the game is only on three lists at present. – Rhain ☔ (he/him) 09:55, 31 January 2023 (UTC)

Considering we've had video games in play for maybe 30-40 years, best of the decade / best of all time is a good indicator of candidacy for 'best'

Also considering the general reception / core which surrounds it FO:NV seems appropriate to be on the list if FO3 is also on the list. And I disagree that the sources are unreliable - what qualifies reliability, exactly? Because we cite IGN, even though IGN is itself known for being unreliable & and accepting paid promotion / reviews at varying intervals. GeneralHamster (talk) 08:37, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

@GeneralHamster: You're allowed your opinion about "best of the decade" lists, but they are inappropriate for this article, whether you like it or not. This is explained in the FAQ, question 1. If you think this should be changed, start a discussion—until then, they will not be accepted as sources.

WP:VG/S and WP:RSP qualify reliability. If you personally disagree, that's fine, but those are the rules. – Rhain ☔ (he/him) 11:00, 7 February 2023 (UTC)

List of the top 100 games by number of referenced sources (excluding sources over 10 years old.)

Top 100 Referenced Games-- using sources only from 2013 onwards

1. Tetris - 22

2. The Last of Us - 22

3. Mass Effect 2 - 21

4. Final Fantasy VII - 19

5. Resident Evil 4 - 19

6. Super Mario 64 - 18

7. Goldeneye - 18

8. Metal Gear Solid - 18

9. Half-Life 2 - 18

10. Minecraft - 18

11. The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt - 18

12. Street Fighter II - 17

13. Doom (original) - 17

14. Chrono Trigger - 17

15. World of Warcraft - 17

16. BioShock - 17

17. Uncharted 2: Among Thieves - 17

18. Super Mario World - 16

19. The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time - 16

20. Shadow of the Colossus - 16

(Don't have time to type out the numbers for the remaining entries, but here they are. Refer to https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1qhUnal80p0H42sRjMvONXCtYozBzFgFcFxWb98HMSvQ if you want to see them with more details/in a better format/methodology explanation.)

. BioShock

. Red Dead Redemption

. Portal 2

. The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim

. Journey

. Grand Theft Auto V

. Super Mario Kart

. Castlevania: Symphony of the Night

. Metroid Prime

. The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past

. Super Metroid

. Pokemon Red and Blue

. Halo: Combat Evolved

. Portal

. Diablo II

. Silent Hill 2

. The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild

. Super Mario Bros. 3

. Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic

. Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare

. Bloodborne

. Simcity 2000

. Final Fantasy VI

. Earthbound

. Counter-Strike

. Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater

. Dark Souls

. Super Mario Bros.

. Deus Ex

. Super Smash Bros. Melee

. Fallout 3

. Mega Man 2

. The Secret of Monkey Island

. Starcraft

. Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2

. Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas

. Pac-Man

. Sonic the Hedgehog 2

. Secret of Mana

. Tomb Raider (1996)

. Half-Life

. Grand Theft Auto: Vice City . Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time . Super Mario Galaxy 2 . Batman: Arkham City . God of War (2018) . Space Invaders . Donkey Kong . Ms. Pac-Man . Grim Fandango . Grand Theft Auto III . Ico . The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind . Civilization IV . Okami . Wii Sports . Persona 4 . Inside . Red Dead Redemption 2 . Yoshi's Island . Civilization II . Planescape: Torment . The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask . Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos . The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker . Beyond Good & Evil . Burnout 3: Takedown . Dead Space . Braid . Batman: Arkham Asylum . Xenoblade Chronicles . XCOM: Enemy Unknown . Dishonored . Dota 2 . Uncharted 4: A Thief's End . Overwatch

Below is the thread that prompted me to make this list. \/ — Preceding unsigned comment added by 100.15.231.129 (talk) 08:55, 13 February 2023 (UTC)

I'm curious about the list of the top 100 games by number of referenced sources if we don't pull from sources that are over 10 years old. Like maybe back in the 90s everyone put Game X in their top 100 lists, but now it doesn't make anyone's list. If so, it would be good to know-- it would help us know if a game was just a flash in the pan / simply of its time vs. whether it still stands the test of time and memory and could be worth playing still today. 100.15.231.129 (talk) 18:37, 10 February 2023 (UTC)

I appreciate the suggestion, however I have some problems with the idea. For one, not pulling from sources over ten years old, which seems like an arbitrary number and why not dis-include lists from 20 or 30 years ago, would limit the selection to lists that came out, at the oldest, early 2013, and while there may be games that don’t appear on these younger lists it’s still important to recognize their impact, especially since many of these lists are still from within the last decade. I also believe that the Primary Wikipedia Article inherently does favor older titles, so to not include these older lists would do a disservice to the page as a whole, at least I think. 2605:A601:AE99:A300:69E1:6A7A:E0D0:22E2 (talk) 04:37, 11 February 2023 (UTC)

If there are games that don't appear on the younger lists, then those games arguably did not stand the test of time. Like for utility's purposes, though, as a person living in 2023, I would only want the old games to be on the list if they still hold up to today's standards, cuz that gives me a better idea of which game to play next-- if I'm looking at a list like this for that purpose, rather than just to have historical context/references to what people used to think was good.

I don't think it should be on the main page, though. I was just thinking it'd be nice to have in the talk section here like how we have the other list in here. 100.15.231.129 (talk) 19:21, 12 February 2023 (UTC)

I think in this scenario the best thing to do would be to go through the list omnibus data and see what lists are 10 years old or less, compile them together and then work through the titles on those lists to see which titles appear the most to least, which you’re absolutely free to do. 2600:100A:B053:9566:6580:6757:2593:4EDB (talk) 20:17, 12 February 2023 (UTC)

I see 47 sources in the 'Publications' section of the main article, but only 21 sources in the spreadsheet linked above. Were the remaining 26 used as sources but just not put into that spreadsheet? 100.15.231.129 (talk) 23:41, 12 February 2023 (UTC)

If you go to the talk page and see the topic that says ‘Lists’ it should link you to the omnibus with all the lists. 2605:A601:AE99:A300:F51E:BC83:22F8:D87C (talk) 01:22, 13 February 2023 (UTC)

Why I think certain mod-approved fan lists should be included

I know this is controversial, but hear me out. The relationship between mainstream news outlets and game publishers is very incestuous, and most AAA publishers bribe their reviewers to give them good reputation, whilst indie and AA publishers rely on luck-of-the-draw popularity. I have a certain list I would like to share that was compiled over several weeks of users voting in the same manner as a critics' film poll on the site Backloggd, that offers a working-class alternative to the mainstream. https://backloggd.com/u/Pangburn/list/backloggd-canon-2022-sight--sound/ I hope you will reconsider. Alena 33 (talk) 18:42, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

While I think we can understand the concern, the rule still stands that unless the list is identified as reliable per WP:VG/RS, then it can not be included. 2605:A601:AE99:A300:3D43:2B29:BBE8:CA5B (talk) 19:35, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

Star Wars: X-Wing & Persona 4

Looking over the Spreadsheet and Omnibus List Data I’ve noticed that Star Wars: X-Wing is listed as having qualified for inclusion onto the main page, yet is not, and that Persona 4 is specifically stated on the spreadsheet as Persona 4 Golden. I saw that many of X-Wing’s entires were in fact Series/Joint Entries, so do we correct the main page and include Star Wars: X-Wing on the 1993 section, or do we correct the spreadsheet to indicate it still hasn’t qualified yet? And do we keep Persona 4 listed as Persona 4 and correct the spreadsheet accordingly or change Persona 4 to Persona 4 Golden? 2605:A601:AE99:A300:4478:FF59:1720:35CA (talk) 02:59, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

I'll let others check the X-Wing entries, but Persona 4: Golden isn't different enough to qualify as a separate game from Persona 4, so I don't see an issue with treating both P4 PS2 and P4 Golden as the same game under an umbrella title of "Persona 4." SnowFire (talk) 03:04, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

Hi, thanks for the question.X-Wing is listed by five sources. It is included on the Hyper, Next Generation, and GameSpot lists only as part of joint entries, which are not counted for inclusion on the page. The spreadsheet listing is a mistake. Phediuk (talk) 16:41, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

I've updated the omnibus spreadsheet to reflect Star Wars: X-Wing properly. No idea why it was listed as having six sources as I've gone over all of the games with six to make sure they are correct in the past--must've missed that one. Apologies. I also changed Persona 4 to mention Golden separately as well, but it's as SnowFire mentioned in regards to that. BenSPVE (talk) 18:08, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

No worries; thanks for the quick fix. Phediuk (talk) 23:41, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

Gameplanet and Netzwelt

I've found two sources with their own lists of the best games. Gameplanet had a list of five games in 2008, compiled by then-editor-in-chief Dan Cheer. Gameplanet is one of the sources identified as a reliable source. I may just be overly concerned, but I am not sure whether the list is Cheer's personal list or one with editorial oversight. He did not indicate it was personal, just a disclaimer that "this article may not actually contain references to great games", whatever that means since all the games on that article are "great" according to Wikipedia's own.

One source that did have editorial oversight is Netzwelt.de. Their list was compiled in 2018, featuring 22 games. They are viewed in the article's gallery, and the rest of the article is irrelevant. There is only one catch: that I know next to nothing about the website, and only became familiar with it just now. It's been around since 1997, and other news organizations seem to have referenced it. If anyone can share more information about the online magazine and its publisher, I may have a clue what the quality of this article might be like, and whether to use it at all. Free Media Kid$ 09:59, 25 February 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for these. The Gameplanet one seems more like a blog post than a feature, though, on the other hand, it is by the editor-in-chief. However, even then, it consists of only five games (Elite, Civilization, Counter-Strike, Diablo II, and World of Warcraft), all of which are on the page already, so there's no rush to include it anyway. The Netzwelt list seems usable, though it does contain two notable oddities in that it includes Cyberpunk 2077 and The Last of Us: Part II two years before either game was released (assuming that the December 2018 publishing date is correct.) Both games' entries discuss them as if they are already out, but I cannot view any older archives of the list to see if it was updated at some point. I think we should at exclude those entries, if we use this list. Phediuk (talk) 16:20, 25 February 2023 (UTC)

I would also suggest excluding the Super Mario and Monkey Island entries for just being for the series as a whole and not for any specific game. Looking over the visualized data, this would give Virtua Fighter 5 the sixth entry it needs to be added to the main page. Anonymouseditor2k19 (talk) 23:46, 25 February 2023 (UTC)

VF5 is currently at four sources (GamesTM, GamesRadar, 1001 Games, and Hardcore Gaming 101), and the Netzwelt list, should it be incorporated, will be the fifth. Phediuk (talk) 01:12, 26 February 2023 (UTC)

I've updated it to four for now, until Netzwelt is added officially. In the coming weeks I'm also going to go through all games with 5 sources and corroborate those with the list data as there does seem to be more errors than I realized. BenSPVE (talk) 15:45, 26 February 2023 (UTC)

Netzwelt, 2018

Castlevania: Symphony of the Night Tetris Street Fighter II The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild Starcraft Grand Theft Auto V Wipeout: 2097 Counter-Strike Dark Souls III Super Mario (series) Resident Evil 4 Pong Uncharted 2: Among Thieves Virtua Fighter 5: Final Showdown Minecraft Final Fantasy VII Super Mario Kart Monkey Island (series) Garou: Mark of the Wolves The Last of Us 1&2 (dual entry) Day of the Tentacle

Phediuk (talk) 16:20, 25 February 2023 (UTC)

Dwarf Fortress

While I haven't found sources yet, it's pretty probable that those sources do exist considering Dwarf Fortress's reputation. I think it's worthwhile looking for these sources 2600:4040:5531:4600:6CB5:10F5:186C:4721 (talk) 00:16, 28 February 2023 (UTC)

This article isn't about "reputation", it's about the game's inclusion on lists, per the FAQ atop this page. According to the omnibus data, Dwarf Fortress is halfway there, with three list mentions. – Rhain ☔ (he/him) 00:18, 28 February 2023 (UTC)

The Times “20 best video games of all time”

The list is behind a paywall, so I can't read it, but it sounds like it fits the criteria, being chosen by an "expert jury" including Charlie Brooker 2607:FEA8:92E4:900:D12C:CC32:C06D:4F81 (talk) 16:14, 1 March 2023 (UTC)

The list can be viewed through an archived link here:

The Times, 2023

1. Portal & Portal 2 (dual entry) 2. The Last of Us 1 & 2 (dual entry) 3. Super Mario Odyssey 4. Tetris 5. Bioshock 6. Doom (1993) 7. Minecraft 8. Journey 9. Civilization V 10. Red Dead Redemption 11. Halo: Combat Evolved 12. Pokemon Red, Blue, and Yellow 13. Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas 14. Uncharted 2: Among Thieves 15. Far Cry 4 16. Hearthstone 17. The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim 18. Pac-Man 19. Simcity (1989) 20. Sonic Adventure 2

Being published by The Times, it's a RS. Also, the list is explicitly about the best games, expert-chosen, and not subject to any platform/era/genre restrictions. Of the four experts, Charlie Brooker and Helen Lewis both have games journalist cred, Brooker having been an editor for PC Zone and Lewis having written extensively on gender issues in gaming (see, for instance, this summary of Gamergate in The Guardian). In addition, Lucy Prebble worked for Bungie as head scene writer on Destiny. DanTDM is the odd one out among the four, being a Youtube game commentator, but on the other hand, he does seem to be a notable personality per RS coverage on his page. I'm not seeing much of a reason to exclude this list, so I will incorporate it shortly, if there are no objections. Civilization V and Hearthstone will both be added to the main page. Phediuk (talk) 01:25, 2 March 2023 (UTC)

I was wary of the "expert jury" when I first saw it, but these credentials check out.

Of the games that won't be added as a result of this, this is the fourth listing for The Last of Us Part II, the third for Pokemon Yellow, the second for Far Cry 4, and the first for Sonic Adventure 2, should the omnibus be correct. Anonymouseditor2k19 (talk) 05:51, 2 March 2023 (UTC)

If Persona 4 Golden counts as Persona 4, shouldn't Pokemon Yellow count as Pokemon Red and Blue? 108.51.46.15 (talk) 00:22, 3 March 2023 (UTC)

Yes, the Red/Blue/Yellow entry will be counted for Red and Blue, since WP treats them all as versions of the same game, rather than as different games. Conversely, the true multi-game entries -- i.e., Portal 1&2 and The Last of Us 1&2 -- will not be counted, as is the standard practice here. Phediuk (talk) 02:27, 3 March 2023 (UTC)

Red/Blue & Yellow were separate article-wise until a few months ago, but it seems they recently merged those pages, so I've updated it. Gold/Silver & Crystal are still separate, however, so for now I will keep them separated unless there's official Wikipedia policy elsewhere such as on WP:VG that I'm not seeing. BenSPVE (talk) 04:12, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

The Times list has been incorporated. I have also added the list to the omnibus data. Phediuk (talk) 11:54, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

Top 100 Refenced Games Updated XJJSX (talk) 16:27, 4 March 2023 (UTC)

Visualized data updated. BenSPVE (talk) 02:14, 5 March 2023 (UTC)

Euronics "The 40 best video games of all time, 2018

So I threw Euronics' gaming blog onto WP:VG/S to check for reliability, and in the meantime, I'll post this list here. It seems to fit all the other criteria, namely that was chosen by the staff at Euronics themselves and not by a vote, and that it covers games without restrictions towards company, genre, year, platform, etc. Looking at the profile for the author of the article, he seems to be covering gaming on Euronics in general, as well as other forms of electronics.

Euronics, 2018

1. Tetris 2. Super Mario Bros 3. Metroid 4. Street Fighter 5. The Secret of Monkey Island 6. Alone In the Dark 7. Doom 8. Resident Evil 9. Command & Conquer: Red Alert 10. Half-Life 11. The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 12. Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 13. Age of Empires 2 14. Unreal Tournament 15. The Sims 16. Diablo 2 17. Counter-Strike 18. Gothic 19. Max Payne 20. Halo 21. Warcraft 3 22. Battlefield 1942 23. Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic 24. Fable 25. World of Warcraft 26. Anno 1701 27. Portal 28. Super Mario Galaxy 29. Mass Effect 30. Uncharted 31. Batman: Arkham Asylum 32. League of Legends 33. StarCraft 2 34. Call of Duty: Black Ops 35. Dark Souls 36. BioShock Infinite 37. Assassin's Creed: Black Flag 38. Grand Theft Auto V 39. The Witcher 3 40. Overwatch

--Anonymouseditor2k19 (talk) 23:06, 5 March 2023 (UTC)

Listed consoles for games

I just noticed on the main page that Inside (2016) only has Xbox One as a listed console. I know it's at least on the Switch now, too. Should we update that, or is there something about the Xbox One version that makes it better than the other versions?

Similarly, Persona 4 I think is also on more than just the Playstation 2 now, if Golden is included there, which I think it is.

Resident Evil 4 has also made it to multiple consoles now. Skyrim's on the Switch now, too.

A bit more of a stickler perhaps is The Witcher 3. It's on the Switch, but would the Switch version make it onto this list? What about gta 3, vice city, and san andreas? Do their 'Trilogy' versions on the Switch and other consoles count? A lot of people don't seem to like the 'Trilogy' release, so maybe no? 2603:6080:6500:DD3A:88E:D847:4DAC:857F (talk) 03:05, 6 March 2023 (UTC)

So the way it works is that the consoles listed are the ones that the game originally came out on at release.XJJSX (talk) 03:11, 6 March 2023 (UTC)

Remove Destiny 1 from said list?

Hello. I noticed Destiny 1 was included among the games considered the best. Honestly, I don't think it should be included there, because despite being considered the pioneer of live service games, it does not meet the criteria, since the Metacritic critc scores are 75 and 76. Plus, the game is mostly divisive/polarizing, some claiming it was good, others claiming it was bad, such as people criticizing the idea itself of live service games, and the story being incredibly lackluster. CJ In World of Gaming (talk) 17:55, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

@CJ In World of Gaming: Metacritic scores and reviews are irrelevant. The game meets the criteria per the FAQ atop this page. – Rhain ☔ (he/him) 23:01, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

It was listed by at least six separate outlets on their lists for the greatest games of all time. That's how the criteria works, and if you have a problem with Destiny being listed and feel as if it warrants a discussion, then you should be directed your criticisms instead towards the criteria itself. Anonymouseditor2k19 (talk) 02:22, 25 March 2023 (UTC)

Increase/update this list

Reading the various articles in the references, I spotted videogames not present on this list, like Tekken 2 and 5 (DR), Pokémon GO, Garou: Mark of the Wolves, etc. I wanted to give my contribution, but I'm not familiar with this type of table. Angol Fear (talk) 14:59, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

For the game to be included onto this list, it must be included on at least six separate best games of all time lists by separate publications, each of which must be determined as reliable by WP:VG/RS (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:VG/RS), and be inclusive of all games released up to that point. This information can be found on the frequently asked questions tab, which, if you are on mobile, can be found by requesting the desktop version of the site and going over to the talk page. If you think the criteria should be changed then you are free to open a discussion. XJJSX (talk) 16:59, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

Best Video Games of All Time - Parade.com, 2023

Parade magazine put out a list a month ago of what it deems to be the twenty-five best games ever made. No audience voting involved, no limits on platforms or years listed from what I can tell, and Parade is a well-established outlet in general.

https://parade.com/entertainment/best-video-games-of-all-time

Best Video Games of All Time

25. Animal Crossing: New Horizons

24. Ghost of Tsushima

23. Mass Effect 2

22. The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt

21. Uncharted 4: A Thief's End

20. Elden Ring

19. Super Smash Bros. Ultimate

18. God of War: Ragnarok

17. Tomb Raider 2013

16. Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic

15. Metroid Prime

14. Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty

13. Resident Evil 4

12. Grand Theft Auto V

11. Street Fighter II

10. Halo: Combat Evolved

9. Pac-Man

8. The Last of Us (original)

7. Wii Sports

6. Pokemon LeafGreen and FireRed

5. Minecraft

4. Tetris

3. Super Mario World

2. The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild

1. The Last of Us Part II

No new games will be added if this is incorporated, but Tomb Raider would be at five separate listings, while Elden Ring, Super Smash Bros Ultimate, and Animal Crossing: New Horizons will all be bumped up to four separate listings.

--Anonymouseditor2k19 (talk) 00:25, 21 February 2023 (UTC)

Thanks. Throw it up on WP:VG/S first to make sure of its reliability, since, from what I can tell, most of its citations are either for image links only, or only passing mentions of the site in journalist bio articles. We should clear up any doubt that it's a RS before adding. Phediuk (talk) 07:47, 21 February 2023 (UTC)

Done. Anonymouseditor2k19 (talk) 11:53, 21 February 2023 (UTC)

Since there have been no objections, I have incorporated the Parade list onto the main page, and added the list to the omnibus data. Phediuk (talk) 22:11, 23 February 2023 (UTC)

Visualised data updated. Also, just as a clarification, Elden Ring is only at 3 sources as of now because Sports Illustrated 2023 and USA Today 2022 share authors, and therefore only one vote is counted from both lists, as mentioned in the Omnibus list data. BenSPVE (talk) 23:31, 24 February 2023 (UTC)

Does Pokemon FireRed and LeafGreen count as another entry for Red and Blue? 🤔 Does Pokemon Yellow count as another entry for Red and Blue? 100.15.231.129 (talk) 07:19, 27 February 2023 (UTC)

FRLG have their own article Alena 33 (talk) 19:11, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

Top 100 Referenced Games List Updated Accordingly XJJSX (talk) 23:33, 23 February 2023 (UTC)

List of all current 5-entry video games (April 2023)

Hi everyone.

I've decided to make a new list of all games with 5-entries at the moment for future reference.

A Mind Forever Voyaging
Alien: Isolation
Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag
Banjo-Kazooie
Battlefield 2
Borderlands 2
California Games
Cannon Fodder
Cave Story
Crazy Taxi
Deus Ex: Human Revolution
Dishonored 2
Earthworm Jim
F-Zero
Final Fantasy VIII
Freespace 2
Golden Axe
Guitar Hero II
Hades
Head Over Heels
Heros of Might & Magic III
Kingdom Hearts II
Lumines
Mass Effect 3
Mario Kart 8
Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots
NHL '94
Ori and the Blind Forest
Outrun 2006: Coast 2 Coast
Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door
Peggle
Pilotwings
Pole Position
Shadowrun (SNES)
Skies of Arcadia
Sonic CD
Spy Hunter
SSX3
Star Wars: X-Wing
Stunt Car Racer
Super Bomberman
Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars
Super Monkey Ball
Super Smash Bros. Brawl
Super Smash Bros. Ultimate
Tekken 2
The Sims 3
The Witness
Time Crisis
Timesplitters 2
Tomb Raider (2013)
Towerfall
Vagrant Story
Xenogears

Of course I will try to update this as more games get 5 entries or get their 6th entry and need to be removed from this list. Eseseso (talk) 15:40, 13 April 2023 (UTC)

If you took this from the visualized sheet by chance I just want to let you know some of it may be incorrect (some 4 games may actually have 5, and vise versa)--I still have not had time to go through and 100% check things over. Hoping to do it soon. BenSPVE (talk) 17:19, 15 April 2023 (UTC)

It would be useful if there was a sub page somewhere that listed these, along with the current references to avoid duplication. - X201 (talk) 21:07, 15 April 2023 (UTC)

I took this from my previous list, but then looked at the spreadsheet and made adjustments by removing those that no longer had 5 entries and adding some new ones.

I apologize for any errors. Eseseso (talk) 15:36, 16 April 2023 (UTC)

GamingBolt, 2023

GamingBolt published a new Top 30 Games of All Time list on April 6. The preamble says it is about "[c]ategorizing the best games of all time"; in addition, the list is from a RS, editor-chosen, and unrestricted by platform/genre/era. Here is a transcription:

GamingBolt, 2023

1. The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild 2. Elden Ring 3. Half-Life 2 4. The Last of Us Part I 5. Grand Theft Auto V 6. Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty 7. The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt 8. God of War Ragnarok 9. Batman: Arkham City 10. Silent Hill 2 11. Resident Evil 2 (2019) 12. Mass Effect 2 13. Uncharted 2: Among Thieves 14. Dead Space (2023) 15. Metroid Prime Remastered 16. Journey 17. Super Mario Galaxy 2 18. Gran Turismo 3: A-Spec 19. Horizon Forbidden West 20. Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory 21. Monster Hunter: World 22. Gears of War 23. Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 2 24. Celeste 25. Ori and the Will of the Wisps 26. Forza Horizon 5 27. Perfect Dark 28. Burnout 3: Takedown 29. Far Cry 3 30. SSX 3

Assuming there are no objections, I will incorporate this list shortly. Perfect Dark will be added to the main page. Phediuk (talk) 17:42, 8 April 2023 (UTC)

Do it. Timur9008 (talk) 12:03, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

Done. I have also added the new GamingBolt list to the omnibus data. Phediuk (talk) 23:01, 10 April 2023 (UTC)

Top 100 Referenced Games List Updated Accordingly XJJSX (talk) 00:33, 11 April 2023 (UTC)

Visualized data updated. BenSPVE (talk) 22:36, 12 April 2023 (UTC)

The Last of Us Part 1 counts as another entry towards The Last of Us, right? 🤔 108.51.46.15 (talk) 10:31, 17 April 2023 (UTC)

Same question for Dead Space, Metroid Prime, and Resident Evil 2 108.51.46.15 (talk) 10:50, 17 April 2023 (UTC)

I did not count TLOU Part 1, RE2 (2019), or Dead Space (2023) toward their respective originals, since they each have separate articles; Metroid Prime Remastered was counted for Metroid Prime, since it shares an article with the original release. All of the original games are on the page already anyway, so it doesn't matter much either way. Phediuk (talk) 11:05, 17 April 2023 (UTC)

I also did the same for the visualized list--if a remake/remaster has its own page on Wikipedia, it counts as its own game for the purposes of this list. Otherwise, original game. BenSPVE (talk) 23:08, 17 April 2023 (UTC)

Echo what Pheduik and BenSPVE say, in regards to the Top 100 Reference List of that’s what you’re referring to XJJSX (talk) 03:35, 18 April 2023 (UTC)

Versus

Sorry to be a party pooper, but this isn't the place per WP:NOTFORUM, WP:TALK#TOPIC. I'd recommend heading to WP:DISCORD for discussions like this. – Rhain ☔ (he/him) 06:48, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Had a fun idea for a discussion (though I’m not sure if it’s entirely appropriate for this page lol), this is more in an opinion discussion than anything, hopefully this will get some interaction; which trio of games would you rather play? Super Mario 64, The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time and GoldenEye 007 on the N64, or, Metal Gear Solid, Final Fantasy VII and Castlevania: Symphony of the Night on the PlayStation? XJJSX (talk) 06:42, 20 April 2023 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Keep up to date

Hi there - thanks for all your work on this page. I was just wondering, what would be my best way of keeping up to date on when new games are added to the list? Mogowulf (talk) 11:04, 28 April 2023 (UTC)

@Mogowulf: Keeping the page on your watchlist would be the best bet, I'd say. Cat's Tuxedo (talk) 15:16, 28 April 2023 (UTC)

Hi there - thanks for getting back to me. I've started following the page, but how do I go about seeing if an addition(s) has been made to the list and what that addition is? 2A00:23C6:191A:D01:2E3B:70FF:FE7E:43FF (talk) 11:20, 2 May 2023 (UTC)

Hi, thanks for the question. The edit history for the page notes all added games in the edit summaries; the discussions for new lists here also mention specifically which games are to be added. Phediuk (talk) 19:43, 3 May 2023 (UTC)

vg.no "The 100 best games of all time"

Verdens Gang's online magazine, vg.no, has a list of 100 greatest games ever made, and seeing as how Verdens Gang is one of the largest newspapers in Norway and its online magazine is the most read online outlet in the country, I'd thought I'd throw this list on here for assessment.

The problem however, is that there's a paywall that prevents the rest of the article from being read, and because of that I can't provide information on the criteria, how the games were decided upon, which games were chosen, and all other qualifying factors for lists that get used here. Is there anyone else that could check the article for that information? Anonymouseditor2k19 (talk) 00:31, 5 May 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for this suggestion. I should note that this list credits GLHF as the author, so it is probably a translated version of the list they published in USA Today or Sports Illustrated, both of which are incorporated already. Phediuk (talk) 19:32, 5 May 2023 (UTC)

That's a relief, so we can write this one off then. Anonymouseditor2k19 (talk) 00:29, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

Digital Trends, 2023

Digital Trends published a "50 best video games of all time" list today. The site is a RS per WP:VG/S, and the list is staff-chosen, about the best games, and unrestricted by platform/era/genre. If there are no objections, I will incorporate it into the main page shortly. Here is a transcription:

Digital Trends, 2023

1. Tetris 2. Portal 2 3. Super Mario Bros. 3 4. The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild 5. Pac-Man 6. Minecraft 7. The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 8. Hades 9. Half-Life 2 10. Super Mario 64 11. Pokemon HeartGold and SoulSilver 12. Wii Sports 13. The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim 14. The Last of Us 15. Earthbound 16. Silent Hill 2 17. Fortnite 18. Shadow of the Colossus 19. Mario Kart 8 Deluxe 20. Mass Effect 2 21. Batman: Arkham Asylum 22. Dark Souls 23. Chrono Trigger 24. Grand Theft Auto V 25. Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater 26. Stardew Valley 27. World of Warcraft 28. The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt 29. The Sims 4 30. Sonic the Hedgehog 2 31. Halo 3 32. Doom (1993) 33. Metroid Prime 34. Resident Evil 4 (2005) 35. Super Smash Bros. Ultimate 36. Celeste 37. Disco Elysium 38. Diablo II 39. Uncharted 2: Among Thieves 40. Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare 41. Final Fantasy VI 42. Left 4 Dead 2 43. Papers, Please 44. Nier: Automata 45. Civilization V 46. Yakuza: Like a Dragon 47. Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2 48. Amnesia: The Dark Descent 49. Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3 50. Fire Emblem: Awakening

Once this list is incorporated, Fortnite will be added to the page. Phediuk (talk) 20:53, 5 May 2023 (UTC)

For those keeping track, this should also place Hades, Mario Kart 8, and Super Smash Bros. Ultimate at five separate listings, Celeste and Disco Elysium at four, and Nier: Automata, Pokémon HeartGold and SoulSilver, Marvel vs. Capcom 3, and Amnesia: The Dark Descent with three. Anonymouseditor2k19 (talk) 00:26, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

Done. I have also added the Digital Trends list to the omnibus data. Phediuk (talk) 21:01, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

Top 100 Referenced List Updated Accordingly. XJJSX (talk) 22:13, 6 May 2023 (UTC)

Omnibus visualized list updated. BenSPVE (talk) 03:24, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

What counts as "original platforms"?

What time frame does a game port have to release in since its initial launch to count as an "original platform"?

Asking because I'm noticing a weird grey area when it comes to games and their "original platforms" on this page. With games like Portal 2, the Orange Box was not released on PlayStation 3 until a month after it's Xbox 360 release, but yet it's listed as an original platform. NegativeMP1 (talk) 20:08, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

Okay, I made a mistake, Portal 2 didn't release in the Orange Box and I got it confused with Portal 1, so ignore that analogy, but my initial question of what counts and does not count as an original platform still stands. NegativeMP1 (talk) 20:19, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

Your initial summation is correct; the practice here has been to list any platforms from within a month after a game's initial release. Phediuk (talk) 20:33, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

There's no official cutoff, but the usual standard is "within a month." See Talk:List_of_video_games_considered_the_best/Archive_4#Tomb_Raider_platform for an example discussion that affirmed this. In theory, this could be bent if something weird happened, e.g. there was the equivalent of a "narrow release" nobody played followed by a "wide release", but I think the only example of that on the list right now is Tetris, as I doubt any of the reviewers played the Electronika 60 version, but we didn't actually do said bending to include the later MS-DOS release. (Okay, The Oregon Trail too, but I already ranted about that in the archives, that the reviews are really talking about later versions even if they say they aren't.)

As a side rant only semi-related to your question, currently Destiny is single-handedly greatly expanding the size of the Original Platform column with its 4 release platforms. Probably not worth breaking searchability by abbreviating PlayStation just for Destiny, but still vaguely annoying. SnowFire (talk) 20:41, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

Vertical space is cheaper than horizontal. Just split Destiny into two lines IMO. -- ferret (talk) 20:44, 8 May 2023 (UTC)

Adding Elden Ring

As far as I have found, there are at least six separate publications listing Elden Ring. Each of these publications are used as sources for other entries on the list. Shouldn't this mean Elden Ring should be added? Sorry if I am being dumb and missing something. [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] Deejaypedia (talk) 21:05, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

I believe the SI.com and USToday.com lists are related, so not separate publications. Your third source doesn't list Elden Ring. The GQ 2023 list is being evaluated above and has not yet been accept, though likely will be. As such, even with GQ, Elden Ring sits at 4 publications. -- ferret (talk) 21:32, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

Oh yeah you're right don't know why I used source 3 haha. And I didn't know that SI and USToday were related, thank you and sorry! Deejaypedia (talk) 15:28, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

GamesMaster Sept. 1994

I located the Sept. 1994 copy of GamesMaster, but I cannot seem to find the "The All Time Top 100 Ever" list. Anybody got any idea about this? Am I looking right at it?--Gen. Quon_[Talk] 14:22, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

It's a supplement that came with the issue. Phediuk (talk) 18:57, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

Excellent! Thanks for clearin' that up!--Gen. Quon_[Talk] 01:43, 14 May 2023 (UTC)

Fate of the Top 100 Referenced Games List (solved)

For any of you that know, is Lowercase Sigma going to automatically archive the Top 100 Referenced Games List, or are they able to pick and choose what gets archived? - XJJSX XJJSX (talk) 15:18, 15 May 2023 (UTC)

List from an undocumented publication? (Fortress of Solitude)

A list was just published by a publication called "Fortress of Solitude" recently, describing their "12 best video games of all time". However, Fortress of Solitude is not mentioned on Wikipedia:VG/S whatsoever, and the publication does not have its own Wikipedia article. So, would this list even qualify?

In the event it happens to, this is the list. The Last of Us Part II and Metal Gear Solid V would reach five entries, and MW 2019 and Batman: Arkham Knight would reach four.

Fortress of Solitude, 2023

1. Red Dead Redemption 2

2. Half-Life 2

3. The Last of Us (Part I and Part II both)

4. The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild

5. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare (2019)

6. The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim

7. Batman: Arkham Knight

8. Final Fantasy VI

9. Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain

10. Halo: Combat Evolved

11. Sonic the Hedgehog 2

12. Grand Theft Auto V

NegativeMP1 (talk) 18:27, 16 May 2023 (UTC)

What makes Hannah Lieberum's opinion here notable, with no stated credentials, especially as she publishes a top x list in various genres and topics literally every day? Site does not have a published editorial policy and accepts freelance content. No staff page. The page repeatedly declares "We are not a blog", making me think someone has read Wikipedia sourcing discussions before and is aware of NOTBLOG. Irrelevant to an WP:RS determination but *god* do I hate infinite scroll sites. Every time I tried to reach About us in the footer another article, all of them Top X lists, would push it off screen again. -- ferret (talk) 18:54, 16 May 2023 (UTC)

Yeah this is why I asked, because I couldn't find any further information about the site at first glimpse and I am not an expert on researching this stuff whatsoever so I asked just to be sure. NegativeMP1 (talk) 19:05, 16 May 2023 (UTC)

Computer Gaming World, 1996

I dug up a list from Computer Gaming World magazine:

https://archive.org/details/Computer_Gaming_World_Issue_148/page/n66/mode/1up

Would this be able to be included? The list seems very PC-focused, unsurprisingly, as it was from a computer-based magazine, but in every other respect, it seems like a suitable list. Plus, the title does just say "Best of All-Time", not "Best PC Games of All-Time", so it's not explicitly a PC list. Is it too PC-focused or should it be added? I'd like some input before I go to the trouble of transcribing everything. IAmACowWhoIsMad (talk) 19:31, 16 May 2023 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure this is PC exclusive. It's not explicitly stated, because the magazine just covered PC games. Unless someone spots something there that was clearly console (and explicitly included/reference that console version). The fact that there's no Nintendo games at all is pretty damning though. -- ferret (talk) 19:44, 16 May 2023 (UTC)

Yeah, that's about what I thought. Thanks for your input though! IAmACowWhoIsMad (talk) 20:00, 16 May 2023 (UTC)

I want to know about these video games.

I will list some video games here because I want to know how many lists they're in. I'm asking because I thought they would be added soon but I don't see them, so these are the games:

Shenmue II
Herzog Zwei
Skies of Arcadia
Earthworm Jim
NHL 94
Grandia II
Road Rash
Power Stone 2
DragonFire0315 (talk) 17:22, 17 May 2023 (UTC)

Shenmue II - 4 entries

Herzog Zwei - 4

Skies of Arcadia - 5

Earthworm Jim - 5

NHL 94 - 5

Grandia II - 3

Road Rash - idk theres three different versions on the list

Power Stone 2 - 4 NegativeMP1 (talk) 18:01, 17 May 2023 (UTC)

And what about Phantasy Star II? How many entries does have PS II? DragonFire0315 (talk) 20:20, 17 May 2023 (UTC)

There's a link to the spreadsheet in question 1 of the FAQ above where you can explore as many of these questions as you like. SnowFire (talk) 20:47, 17 May 2023 (UTC)

I found it. Thank you! Gonna give it a check now. DragonFire0315 (talk) 21:00, 17 May 2023 (UTC)

GQ, 2023

New list from GQ, based on a survey from 239 "developers, streamers, directors and journalists in the business". If eligible, I believe this would add Dishonored 2 and Hades to the list, but I'll leave it to the professionals. – Rhain ☔ (he/him) 14:41, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

I also believe Persona 5, Hollow Knight, Nier:Automata, Outer Wilds, and The Last of Us Part II may now be eligible, but I could be wrong. 173.16.82.134 (talk) 15:10, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

If the list is eligible, Outer Wilds will be at three, the others at four. – Rhain ☔ (he/him) 15:15, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

Since the list is from a RS, chosen by solicited industry experts, about the greatest games, and unrestricted by platform/genre/era, I see no reason not to incorporate it. Here is a transcription:

GQ, 2023

1. The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild 2. The Last of Us 3. Tetris 4. Bloodborne 5. The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt 6. Mass Effect 2 7. Metal Gear Solid 8. Portal 2 9. Dark Souls 10. Half-Life 2 11. Resident Evil 4 (2005) 12. Disco Elysium 13. The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 14. Super Mario World 15. Red Dead Redemption II 16. The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim 17. Final Fantasy VII 18. Super Mario 64 19. Doom (1993) 20. Elden Ring 21. Halo: Combat Evolved 22. World of Warcraft 23. Bioshock 24. Minecraft 25. Pokemon Red and Blue 26. The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past 27. Street Fighter II 28. The Last of Us Part II 29. Journey 30. Outer Wilds 31. Shadow of the Colossus 32. Deus Ex 33. Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater 34. Uncharted 2: Among Thieves 35. Portal 36. Super Mario Bros. 3 37. Silent Hill 2 38. Hades 39. What Remains of Edith Finch 40. Super Mario Galaxy 41. The Sims 42. Chrono Trigger 43. Nier: Automata 44. The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind 45. Halo 3 46. Destiny 47. God of War (2018) 48. Grand Theft Auto V 49. Stardew Valley 50. Spelunky 51. Final Fantasy X 52. Half-Life 53. Dishonored 2 54. Ico 55. Hollow Knight 56. Inside 57. Final Fantasy IX 58. The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion 59. Fallout 3 60. Super Metroid 61. Grand Theft Auto III 62. Castlevania: Symphony of the Night 63. The Sims 2 64. Persona 5 65. Goldeneye (1997) 66. Fallout: New Vegas 67. The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker 68. Thief: The Dark Project 69. The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask 70. Left 4 Dead 2 71. Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare 72. Yakuza 0 73. Final Fantasy VI 74. Undertale 75. Metroid Prime 76. Pokemon Gold and Silver 77. The Secret of Monkey Island 78. Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 2 79. Tetris Effect 80. Firewatch 81. Fortnite 82. Dragon Age: Origins 83. Bioshock Infinite 84. Shenmue 85. Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn 86. Civilization V 87. Super Mario Odyssey 88. The Last Guardian 89. Hitman: World of Assassination (the series, collectively) 90. Super Mario Kart 91. Grand Theft Auto IV 92. Mass Effect 93. Fable II 94. Okami 95. Ultima Underworld: The Stygian Abyss 96. Super Mario Bros. 97. The Return of the Obra Dinn 98. Age of Empires II: The Age of Kings 99. Rez 100. Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic

Assuming there are no objections, I will incorporate this list shortly. Dishonored 2 and Hades will be added to the page. Phediuk (talk) 15:58, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

Make sure to cross-reference with the other GQ list, but that won't affect those two games being added on account of them both releasing after that list. Anonymouseditor2k19 (talk) 20:53, 10 May 2023 (UTC)

Done. I have also added the GQ list to the omnibus data. Phediuk (talk) 09:58, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

If I am correct, then Disco Elysium is one listing short of being added to the page, while Nier: Automata, Fallout: New Vegas, Final Fantasy XIV, Final Fantasy IX, Hollow Knight, Persona 5, Ultima Underworld: The Stygian Abyss, and Elden Ring all need two more listings. Anonymouseditor2k19 (talk) 20:52, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

Visualized data updated. BenSPVE (talk) 04:05, 18 May 2023 (UTC)

Where can I see some ranks from magazines?

I mean, I want to see some ranks from magazines like GamesMaster, but I don't find them nowhere. Where can I see the ranks? DragonFire0315 (talk) 02:37, 18 May 2023 (UTC)

Hi; the omnibus data is here. It is also linked in the pinned "Lists" thread near the top of the page. Phediuk (talk) 00:34, 19 May 2023 (UTC)

Gamereactor.se "Best Ever: Games", 2022

Found another Gamereactor list, this time from their Swedish branch, listing the Top 50 games of all time as of 2022. Cross-referenced with the other two lists of theirs we have and it's a different list entirely, once again decided by the editors with no limitations to platform, year, how many from a specific franchise, etc.

Gamereactor.se, 2022

1. The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 2. The Last of Us (2013) 3. Half-Life 4. Final Fantasy VII 5. Halo: Combat Evolved 6. The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past 7. Super Mario 64 8. Half-Life 2 9. Grand Theft Auto V 10. Starcraft 11. Super Mario World 12. Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Easter 13. Resident Evil 2 (1998) 14. Gran Turismo 15. Super Metroid 16. Castlevania: Symphony of the Night 17. Tomb Raider (1996) 18. BioShock 19. Red Dead Redemption 2 20. NiGHTS Into Dreams 21. Mass Effect 2 22. Grand Theft Auto III 23. Halo 3 24. God of War (2018) 25. The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay 26. Metroid Prime 27. Silent Hill 2 28. Resident Evil 4 (2005) 29. Fallout 3 30. Elden Ring 31. Wipeout 2097 32. Street Fighter II Turbo 33. Diablo II 34. Chrono Trigger 35. Baldur's Gate II: Shadows of Amn 36. Journey 37. Quake III: Arena 38. Tetris (1989) 39. Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne 40. GoldenEye 007 41. Age of Empires II 42. Command & Conquer: Red Alert 43. Final Fantasy VI 44. Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic 45. The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt 46. Assetto Corsa 47. Doom (1993) 48. Disco Elysium 49. Divinity: Original Sin 2 50. Super Smash Bros. Ultimate

Anonymouseditor2k19 (talk) 21:35, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

Nice work digging this up. If there are no objections, I will incorporate this list shortly; Super Smash Bros. Ultimate and Disco Elysium will be added to the page. Phediuk (talk) 22:19, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

This would also place Elden Ring at five listings after the fourth listing it got from GQ, and Divinity: Original Sin 2 at four listings. Anonymouseditor2k19 (talk) 22:31, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

Done. I have also added the Gamereactor list to the omnibus data. Phediuk (talk) 01:49, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

Top 100 References List Updated Accordingly. XJJSX (talk) 02:56, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

I've been updating the top references list counting only publications since 2013, as well-- https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1qhUnal80p0H42sRjMvONXCtYozBzFgFcFxWb98HMSvQ/edit#gid=1708103363

My goal was to try not to overcount games that were super-loved in the past but don't hold up quite as well today. I've found a bit of overemphasis on today's games, though, in some respects. Like everybody loves a game for a few years and puts it on their lists, and then as time passes by, those games don't make the lists any more. A better way of doing what I was trying to do might be weighting the score more of older games that still get mentioned in modern lists, and weighing relatively less more recent games, but I'm not gonna go into all that advanced mathematics for something I'm not getting paid for. :P Just keep those potential biases in my list in mind if you want to check it out.

I do like this list I'm sharing here, though, because it shows, for example, that a game like Majora's Mask has more staying power than Punch-Out, Gauntlet, Quake, or Gran Turismo-- great for their time games which rank higher on the base top 100 referenced games list, but don't make the list at all using only (relatively) modern lists. (While Majora's Mask still does.) 69.250.79.196 (talk) 22:19, 19 May 2023 (UTC)

Visualized data updated. Apologies for the delay on the last few--I have not been receiving notifications for some reason. BenSPVE (talk) 04:21, 18 May 2023 (UTC)

Japanese sources

Don't reputable Japanese publications and sources make lists like these? Why aren't those sources included? 69.250.79.196 (talk) 13:01, 22 May 2023 (UTC)

Provide one? That's really the only answer. No one is aware of a suitable listed from a reliable publication. -- ferret (talk) 13:37, 22 May 2023 (UTC)

To go into this some more, Japanese publications do indeed love lists of favorite/best XYZ, but they are also very poll-oriented, and generally polling the whole audience rather than just a panel of experts or the like. That tends to make them difficult to use with the standards adapted here on Wikipedia. SnowFire (talk) 13:48, 22 May 2023 (UTC)

Also, regarding the Famitsu lists specifically, their 2006 top 100 does not claim to be a list of best or greatest games, but only of readers' favorites. They did a similar top 20 list in 2019 that was additionally restricted to the Heisei era (i.e., 1989 up to the then-present.) With that said, they are just one source; we would be happy to take a look at lists from other Asian sources, though non-Latin-alphabet languages are more difficult for an English-speaking audience to track down, since Google does not always catalogue pages from, say, China, and print sources may not be available to us at all. Phediuk (talk) 19:18, 22 May 2023 (UTC)

Games that are listed as series in some publications.

I was wondering this for a long time. Why video games that are listed or ranked by some publications as series (in other words, including all the games of the series) don't get an entry? For example, if Sonic the Hedgehog is included in a list as series, why its games don't get an entry? Like old magazines included all his games on their lists as series, or Phantasy Star series for example. It shouldn't Phantasy Star games (I, II, III and IV) get an entry because of that? DragonFire0315 (talk) 01:36, 23 May 2023 (UTC)

Because series/franchises are not individual games. There are MANY Sonic games that are actually considered terrible. -- ferret (talk) 01:53, 23 May 2023 (UTC)

Yeah, but the old ones (from Sega Genesis) are not as they're amazing. Anyway, the only magazines that rank or list games as series are old ones, I mean the 90's ones. DragonFire0315 (talk) 02:06, 23 May 2023 (UTC)

Super Star Wars

I was looking over the omnibus data and I want to talk about this. In the Hyper 1995's list, I see Super Star Wars is ranked as series there. However, some time ago I saw in Video Game Canon the Hyper 1995's list there and then I saw Super Star Wars is not ranked as series there but the first game one: https://www.videogamecanon.com/lists/hyper-1995/

I think this should be checked out in any case. If Super Star Wars is not ranked as series there, the game would get a new entry and Super Star Wars will have 4 entries now. DragonFire0315 (talk) 16:15, 25 May 2023 (UTC)

Super Star Wars is a "series" entry in both the 1995 Hyper list (page 22 here) and in the omnibus data's transcription of it. Phediuk (talk) 01:42, 26 May 2023 (UTC)

I had that doubt because what I saw in Video Game Canon, but now everything is clear. Thanks! DragonFire0315 (talk) 05:03, 26 May 2023 (UTC)

STALKER

Looking over the spreadsheet I noticed there are seemingly two separate entries for STALKER: Shadow of Chernobyl & S.T.A.L.K.E.R: Shadow of Chernobyl. Just looking for some clarification on this to see if we can condense these into one game entry. XJJSX (talk) 04:31, 25 May 2023 (UTC)

Fixed. Thank you! BenSPVE (talk) 23:41, 31 May 2023 (UTC)

Thank you! XJJSX (talk) 01:18, 1 June 2023 (UTC)

Why list publisher but not developer?

Hoping one of this page's editors could answer this question for me, how come the table of games lists each game's publisher, but not developer? Given the topic of the page, wouldn't it make more sense to list the primary studio that actually developed the game, rather than just the company that had the publishing rights? Especially since many of these games had multiple different publishers for different regions and platforms. 2A00:23C6:8281:A501:EDE1:7B8A:8BA9:33BD (talk) 19:20, 29 May 2023 (UTC)

This is a good point, and I'd support switching from publisher to developer. Shooterwalker (talk) 02:28, 30 May 2023 (UTC)

I would honestly support upgrading the list to include developers AND publishers, or even publishers with developers. I personally think that in a list like this, it's more fair to use developers, as they were the ones to make the games and they should be first and foremost. NegativeMP1 (talk) 02:51, 30 May 2023 (UTC)

Agreed. 100% Alena 33 (talk) 03:15, 30 May 2023 (UTC)

This has come up before, and I'm perennially on the grumpy let's not include developer side. If anything, I'd rather remove both, but publisher is more defensible. This is a table of games, not every single true fact about said games; by far the most important piece of information in the table is the humble wikilink to the game itself. Tables are more powerful when they only include the absolute most relevant info; every column needs to justify its place. If a reader wants to learn more about a specific game - they can click on to the full article. I'll also remind that >50% of Wikipedia readers are on mobile, and very wide tables don't generally work great with narrow phone screens. At least with publisher, it's reasonable to sort the column to, say, see all Nintendo games or EA games that are on the list. But developers are often more obscure or hard to define, especially developers that are subsidiaries of larger companies (e.g. Rockstar North, Rockstar Toronto, etc.). And sure, there are some developers that are famous, like FromSoft, but most people know Nintendo, not HAL Laboratory. And it's interesting to cite "multiple different publishers" - that's also an issue with developers, when one developer does the PC port, another developer does DLC, etc. In general, most readers know the publisher better than the developer - usual reminder that readers are way more casual than video game space topic editors on Wikipedia. And a decent amount of the time, developer is either the same as the publisher and is just duplicative. SnowFire (talk) 05:07, 30 May 2023 (UTC)

But to your point about only including the absolute most relevant info, I think when we're talking about the games that are considered the best, the people who actually created these acclaimed games is a lot more relevant to the topic than the people who held the publishing right. Just because the publisher is more recognisable to a casual reader does not make it more the more relevant information to the topic at hand. If it's a one or the other situation, I think the people who make the games should take priority. 2A00:23C6:8281:A501:8C70:7259:83F7:20B3 (talk) 13:21, 30 May 2023 (UTC)

Yeah this argument is fair enough, looking at it further the infobox would actually just be cluttered if the developer field was added and probably become unviewable on mobile, which this page is already hard to read on the mobile app to begin with. NegativeMP1 (talk) 18:16, 30 May 2023 (UTC)

I was the one who originally removed the developer field since I didn't think we needed to list 7 different internal studios of Nintendo and Ubisoft games. It seems consensus is leaning towards it being re-added, but it shouldn't replace the publisher field if so. A compromise would be to omit the developer if they self-published or otherwise format it like we do on award pages. (FromSoftware / Sony Computer Entertainment for Bloodborne, while Nintendo works for Breath of the Wild). And while we're at it, why are we listing genres? They are not a defining feature of a game's reception. ~ Dissident93 ^(talk) 18:13, 30 May 2023 (UTC)

I agree with SnowFire and Dissident93 in that publishers are generally more clear-cut and simpler to name here than developers, which can get hazy when you start trying to determine which particular team in a large company made a game. I do not feel strongly about this, since there is a high degree of overlap between developer and publisher anyway (i.e., the bulk of the list would not be meaningfully changed if devs replaced the publisher column), though I do feel the current set-up is the most streamlined and easy-to-manage option. Phediuk (talk) 18:51, 30 May 2023 (UTC)

Disagree on the "genres not mattering" part. A big part of why games like Doom, Street Fighter II, Final Fantasy VII, Resident Evil, Super Mario 64, etc. are so acclaimed is because of how much they revolutionized their respective genres, so not listing the genre of game tells less of why the games listed are considered to be some of the best ever made. Anonymouseditor2k19 (talk) 00:40, 2 June 2023 (UTC)

I have a neutral stance in this. My opposing point is similar to @Dissident93's. Not every developer is a company or a brand name. What is this article gonna look like when we have The Oregon Trail's developers listed? It'll start to become cluttered. My point of support, on the other hand, is for the sake of credit. What I mean by this can be related to LJN. (Yes, I know.) Their prime infamy was for making terrible NES tie-ins, but they were often believed to be the developers for them when in reality they had really bad luck in choosing developers. I believe that emphasizing publishers over developers could lead to misinformation on who was actually responsible for the game and its quality.

Also wanted to add the previous discussion of this topic that Dissident was involved in, for the sake of relevance. Carlinal (talk) 07:50, 31 May 2023 (UTC)

I think giving credit to the people who actually made the games is an important consideration, I don't see it as any more in the weeds as publishers. As mentioned in the initial comment, publisher details can be equally nebulous; If Persona 5 makes the list, who is the publisher? Atlus? Atlus USA? Deep Silver? Sega? This applies to some on the list right now. Destiny's publisher is listed as Bungie, but at launch it was Activision. Why choose one over the other?

I think if we decide that developer information is too in the weeds to include, that same rule should apply to publisher information as well. If it has to be one or the other though, it should be developer. In my view, the development information is more relevant to the topic at hand, that information is much more linked to the quality of the games listed. And to your point, having this information available helps to avoid misinformation about who is responsible for the creation of these games. 2A00:23C6:8281:A501:6426:BF78:3E26:FA02 (talk) 18:33, 31 May 2023 (UTC)

Hi, thanks for the thoughts. I changed Bungie back to Activision (it used to be Activision anyway, but someone changed it), since the page otherwise lists the original publisher for every entry. If Persona 5 ever gets onto the list, Atlus will be the listed publisher. If there are any other anomalies, they can be corrected. For what it's worth, the bulk of the column would be the same even if developers replaced publishers; Super Mario Bros. is still made by Nintendo, Half-Life still by Valve, Hades still by Supergiant, and so on. Most of the publishers are already the developers. Placing the pubs in the column simply sidesteps the compulsion to list, e.g., "Square Product Development Division 1", rather than just Square. Again, I view this as a minor issue, but I do believe that publishers are simpler to determine, shorter to name, look cleaner on the page, and generally overlap with the developer anyway. Thanks again for pointing out the Destiny anomaly. Phediuk (talk) 19:52, 31 May 2023 (UTC)

Well in that case, also worth pointing out Stardew Valley's publisher is listed as ConcernedApe. The original publisher was Chucklefish. 2A00:23C6:8281:A501:6426:BF78:3E26:FA02 (talk) 20:27, 31 May 2023 (UTC)

Thanks; fixed. Phediuk (talk) 20:38, 31 May 2023 (UTC)

Spreadsheet missing major 2019 games

Sekiro (2019) & Death stranding (2019) are missing from the spreadsheet !!! is this an error ?? Pemajy (talk) 15:34, 8 June 2023 (UTC)

@Pemajy: Not an error. Neither game has been included in a list as of yet. – Rhain ☔ (he/him) 23:31, 8 June 2023 (UTC)

User:Rhain I can't understand how/why not even a single publication have mentioned them yet..., anyways thanks for the answer. Pemajy (talk) 03:28, 9 June 2023 (UTC)

Lists from the same source (but a different year)

I noticed IGN has multiple lists on the omnibus list data-- 2007, 2005, 2003, etc. If a game makes it onto three of those lists, is it counted three times?

What about GQ's lists? It had updates to its 2013 list in 2018, 2019, and 2020. If a game making it onto multiple IGN list updates gets it counted multiple times, should Barbarian get counted four times for making it onto GQ's 2013, '18, '19, and '20 lists? 2600:4040:B5F5:B00:D5EC:B6C5:1A93:E325 (talk) 03:34, 17 June 2023 (UTC)

Also, what do you do when it says something like 'series, collectively'? Do you count that as plus one for the 'series, collectively', and then add that item (like say, 'Final Fantasy series, collectively') to the main page when it gets 6+ entries? 2600:4040:B5F5:B00:D5EC:B6C5:1A93:E325 (talk) 04:05, 17 June 2023 (UTC)

Per the intro to the article and Q1 on the FAQ above, "each game must be included on at least six "best games of all time" lists compiled by separate publications". So basically it's as if IGN has one mega-list that keeps getting appended to with whatever new entries they stick on a yearly list. But appearing on multiple IGN lists doesn't "help". SnowFire (talk) 05:59, 17 June 2023 (UTC)

Also, as for your second question, "series" entries are not counted for purposes of inclusion on the page. Phediuk (talk) 15:52, 17 June 2023 (UTC)

Need for list ranking threshold.

Top 200 greatest games of all time, a listing at number 158, shouldn't be a qualifier for the list. Only the top 20 rankings in such a list should qualify. 2407:7000:986C:1300:4432:31E:2102:4EE0 (talk) 00:46, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

Hard disagree. The article name is "list of video games considered to be the best", not "list of video games that appear most frequently within the top twenty on 'greatest video games lists'". Anonymouseditor2k19 (talk) 01:04, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

I greatly disagree. I can see where you're coming from, but with the way this article seems to be (I'm not for sure, I just got here), this has no reason to be a requirement, especially when the highest rated games across most publications are generally the same due to bias. NegativeMP1 (talk) 06:01, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

I agree with the others. The title of this page is fairly broad, and shouldn't be restricted to some arbitrary number; it should be restricted simply to games that reliable sources have identified as "the best"... whatever that may mean.--Gen. Quon_[Talk] 14:09, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

I was curious about this prompt, so I figured it out. Here's a list of the games that have made it into the top 20 of the approved lists 6 times or more-- https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1logDYpYmRdVZFAq5S5-VUOF0W-QglBFUyfY0UZ1Du0A/edit?usp=drivesdk

Not saying we should add this to the main article, necessarily, (unless you want to,) just putting this here for the original asker and anyone else who might be interested. 2607:FB91:1448:C7D:590B:B9FC:E573:CA5F (talk) 12:35, 19 June 2023 (UTC)

Gaming Gorilla publication to be added?

I found a new list of the top 100 video games of all time here, and I think this should be used as a source. This I believe would push Elden Ring up to 6 entries. https://gaminggorilla.com/best-video-games-all-time/ Deejaypedia (talk) 21:30, 24 June 2023 (UTC)

GamingGorilla is currently being discussed as unreliable. This source isn't suitable here. -- ferret (talk) 23:03, 24 June 2023 (UTC)

Elden Ring

Elden Ring is widely regarded as one of the best games of 2020s and I have multiple sources that supports this claim. DarkFallenAngel (talk) 17:08, 24 June 2023 (UTC)

Please read the LISTCRIT at the top of this page and present your sources and explain why they meet the criteria. This list is heavily maintained and constantly re-vetted. New sources are of interest. -- ferret (talk) 17:35, 24 June 2023 (UTC)

The two new sources DFA put in are from Business Insider and Empire, both 2023 lists. Were they checked out before? Carlinal (talk) 18:33, 24 June 2023 (UTC)

Wait no, the Business Insider one is from 2022. Carlinal (talk) 18:35, 24 June 2023 (UTC)

WP:RSN has Business Insider as a situational source. Most importantly, their list is not a list of their own making. They're just reporting the top ranks of Metacritic. They offer no opinion on any of the games, just listing their metacritic score and ranking. This is no good. EmpireOnline's reliability is not established by either RSN or WP:VG/S, however, it's a reader poll so it's out. -- ferret (talk) 19:12, 24 June 2023 (UTC)

The Empire poll was one voted on by readers, so no. Anonymouseditor2k19 (talk) 00:17, 25 June 2023 (UTC)

The Last of Us: Part II

Isn't about time to add that? 2601:1C2:1500:5190:C9B1:5A91:C411:AF7F (talk) 08:22, 28 June 2023 (UTC)

It currently has three listings (and two "dual entries" with Part I, which seemingly don't count), so it's not quite there yet. – Rhain ☔ (he/him) 08:30, 28 June 2023 (UTC)

Game Informers Top 100 RPGs

Good afternoon, first time posting. Game Informer had a list of Top 100 RPGs back in 2018. Would that be suitable or no because it’s focused solely on a specific type of games? Marcellopes95 (talk) 17:24, 3 July 2023 (UTC)

@Marcellopes95: No. A list cannot have any genre or platform restrictions. Cat's Tuxedo (talk) 18:12, 3 July 2023 (UTC)

Understood , thanks for the quick reply! Marcellopes95 (talk) 21:45, 3 July 2023 (UTC)

WatchMojo?

WatchMojo came out with a Top 100, I'm wondering if it's legible. Alena 33 (talk) 21:21, 9 July 2023 (UTC)

Unreliable per WP:VG/S. -- ferret (talk) 21:25, 9 July 2023 (UTC)

Video Game of the Year book

Was curious if entries in the new Video Game of the Year book by Jordan Minor are eligible to be included on this page. The book picks several games every year (typically one from Minor himself and then several more choices from guest writers) as the best game of the year, dating back to 1977. Given the format of the book, I can imagine there might be some disagreement on whether it fits the guideline, but I wanted to bring it up for consideration anyway. 2A00:23C6:8281:A501:4CC6:1AB4:B69E:CF44 (talk) 17:39, 23 July 2023 (UTC)

If 1001 before you die fits, I can see this fitting. It's down to the mods tho 67.1.163.122 (talk) 01:36, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

I feel like the arbitrary restriction of choosing one game per year and being forced to pick one game for each year disqualifies it. S3kt0r359 (talk) 16:47, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

Hi, thanks for the suggestion. However, although the book's subtitle refers to the "Best, Boldest, and Most Bizarre Games", I believe the intended reading here is not that these qualities all apply to every entry, but rather, that any one of them can justify an entry being considered -- in the words of the book's summary -- "a defining game, a game that captured the zeitgeist and left a legacy for all games that followed." Therefore, the book's entries should not necessarily be considered the contributors' picks for "best" games. A few of the choices reflect this approach, i.e., Depression Quest is known less for the game itself and more for the harassment campaign around it. Compare this to the approach of 1001 Games book, which identifies itself specifically as "1001 of the best video games from around the world and on all formats". So, I do not think the new book fits the inclusion criteria here, but thank you for bringing it to our attention. Phediuk (talk) 17:11, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

Is HiConsumption a reliable source?

Or is it already on the master list Alena 33 (talk) 00:29, 30 July 2023 (UTC)

It's not currently listed on WP:VG/S, making it unreliable by default, though if you want you could open a case or discussion there to gain a consensus on its reliability (I personally never heard of this source so I have no personal judgement on it). NegativeMP1 (talk) 00:52, 30 July 2023 (UTC)

It technically doesn't make it unreliable by default, just ineligible for inclusion on this list by default. Sergecross73 msg me 18:13, 30 July 2023 (UTC)

Almost Top 100

Hi. This list is to keep track of games which are one entry away from making the Top 100 Referenced List.

Almost Top 100

1. The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask - 17

2. Grand Theft Auto: Vice City - 17

3. Civilization IV - 17

4. Batman: Arkham Asylum - 17

5. Left 4 Dead 2 - 17

6. Asteroids - 16

7. Galaga - 16

8. The Legend of Zelda - 16

9. Donkey Kong Country - 16

10. Resident Evil 2 - 16

11. Soulcalibur - 16

12. Thief II: The Metal Age - 16

XJJSX (talk) 02:46, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

Link to this section for easy-to-access context. Carlinal (talk) 05:34, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

For context the Almost Top 100 refers to the “List of Top 100 Games by Number of Referenced Sources”, not the “excluding 10 yr old sources” list. XJJSX (talk) 15:51, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

Empire Online 2023

Someone recently tried to add this list to the article but it was reverted due to being possibly user generated. This may be worth a discussion though, and when it said "ballots", it didn't specify if it was chosen by viewers or the staff team. Empire is a legitimate published magazine that already has a list from 2009 in use here, so it's very possible that the votes were cast by the staff team. No evidence points towards being user generated on its own right now. Thoughts? NegativeMP1 00:02, 19 August 2023 (UTC)

Thanks for the suggestion. However, this particular list is a reader poll, which it why it wasn't added to the page. Phediuk (talk) 01:12, 19 August 2023 (UTC)

Want to know how far Fallout New vegas is.

I saw CQ list and there i found fallout new vegas, i was expecting new vegas to be added this time but no, so i wanna know how far is it ? And where can we see position of other games who havn't been added yet. Shank19112000 (talk) 19:56, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

Four listings, since the spreadsheet lists three outlets so far and the GQ list hasn't been integrated yet. Anonymouseditor2k19 (talk) 20:32, 11 May 2023 (UTC)

What are the others you saw? I found it's listed in the Polygon 2017 list, IGN 2021 (updated in March 2023), and GQ as you mentioned. Wonder if you missed either of the first two (I have no idea where this "spreadsheet" is unless you meant the list of sources used in the article). VintageVernacular (talk) 02:17, 26 August 2023 (UTC)

@VintageVernacular: The spreadsheet is linked in the FAQ atop this talk page. Per the omnibus data, New Vegas is named by four publications: Game Informer (2009), GQ (2023), IGN (2019 & 2021), and Polygon (2017). – Rhain ☔ (he/him) 02:29, 26 August 2023 (UTC)

Thanks. I dug up the sources GeneralHamster used earlier this year, most of which was addressed in archive 10 (per-decade lists, per-genre lists, etc). There were three that weren't addressed, but I found they can't be used for various reasons. SVG is marked unreliable by WikiProject Video Games, and these two websites they used describe their lists as "meta-lists" scraped from other sources (probably sources we're already looking at here). Other sources I found online didn't look terribly reliable and more like random blogs/whatnot.

I think this game will find its way onto this page some day (it was the sole game I was surprised wasn't here), but perhaps not any time soon. The best shot at it seems to be discovery of some book, journal, or magazine articles that weren't thoroughly indexed by the Internet (or simply not yet evaluated despite having been indexed) and happen to grace it with a mention. Or of course, waiting. VintageVernacular (talk) 02:38, 26 August 2023 (UTC)

Oh and, it got an honorable mention in the Digital Trends list. But that doesn't count. VintageVernacular (talk) 02:40, 26 August 2023 (UTC)

New Vegas has now been added to the list. GeneralHamster (talk) 09:16, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

I've reverted your edit. It doesn't quite meet the criteria yet, as previously explained here. – Rhain ☔ (he/him) 09:19, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

This is getting to the point where, unfortunately so but seriously so, banning should be considered. XJJSX (talk) 17:15, 19 July 2023 (UTC)

I don't think that's a proportionate response here. It's a disagreement over what qualifies as "best of" etc. Myself and Rhain buried the hatchet on my talk page. GeneralHamster (talk) 07:33, 20 July 2023 (UTC)

Looking at it now I am relieved to see this “user” has had their ability to edit revoked. XJJSX (talk) 16:41, 22 July 2023 (UTC)

Keep an eye out for Baldur's Gate 3

I believe it's only a matter of time before Baldur's Gate 3 is inducted into the list. It's an almost universally praised game. 58.8.155.78 (talk) 20:51, 1 September 2023 (UTC)

It's.... going to take a while to meet the list criteria. Such publications as this list relies on are not released very often. -- ferret (talk) 20:54, 1 September 2023 (UTC)

Speedball 2: Brutal Deluxe

"The first version was simultaneously developed and released for the Amiga and the Atari ST in 1990." [8]https://readonlymemory.vg/the-making-of-speedball-2/

Therefore Amiga should be beside Atari ST in that table cell as the other original platform. 188.143.5.95 (talk) 14:39, 4 September 2023 (UTC)

Added. ~ Dissident93 ^(talk) 15:38, 4 September 2023 (UTC)

C85 News?

They seem to be a pretty decent, unbiased site. I’ll link it here. https://c86news.com/video-games/2022/09/10/top-100-video-games-of-all-time-ranked/ Alena 33 (talk) 23:42, 19 August 2023 (UTC)

Similarly to HiConsumption, C85 is not is listed at WP:VG/S, making it ineligible for use on this list, but thanks for the suggestion. NegativeMP1 00:59, 20 August 2023 (UTC)

This list has already been included. It was also published in USA Today, and its appearance there apparently made it eligible. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_video_games_considered_the_best#cite_note-GLHFUSAToday-101 IlmeniAVG (talk) 08:15, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

Video Game Canon Lists

I've found a website that contains links to various editor-chosen "best games of all time" lists, most of which are already included here. There are some that have yet to be included here (such as 1Up and GamePro), as well as lists from sources already included here (though I haven't checked much if their lists overlap with other years). I'll leave the link here in case any of them are credible enough to be a part of this page. https://www.videogamecanon.com/lists/ Averychicks (talk) 21:51, 22 August 2023 (UTC)

This is a great resource when looking for similar lists, though it seems most (if not all) relevant ones are already included. Several don't quite fit the criteria: 1Up and GamePro both list the "most important games", not the best games, so don't quite fit here. – Rhain ☔ (he/him) 23:21, 22 August 2023 (UTC)

Oh this is very amusing. I love aggregation websites like this and I acknowledge the lists used in it. The thing is it was actually mentioned way earlier in the archives of this page. I wonder if someone will take the time to recheck every single source used to see if there's something that isn't accepted yet. Carlinal (talk) 04:11, 23 August 2023 (UTC)

Guilty, I've done that multiple times. I did it just the other day, mainly because there haven't been any new lists to add as of late. Anonymouseditor2k19 (talk) 16:08, 23 August 2023 (UTC)

Ah I see. Thank you so much for your efforts! Carlinal (talk) 16:56, 23 August 2023 (UTC)

With the release of games like Tears of the Kingdom and Baldurs Gate 3, I'm very confident that by the end of this year some publications like IGN will release new Top 100 lists. NegativeMP1 17:12, 23 August 2023 (UTC)

Okay, added Video Game Canon as an external link, since I believe it is acceptable as such in comparison to the Metacritic and OpenCritic links in nature. (Was further convinced to add it as this film article has They Shoot Pictures, Don't They? for an external link). If this gets reverted I'd really like a reason issued as to why. Thanks. Carlinal (talk) 06:58, 29 August 2023 (UTC)

What about PlayThatGame or Acclaimed Video Games? Alena 33 (talk) 05:01, 31 August 2023 (UTC)

I looked into both of them and I don't think either are as close to this article's criteria as Video Game Canon. PlayThatGame includes not only reader polls but various lists of a certain year or platform, and dozen of "favorite" lists which I'm sure is different in character than "all-time". Acclaimed Video Games, while not having reader polls, is similar in nature, though for some reason decade-end lists are classified under "Other". That's not to say Video Game Canon doesn't mention the ones that don't count, but they're still separated from what does. I thank you anyway for bringing them up, I'm just as interested in these. They have larger collections of lists anyway, so perhaps there's something useful to mine in them regardless. Carlinal (talk) 22:56, 1 September 2023 (UTC)

Creator of Acclaimed Video Games here.

Considering how new and relatively unknown my website is, and the fact that it is still very much a work in progress, I do not think it should be linked to in the article as an authoritative source on what video games are considered the best. However, I think this should be reconsidered once Acclaimed Video Games is more established. End of year/decade lists have the same purpose as all time lists, they just cover a shorter period of time, so if they can all be aggregated together then the ability to include them is strictly an advantage (as long as the methods are sound). At the very least, it should be less concerning than the 1Up and GamePro lists, mentioned above, that Video Game Canon includes. Though, as I said, I don't think my website should be mentioned yet anyway, so it is immaterial for now.

On Acclaimed Video Games being useful to mine, I believe the lists that you don't have are the following:

Edge (Spanish) 2007

Edge 2009 Might have to discuss whether or not this is a true "best" games list. I think it is, but others may disagree.

Game Informer 2001

Games TM 2015 Exact publication date unknown for this one. 2015 is an estimate.

GQ Spain 2020 I believe this one was edited a few times.

Stuff 2011

There are a couple of others but I don't have links for them. IlmeniAVG (talk) 15:07, 4 September 2023 (UTC)

@Rhain: @Anonymouseditor2k19: I don't see any issues with the Game Informer 2001 list in specific, is there anything I'm missing or would they be candidates to incorporate here? NegativeMP1 23:44, 4 September 2023 (UTC)

(edit conflict) "End of year/decade lists have the same purpose as all time lists, they just cover a shorter period of time" — I think that's a perfect explanation as to why they don't have the same purpose. This list is meant to consider the best games "of all time", not the best games "of a short period of time", so year/decade lists aren't really suitable. As for those sources:

Edge (Spanish) 2007 — reader voted
Edge 2009 — discussed here
Game Informer 2001 — reader voted, discussed here
GQ Spain 2020 was technically incorporated (see here and here) but the article doesn't make this clear
Stuff 2011 was incorporated but removed after some issues arose with archiving

GamesTM's list might need some additional eyes. The front cover is practically identical to their 2018 list but there are several differences within the list itself (and very little information regarding its publication). – Rhain ☔ (he/him) 00:06, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

I tried searching it up, and I couldn't find this specific list at all for GamesTM. Part of me wonders if it was even an official release and not an early version that was sent out by accident. Anonymouseditor2k19 (talk) 01:25, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

Yeah, it's very bizarre. There are 33 games from the undated list that aren't on the 2010 list, and 31 that aren't on the 2018 list, but otherwise they're very similar. It definitely feels like it was written between the two lists, so it's strange that there's no information about it. – Rhain ☔ (he/him) 01:58, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

I can confirm that the undated GamesTM list is not mentioned on any of the covers from 2015-16, though it seems to date from that period, as The Witcher 3 is the most recent game on it. Usually, supplements such as these are advertised on the front of the relevant issue, so I am unsure of this list's origin; Google has turned up nothing. Phediuk (talk) 16:44, 5 September 2023 (UTC)

The top 200 list that they did for their 200th issue isn't mentioned on the cover of that magazine either, so I don't think that means much. However, I did reach out to one of the staff writers to see if they knew anything about it, and got the following reply:

"It certainly looks like something the games™ design team would have put together, and it reads very much like our house style. As for its origin, I could only offer an assumption: that this was ultimately packaged together and given away outside of the magazine, most likely as a digital PDF by Future Publishing for when people signed up for one of our newsletters or voted in the Golden Joysticks, that sort of thing."

Not definitive, but I'm guessing it's not an official list. IlmeniAVG (talk) 04:28, 7 September 2023 (UTC)

Found it! Looks like it was one of their special issues, published in September 2015. – Rhain ☔ (he/him) 05:21, 7 September 2023 (UTC)

Excellent work; I will make a new section for the unearthed GamesTM list. Phediuk (talk) 06:29, 7 September 2023 (UTC)

I suppose what I don't understand is why the inclusion of end of year/decade lists makes Acclaimed Video Games' all time list less authoritative than Video Game Canon's all time list, which is what is implied above. All "best of" lists cover different periods of time, with the limitation of all time lists being their release date, so the only concern, from my perspective, is whether not they are aggregated using sound methods.

To be clear, I am not saying that this article should reference end of year/decade lists; this is purely about what external links to include. If there is an external link to Video Game Canon, then I think a link to Acclaimed Video Games should be there as well, once Acclaimed Video Games is more established.

On the GamesTM list, unfortunately I have no additional information about it. I've tried looking into it a few times but never with any success. IlmeniAVG (talk) 04:26, 5 September 2023 (UTC)