The Qt3 Top 10 Games of the Decade Voting Thread

I can’t believe I had forgotten OTC. Back to my copy!

You’re right that it is a quirky aspect of human behavior, but I think your posts may be glossing over some nuance in game design; games have payoffs in different ways, not all people play games for the same reasons, “hooks” are spaced unevenly, etc. You don’t get one ‘happiness unit’ per hour per game etc.

I mean, the splash phrase for this review of Dreadhalls is “get me out of here”:

…yet it’s a “gold standard”.

What about the point that certain games seem to linger in memory more than others? Are more personally impactful?

Distilling everything down to hours played is an interesting metric, sure, but it’s not the last word.

I didn’t say I didn’t like Fallout 4. I liked it and enjoyed it for the most part. I didn’t love it because of its flaws. Not mutually exclusive.

I think SamS thinks they’ve found a contradiction, and from that has had a huge epiphany. But actually they have just found some signal noise.

I played loads of games over the last ten years, loads. The 400 hours into Stellaris is not statistically significant, it’s a one off anomaly. If you created a list of all the games I’ve played for more than 10 hours and compared it to the list of 61 games I loved enough to consider for my top ten list, you’d find you had two versions of the same list with a couple of games different on each list.

The other big problem is that a player isn’t always choosing to do one thing over the other; not all games are created equally, so a comparison can be pointless. It takes three hours to get through Gone Home, yet that game made a few people’s lists because those three hours are super duper memorable and affecting. Three hours into Fallout 4 is not even enough time to have some of the core mechanics revealed to the player.

But that’s okay, because they’re different types of game. If you were drawing a comparison only between genres, or within an identical genre, you could perhaps make the argument about stated versus revealed preference. Gaming, fortunately, is a lot broader than that.

Tabletop bros!

Man, that makes me really wanna try out Seafall!!

It is not for everyone, hard to say more without going into spoilers.

Speaking of time investment, I’ve been playing Elder Scrolls Online with a buddy and just hate the huuuuuuuge time sink it takes to level up anything. Basically I’ve given up and just tag along with my mate and every once in a while and get like 1% increase over a 12hour session or something. He basically plays 3 hours a day and is miles ahead of me and still not maxed out.

In the “proper” Elder Scroll games like Morrowind / Skyrim it actually feels like you are progressing and the game adapts accordingly without needing to play 200hours per level.

Heh. Reminds me of when I played my one and only MMO back in the day. Dark Age of Camelot. I was fine with the progression until I hit, I think it was 36 or something. And then getting level 37 took me approximately the same amount of time it had taken to get from level 30 to 36. It was ridiculous. That’s when I stopped playing. Well, eventually. Maybe not right that day.

Let me give you an example.

I played Assassins Creed Unity. I enjoyed many aspects of running around Revolutionary France, and had issues with others. But I did enjoy much of my time.

And then came the final mission which pissed me right the hell off. On top of a design that was tedious, the bugs meant that many of my successful runs, ones where 20 minutes in I am closing in on completion after neutering the bullshit sniper fest, and I clip through a floor, or get stuck on the scenery. After about the 7-8th time of losing 20 minutes of progress, and please note my total video game time last year was less than 100 hours (probably closer to 50), I was fucking livid. I beat that stupid game, but was hating it at the end. It really soured me on the total experience.

DAoC was the only MMO that hooked me of the several I tried and I think that was because I found a really good group in my guild to run with regularly and then went from like level 40 to 50 and Realm Rank 5 rather quickly. DAoC would definitely make my top 10 of the previous decade.

I’ve been tempted to try ESO but no way can I afford the time sink. Bad enough trying to make progress in single player RPGs and Ubi games.

Here’s another example: I loved Dragon Age II - no, really, I did - right up until the last third or so of the game, due to some really stupid plot choices and an ending I don’t even remember but remember hating. I finished it and definitely enjoyed the 30 hours or so it took to get up to the point where my opinion changed. Could I have quit at that point? Sure, but I had already committed so much time, I figured I would see it to the end. Also, I was hopeful that something would change my mind about where the game was headed.

I think the only time I quit a game is when it really rubs me the wrong way from the start. There are lots of games that start off with a bang and end with a whimper. Or outstay their welcome. I could think of a dozen or more JRPGs that could have been much better if they were 30 - 40% shorter. And there are games that are great except for some stupid mechanic or other (JRPGs come to mind again - as much as I adore Final Fantasy IX, the constant random battles really grate. Everything else about the game, I love).

My favourite outcome of this thread is discovering I’m not the only person in the world who loved Dragon Age II.

At last! Thought I was going to be only person to include it! :-D

Hoping to get mine in tomorrow. I’m a late person.

Be glad: I would have blamed you very strongly if he hadn’t!

So much pressure!

But seriously, OTC is such a unique game.

I don’t think it’ll make my top 10 list, but I did love it.

Here are my top 10 in no particular order:

  • Destiny

  • XCOM2

  • Divinity original sin 2

  • Offworld Trading Company

  • Dark Souls 3

  • Mount & Blade: Warband

  • Rocket league

  • Kingdom: New Lands

  • Hollow Knight

  • Zelda: breath of the wild

Can you bold the titles please?

Edit: Ninja’ed!

Not the dots, just the titles.