The past decade will be a memorable one for gamers. From Sony’s PlayStation 2 triumphing over Sega’s Dreamcast, to Microsoft entering the market with the Xbox and, more importantly, Xbox Live. To Nintendo’s Wii getting our grans involved as casual gaming hit full stride; downloadable content and distribution changing the way we use our consoles and PCs, and World of Warcraft condeming us all to our bedrooms and the fortress of empty pizza boxes within. Thunderbolt was there through all of it. Now we’re going to look back, not just at the best games or consoles, but at our personal favourites and some of our greatest memories and experiences from the decade that was: 2000 - 2009.

Grand Theft Auto III

It was the summer of 2001. The latest issue of Official PlayStation Magazine had hit store shelves with the promise of a brand new demo disc and all the glorious contents within. Playing demos of the newest up and coming titles was always the highlight of the month for eleven-year-old me, though this month it was to be a heartbreaking experience. That ill-fated demo disc and its promise of a playable section for Harry Potter and the Philosophers Stone was to be the death of my beloved grey box. I still remember the day I picked up my PlayStation at a Woolworths that no longer exists; complete with a copy of the Three Lions football game and the joys to be had just fiddling around with a 3D render of a T-Rex and killing Abe and his Mudoken friends, over and over again. But this day was sadly the end of all that as that demo disc ripped apart the disc holder, tiny metal balls flying off in all directions, lost beneath cupboards and wardrobes and the dust therein. It would have probably been easy to fix, but I thought why bother? There’s a new model just sitting there, waiting to be bought.

It was then that I finally asked my parents for a brand new PlayStation 2. Shifting through the catalogue pages and ogling its attractive, next-gen looks and impressive library of games was agony. The wait till Christmas was even more horrendous; with a broken PlayStation and no games to play I even ventured into the dark, dingy basement just to pull out my NES and SNES and give the Mario Bros. another run-around. Eventually I made it into December, a freezing winter’s night providing me with one of my greatest gaming memories of the decade. I came home from school to find a large package sitting outside the house. Wondering to myself what it could be, I never imagined it to be my PS2 - the delivery guy would be suicidal to just leave it out here in the open - but it turns out it was. I ripped open the top to reveal that glowing blue box, the letters “PS2” shimmering out at me. I immediately set it up, fascinated by the lifelike visuals offered in Tekken Tag-Team Tournament. It was everything I ever wanted; now it was time for the games to come rolling in.

I don’t know if it was the hype generated by magazines, the fact all my friends were talking about it or the out-of-reach 18 rating, but Grand Theft Auto III was top of my most wanted list by a long shot. Christmas came around and my uncle pulled through; obviously not worried about the age rating, he must have been confident in my ability to avoid going on a murderous rampage. I still remember the first time I played it and the amazement that sprung out of the vast, open world of Liberty City. I had never played an open-world game before so this was brand new territory, and I had no idea what I was getting myself into. Sure, I had played previous GTA games at friend’s houses in the past, but this was completely new and exciting. After that opening jail break I must have spent a good 20 minutes driving around before I realised the marker on my map, telling me where I needed to go. It was so expansive and different to anything I had ever played before, and is probably one of the only games this past decade to ever emote those kinds of feelings.

Once Christmas was over I headed back to school and GTAIII was all the talk of my inner circles. It’s here that some of my greatest memories come to fruition, and why GTAIII will forever be one of my favourite games of the past decade. Despite the lack of any multiplayer features, playing it with friends was as fun an experience as you could muster. Whether it was just driving around, causing havoc; attempting to cross the closed-off bridges to the other islands, or even trying and failing to fly the impossible, almost-wingless Dodo aircraft, it was always vastly more enjoyable than any split-screen game out there. We’d even invent some of our own competitive games, such as heading to a particular part of the city, notching up a 5 star wanted level and seeing how long you could survive. The possibilities were endless; even finding hidden parts of the city or just laughing at the pedestrian that would yell “in the navy!” whenever you walked past. Grand Theft Auto III might not be the best game of the noughties, but the freedom to express yourself and venture from any kind of narrative and just go crazy with it is the reason I remember it so fondly.

Richard Wakeling

BioShock

Atmosphere. It’s an underrated part of games, and one that can truly propel a title to new heights. Interestingly, it’s a quality most recognised in games of the horror or thriller genre. Dead Space had it in spades, and so did F.E.A.R., Condemned: Criminal Origins, Silent Hill 3 and Project Zero. A game needs atmosphere to be scary, but it also needs it to create a sense of place; that feeling that the world you are walking in exists, that every little detail is real and alive - from the sound of footsteps in the room above to the slight flickering of a candle about to blow out. BioShock not only had an unparalleled sense of atmosphere, but an intriguing world and an intensely intelligent narrative. It had it all.

The opening to BioShock is so impressively realised you can’t imagine the developers being able to continue with the quality, but they do, somehow. Each ‘level’ brings with it a wealth of personality and intrigue, and a new story to learn about.

It is difficult to work out what made BioShock so special and fresh, aside from the obvious in the kind of location you would previously only dream about, in Rapture. Was it the hulking presence of the Big Daddies that impressed you? Perhaps it was the finer details, like the delicately beautiful dancing splicers in Cohen’s apartment, the psychotic dentist’s room, or the lady singing to her revolver. Maybe it was the finely crafted architecture of Rapture that piqued your interest, or the philosophical questions that lied behind its marvelous structure.

When you think hard about it, however, the answer becomes easy - BioShock’s greatest feat was its bold decision to be something different in a risky time. It told a story like no other, and played a game like one, too.

Oliver Banham

Shinobi

Back in 2002 a little franchise by the name of Shinobi was resurrected for the PlayStation 2. Baring little resemblance to the side-scrolling 16-bit adventures of Joe Musashi, new Shinobi was a game designed to punish the player with its waves of endless enemies, near infinite amount of bottomless pits and total lack of check-points. It was in many ways as old school as a 3D action game could ever be, and yet, fans of the series complained it differed too heavily from the past. Well I got some news for you, Shinobi didn’t like you, in fact it hated you, and it hated me as well but I’m a fan of tough love.

Hidden beneath Hotsuma’s tale of deception, betrayal and revenge is one of the best action games of the last decade. While other 3D ninja series highlighted stealth or over-the-top action, Shinobi relied solely on speed and deadly efficiency. Slow down and you’re dead, it’s that simple. At the same time it incorporated the most devilish ninja platforming seen in a game since the original Ninja Gaiden trilogy, and ingeniously, the platforming often required mid-air combat to progress. Coupled with its hip retro inspired tunes, level numbers that were subdivided by dashes and its genuinely clever designed boss battles, it was exactly what a 3D Shinobi title should have been.

Sean Kelley

Persona 3

Persona and Shin Megami Tensei have been around for more than a decade, but it was 2006’s third installment that propelled the series to a more international popularity. Featuring a cast of troubled teens and a host of enemies that look like they were ripped out of the Bauhaus circa 1930, Persona 3 was an alternative to the typical JRPG fare that most people were getting from Final Fantasy and the like.

Oh, sure, the premise was still similar: a bunch of angsty teens team up to save the world. But where Persona 3 shined was the presentation of this classic setup. The atmosphere manages to make a 70-hour game feel intense, thanks to the foreboding darkness that is hinted at in the earlier sections of the game but doesn’t truly spring forth until the third act. The crushing sense of despair eats away at the sugary facade offered in the initial parts of the adventure; and by the end, it’s almost impossible to find breathing room. The game’s ending is bittersweet at best; and much like more mainstream games like Mass Effect, it’s hard to not get attached to the characters you guide through their perilous adventure, thanks in no small part to the amount of content there is to find in day-to-day conversations with your party. Building relationships with people is a necessity in Persona 3, and the Social Link system managed to provide an interesting outlet for that: away from the action entirely.

It’s also worth mentioning Persona 3’s presentation. The juxtaposition of the crushing weight of the main story juxtaposed with the sometimes-inane teenage chatter starts off as confusing, but ends up as heartbreaking. The music is a strange brew of electronica and hip-hop, and the urban environments cement the feeling that Persona 3 is still an RPG for the modern age.

Bart Robson

Wii Sports

Say you what you want about Nintendo’s apparent treason against the ‘hardcore’ demographic and their attempt to branch out to a new market. Wii Sports is arguably the most significant, important and defining game of the last decade - unquestionably of the current generation at least.

It succeeds in bringing all types of people around the television (not quite as picturesque as the adverts would have you believe, mind), and the almost non-existent learning curve is the epitome of everything Nintendo is striving for in the Wii. Christmas 2006 at my household was dominated by doubles in tennis and boxing that at times look set to spill over into the living room. I can’t think of another game that has had me working double-hard to claim my place at the top of the leaderboard in bowling; a record held by, and I never thought I’d say this, my own mother. It took a perfect 300 game to accomplish that - a feat I hold up as one of my proudest in videogames this decade.

And it didn’t cost a penny.

Craig Nye

Resident Evil 4

When discussing a particular game in retrospect with others, you tend to refer to certain moments by names made up by yourself. This is true of Resident Evil 4, as its experience is a megaton-clusterbomb of memorable moments, with each as enjoyable and entertaining as the last.

From your first foray into ‘The Village’, where you discover that the villagers are not at all friendly, to ‘The Shack’, where the Ganados onslaught overwhelms. You have your first battle with ‘El Gigante’, the first meeting with ‘Chainsaw Man’, ‘The Chainsaw Sisters’ and the eery ‘Regenerators’, not forgetting the pant-wetting ‘Oven Man’. When the game isn’t throwing a barrage of expertly designed enemies at you, however, it’s casting you into a world of variety in location.

From mine carts to Egyptian ruins, cultist churches to towering castles - you ended up in the strangest of places, but never for one second did the adventure not feel cohesive. Every place, every enemy and every scenario felt right, and each was designed perfectly. Everyone remembers Resident Evil 4 for different things, and one thing everyone can agree on is that it delivered an expertly paced, exhilarating adventure that never once slipped up.

Oliver Banham

Sly 2: Band of Thieves

While many gamers were caught up with the Precursors or unraveling the intergalactic mysteries of the Lombax, a lone platformer snuck his way into many a PlayStation 2. However it wasn’t until the raccoon’s sophomore outing that Sucker Punch finally perfected the 3D platforming blueprint laid forth by Super Mario 64.

Dumping the goal based levels of The Thievius Raccoonus, Sly 2 welcomed in the large open ended levels of the new platforming era. What set Sly, Murray and Bentley’s approach to these levels apart from the crowd was that their missions were given relevant context to the story. Each and every mission for the trio served the greater purpose of laying the groundwork for the massive, satisfying and often hilarious heists the series would be known for. Missions were always kept varied thanks to the dozens of mission types, different play styles of each character and the ability to play stealthily.

Although the Sly Cooper series isn’t a total unknown, it still remains the odd man out when viewed alongside the work of Naughty Dog and Insomniac. Sly 2 is easily the apex of Sucker Punch’s overlooked franchise and the best platformer found on the PlayStation 2. Sly’s been hiding out for a long time, and it’s time that you noticed him.

Sean Kelley

The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion

I’m almost embarrassed to admit this. Where Oblivion isn’t flawed in design it is technically duff. Where there isn’t cheesy voice acting there’s wonky AI. Where there isn’t a rubbish questline to plough through there’s - hold on a second. There’s crap combat, yes; awful sections through Oblivion Gates, of course; a stupidly hard foe, par for the course. Every single one of its pretty egregious flaws, however, is undermined wholesale by the realm of Orcs and Elves that Todd Howard and his team crafted. In many ways, this is an atrocious game, one that breaks all the rules of good design in nearly every area. In one, crucial, vital, magnificent way, however, it is the greatest game of the decade, maybe even the ever. Oblivion got its hooks in me like no other piece of software since Ocarina of Time had managed, and that was thanks to my complete and utter investment in the world. It did its best to remind me I was playing a broken piece of shit on an uncomfortably regular basis, but did I care? Of course not. Is Morrowind the superior Elder Scrolls title? Most likely. Oblivion, though, is the best The Lord of The Rings simulator of all time, and guess which one of those I value more? Tamriel is a world that demands your utter dedication for ostensibly little return, but what lies beneath is the deepest, most fascinating and most free gaming experience of the last ten years. It’s escapism of the highest order, so strap on your Mithril Greaves and unsheathe that Daedric War Axe, adventurer, it’s time to save the world.

Fraser McMillan

Ninja Gaiden

Say what you will about Tomonobu Itagaki’s overzealous love for massive breasts and polka dot bikins – the man certainly knew how to put together a razor-sharp, hardcore action game. Team Ninja’s bold re-imagining of Tecmo’s classic NES title was the perfect blend of fighting game mechanics, blood-soaked action and ego-crushing difficulty. Many set down the controller after being obliterated repeatedly by stage two’s Samurai Horseman boss, but those who persevered found themselves wielding one of the most blisteringly-fast and devastating protagonists in video game history. A shaky plot and confusing narrative could do nothing to bring down Ninja Gaiden from its lofty place as one of the best action titles of the last decade. Kratos, eat your heart out.

Josh Kramer

Rock Band 2

Forget Wii Play, Singstar and Dance Dance Revolution, because Rock Band 2 is the definitive party game, and arguably the definitive multiplayer experience. While the initial investment may seem a little steep, it only takes one song to realise your purchase never should have been doubted. Played solo, Rock Band 2 is fantastic, with three others it’s magical.

Emulating the feeling of being in a rock band has been with us since the original Guitar Hero, but never has it felt so refined or authentic. With an extensive and varied tracklist, a drum trainer, new challenge mode and a more appealing world tour, Rock Band 2 simply perfected the original game. The new online ‘battle of the bands’ mode gave gamers even more reason to go back to it, as well as new downloadable content added weekly.

The Rock Band Store has grown considerably since its inception, being home to over eight hundred songs and counting. With albums from such acclaimed artists as Rush, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Foo Fighters, The Who and Megadeth, the store definitely has the support of the music industry, and can be considered a serious marketing device and record seller. And with the Rock Band Network now in beta testing, even more artists will be able to use Rock Band as a platform to release music, and get people interested in their songs.

When all these new and exciting ideas are being talked about, it’s easy to forget the real reason why the Rock Band formula is so successful. Quite simply, it transcends fun. The feeling of nailing a solo on guitar, or not missing a note on an opening drum fill is something unmatched in the current gaming landscape. It’s that feeling of competence, that feeling of simulation and feedback that makes Rock Band 2 such a pleasurable experience, and when it can be shared with others, then you have something truly special. It’s what video games are all about, and hopefully what they will still be about further down the line.

Oliver Banham

Power Stone 2

In the summer of 2000 Capcom unleashed arguably the best party fighter to date, Power Stone 2. Incorporating almost everything the also brilliant original had to offer, Power Stone 2 was bigger and better in almost every way imaginable. More characters, more items, more stages and more players.

Realizing that Power Stone would never match the same level of depth as a Street Fighter title, Capcom decided to open the series up and go bigger. With four players vying for up to six stones at once, stages had to be scaled up significantly over the intimate interiors that populated the original. Not content with just bigger, most of the new stages weren’t only interactive but dynamic and constantly changing. Fights took place while running from giant boulders, jumping between dueling submarines in the arctic or even during mid free fall. The game always kept players on their toes with something unexpected, whether it be a drivable tank introduced or a meaty health recovery item, such as the delicious Wedding Cake, something was always bound to happen that could quickly alter the course of battle.

Even with all the nonsense that populates Power Stone 2, to say there was no depth or strategy would be downright wrong. Knowing which characters could take advantage of a certain stage was important, as well as knowing precisely when to throw the last vase in your immediate vicinity. Sometimes it’d even be wise to sacrifice half your health and resurrect a fallen enemy or jump off the screen and eat the damage, just to avoid another enemy’s overdrive attack that you were unlikely to dodge. But that’s what made it so good, it made you do stupid things and take huge risks, made you aware of your environment and your enemy, always thinking and always adapting.

Sean Kelley

Far Cry 2

Were there any justice in the world, Far Cry 2 would be my favourite game of the decade. It’d be yours as well, in fact, and everyone else’s. We don’t live in a perfect world, though, and that’s why it isn’t number one in every single retrospective list compiled in the last couple of months. So, not my favourite. It is, however, the best game of the decade, and it’s my job to tell you why you’re so horribly wrong about Clint Hocking’s opus.

Far Cry 2 is flawed. Dreadfully, fundamentally flawed. These negatives aren’t anchored, as many seem to think, in poor design decisions. They’re of a different nature to the issues plaguing other games; not resulting from laziness or ineptitude, but the product of exactly what makes Far Cry 2 the masterpiece that it so resoundingly is. That “Citizen Kane moment” whereupon a medium’s language is discovered near fully-formed? Far Cry 2 was ours, and it slipped by almost unnoticed.

Providing emotional engagement and emergent action through mechanics - which proved incredibly difficult with a genre as well-trodden and conducive to glorification of war as the FPS - is what Far Cry 2 excels at. Desperately hammering the heal key when a buddy hits the floor in a firefight, accidentally driving into a ravine when concentrating on the map, making an action-hero style escape over rooftops with bullets whizzing inches past, unintentionally shooting an antelope with your over-sensitive twitch instincts, gazing out over a lake at sunrise, sniping the cargo’s driver from hundreds of feet away before charging in with a rocket launcher and searching for the glint of AKs during a midnight raid.

None of these were hard-coded into the game. These are all things that I have experienced during my time with Far Cry 2 because it allowed me to do so through interaction, immersion in the world and strict systemisation over scripting. I can express myself in its fascinating world, which is also a phenomenal achievement. Groans about the frequency of enemy encounters are legitimate to an extent, but the caps-popped throughout are far less frequent than any normal action game.

Without the player’s input, Far Cry 2 is nothing. It’s expressly not a rollercoaster, and can be hard going at times; the reward for perseverance, though, is incredible. Never before have I shot an injured, escaping man in the head and instantly paused in disgust, looking down at my own hands and feeling physically sick, pondering the motives for my actions and their consequences. The butterfly effect is in full force in this title, but there aren’t a set of ready-made eventualities laid out before us. The narrative the player creates in Far Cry 2 is many times more interesting and worthwhile than any linear narrative can be. It’s not only a revolution of the action genre, but a full scale realisation of the potential of the video game form. It’s not perfect, nothing this brilliant ever is, but watching a work of such scope’s dismissal in the face of bog-standard AAA fodder is not so much disheartening as it is painful. Why it isn’t more lauded I can’t really be sure, but I fear for the future of the medium if someone doesn’t try to iterate on its original formula.

Fraser McMillan