Video games are a large part of our culture nowadays ranging from Mario Kart to DOOM, Sonic to God of War, and Spyro to Halo, but out of every single game ever made, which is the best created? Well, there are so many different genres and gameplay styles that it feels almost impossible to decide which game is the best ever made.
Determining which games are the best is difficult, so let’s get a mix of opinion’s from both critics and fans. Websites like Metacritic and IGN are used by critics to rate video games, movies, and tv shows. And Game Of The Year Winners will show what the fans enjoy as it’s a live event held every year where the fans can vote for which game they think is the best that released that year
So let’s look at some of the genres and some of the best games in those genres. Let’s start with the platformer genre, and looking at websites such as Metacritic and IGN along with Game of The Year winners show that the best platforming games are
- Super Mario Galaxy with a 97 on Metacritic and a 9.7/10 on IGN,
- Super Mario Galaxy 2 with a 97 and 10/10,
- Super Mario Odyssey with a 97 and a 10/10, and
- Astro Bot with a 94 on Metacritic, and 9/10 on IGN along with winning Game of The Year in 2024.
Next let’s look at the Shooter genre, on Metacritic the top 5 shooters are
- Perfect Dark
- Metroid Prime
- Halo combat evolved
- Half-life 2 and
- Bioshock
And when looking at IGN the top are
- Halo: Combat Evolved,
- Quake, and
- Goldeneye 007
- System Shock 2
- Overwatch, which won Game of The Year in 2016.
Now let’s look at the Open world or Action Adventure games, on Metacritic the top 5 are
- The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time,
- Grand Theft Auto IV,
- The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild
- Red Dead Redemption 2
- Grand Theft Auto V,
and on IGN the top picks are
- God of War (2018)
- The Last of Us Part II
- Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End
the genre has several Game of the Year Winners such as
- The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (2017),
- God of War (2018),
- Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice (2019),
- The Last of us Part II (2020) I
- It Takes Two (2021).
Let’s move onto the fighting games on Metacritic. The top 5 are
- Super Smash Bros Brawl,
- Street Fighter IV,
- Super Smash Bros Ultimate,
- Super Smash Bros Melee, and
- Street Fighter 6.
On IGN the top 5 are
- Street Fighter III: 3rd Strike,
- Guilty Gear Strive,
- Tekken 7,
- Dragon Ball FighterZ, and
- The King of Fighters XIII.
And unfortunately, none have won Game of The Year as of yet.
And lastly, the racing games. On Metacritic the top 5 are
- Gran Turismo,
- Gran Turismo 3: A-spec,
- Gran Turismo 2,
- Forza Horizon 4, and
- Forza Motorsport.
On IGN the top choices are
- Burnout 3: Takedown,
- Gran Turismo 3: A-spec and
- Forza Horizon 3. As of now, none have won Game of The year.
So which is the best? Well There are 3 options.
- Astro Bot, nearly perfect scores on both Metacritic and IGN along with winning Game of The Year in 2024.
- The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild was rated very highly by Metacritic and IGN, it also won Game of The Year in 2017.
- God of War (2018) being in the top 10 of both Metacritic and IGN for best Action-Adventure game, being number 6 and 2 respectively, it also won Game of The Year in 2018.
But which is the best? Well that’s up to you! It can be one of the 3 above, it could be one not even mentioned in the article. It depends on you, the player! What you like could be totally different than what someone else might view as the best game.