I stumbled upon this thread while surfing and thought it might make interesting Circuit Blog fodder. The article argues that 1984 was the greatest year in movies ever (check out the link to see the list, its quite impressive) as opposed to the apparent critics choice of 1939 (claiming both The Wizard of Oz and Gone With the Wind). Coming up with an alternative year will take some research and some time, so I’ll leave it out there until I pick my own choice, but I’ll be interested to see what the rest of Circuit Blog nation comes up with.

Keenan

10. Cranium - An amalgam of win lose or draw, charades, name that tune, and pictionary, not much strategy required, so it slides to 10, but still requires more than lucky die rolling like too many board games.
9. Connect Four - Basically advanced tic-tac-toe, and a classic
8. Checkers - While Chess’s idiot cousin, still an all time great.
7. Scrabble - For all those word people out there
6. Clue - Few games hinge so heavily on the ability to effectively use deductive logic to win
5. Balderdash - My favorite game for a long time, requires clever word smithing along with a keen sense of your opponents.
4. Stratego - great military strategy game
3. Risk - Simple, classic, although strategically, fairly predictable
2. Settlers of Catan - Its like a mix between Monopoly and Risk, with a new board every time you play
1. Chess - Simply the greatest game ever invented

Keenan

Ok, now’s your chance to look like a genius. What is your theory of the island? What is the smoke monster? Who is Jacob? What is going to happen after the bomb? How are all the loose ends going to be tied up?

*Kegen: Sorry to hijack your question Keenan, but it is such a great question that it prompts another, and that is-what are everyone’s wild guesses about next season? guesses based more on a feeling of the story than any specific evidence.

I feel like this list is long over due, and could generate some interesting debate (at least this is the kind of thing I love talking about). In order:

10. Guardian (Halo 3 - xBox 360): This is still, despite my placing it 10th, my favorite H3 map. The reason I don’t rate it higher is only because it has a tendency to snowball, which can be REALLY frustrating if you’re on the wrong end of the spree, but can be super satisfying if you’re the one on the killing frenzy. Also, the sniper tower tends to encourage camping (guilty as charged, and it isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but…), which tends to force a majority of the action to that corner of the map.
9. G5 Building (Perfect Dark - N64): I only wish they would have used a different texture on the walls so that everything didn’t look the same. Very close quarters for PD, and it was possible to be super cheap against the Sims by holding up in the dead-end hall at the top with the window, get your magnum doubled up, train your sites to head level and wait for them to pop out from the end of the hallway. Incidentally, that ended up being one of the big problems with many of the PD maps, too many dead end hallways that you could get yourself set up in.
8. Sandbox (Halo 3 - xBox 360): I know, this is a very new map (well, really 3 maps in one), but I have extremely high hopes for it, and love customization. This forgeable canvas promises to have all the flexibility and functionality that Foundry lacked.
7. Prisoner (Halo CE - xBox): I always liked this level, even though I was never all that successful at it. I liked the balance of two clear strategies, snipe and cover the over-shield or roam the bottom with rockets, AR and invisibility. The plasma rifle was also great in this level, catch a guy on one of those gangways, stick him with the gun until you ran over and punched him. I always wanted an official remake of this level for H2 & 3, but without fall damage, it probably wouldn’t play nearly as well.
6. High Ground (Halo 3 - xBox 360): It took me awhile to warm up to this map, but it plays with a great balance of long, mid, and short range combat, plus vehicles work, but it isn’t so big that 4 player games slow down. You can play a post up game, or roam, good lines of sight, but plenty of cover to allow safe travel across the map.
5. Stack (GoldenEye - N64): This map usually ranks behind the Facility and Temple, but I always thought it was a better map than either of them, there weren’t any bottle necks, the bi-level courtyards made for interesting shoot-outs. I chose the Stack above the Library mainly because the Basement wasn’t all that fun, and really made the level too big for even 4 player matches.
4. The Pit (Halo 3 - xBox 360): This map plays so balanced. Again, there is a nice mix of long, mid, and short range combat, definitely multiple strategies and playing styles can be successful which makes for more interesting and exciting games.
3. Villa (Perfect Dark - N64): The quality of multiplayer maps in this game was one of the big strikes against it, but this was a great map. Unfortunately, it was one of the very very few maps in which the Sims didn’t get too bogged down in a loop somewhere and turn into a shooting gallery. Great lighting, hill games here were super fun.
2. Chill Out (Halo CE - xBox): Small maps are my favorite, so its no surprise that this was my favorite map from CE. The remake for H3 really shows how different the game has become.
1. Complex (GoldenEye - N64): Simply the best. There aren’t any natural bottle necks in this level, it flows so well with multiple routes to anywhere on the map, all parts of the map are played. I have fond memories of shoot-outs in all of the sections. Its sad that this was also the best map on PD, for some reason, Rare wasn’t ever able to replicate the magic they created with this map. Making a forged Sandbox version of this map for H3 is priority #1 for me.

So we sort of covered some of this with our top 10 video games post, but we’ve been digging deeper into all the mediums lately so I thought this might be an interesting direction. INPO:

WinBack: Covert Operations (N64) - Still the best 3rd person stealth 4-player split screen multiplayer game ever.
Conker’s Bad Fur Day (N64) - Rare = awesome
NBA 2K3 (xBox) - The best basket ball game ever made, the controls are simple and intuitive and the character generator is robust enough to make reasonable facsimiles of all your friends. 2 v 2 street ball is about the funnest 4 player sports game ever. I still can’t believe they haven’t made this game backwards compatible with the 360 yet (actually, I just checked, and it has finally been added to the list, hooray!).
WWF No Mercy (N64) - Super fun, amazing character personalization possible, you could customize all 100+ moves your player performed in the ring, and again, great 4 player action.
Perfect Dark (N64) - actually, probably a better game than its predecessor, but the multiplayer levels weren’t quite as good and the campaign was just terrible, I hate when an FPS turns into an alien shooting gallery.
Micro Machines (NES) - great game, spent tons of time playing this game at a friends house growing up.
Clayfighter (Sega Genesis) - back when I still cared about graphics (and fighting games), this game blew my mind.
Tecmo Superbowl (NES) - still maybe the best football game ever made, and the savable season progress was revolutionary.
Base Wars (NES) - best baseball game ever made, on a close play you get to fight it out for the call.
Halo 3 (xBox 360) - Yeah, I did it, I know, I know, when a game is the highest selling game of all time, it can hardly be considered underrated, but it really is a great game, better than CE, and consistently rates below other titles on other lists published on the web, so say what you will.

-Keenan

Back at it, NPO:

Seinfeld (the most perfect comedy ever, if you disagree, then you’re wrong.)
Simpson’s
The Daily Show (w/ Jon Stewart)
News Radio
Get Smart
The Cosby Show
30 Rock
The Office (American)
Scrubs
The Red Green Show

Notable snubs:
M*A*S*H
Cheers

Time to spice things up, NPO:

Anchorman
So I Married an Axe Murderer
Office Space
Napolean Dynomite
Monty Python and the Holy Grail
Kung Fu Hustle (replacing: Dumb and Dumber)
Zoolander
Best in Show
Down with Love
Billy Madison

Notable snub: Animal House - the most over rated movie of all time, lets face it, it just isn’t funny.

We’ve done super hero characters, and comic book villains, its time to forget the personalities that make those characters great and concentrate on the powers these characters have that make them super (sorry Batman fans, being super rich doesn’t count). This can be interpreted as either the super powers you would most want to have or the most interesting powers for plot development. I tried to keep both in mind:

10. Super agility
9. Telekinesis
8. Power negation
7. Shadow manipulation
6. Invisibility
5. Invulnerability
4. Teleportation
3. Intangibility
2. Shape shifting
1. Reactive adaptation

I know we’ve been talking about doing this one for some time now, so here it is, in all its glory. It will be interesting to see how far people are willing to stretch the category. My list, saving best for last.

10. Unforgiven - Generally over-rated, but still deserving of a spot.
9. For a Few Dollars More - Sergio Leone is a genius.
8. The Wild Bunch - Introduced the “long walk” that has been emulated numerous times in other movies.
7. Once Upon a Time in the West - More Sergio Leone, just a great movie.
6. The Outlaw Josie Wales - Great dialog, I find the ending a little cheesy, but some of the exchanges with his Indian friend and the carpetbagger are just priceless.
5. Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid - Great chemistry between Newman and Redford, a lot of fun to watch.
4. Open Range - Best shootout, really great story, very watchable
3. Dances With Wolves - All around good story, though not your typical hero driven western
2. Tombstone - great characters, so many quotable lines, great story, Val Kilmer is awesome.
1. The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly - greatest movie (not just western) of all time, beautiful visuals, pioneered the freeze frame intro that has become a part of so many movies, great use of time for dramatic effect.

Notable snub - anything with John Wayne in it, he’s a joke and an embarrassment to movies.

Keenan

It was August in the train station. Outside it was December and a hundred and six degrees fahrenheit with snow up to your watch. When my train had pulled up I’d said to myself, “Don’t forget your suitcase.” I stepped out the doors. It was sunny as hell. The glare gave me a headache, but I was glad to see it.
The station was heavily peopled and stinking of honey. All the Rich Ones wear it because it’s so damn expensive, but it doesn’t cover up their stink. Surely, you’ve smelled it, makes them smell like sugar and sweat. I hate that smell. I hate how it tastes. There were three cops on the ceiling searching the crowd’s faces. Their eye scanners were registering our chips. I had broken my arm when I was a small one, and I had had to get a replacement chip, which put me on the Watch List. And sure enough there were floor cops moving towards me. They’d already spotted my chip. Damn quick. They were antsy. Of course, I had expected this. The Honorable Rulemaker’s speech is tomorrow. (more…)