My Top 10 Video Games (and why)

Everyone loves a good top 10 list right? Well I'm not an exception to that rule. So I figured I'd finally sit down and write out a top 10 list for video games. Let me say though, before I get started, that this was a lot harder than I figured it would be. Naming them off to my friends is always easy, it's whatever I like the most at the time. For this list though I tried to come up with good reasons why, and that makes this harder to do. Now I know why other blogger's / site's lists didn't always make the most sense to me.

Obviously this is my opinion, and as such based on my experience. My experience is primarily as a PC and Xbox gamer. I have played plenty of games on the PS2, N64, and Gamecube, but it's been about 10 years since I've done so. After I got my first Xbox I never looked back on the other consoles. Love me or hate me for it, that's where this list comes from. I also had to have reasons for where things came on the list other than just "I thought this was fun" unless it was really really really really fun. So games that I may have put higher on the list simply for enjoyment didn't make it otherwise. I may do a "games I like the most list" but this is more of a combination of like+innovation+impact on the gaming world. So anyway, here we go!

Number 10

Call of Duty 4 Modern Warfare: The CoD franchise has basically become the biggest gamer joke there is. People buy the exact same game over and over again with just slightly better graphics. However, it wasn't always this way. Modern Warfare took Call of Duty out of WWII and brought it up to the modern age. Interesting and relevant events happened in it pertaining to terrorism, nuclear war, and really questioned what it meant to be an American Soldier. Plus it had one of the best multiplayer systems of any game that had existed to that point. With great maps, game types, and customization. While all of this stuff is standard now, and wasn't exactly new then, Modern Warfare really upped the anti of it all.



Number 9


Forza 4: Racing Games in general are either really silly like Mario Kart or super serious like Gran Turismo. Forza is mostly serious with a hint of silly, giving it broader appeal than either extreme. Plus the serious stuff is really good. Real racing drives have said Forza has the most realistic car feels of any game compared to real life, making it the best Racing Sim there is. However, the huge variety of customization options, and game modes like tag and bowling, make this game fun and easy enough for non sim players to enjoy too. Forza 4 Got this spot over the more recent Forza 5 because it has so many more cars and tracks, that Forza 5 actually felt like a step backwards.



Number 8

Final Fantasy 8: I will probably be crucified for this, but I think FF 8 was the best game in the Final Fantasy Series. Even better than FF 7. While 7 was good, 8 had a better story, better battle mechanics, a bigger more open world, better characters, and Squall was a much better more in depth protagonist that Cloud was. FF8 gets the spot over FF7 because it was the peak of the series so far. With the best implementation of the best features of all the Final Fantasy's.



Number 7

Rock Band / Guitar Hero: This is another choice that I'm afraid will get me a lot of flak, but think about it. These two series' of games inspired a lot of people I know personally to get into music. They learned some of the basics about guitars and got good practice at finger spacing playing these games. On top of that they led ultimately to the rise of Rocksmith. A video game that teaches you how to play Guitar. So while these games were honestly huge cash in's on a short lived fad, they ultimately did some real good in the world by helping kids and adults alike become interested in making music. Then providing the starting point for those same people to learn how to make that music. It's at number 7 because honestly the games weren't that great, and after you mastered Through the Fire and Flames on Expert (I did) there wasn't much left to them.



Number 6

Halo Franchise: Coming in just out of the top five is the Halo Franchise. Without doubt the first Halo game is what put the Xbox on the map back in 2001 with its vast in depth story, inventive gameplay mechanics, and then cutting edge graphics. The series evolved over the years to become one the biggest franchises in gaming, turning out record sales numbers and evolving into its own subculture. It has its own successful books, comics, live action movie, anime, and spawned the extremely popular Red Vs. Blue series. However, recent changes to make the game more like a mix of CoD and Battlefield combined with the ever shortening campaign has left a bitter taste in my mouth that's just enough to keep it at 6th place.



Number 5

Minecraft: What can I really say about this Juggernaut? Minecraft practically rewrote the rule book for crafting games, open world games, and it wrote the rule book for early acces / beta release. It has taken the world by storm with about 15 million copies sold (when this is being written) if you combine pocket edition and the console versions with the original game. It's fun and simple gameplay mechanics have turned playing with digital blocks into an artform where people's only limitations are their imagination. It however only hits the fifth spot because despite all of this, it doesn't offer anything else. It's a great game to play when you are bored and just want to mess around a bit, but not having a story or any sort of characters relegates its primary use to those players with good imaginations. Which sadly a lot of people don't have.



Number 4

The Walking Dead Season 1: Some people may be reading this going "That's a TV show, not a game". But it is a game too. It's an original story based in the same universe as the comics, but people who are only fans of the show can enjoy it too. This game is on my list because of how engaging the story it. I got so sucked into this 10 hour adventure that I actually cried at how the game ended. Make fun of me if you want, but this is what game design is supposed to be like. A medium that is both entertaining and engaging, and this game nails it. The only reason it isn't higher on the list, is that after you finish it once, that's about it. You can replay it, but all the shocking story twists are gone and it's hard to get as attached again.



Number 3

Eve Online: This is actually a fairly recent addition to my gaming collection, but it is a powerful game all the same. At 11 years old this year, it is 10th Oldest still running MMO in existence and it has evolved over the years to keep up with technology and what gaming culture wants. This game has the steepest learning curve I've ever seen in a game, but has the most reward. Players literally control everything in the game. All items are manufactured by players, and the economy stabilizes itself based on player action. Players create in game corporations that can be toppled by espionage as well as war. Players can build space stations, moon bases, and colonize planets. Thousand+ player battles happen in open areas of space resulting in hundreds of thousands of real world dollars lost (I'll explain this in a future post where I am going to really talk about this game). There is so much depth that anyone can find a number of things to do for a very long time.



Number 2

The Elder Scrolls IV Oblivion: I think everyone who plays games has to have an Elder Scrolls on their top 10 list. For Good reason too, the whole series is full of epic story telling, deep and interesting characters, and really complex meaningful gameplay. Oblivion however stands as the best of the series. While I've extensively played them all (even the old PC games) I've easly put triple the amount of time into Oblivion. It makes the list at 2 because of how perfect the game really is. It is the perfect balance of serious with casual. It has the perfect amount of depth to play it for 1000+ hours (like I did) but is accessible enough to play it just to beat the story. Morrowind was to serious, Skyrim to Casual, and as such that makes Oblivion the best and second on my list.

Number 1

Mass Effect Trilogy: Ever since the first released back in 2007 I've loved this series more than all the rest combined. A great story, great writing, wonderful voice acting, solid combat, and decision making that actually mattered made this game series my favorite. It changed throughout each game in the series with things being refined or altered to set a better pace for the game, but it never lost what made it so great. What makes this game #1 is the decision making aspect of the game, that went beyond good and evil choices. Throughout the games you literally decided the fate of races and worlds as you prepared for the final enemy in the last game. People were going to die, you just had to choose which ones to save. All of those decisions mattered too. Certain alien races or characters really helped you out in the end, and if they were dead then you felt it. Missing ships, soldiers, equipment, and/or characters that you really cared about affected you and the game world as a whole. The ending only went a few different ways, but how you got there was a sprawling journey with hundreds of different paths. If you've never played this series before, then you should give it a shot. Out of all my 360 games, this was the only series I kept when I upgraded to the Xbox One. I gutted the rest of my collection and either sold them, or put them in my display case. This series though still proudly sits on my gaming shelf ready to be replayed this year at least one more time for nostalgia sake before it too gets a shelf of its own.

Conclusion

So that's my list. If you were just curious, thanks for coming and feel free to comment about the choices I made or what you think should have been in there. If you are about to crucify me in those comments, then hold on and keep reading.

Let me nip (hopefully) some problems in the bud before things get out of hand here by answering what I feel are going to be the most common ones.

Why didn't you put a Mario or Zelda game on this list? - Well, as I said at the beginning I primarily play Xbox and PC games. I do that because Mario and Zelda don't cut it for me. Sure some of them are good, but they are basically the same game rehashed over and over and over and over again. There are a few gems, and obviously they get brownie points for being the original game series', but the overall state of their respective series is telling the same story over again with different graphics. I don't have anything against them, but I'd rather spend my money elsewhere.

Why isn't the Half Life Series here? - See the above comment. I liked Half Life 1 and 2. They were solid games, that had a lot of good stuff in them. I just never saw them like everyone else did. Maybe I missed the point of them, or just didn't understand how amazing they were supposed to be. They just didn't do if for me like other games did. Part of that is probably because I've always been more of a simulation and RPG fan, and that shows in my list.

But, FF7 is much better because...... - If you are just going to rage at me, I don't care. If you want to debate me, that's fine but I probably won't change my mind. I have played both. I own both for PS1. That's one of the only reasons I've kept my PS2 all these years. I like both of them a lot, but when it comes down to it 8 is the better game in my opinion. You can have your opinion too, that's fine.

Why isn't X on the list? - Maybe I didn't play it. Maybe I didn't think it was fun enough. Maybe it didn't have any other qualities other than just being fun. Feel free to ask, but one of these three answers is probably it. I will gladly respond with reasons why if I considered it, but odds are these are going to be the top answers.

Seriously, Guitar Hero? - Just don't, I defended this position fairly well.

Why so many new games? - Well like any other medium games change over time. While it is still pertinent to occasionally point to games from the past, like all other things we have to move on. Eventually the relevance of a game becomes non existent because culture moves on and people get older. Games from 15-ish years ago are losing their relevancy, but in the case of Final Fantasy, that series still continues today. That one particular item is still relevant to today's culture because of the rest of the series.

How my blog is evolving + future posts.

Hello internet. As I write more and more posts I've noticed a trend in my blog that while not unexpected, I figured would take a lot longer to show up. I almost exclusively climb up on my soapbox or teach you guys about something. While I knew that would happen, I figured I'd do a lot more fun posts as well. To that end I'm working on a few other posts that are more fun to me than Religion, Racism, or Babies. I'll tell you about them in a minute.

I'm pretty surprised how many visitors I get. It's not thousands, but most of my posts have about 20 unique views with a couple of them having about 100. Thanks to everyone who reads this! I was hoping that one day people other than me would read it, but I never expected so many people almost immediately. I'd love to hear more from you in the comments section too.

I'm working on some great future posts that are a bit more fun this time. Some of them are still educational and/or Soap-Boxy, but they are more fun for me to do because they are about things I personally enjoy. So, in no particular order, here are the next few post titles.

1. Are We Alone?
2. Entertainment: Getting the most bang for your buck
3. Top 10 Movies (and why)
4. Top 10 Games (and why)
5. Sexism in Video Games
6. My big Questions

All of these have had some amount of work done on them, but I never know how long it will take me to write a topic. These aren't really coming in any order, except when I finish them. I'll probably try to break up the more serious topics with the more fun ones, but in all you'll just have to check back every week to see what pops up. 

That's also another thing. I'm going to try to start posting on a schedule. Not because I have to, but because I like writing these, and a schedule helps me keep up with it. I have a schedule for the my gaming site and for my new journalism job, and if I don't schedule this soon It will get lost and forgotten. So, Every Saturday is now guaranteed blog post day. While I may still get the urge or time to post on other days, unless there is an emergency I'll be putting up a new post on Saturday evenings. Probably around 6pm Eastern Time. So, I hope you enjoy! 

How not to debate an Atheist.

Given the recent debate between Bill Nye the Science Guy (that never gets old :) ) and Ken Ham (the founder of the Creation Museum) I've been doing some thinking. First of all, it's an excellent debate, no matter what side of the argument you are on. Both men are well known experts in their respective fields, and both made some excellent points which should inspire you to thought. I will say though, that Ken asked some very poor questions that are easily refuted. To that end I have decided to come up with a list of 10 arguments to never use when debating an atheist or agnostic person on their belief in God. These are the 10 most common arguments that I found, and are all easily refuted. Please note these are by no means ranked in any particular order, just the order I decided to write them.

1. Carbon Dating is unreliable, so there is no way to prove that the earth is 4 billion years old.

This is partially true. Carbon dating is only accurate up to about 60 thousand years. Beyond that it becomes unreliable. However, there is an accurate method that has been tested and re-tested for years to prove it's accuracy. Radiometric, or radioactive, Dating is a method where they measure the radioactivity of materials that they know are old. It is complex science, but in a nutshell we know how radioactive materials like uranium are. We also know how much radioactivity they lose over time, and so based on how much radiation is present in a sample we can determine how old it is based on how long it would have taken for it to lose that much radioactivity. Debate all you want of the validity of these methods based on biblical accounts and a biblical worldview, but they have been proven to be accurate and that fact cannot be argued against scientifically.

2. Atheism is clearly a religion too.

Atheism is clearly a religion in the same way that not smoking is a habit, or that sleeping is a medical condition. It is true that Atheists are a group of people who have similar worldviews, but that no more makes them a religion than it does to say that cat people and dog people each get their own religion because they have similar feelings about their respective animal.

3. Scientist X or Y believes in God!

While some scientists do believe in God, an overwhelming majority of them don't. In 2009, the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press polled members of the American Association for the Advancement of Science on belief in a higher power. 51% believed that their could be a higher order to things, but when specifically asked about the existence of any sort of God, only 5.5% said they believed in God's existence. That means that if you point to a scientist who believes in God, then you cherry pick one of the few who do, and you will be picked apart because of the 94.5% of scientists that do not believe in God.

4. The United States was founded as a Christian Nation!

While the US is primarily Christian now, we were not founded as a Christian Nation. Here is why.

• The Declaration of Independence does mention God, but because that simply separated us from England it is not a basis for saying that we founded a Christian Nation. 
• The constitution is a secular document written ,among other things, to protect the freedom of ALL religions and beliefs. 
• The Treaty of Tripoli (Treaty of Peace and Friendship between the United States of America and the Bey and Subjects of Tripoli of Barbary) was the first treaty concluded between the United States of America and Tripolitania, signed at Tripoli on November 4, 1796. It specifically states the following: 
• As the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion,—as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion, or tranquility, of Mussulmen [Muslims],—and as the said States never entered into any war or act of hostility against any Mahometan [Mohammedan] nation, it is declared by the parties that no pretext arising from religious opinions shall ever produce an interruption of the harmony existing between the two countries.
• In God we trust didn't appear on coins until 1864, and it didn't appear on paper money until 1957. It also wasn't adopted as the US Motto until 1956.
• Finally, Under God, was added to the pledge of Allegiance in 1954.

So, arguably we are a Christian Nation now, but we were not founded as one. There is other evidence as well, but these are the biggest reasons that Christians base their reasoning on.

5. The human body is too complex to have not been created.

This is an argument that does sound fairly concrete, but it isn't. While humans are the highest order in the food chain, we don't have the most complex bodies. Only the most complex brains. Primates have bodies that are almost the same as ours, and can be trained to do the exact same thing that people can. Cows have more complex digestive systems, and almost every other creature on the planet produces its own vitamin C. We have to ingest ours. Insects have complex detection systems on their antennae that are more sensitive than our eyes, bats and certain fish have sonar vision, and butterflies have more complex eyes that can see more colors than human eyes. While all of these things are amazing, and could be used to craft and argument, simply stating that because we are so complex there must be a God will not win a debate. We aren't as complex as you may believe.

6. But, The 2nd Law of Thermodynamics says...

First of all, if you've used this argument, let me ask you a question. What are the other 3 laws of thermodynamics? If you can name them without looking them up, then you probably understand why this argument is invalid. If you can't you don't understand thermodynamics enough to even make this case, and shouldn't argue with it anyway.

The 2nd Law of Thermodynamics states: that the entropy of an isolated system never decreases, because isolated systems spontaneously evolve toward thermodynamic equilibrium—the state of maximum entropy.

Christians often use this argument to say that we could not have evolved, because we would have hit our maximum potential sooner and not became humans, or would have used up all of our energy and ceased to exist. However, as I have highlighted above in Bold Italics, this only applies to an isolated, or closed, system. The earth is not a closed system. It's system extends to space, our solar system, our galaxy, and the universe. Even if the universe has a finite size, which we don't know yet, the amount of energy required to phase us out of existence or to stop all development is unfathomable. Therefore this argument is invalid.

7. If we evolved from monkeys why are there still monkeys?

Assume that some monkey's evolved into humans as part of their evolutionary path. What about the rest of them that did not? They didn't die off, but simply evolved into other types of monkeys. Making this statement is similar to saying, America was Colonized by Europe, so why does Europe still exist? Not all Europeans came to America, so they stayed European. Therefore Europe still exists.

8. Science changes all the time, so it can't be trusted.

There are two parts to this answer. First, this is actually the fact that makes science so trustworthy. Most scientists and all scientific principles are called theories. Even ones which are commonly referred to as laws. This is because people understand that any scientific principle at any point could be dis-proven, refined, or altered to suit a new understanding of something. By making scientific theory this way it means we can trust that they won't pretend to know it all, and will in fact be open to finding new evidence to lead us to truth.

The second part is this. Have you ever gotten medicine for a cold? Have you ever gotten shots, driven a car, used a phone or computer, eaten at a restaurant, used sunscreen, put on make up, flown in a plane, drank a soda, or used a microwave? Of course you have. Maybe not all of them, but the list is truthfully much longer than that. Almost everything that we have or use is based in science. Even the Bible you read was created using a machine that science allowed to be developed. You trust that these items will do what they are supposed to, and therefore you trust science every day.

9. Hitler was an Atheist!

We don't know if Hitler died and Atheist or not. There are good sources on both sides of the argument, and honestly we can't know what he truly believed anyway. We do know however that in Mien Kampf Hitler states that he was raised Catholic and believes that the Aryan Race was created and Destined to be the perfect race. Meaning that at least at one point in his life Hitler was actually a Christian.

10. You just like sinning so much that you don't believe in God.

If you get to this point in a debate then you have badly lost, and are just angry. That statement is paper thin stereotype against all non religious people, that isn't true. While there may be some Atheists where this is the case, it nowhere represents all of them. That would be the same thing as an Atheist saying "You're just a christian because you like sinning and are afraid to face the consequences in the afterlife." It isn't true in most cases, and is very offensive.

Bonus* Personal Experience with God. 

Personal experiences are practically impossible to both prove and disprove. They are powerful tools however for both witnessing and debating. You can't rely on them though to change someones mind or win an argument. Consider this. If someone has had a personal experience where they were abducted by aliens, would you believe them when they told you about it? What if someone is schizophrenic, and have the personal experience of hearing voices or seeing things. Does that make those things real?

You may say those are ridiculous and extreme arguments, but look at it from the perspective of the Atheist. They don't believe in a God, so your experience with God will be placed in the same realm as the alien abduction story. It may even make you seem schizophrenic, because you see, hear, or feel things that, to the Atheist, do not exist. Your personal experiences are yours, and have the most meaning to you. That can be used with those who are willing to believe, or if you are credible in some way (scientist, doctor, ect) but in no way are they able to win someone over on their own. The more you play up your personal experience, the weaker your argument becomes.

Conclustion

To be honest I considered not posting this. I know I will catch flak either from Hardcore Conservatives or young earth creationists, or both. But the point of this post is not to convince a Christian that he/she is wrong (I know that if you don't believe in science or historical fact that I won't convince you of that in this blog post), but rather to teach you how to avoid some simple errors in debating an Atheist or Agnostic person. Odds are they know this stuff, and making arguments that are wrong are easily refuted only makes you and Christians look bad. Above all remember to be respectful to those you debate with. Getting angry, frustrated, or coming off as condescending will cause to lose the debate every time, because you lose the respect and attention of the person you are debating. 

What's up in Jared Land

You know I blog and will mostly blog about things that are bothering me or I am interested in. Occasionally though I'll just talk about my life. Like now!

First off, I know there hasn't been a post in a couple of weeks. I am working on some good ones, but to be honest I'm mostly sucked into EVE Online. What an awesome game! Unless you don't like slower paced games. Eve is much much more about the thought that you put into creating your character. What skills you train, where you go, and how you handle yourself in the universe. It is much more realistic than I HAS THE BESTEST SWORD AND MAGIC!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! But this realism comes at the price of it is Ungodly slow. Some skills take days or even weeks to train. That's real time days and weeks. However, It is my new gaming love. I still pop on WoW every other day or so to run dungeons or check auctions, and I still play my games that I review.

Speaking of reviews check out http://www.leftstickdown.com/ for awesome gaming reviews and news. I'm posting 3 reviews this week, and my whole catalog is there to look at.

Some of my friends have been asking me about twitter, and so my blog will now be linked to my twitter account. So if any of you want to follow me there rather than here I'm jma4707

I also started work as a journalist. When I get more information I'll make it available, and then if you are interested you can come read my news articles. I'd really appreciate the support :)

I'm also doing some work on the layout of my blog. I'm playing with different backgrounds, spacing, and page arrangements so please feel free to leave comments with your opinions. I'm looking for something that's visually appealing for most readers, but is still my style.

Time to go play EVE I think.