X-Play's Lists of the Best
Sunday / 08.06.06 / 09:21PM / Joe
Last month X-Play (increasingly irrelevant G4's increasingly irrelevant game review show) did some special episodes where they counted down the top ten games for all three systems.
Of course, no such list is going to be the end-all for all gamers (no Kingdom Hearts? no Paper Mario? no Final Fantasy? no LEGO Star Wars? no Fatal Frame, even for me?), but there are some undercurrents in the lists that I wanted to point out.
| Xbox | PS2 | GameCube | 10. Forza Motorsport
9. Jet Set Radio Future
8. Beyond Good and Evil
7. Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory
6. Psychonauts
5. Chronicles of Riddick
4. Burnout 3
3. Ninja Gaiden
2. KOTOR
1. Halo 2 | 10. SSX Tricky
9. Ratchet & Clank: Going Commando
8. Ico
7. Sly 3: Honor Among Thieves
6. Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater
5. Katamari Damacy
4. Guitar Hero
3. Shadow of the Colossus
2. God of War
1. GTA: San Andreas | 10. Soul Calibur 2
9. Viewtiful Joe
8. Eternal Darkness
7. Animal Crossing
6. Super Mario Sunshine
5. Super Smash Bros Melee
4. Mario Kart: Double Dash
3. Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker
2. Metroid Prime
1. Resident Evil 4 |
First of all, it seems obvious that they used a "no franchise hogs" rule... because there is no other way that the Xbox list would lack the original Halo, and the PS2 list would lack Vice City, MGS2 or the previous (and better) editions of Sly. And what's up with choosing Katamari 1 over Katamari 2?
For all those games that are part of a series, it's probably best to consider X-Play's placement including all the games in that series. Otherwise, seven of the Xbox slots would have gone to games that begin with Halo, KOTOR and/or Splinter Cell.
Which leads me to my second point... look at the number of exclusive titles on each list...
GameCube: Seven pure exclusive titles. Two games that were intended as exclusives (Viewtiful Joe and RE4), and one game that everybody played (Soul Calibur 2).
PS2: Eight pure exclusive titles. SSX Tricky was everywhere and San Andreas had one of those six-month-later Xbox+Windows releases.
Xbox: Three pure exclusive titles (Forza, Jet Set, and Ninja Gaiden). Three titles that are also available on the PC (Riddick, KOTOR, and I'm including Halo 2 even though I don't think that's actually happened yet). The remaining four titles were all available on PS2.
So, how sad is it that most of your Top Xbox Games Ever aren't even Xbox exclusives?
If you take all the games from the Xbox and GameCube lists that are also available for the PS2, you get a stunning seventeen Best Games of This Generation. Yeah, yeah, that doesn't account for Xbox Live, and you won't find Link in SC2... but the unvarnished truth here is that over half of X-Play's list lives on the PS2 in some form or another.
Sony for the win.
Also, if you take a backwards look and sublist the games on the other two that were also on Xbox, things get even weirder. How is it possible that the Best PS2 game - San Andreas, which also had an Xbox release - can have ten Xbox games that rank higher... including underselling dogs like Psychonauts and Beyond Good and Evil, which did not even make the PS2 list?
There are some similar mind-warping jumps following Soul Calibur 2, Burnout 3 and Splinter Cell. Obviously these lists were not intended to ever be directly compared... although when you try to tell Xbox players that their edition of fucking Psychonauts was better than their edition of San Andreas, you're hoping they have a short memory.
Once again, the sad state of the Xbox is this: if you wanted online play, you went Xbox. That's all they sold the console on, and that's all they delivered.
By the way, I own eighteen of those games, including all of the Cube list!
PS: I'm surprised X-Play could even name ten GameCube games, wont as they are to cater to the NINTENDO IS TEH GAY demographic. Although I would have easily slotted Pikmin 2 in there instead of Viewtiful Joe. | 
