Best Game of the Decades

[Wolf Kanno]

Similar to a few threads we had recently, what do you feel is the best game of each decade you've been playing games? So what is the best game of the 80s, 90s, 00, 10s? One game per decade, but any gaming platform. Remakes and ports count, but only for the decade of their release.

[Lord Golbez]

Isn't this just compiling the results of several threads. Ah well, I'm game.

80s: Legend of Zelda - The only decade in which Legend of Zelda actually deserves its status as a top contender for GOTD or even GOTY. Partly because it actually is kne of the best Zelda games, partly because the competition in tue 80s just isn't as stiff.

90s: FF7 - The best game for the best gaming decade. There's a reason the remake is so anticipated and also a reason it has almost no hope of living up to the original. Don't mess with near perfection. This is almost unfair because at least 3-4 of my top 5 games are from this decade, while Legend of Zelda probably wouldn't even male my top 20.

00s - Persona 4 - I go back and forth between this and Persona 3 (as well as considering FFX and Sukoden 5). However, the gameplay improvements over P3 make this one the victor for me.

10s - Persona 5 - This one is an easier choice for me than P4 as there are no other games of the decade that come close. While P4 has to contend with another Persona as well as strong showing from FF (X, not the others) and Suikoden (3 and 5), the closest runner up for me here is Horizon Zero Dawn, which is a great game, but not a substantial challenge to P5.

[WarZidane]

I can get most of my answers from some of the other threads, yeah, but eh :p

80s: Mega Man 2 - Admittedly there's not a lot of serious competition here, games were very much still in their infancy, especially RPGs (which is why this is the only decade where an RPG wasn't my top game). But Mega Man 2 was amazing nonetheless, and it'll still be the first game that comes to my mind when you ask me to think about any Mega Man game.

90s: Xenogears - Still my favorite Square-Enix game of all time, just amazing in every regard despite the disc 2 budget/time-constraint shenanigans that I will forever lament.

2000s: Ar Tonelico 2 - This game deserved a better localization, but I'll take what I got, which was still my favorite game of the decade. Characters, world, story and music all combine into something brilliant, and even the gameplay was very fun (albeit rather easy)

2010s: Trails of Cold Steel 4 - Being the climax of the first three arcs of my entire favorite franchise and bringing them all together, this game has given me the highest highs in my gaming history. It's a divisive game among the fanbase, but it's my favorite entry anyway :p

[Aulayna]

I tried to be as impartial as possible on this one and think of it in terms of titles that really had a significant impact on the gaming industry as a whole, rather than what my favourite game from each decade would be.

80s: Tetris - an icon of gaming at this point. Probably anyone who's played a game will have touched on some Tetris-like title at this point.
Runners-Up: The Legend of Zelda, Mario Bros.

90s: Half Life - I think that Half Life was the culmination of a lot of evolution in the FPS space in the 90s that blended shooting with story and atmosphere and set the stage for enemies behaving differently to one another. Much of what Half Life achieved set the building blocks for what would lead to the behemoth that the FPS genre is today.
Runners-Up: Super Metroid, Final Fantasy VII, Metal Gear Solid

00s: World of Warcraft - pretty much pulled an entire genre out of relative obscurity and still going fairly strong to this day, created dozens of pop culture references, and popularized game systems that would eventually stretch well outside of the MMORPG genre.
Runners-Up: Morrowind, League of Legends (although arguably this should be in the 10s section), Mass Effect

10s: Minecraft - biggest selling video game of all time, easy to pick up with so many possibilities, systems that have found their way into AAA titles, fun for the whole family, still sells a crazy amount nearly 10 years after release, has seen-off countless clones, yeah.
Runners-Up: The Witcher 3, Red Dead Redemption 2

[Badr Boodai]

I tried to be as impartial as possible on this one and think of it in terms of titles that really had a significant impact on the gaming industry as a whole, rather than what my favourite game from each decade would be.

80s: Tetris - an icon of gaming at this point. Probably anyone who's played a game will have touched on some Tetris-like title at this point.
Runners-Up: The Legend of Zelda, Mario Bros.

90s: Half Life - I think that Half Life was the culmination of a lot of evolution in the FPS space in the 90s that blended shooting with story and atmosphere and set the stage for enemies behaving differently to one another. Much of what Half Life achieved set the building blocks for what would lead to the behemoth that the FPS genre is today.
Runners-Up: Super Metroid, Final Fantasy VII, Metal Gear Solid

00s: World of Warcraft - pretty much pulled an entire genre out of relative obscurity and still going fairly strong to this day, created dozens of pop culture references, and popularized systems that would eventually stretch well outside of the MMORPG genre.
Runners-Up: Morrowind, League of Legends (although arguably this should be in the 10s section), Mass Effect

10s: Minecraft - biggest selling video game of all time, easy to pick up with so many possibilities, systems that have found their way into AAA titles, fun for the whole family, still sells a crazy amount nearly 10 years after release, has seen-off countless clones, yeah.
Runners-Up: The Witcher 3, Red Dead Redemption 2

Great TOP!
Not long ago I found out that Tetris is very useful for developing brain activity. It is sort of a "morning exercise" for the brain.
WoW is one oа the best games ever. No wonder that it is the most popular MMORPG ever. I used to play it up to 10 hours daily when I was young :)

[Del Murder]

80s - The Legend of Zelda. Tetris is VERY close, but Zelda began one of the most epic series of gaming, was years ahead of its time, and created a formula that still works. Tetris may be more global, but Zelda is more fun.

90s - Final Fantasy VI. This is the golden age of gaming and there are so many to choose from, so I just chose my favorite of all time. This game made me fall in love with RPGs and realize that RPGs are my favorite type of game. It's just a perfect game.

00s - Final Fantasy XI. Like Aulayna I'm going with a MMO as they really came into their own with this decade. I never played WOW, but I did play FFXI. And spent the better part of the decade playing this and nothing else. I still fondly remember taking on some tough missions with my LS and also just duoing random stuff with Miriel.

10s - Mass Effect 2. This was another evolution of the RPG for me as it introduced me to the open world (or galaxy) choice-based action RPGs that are basically everywhere now. I still think ME2 is the best of those.

[Quindiana Jones]

I will speak to my favourites more than the best, but it's worth noting I only entered the world of gaming in the early 2000s.

90s: FFVI. Played this for the first time, like, a decade ago, and it's so good. Great fun, so much GAME in it, plus Sabin suplexes a fucking train.

00s: FF9. Just gotta be. This is the game that made me an actual gamer, and is basically the beginning point of my actual life, as opposed to those prior years I wasted not playing FF9 before it even came out.

10s: Dark Souls. My favourite game of the past decade; I did deal with the same barriers to entry that others did, and From Soft have done an objectively better job of making the later games more accessible without compromising the core gameplay, but DS1 holds a special place for me. I adore that game, and I adore its method of storytelling.

20s: I believe the only 2020 games I've played this year are Hades and Cyberpunk, so that's an easy win for Hades. Even if it weren't an easy win, Hades would be in top position for my Decade to Date best game, simply because of how masterfully crafted it is. Honestly, one of very few 10/10 games in my world.