Best Game of the Noughties (2000-09) - Round Two

[This Old Neon]

Round Two of the “Best Game of the Noughties (2000-09)” side-event includes 3 polls of 10 games each.

• You can vote for UP TO FOUR (4) games per poll, or skip a poll entirely.
• The top 4 games in each poll will advance to Round Three.
• You can’t change your votes once they’ve been submitted, so click carefully. Voting closes on Saturday at midnight ADT.

VOTE HERE

Poll 1 of 3
Batman: Arkham Asylum (2009, Multiplatform)
BioShock (2008, Multiplatform)
Demon's Souls (2009, PS3)
Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance (2005, GCN)
Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas (2004, Multiplatform)
Left 4 Dead (2008, PC)
Persona 4 (2008, PS2)
Shadow of the Colossus (2005, PS2)
Team Fortress 2 (2007, PC)
The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind (2002, PC)

Poll 2 of 3
Animal Crossing (2001, GCN)
Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow (2003, GBA)
Final Fantasy X (2001, PS2)
Final Fantasy XII (2006, PS2)
Mass Effect (2007, PC/360)
Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty / Substance (2001, PS2)
Osu! Tatakae! Ouendan (2005, DS)
Pokémon [Ruby/Sapphire] Version (2002, GBA)
Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time (2003, Multiplatform)
Super Smash Bros. Melee (2001, GCN)

Poll 3 of 3
Baldur's Gate II: Shadows of Amn (2000, PC)
Half-Life 2 (2004, PC)
Half-Life 2: Episode Two (2007, PC)
Halo: Combat Evolved (2001, PC/XB)
Mega Man 9 (2008, Multiplatform)
Metroid Prime (2002, GCN)
Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door (2004, GCN)
Portal (2007, Multiplatform)
Resident Evil 4 (2005, GCN)
Spelunky (2008, PC)

[Kong Wen]

Poll 1 of 3
Batman: Arkham Asylum (2009, Multiplatform)
BioShock (2008, Multiplatform)
Demon's Souls (2009, PS3)
Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance (2005, GCN)
Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas (2004, Multiplatform)
Left 4 Dead (2008, PC)
Persona 4 (2008, PS2)
Shadow of the Colossus (2005, PS2)
Team Fortress 2 (2007, PC)
The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind (2002, PC)

Batman: Arkham Asylum, Demon's Souls, and Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance are easy votes for me. For my fourth, I can't decide between Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, Shadow of the Colossus, or Team Fortress 2... but I'm leaning towards the latter.

Poll 2 of 3
Animal Crossing (2001, GCN)
Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow (2003, GBA)
Final Fantasy X (2001, PS2)
Final Fantasy XII (2006, PS2)
Mass Effect (2007, PC/360)
Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty / Substance (2001, PS2)
Osu! Tatakae! Ouendan (2005, DS)
Pokémon [Ruby/Sapphire] Version (2002, GBA)
Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time (2003, Multiplatform)
Super Smash Bros. Melee (2001, GCN)

I preferred the Wii Animal Crossing to any of the others, so no vote here. Final Fantasy XII gets an insta-vote as it's amazing. Aria of Sorrow is one of the best entries in the Castlevania series, so I'm voting for that too.

Poll 3 of 3
Baldur's Gate II: Shadows of Amn (2000, PC)
Half-Life 2 (2004, PC)
Half-Life 2: Episode Two (2007, PC)
Halo: Combat Evolved (2001, PC/XB)
Mega Man 9 (2008, Multiplatform)
Metroid Prime (2002, GCN)
Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door (2004, GCN)
Portal (2007, Multiplatform)
Resident Evil 4 (2005, GCN)
Spelunky (2008, PC)

Mega Man 9 is the best game in the classic series. Portal is one of the best games of all time. I'm not voting for Spelunky Classic because, as forward-thinking as it was design-wise, it doesn't hold a candle to the non-Noughty remake.

[The Shoemaker]

Man what a unique decade of games. 2010-2020 would honestly be a very different selection compared to this. Some franchises are never to be seen again, some franchises saw their peak here and only went down through the next decade.

[SkyPikachu]

Man what a unique decade of games. 2010-2020 would honestly be a very different selection compared to this. Some franchises are never to be seen again, some franchises saw their peak here and only went down through the next decade.

It's basically my childhood decade. Was 7 when it started and 17 when it ended. Hence why I picked it as I get nostalgic over games I've never played but have the look and feel of this time frame. Kameo and Fable II being recent examples that I played this year.

Basically looking for more titles from this era.

[The Shoemaker]

Man what a unique decade of games. 2010-2020 would honestly be a very different selection compared to this. Some franchises are never to be seen again, some franchises saw their peak here and only went down through the next decade.

It's basically my childhood decade. Was 7 when it started and 17 when it ended. Hence why I picked it as I get nostalgic over games I've never played but have the look and feel of this time frame. Kameo and Fable II being recent examples that I played this year.

Basically looking for more titles from this era.

Yeah this was the decade of my youth as well. Helps that this is the most neglected era from Nintendo at least in terms of making these games available on modern systems. I also felt this was the decade where developers really understood what they wanted to do in a 3D environment.

[Kong Wen]

Man what a unique decade of games. 2010-2020 would honestly be a very different selection compared to this. Some franchises are never to be seen again, some franchises saw their peak here and only went down through the next decade.

It's basically my childhood decade. Was 7 when it started and 17 when it ended. Hence why I picked it as I get nostalgic over games I've never played but have the look and feel of this time frame. Kameo and Fable II being recent examples that I played this year.

Basically looking for more titles from this era.

It's interesting because it's my college decade, but that gives it the same / a similar kind of nostalgic value for me as it has for you. Lots of great memories and landmarks associated with games that came out at this time. There were some off years in there, and some years were I did some serious gaming.

[SkyPikachu]

Man what a unique decade of games. 2010-2020 would honestly be a very different selection compared to this. Some franchises are never to be seen again, some franchises saw their peak here and only went down through the next decade.

It's basically my childhood decade. Was 7 when it started and 17 when it ended. Hence why I picked it as I get nostalgic over games I've never played but have the look and feel of this time frame. Kameo and Fable II being recent examples that I played this year.

Basically looking for more titles from this era.

Yeah this was the decade of my youth as well. Helps that this is the most neglected era from Nintendo at least in terms of making these games available on modern systems. I also felt this was the decade where developers really understood what they wanted to do in a 3D environment.

Yeah the N64 was basically a 3d game beta testing machine and is the reason the 3d games are so amazing this decade. Correct me if I'm wrong but the switch can't play a single nintendo game from this decade right? Even the Wii U (which isn't even relevant anymore) only got a handful of GBA and DS games + the 2 zelda remasters and Wii backwards compat. 3ds (is it modern still?) has a full DS library.

Gamecube is the console I skipped and the console nintendo seem to ignore. Thanks nintendo -_-

[The Shoemaker]

It's basically my childhood decade. Was 7 when it started and 17 when it ended. Hence why I picked it as I get nostalgic over games I've never played but have the look and feel of this time frame. Kameo and Fable II being recent examples that I played this year.

Basically looking for more titles from this era.

Yeah this was the decade of my youth as well. Helps that this is the most neglected era from Nintendo at least in terms of making these games available on modern systems. I also felt this was the decade where developers really understood what they wanted to do in a 3D environment.

Yeah the N64 was basically a 3d game beta testing machine and is the reason the 3d games are so amazing this decade. Correct me if I'm wrong but the switch can't play a single nintendo game from this decade right? Even the Wii U (which isn't even relevant anymore) only got a handful of GBA and DS games + the 2 zelda remasters and Wii backwards compat. 3ds (is it modern still?) has a full DS library.

Gamecube is the console I skipped and the console nintendo seem to ignore. Thanks nintendo -_-

No Nintendo games from that era, Turok (n64) is on the eShop though Haha.

Gamecube is that weird in between era where it was backwards compatible on Wii so never a part of the VC, and then on Wii U they restarted the VC from scratch and never got to Gamecube. It's also a good era to remaster games, which we saw with the Zelda remakes, Prime Trilogy and Luigi's Mansion, so I'm not sure if they want to keep getting $60 from us that way rather than offer them digitally.

But Switch is a different story. There's a long, long way to go before we could ever hope to see a wide selection of gamecube games on it.

[This Old Neon]

Poll 1 of 3
Batman: Arkham Asylum (2009, Multiplatform)
BioShock (2008, Multiplatform)
Demon's Souls (2009, PS3)
Shadow of the Colossus (2005, PS2)
Team Fortress 2 (2007, PC)

Poll 2 of 3
Animal Crossing (2001, GCN)
Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow (2003, GBA)
Final Fantasy X (2001, PS2)
Mass Effect (2007, PC/360)
Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time (2003, Multiplatform)
Super Smash Bros. Melee (2001, GCN)

Poll 3 of 3
Half-Life 2 (2004, PC)
Halo: Combat Evolved (2001, PC/XB)
Mega Man 9 (2008, Multiplatform)
Metroid Prime (2002, GCN)
Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door (2004, GCN)
Portal (2007, Multiplatform)
Resident Evil 4 (2005, GCN)

Egads.