This Old Neon Forum

Welcome to the #BGE2020 Elimination Round of 256!

Each game is seeded based on its performance in the two opening rounds of pools. Every game in the Upper Bracket has defeated multiple other games in 1-on-1 polls to get to this point. These are still the best of the best.

Polls are updated weekly, typically on Sunday or Monday. Check back throughout the week to make sure you don't miss a vote!

HOW TO VOTE

This is easy. You only get one vote per poll. The game with the most votes wins. In the event of a tie, the higher seed advances, so don't get complacent!

I really hate voting against Wind Waker - the cel-shaded graphics are amazing, it has fantastic dungeons, the open ocean sailing gives it a scope and sense of place perhaps unmatched in Zelda games prior to BotW, and it's one of the rare Zelda games to so firmly and unambiguously continue the story from an earlier game (in this case, Ocarina of Time). I'm a sucker for stories that show you glimpses of the past as you wander that past's future state.

But man, System Shock - it doesn't get the love its sequel does, but the audio logs and story are just as chilling, cyberspace is incorporated in a way the sequel lacks, Shodan is creepy as hell in her debut, and the game pioneered a different way of utilizing the first-person, 3D perspective from that used in games like Doom and Quake. It also has some truly surreal moments, like the elevator muzak cheerily playing as hordes of zombies claw at the door. I remember getting this to run in the days before DOSBox and needing instructions from the TTLG forum to figure it out.

Good times.