• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

Favorite Decade of Gaming?

Your Favourite Decade of Games?

  • 1980 or before

    Votes: 1 0.4%
  • 1981-1990

    Votes: 8 3.5%
  • 1991-2000

    Votes: 121 52.8%
  • 2001-2010

    Votes: 72 31.4%
  • 2011-2020

    Votes: 18 7.9%
  • 2021 or after

    Votes: 9 3.9%

  • Total voters
    229

ACESHIGH

Banned
I have been revisiting lots of games in Retroarch during the past year and damn... the innovation and style from the 90's can't be matched. Japanese devs were on fire. And you know what... I love that games looked like games and sounded like games, not like today where we have these uber realistic productions with Hans Zimmer esque OSTs that play like shit.

I think that the japanese gaming industry lost their mojo around 2004. Then they started catering to weebs and their internal markets. Japanese games used to be at the forefront of innovation as well, but then the Western gaming industry destroyed them in the HD era.

The period from the mid 90's thru the mid 00's had a combination of unique factors that made it the best period in gaming:

- Japanese devs produced incredible pixel art during the 16 bit and 32 bit eras. Since by then they were really experienced at their craft.

- PC gaming was growing at a breakneck pace both in popularity and tech. The golden era of PC gaming started in 1993 with Doom and ended with the big 3 of 2004 (Half Life 2, Doom 3 and Far Cry) 2005 - 2010 were the dark ages of PC gaming.

- 3D in gaming was new and devs had to experiment a lot. For that reason a lot of unique games were greenlit. There were no safe formulas like today. And since budgets weren't the GDP of a small country you could cater to niches.

- Just like rock music peaked in 1973, gaming peaked in 1998. Nothing wrong with that.
 
Last edited:
Voted for last decade, which brought great indies, great AAA and saw the birth of VR.

sorry, I forgot my rosy-tinted glasses that transforms ancient pixelmess with laggy controls into the best games ever...
 

Komatsu

Member
I am going to be that guy and say.... 1995 to 2005. The 5th and 6th generation of consoles were the pinnacle of video games as a creative endeavor. Consoles started catching up with arcades, there was money but it wasn't a paint-by-the-numbers GaaS hellfest like today.

1995 opens with Chrono Trigger and ends with Donkey Kong Country 2 and Twisted Metal. Then we had ten years of awesome releases almost every single year, with 1998 in particular being a standout year (Panzer Dragoon Saga, Ocarina of Time, Metal Gear Solid, Half Life...). It ends in 2005 with Shadow of the Colossus, Resident Evil 4 and God of War... 2006 was when the PS3/Xbox 360 basically came onto the scene and the industry started to flip
 

ShirAhava

Plays with kids toys, in the adult gaming world
1991-2000

2001 is when everything started to go to shit...no sega home console, arcades dying, boring cinematic games with shitty gameplay being AAA, everyone going gaga over janky 3D action-adventure games, online everything I could go on and on

Knowing what I know now I would have quit 'modern' gaming in 2002 and went retro then rather than when I did in 2017
 
Last edited:

Vitacat

Member
Like many here I chose the 90's. It was an amazing decade of gaming, when arcade quality visuals finally came home, and games expanded into genres and gameplay that still influence games today.

But I also still have a lot of love for the 80's. I'm old...
 

cireza

Banned
That would seems to be 2000's imo, 2D games were going through phases in the 90's especially 95 onward where you started to see a lot of just retooled 16-bit games, weird CG, clashing foregrounds and backgrounds (hi Mega man X4 X5 and X6) odd smearing or stange resolutions across the sprites or backgrounds and objects, it seemed early 2000's which removed the 2D is not 3D Stigma (From consoles anyway) were among the biggest, cleanest, and well animated of 2D, but that was only for about 2-3 years or so.
I don't see that many 2D games in the early 2000's. I can think of SNK's last years as console manufacturer (with indeed awesome 2D games). There was Guilty Gear but I never felt that this high resolution 2D was that great and animation was poor. Capcom had totally lost it, Third Strike and Jojo being their last competent looking 2D fighters (and it was awesome).
 
Definatly the PS2 / Game cube / Xbox era, so 2001 onwards

I somehow managed to get all 3 consoles as a young teen and there was so many great things to play. All my friends used to come around weekly and play smash bros melee on GC. GC had so many niche titles I loved to try them. Their first gen output was best during this era imo.

PS2 just had an absolute ton of games released on the console that it was hard not to play it.

The xbox original was my first introduction to online gaming and interacting with players. I was amazing that you could game with other people and chat. Everyone had a mic back in them days and most people were polite. I have a big list of randoms on my friend list lol. Nowadays I don't think most of the players have mics and if they do it's usuly for trash talking or playing loud music for everyone else to listen to.

My friends always played Halo and project gotham. I spent hours ripping new music to the console too 😆
 
Last edited:

Xeaker

Member
2021 and beyond. Gaming is getting better and better every year and whoever disagrees with that statement is a boomer that lives in the past
GW6oujl.gif
 

German Hops

GAF's Nicest Lunch Thief
'80s: Bronze Age

'90s: Golden Age

'00s: Silver Age

'10s: Copper Age

'Next 10 years: ???
 
Last edited:

supernova8

Banned
It's relative to age I guess but for me I'm going with 2001-2010 becuase:

- It was the decade when PS2/GC/XB and also PS3/360/Wii released. That's a lot of progression!
- Household internet connections were still generally dogshit, which meant that even with the increased prevalence of online connectivity for consoles, developers generally released their games finished and there was generally no need to download a massive patch file.
- World of Warcraft launched; for me the first MMO that didn't seem overly complicated and difficult to get into. I suppose partly because it was the first big MMO that launched around the time I was thinking of getting into MMOs, so I didn't feel that intimidation of going into a game where everyone else is already max level.
- tail end of the decade was when I got my first part time job and was able to buy games on my own. It's crazy how the value judgement changes when it's your hard-earned cash and not just bank of mum & dad.
 

Kadve

Member
Definitely the 2000 - 2010ish (PS2/3) era.

When 3d games got truly exciting, developers were still experimenting with bug budget releases and before everything got overdesigned and/or swamped with MTX.

'80s: Bronze Age

'90s: Golden Age

'00s: Silver Age

'10s: Copper Age

'Next 10 years: ???

'70s: Wooden Age

Cause of all that woodgrain!

103mkw7eIGSfCrH5eIfTbWfstH6qxYl1m40jJgwiRP25444VN3mSLkQG0Q3UW91MPxUr6QnCPmDMKSxJdR8N0WaARG0GWykwNZyn4o9HXjwbYqHK25xldyBceHcMqLuk8tEP6W2h3w
 
Last edited:
I voted 1990—2000.But i wanted to vote for 1990—2000 and 2000—2010.In 2000—2010 we got some of the best games ever like Demon’s souls;Dark Souls,Dragons Dogma,Uncharted Gears of War and other great game.the best tower defense game Savage Moon one of my favorite games.This new generation will be as good or better as 2000—2010 especially with the new VR.
 

Gatox

Banned
91-2000 for me, as its the decade I really got into gaming and everything just seemed amazing. First time downloading a games, first time playing online against people I didn't know, first time playing games over LAN with multiple people etc. Then the consoles became more front line with the Mega Drive, SNES etc.
 
90s
Because of the greatest console war ever - SNES vs Genesis
Because even 3rd and 4th placed consoles had incredible libraries - TG16 and NeoGeo
Because even the NES had many great late games
Because the following generation had also 3 consoles with great libraries - PSX, N64 and Saturn
Because even rejects like 3DO were worth owning
Because arcades were still awesome
Because handhelds started and were great alternative scene - GameBoy, GameGear, Lynx, even NeoGeo Pocket and WonderSwan
Because of moneydraining add-ons that gave console fanatics even larger libraries - Sega CD, Turbo CD
Because Dreamcast was also in 90s
Because exclusives, that were left and right, defined a console, not some pixel counts in multiplats

Crazy times, right
 
Last edited:

Ellery

Member
The 90s and it isn't even close.

Final Fantasy IV, V, VI, VII, VIII, IX (yes they released like 6 FF games in this decade and more than half of them are all time great masterpieces 90+)
Silent Hill
Metal Gear Solid
Resident Evil 1,2,3
Zelda Ocarina of Time
Zelda A Link To The Past
Chrono Trigger
Super Mario World
Super Metroid
Donkey Kong 1,2,3, Donkey Kong 64
Half Life (Counter Strike)
Starcraft
Quake
Secret of Mana, Secret of Evermore, Illusion of Gaia, Lufia, Yoshi's Island, Suikoden
Tony Hawks Pro Skater
Diablo, Warcraft 2, Age of Empires, Baldurs Gate
Doom, Goldeneye, Monkey Island, Turok, Castlevania,
Gran Turismo, GTA, Crash,
Thief, Xenogears, Command and Conquer games, Parasite Eve, Dino Crisis, Tenchu,

and lots of Pokemon games.

Pretty cool games imho
 

nemiroff

Gold Member
Nostalgia is a powerful feeling, but "now" is always the best time for me. Was playing It Takes Two with my six year old yesterday and had the gaming time of my life. I'm an older gamer been doing this more or less for four decades, and being able to have access to everything awesome from 2021 and more or less all the way back to the beginning of videogaming with a click of a mouse or a controller is frankly amazing.
 

Josemayuste

Member
Voted 2011 - now

2011 - Skyrim released
Now - We have a wide variety of games from past gens instantly available: retro games, compilations, Remakes, remasters, all kind of genres, Indies, AA, AAA, we have never had so much content, and so much graphical fidelity.
 
Last edited:
A soft spot for the 80s, born out of a mix of naivety and wide-eyed wonder at what a C64 could pump out. That and of course the arcades of the 80s were truly magical playgrounds back then. Not that I was particularly flush as a 10 year old in 1984, however once we'd discovered the art of flicking a 2p coin up the 50p change slot (not a euphemism) to get 5 credits on commando, that was a game changer. Quite literally.

Aside from the 80's, the 90's of course for the obvious transition away from sprite based games changed up the home-gaming experience a fair bit. I would say that we're better off with games today than we've ever been, however I'm not as good with buttons as I used to be so tend to be reasonably shit at them.
 
I don't see that many 2D games in the early 2000's. I can think of SNK's last years as console manufacturer (with indeed awesome 2D games). There was Guilty Gear but I never felt that this high resolution 2D was that great and animation was poor. Capcom had totally lost it, Third Strike and Jojo being their last competent looking 2D fighters (and it was awesome).

You didn't see them because they most games were pushing 3D in media marketing there were plenty of 2D games during the early 2000's and SNK would be a bad example as those were already way outdated by the time, though for the year the machine came out those were impressive games they managed to get out of that console.

Generally 2D games to 3D game ratios were horribly against 2D although some major titles went through so if you were hyped for PS2/Xbox and what not the push for 3D would make 2D gaming a thing way in the back of most peoples minds. It seems the Dreamcast had a somewhat decent ratio however. Still you can fnd some great looking Xbox, GC, PS2, and PC 2D games for the time and even later, issue is once you pass 2003 the ratio is way out of control on home consoles for 3D to 2D games.

To be fair it made sense. But I would have liked to see more real 2D games with 360/PS3 capabilities, if 2D got more support during the tale end of the PS2/Xbox gen but that was never the case sadly, and the consoles were not really designed with high-fidelty 2D graphics in mind since then. The indie scene actually hurt more than helped in that department too lol.
 

HoofHearted

Member
90's by a landslide -

It was when gaming became truly mainstream from arcades to home consoles...

None of this 800% pixel/fps counting BS to be found....
 

EverydayBeast

thinks Halo Infinite is a new graphical benchmark
Majora’s Mask is stored in the year 2000 but when you get down to it you get more Zelda games in other decades.
 

cireza

Banned
You didn't see them because they most games were pushing 3D in media marketing there were plenty of 2D games during the early 2000's and SNK would be a bad exampl
Never cared about marketing. I was playing games and there weren't many 2D games. Low resolution and masterful pixel art like SNK used to do pretty much died with the Neo Geo. I was not talking about gameplay, but visuals strictly. There were many games with 2D gameplay but 3D visuals.
 
Last edited:

TMLT

Member
2001-2010 is gonna get you the best overall bang for your buck I think. You're getting the PS2/XBox/GC generation and then the first half and a bit (the best half too) of the PS3/360/Wii era. Handhelds were hot too with GBA, DS and PSP. I would say those are the probably the two best generations overall, or at least two of the top 3.


I started gaming around 91ish but for me things didnt really pick up until the second half of the 90s. 97-00 was amazing, but as an overall 10 year period 01-10 is the winner.
 
Last edited:

DGrayson

Mod Team and Bat Team
Staff Member
90s
Because of the greatest console war ever - SNES vs Genesis
Because even 3rd and 4th placed consoles had incredible libraries - TG16 and NeoGeo
Because even the NES had many great late games
Because the following generation had also 3 consoles with great libraries - PSX, N64 and Saturn
Because even rejects like 3DO were worth owning
Because arcades were still awesome
Because handhelds started and were great alternative scene - GameBoy, GameGear, Lynx, even NeoGeo Pocket and WonderSwan
Because of moneydraining add-ons that gave console fanatics even larger libraries - Sega CD, Turbo CD
Because Dreamcast was also in 90s
Because exclusives, that were left and right, defined a console, not some pixel counts in multiplats

Crazy times, right

Ya how else were you going to play SSF2 Turbo back then?
 
OK, so this may be slightly embarrassing, but here's something I made some time ago for fun. Because a true nerd/autist does not simply choose a favorite decade of gaming.

Wok4XzL.png


Looking at it now, I should probably rethink the whole "Second Dark Age" thing. Lots of creative titles in that time actually.
 
Last edited:

AV

We ain't outta here in ten minutes, we won't need no rocket to fly through space
2000s without a shadow of a doubt. The PS2 library alone is almost enough to call it, but then you factor in Diablo 2, BG2, CS, WoW, Deus Ex and HL2 on PC, all the Gamecube classics, and some stuff on Xbox.

The 90s is close, but not quite there.
 
Last edited:

cireza

Banned
OK, so this may be slightly embarrassing, but here's something I made some time ago for fun. Because a true nerd/autist does not simply choose a favorite decade of gaming.

Wok4XzL.png


Looking at it now, I should probably rethink the whole "Second Dark Age" thing. Lots of creative titles in that time actually.
Definitely the point of view of a PC gamer. On consoles 95 to 2000 was simply insane.

Microsoft brings dudebros ? Wow...
 
OK, so this may be slightly embarrassing, but here's something I made some time ago for fun. Because a true nerd/autist does not simply choose a favorite decade of gaming.

Wok4XzL.png


Looking at it now, I should probably rethink the whole "Second Dark Age" thing. Lots of creative titles in that time actually.
Lol.... So basically you hate MS
 
Definitely the point of view of a PC gamer. On consoles 95 to 2000 was simply insane.

Microsoft brings dudebros ? Wow...

Lol.... So basically you hate MS

Hey, I love MS-DOS! :messenger_beaming: Seriously though, I was just having fun. It's obviously a personal approach with my preferences and biases coming through. I was never interested in online multiplayer for example. And I hated when Win 95 was the new hotness and for a short time seemingly every PC game had this ugly window border around it for no reason instead of being fullscreen.
 

Alright

Banned
I have to pick 2.

91-2001 - The golden era of games trying to get to grips with an ever shifting change in tech and moving from 2D to 3D. The Dreamcast pushed online gaming further than it ever has and its demise led to...

2001-2010 -... The OG Xbox or Dreamcast 'X' was the passing of the torch from Sega to Microsoft. Microsoft continued to push online and innovative games and ideas.

by the end of 2010, gaming was no longer gaming and has since been taken over by a different market that doesn't even resemble a shadow of its former self. The gaming industry in the 90s would have laughed off the calls to ban booth babes and gamer gate.

To this day I have no idea what gamer gate is, why it was a thing or why people cared. All I know is that was the final nail in gaming's coffin.

RiP
 

Kupfer

Member
Halo
Half Life 2
S.T.A.L.K.E.R.
Call of Duty original
Call of Duty Modern Warfare
Fallout 3
Gears of War
Splinter Cell
L4D
GTA 3/VC/SA/4
Red Dead Redemption
Resident Evil 5
Dead Space
Alan Wake
PlayStation Portable
And dozens more

2001-2010 was for sure my gaming decade
 
Last edited:

Meesh

Member
Not an easy task... I'll have to consider this because depending on what decade, and what consoles or games you're remembering, they've all made their mark at different times.
Subbing though.
 
Top Bottom