Why I Love
Persona 5 and the merger of style and substance
Why I Love: Marketer Michal Napora was sold by the Atlus RPG's flashy exterior, but hooked by its substantial heart
The sweet science of Armadillo Run
Why I Love: Hugecalf Studios' Andy Metcalfe explains how the 2008 indie effort got the ball rolling on his love of physics-based puzzlers
The head games of Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines
Why I Love: Jakub Kasztalski explains why Troika Games' undead immersive sim never gets old
How Odama tilted the playing field
Why I Love: Pig Eat Ball's Nathan Fouts reminisces about Yoot Saito's bizarre pinball-meets-RTS GameCube exclusive
Rez and the power of owning your own experience
Why I Love: Friend & Foe's Ivar Dahlberg examines the Tetsuya Mizuguchi classic and how it influences his own very different work
Old ways can still be the best ways
Why I Love: YoYo Games' Mike Dailly explains how tech from the 1988 Commodore 64 shooter Armalyte is still used today
Striking the balance of autonomy and narrative
Why I Love: Auroch Digital's Nina Collins digs into the guided open-world of Sucker Punch's Infamous
Assassins Creed: An ancient world with a modern mood
Why I Love: KeokeN Interactive founder Koen Deetman shares how Ubisoft's open-world adventure captured his imagination
Brevity is the soul of Minit
Why I Love: Size Five Games' Dan Marshall explains why the 60-second adventure game represents "streamlining at its best"
Diddy Kong was my Dark Souls
Sumo Digital's Jamie Smith says Rare's N64 kart racer left the competition in the dust
Appreciating annelid annihilation in Worms: Armageddon
Why I Love: Perfectly Paranormal's Ozan Drøsdal reminisces on Team17's classic, from its absurd aesthetic to its amenable online community
Metal Gear Solid was ahead of its time
Why I Love: Sumo Digital designer Emily Knox explores how the PSone classic shaped and inspired her childhood self
Homeworld: Sideswiped by a Story
Why I Love: Snowcastle Games' Thomas French reflects on how Relic's deep space RTS provided a strong narrative through mechanics
Portal was a classic from out of nowhere
Why I Love: YoYo Games' Russell Kay remembers how The Orange Box toss-in stole the whole Half-Life show
The Darkness, or "How I learned to leave the Sun and Love the Nordics"
3rd Eye Studios' Gregory Louden finds inspiration in Starbreeze's first-person shooter that lets players inhabit the protagonist for quiet moments as well as firefights
Coming full circle with Halo
Why I Love: The TrailerFarm's Tony Porter shares how Bungie's shooter completed a journey he'd begun as a child playing hooky with his father
Uncharted 4's commitment to making every moment matter
Why I Love: The TrailerFarm's Dan Porter says every aspect of Naughty Dog's blockbuster is evidence of an ambitious dev team fully invested in the project
Monster Hunter redefined big game hunting
Why I Love: Infinite State Games' Charlie Scott-Skinner explains how Capcom's PS2 classic precisely targeted his personal soft spots
The joys of living in a Bubble (Bobble)
Why I Love: Infinite State Games' Mike Daw shares how the Taito arcade classic inspired his own career in score attack games
What makes Dark Souls work?
Why I Love: Over the Moon's John Warner examines how From Software's modern classic invites players to make themselves at home
Thinking outside the cube
Why I Love: Portal was a classic, but Sperasoft's Steven Thornton says Portal 2 is a fresh and brave sequel, outshining the brilliance of its predecessor
Tenchu: No prescription needed
Why I Love: Solar Sail's Tancred Dyke-Wells finds freedom in an overshadowed PSone ninja game
Location, locomotion, morality, and imagination
Why I Love: Skydance devs describe what they took from Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, Pathologic, NetHack, and Tony Hawk's Pro Skater
Monsters, mundanity, history, and high school
Why I Love: Skydance Interactive devs on Monster Hunter: World, Every Day the Same Dream, Europa Universalis IV, and Persona 4 Golden
Dune II and the three rules of a good licensed game
Why I Love: Auroch Digital design director Tomas Rawlings examines what made the seminal real-time strategy game such a massively influential success