2002 was one of those years that is hard to classify. At the time there were very few “wow” games (as opposed to “WoW games”), but when you look back you find that some of the most influential games of the past decade were released in 2002. But before we get to all that, let’s step in the way-back machine (© Binge Gamer 2008) and look at the year that was 2002.

2002 was the year that saw The Sims overtake Myst to officially become the all-time best-selling PC game with a staggering 6.3 million units sold. To date The Sims and its expansions have sold somewhere in the 20 million range.

Microsoft was busy in 2002. In addition to acquiring Rare Ltd. from Nintendo, the company also launched Xbox LIVE. When it was originally launched many long-time gamers vowed that they would never pay a $50 annual fee to play their games online. Considering the Xbox 360 recently surpassed the Xbox in total sales, it seems as though the joke is on them. Suckers.

Squaresoft and Enix locked rings all Wonder Twins-style and formed “Square Enix”. When this originally happened Final Fantasy nerds were outraged that the company dared to change its name, but then realized that media-types like us were still going to refer to the company as “Square” anyways. In hindsight, Enix really got screwed on that deal.

Finally, 2002 saw the launch of the first television network catering exclusively to gamers, G4. Save me all the foamy-mouthed ramblings about how G4 killed TechTV or how it’s trying to be MTV for nerds or whatever the hell you may think – simply acknowledge that the network was awesome at launch and move on. Like I am.

You new to these lists? Eh?! Where the hell do you get off jumping on board after twelve weeks you sniveling piece of… no, no. I’m cool. Going to my happy place… just get yourself caught up.

Top Ten Games of 2001
Top Ten Games of 2000
Top Ten Games of 1999
Top Ten Games of 1998
Top Ten Games of 1997
Top Ten Games of 1996
Top Ten Games of 1995
Top Ten Games of 1994
Top Ten Games of 1993
Top Ten Games of 1992
Top Ten Games of 1991
Top Ten Games of 1990

10.) Battlefield 1942

Battlefield 1942 – The Movie
Battlefield 1942 was one of those games that was able to capitalize perfectly on both timing and trends. The game was released at the height of the WWII craze (that we still haven’t entirely moved on from) and at a time when online multiplayer was the “it” thing for games to have. Not only was EA able to capitalize off of this, but they did so with one of the best online shooters of recent memory.

Battlefield 1942 allowed you to get online and take part in some of the largest multiplayer battles ever seen in a game – 32 on 32. Once you chose your server and logged into the game you could choose between either the Allies or Axis (if you didn’t fail history, you may already know this) as well as what class you wanted to play as. Depending on your style of play you could choose to snipe from afar as a Scout, set up defensive positions as an Engineer or light your favorite cigar and start launching rockets at enemy vehicles, Arnold-style.

The big appeal to Battlefield 1942, besides the chance to finally recreate the ultra-gruesome first 25 minutes of Saving Private Ryan, was the chance to wage true war with tanks, jeeps, battleships, and aircraft. Sure, the fighter planes controlled like a cow in a grocery cart, but the fact that the option was given to players was a definite plus. Sure, the game may have lost some of its luster with it’s trips to the Vietnam (excellent sequel) Middle East (Battlefield 2), and the future (2142), but even today there is still a place for the original. After all, without Battlefield 1942, online gaming wouldn’t be where it is today.

9.) The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind

Ten Minute Morrowind Speed Run
The Elder Scrolls series has always been considered one of the most in-depth RPG franchises by PC gamers, but it wasn’t until The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind that the franchise truly took off.

Morrowind takes place on the island of Vvardenfell in the Dunmer province of Morrowind. If this means nothing to you, I’ll use simple terms: It’s a giant swamp. Any questions? No? Good. The main quest line of Morrowind involved the deity Dagoth Ur. After becoming immortal Ur seeks to drive the Imperial occupiers out of his land. That’s all the plot you’re going to get, if you want to know more then you need to pick up the game or check Wikipedia or… something.

Unlike other games set in the medieval timeframe, Bethesda opted to stay away from the typical European aesthetic. By taking influence from Japanese, Middle Eastern, Egyptian and other cultures, the designers were able to give Vvardenfell a distinctly fanciful look while still being able to keep the world grounded in some semblance of reality.

One of the things that the typical player probably never paid attention to, but was highly praised by reviewers and Elder Scrolls fanatics was the inclusion of some 300+ books. Many of these books told the history of the land, while others were simple tall tales. But one thing was in common with all of these texts – they were expertly written and if the player didn’t mind exercising the muscle between their ears, could add hours to the game experience.

The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind would wind up winning some 60 awards, and would have two expansion packs: Tribunal and Bloodmoon, both of which opened up the world and gave players the chance to explore more of Morrowind. Morrowind did come out on the Xbox as part of a “Game of the Year” edition in 2003 and while it was praised it was regarded to be inferior to the PC counterpart.

8.) Sly Cooper and the Thievius Raccoonus

Sly Cooper – Smooth Criminal
For the sake of argument let’s say you woke up tomorrow and found yourself in a kitchen full of gaming cliches and storytelling devices. Now while you’re in the kitchen you decide that you want to grab the 3D platforming from Super Mario 64, the sneaking from Metal Gear Solid and the cel-shading art style of Jet Grind Radio and throw them all into a giant blender. Do you know what you would get, besides a bunch of CD and N64 cartridge chips?

You’d get Sly Cooper and the Thievius Raccoonus.

Sly Cooper and the Thievius Raccoonus has you playing the title character, Sly Cooper, as he tries to recover the pages of the “Thievuis Raccoonus”, a book that serves as the comprehensive recording of every adventure ever taken on by the Cooper bloodline. To recover these pages, Sly has to sneak into the lairs of the members of the Fiendish Five, a group of villains who killed Sly’s father and stole the book to begin with.

For the few of you who have actually played it, the game was amazing to play. The gameplay was well balanced and challenging, the level design was both ingenious, and the presentation in both the graphical and audio departments were second to none. However, most of you don’t know this first hand because the game was released around the same time as Jak & Daxter and Ratchet & Clank.

In other words: Sly Cooper was the Jessica Simpson inbetween Jak & Daxter’s Britney and Ratchet & Clank’s Christina.

If you haven’t played through Sly Cooper and the Thievius Raccoonus yet, you really have no excuse. You can pick it up at GameStop for $5 used. So do the right thing and play this game.

Or else.

7.) The Mark of Kri

The Mark of Kri teaser
On the outside, The Mark of Kri looks like something Disney threw together to please the children. It has a very colorful, cartoonish art style that, to the uninformed, could act as a false sense of security to lull you into a sense of comfort. And then you decapitate your first enemy and have that world shattered in an instant as you see their lifeless body turned into nothing more than a blood fountain.

…that should be a song title.

The Mark of Kri was able to do something that very few games before it had been able to do, and very few games since it have been able to replicate: making arcade-like hack-and-slash combat fun in what is otherwise an action-adventure.

The combat mechanics in The Mark of Kri were very simple. With your right analog stick, you were able to target up to four enemies. When you targeted an enemy a button icon would show over their head. After you targeted the enemies you could switch between the two in combat by pressing their corresponding button. It added a new twist to the button-mashing combat of old and made playing through the game as a whole a refreshing experience.

The Mark of Kri did get a sequel in 2005 called Rise of the Kasai. However, unlike the first game the sequel was hammered for its poor AI and level design.

6.) Splinter Cell

Splinter Cell: Co-Op Theatre
Let’s get something straight right off the bat: Splinter Cell is not Metal Gear Solid. If you want to get technical (and knowing you bastards, you do), Splinter Cell plays more like Thief than anything else. You see, where Metal Gear Solid integrates stealth gameplay into what is otherwise an action game, Splinter Cell forces the player to rely almost entirely on stealth.

That’s right. If you try to charge enemies in Splinter Cell with guns blazin’, you’re going to get your ass lit up. Amazing, considering how much of a badass Michael Ironside is.

While just about everyone who worked on Splinter Cell will tell you that they were wanting to make a game that emphasized stealth over action, they aren’t telling you the entire truth. Obviously they wanted to make a game based on stealth and non-confrontation, but this had just as much to do with Ubisoft wanting a T rating as it did the designers wanting to make a new kind of game.

Splinter Cell was ported to just about every console under the sun, including the GameCube, PS2, Game Boy Advance, PC, Mac and even the N-Gage. Whereas the Xbox version is considered the definitive version, both the GameCube and PS2 ports had to take significant cuts to get them to run. The PS2 port runs at a much lower resolution and lacks much of the graphical polish of the Xbox original, and the GameCube port is lacking an entire level.

5.) Soul Calibur II

Soul Calibur II Endings. Major Spoiler Alerts… I guess…
The original Soul Calibur is considered to be the best game on the SEGA Dreamcast, and one of the best fighting games ever made. Soul Calibur II was able to take the same core game mechanics from the original while still being able to improve on the formula where needed. A couple of immediate differences from the first Soul Calibur included a new clash system, arena walls that prevented the cheap-ass “Ring Out” defeats, and more potent dodging that made it easier to avoid some attacks.

Okay, let’s not kid ourselves. Soul Calibur II is remembered not for it’s incredibly tight gameplay or for continuing the excellence set by it’s predecessor. No, Soul Calibur II is remembered for the ingenious gimmick of including exclusive characters in each of its three ports. While the GameCube undoubtedly had the coolest character with Link from the Zelda series, and the Xbox had the overpowering Spawn from… well, Spawn, the PlayStation 2 was treated to Heihachi Mishima from the Tekken franchise. A respectable character, sure, but considering that Yoshimitsu is already in both games was it really necessary to give us another Tekken character? You’re Namco, for Christ sake. You could’ve scrounged up one character from another franchise.

Either way the inclusion of Link gave the GameCube version the edge with reviewers, although all three scored over 90% on average. Namco would pull the same stunt with exclusive characters in Soul Calibur IV with Darth Vader and Yoda – although now you can buy the other character for whichever version you have.

How weak.

4.) Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos

GameTrailers History of Warcraft III
You know, it’s nice when somebody else does a recap of one of these games. Thanks to GameTrailers and their Warcraft retrospective designed to both educate gamers about the Warcraft franchise and drive hits from the hype surrounding World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King, I don’t have to write anything more than this:

It was freaking sweet in every way.

…there. Done. You want more info? Watch the video. Moving on.

3.) Super Mario Sunshine

He’s Walking on Sunshine! Get it?! …yeah, screw you, too.
Super Mario Sunshine is one of those games that will never get the respect it deserves, and this is partly because of the same rabid Nintendo fanboys that made Mario the symbol he is. After the release of Super Mario 64, a game which revolutionized the industry and changed the way games were made, expectations were so high for the follow-up that Nintendo really didn’t have much of a chance.

Contrary to popular belief, Super Mario Sunshine is not the direct sequel to Super Mario 64, either. That game, cleverly titled Super Mario 64 2 was canceled when the Nintendo 64’s disc drive, the 64DD, turned into a colossal flop. After the flop of the 64DD, Miyamoto took some of the elements that would’ve been included in Super Mario 64 2 and implemented them into Super Mario Sunshine.

Super Mario Sunshine played a lot like the game before it, but there were some additions to the game. Most notable of these additions was the inclusion of FLUDD, the water pack that helps Mario to clean up the pollution on Delfino Island. So long as water was in FLUDD (a name the designers didn’t even like), Mario could spray enemies and hover over long long gaps that he couldn’t otherwise jump over. Of course, many gamers (and a few reviewers) felt that FLUDD, as well as Yoshi, were merely gimmicks that were tacked on by the development team.

While many consider Super Mario Sunshine to be inferior to Super Mario 64, some actually consider it the superior product. At the time of the games release, both Game Informer and CVG called Super Mario Sunshine the best Mario game to date, and several publications gave the game perfect or near-perfect scores. On a personal level, I consider Super Mario Sunshine and Super Mario 64 to be equals – a sentiment that will only piss off both sides.

2.) Kingdom Hearts

Apparently Kingdom Hearts fans love Linkin Park. Seriously, there were a good dozen of these videos
Guest written by Allison – because JW hates this series
Kingdom Hearts is one of those games that you have to admit is important, even if you didn’t particularly like it. It was a dominating seller for Christmas in 2002, and people are still buying it. Why was it so popular? Well, consumers always eat up RPGs, but this one was a departure for Square, in part because they teamed up with Disney. And come on. We all know that Disney is slowly taking over the world.

Those familiar with Final Fantasy will see those influences in KH, but this isn’t just a rehash of that franchise. The story of the main characters elevates the game and morphs it into an action-adventure story, and in my opinion, one of the best parts of this game is the fact that you can trade out your main characters for Disney characters in whatever world you’re in. I always wanted to fight as Tarzan…

This cross-over worked because Square didn’t try to change too much about what they do best – spiky-haired, morally-ambiguous protagonists with hearts of gold, evil beyond evil manifesting through bosses at every stage, and an epic storyline that lends itself to dozens of sequels that will make the company money for decades.

1.) Metroid Prime

Metroid Prime E3 2001 Trailer
When it was revealed that Metroid Prime was going to be a first-person shooter, longtime fans of the franchise were a bit skeptical. After all, how can you translate all of the exploration, platforming and puzzle solving from the 2D games to the third dimension? Simple: get someone else to do it. That’s exactly what Nintendo did, turning to Texas-based developer Retro Studios to work on Metroid Prime.

The story is that Nintendo saw a project Retro was working on called “Action Adventure”. Impressed with the idea of an action/adventure with a female protagonist, Nintendo asked Retro if they would be up for making a new Metroid game. Retro, being lacking in ignorance (think on that a moment), said yes and threw all of their resources behind the project. This meant canceling “Action Adventure”, as well as Raven Blade, Thunder Rally and NFL Retro Football.

As Retro worked, they quickly discovered that a game like what Metroid Prime was striving to be simply could not work well in a third-person action game. The camera didn’t work well, the combat was “not very intuitive”, and found that exploration was easier in the first-person than it was in the third – so naturally, Retro and Nintendo decided to go with the first-person.

It was a good decision, too. Metroid Prime became one of the most acclaimed games on the GameCube, and the second-best selling game of 2002 behind Grand Theft Auto: Vice City. It also won several “Game of the Year” awards from GameSpot, GameSpy, EGM, Edge and the GDC.

Worst Game of 2002
High Heat Baseball 2003
As a baseball fanatic I could go on all damn day about High Heat Baseball 2003, but I don’t think any human being alive could top the now legendary tirade Tommy Tallarico unleashed when reviewing the game for Judgment Day/Reviews on the Run. So I’ll just let him take it from here:

…God damn I miss this show…

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