Top 10 Most Important Games In History

Most important game in history of top 10 lists:
1. Make a top ten list.

I'm not sure I'm ready to make a top 10 list of games. Sure, I can make a list of games that were important for me, or even just game concepts, but when you say "important games in history", important for what? For what purpose?

This is why games defy this kind of list: what's the purpose of the game. Then you could 'rank'. One some scales, Barbie Horse Adventure achieved as much as a game as Portal.

Personally, using the most democratic definition of "game" in everyday usage of the word (which, giving the ever-changing nature of language, is the most accurate one, in my opinion), I would use certain limitations which would exclude family, religion and mathematics. Also, if I wouldn't do that, I would feel compelled to put "War" near the top of that list which I refuse to do.

Isn't the previous poster correct when claiming that one of the defining aspects of games is that their purpose can't be described?

I wish I knew more about game history. And I feel strange ranking them on "importance" for anything but development of games themselves. I would definitely include Chess and Go in my list, maybe football/soccer, "Spacewar!", playing cards, "Alter Ego"... but doing a list is pretty hard. Maybe later. :D

So which one's which? Chess for right-handed? Alpha Centauri for left? Because I'm seriously running against the grain if so.

Maybe this post, like fiat money, is an elaborate practical joke to trick you into enlightenment. Or maybe I was feeling grandiose on the weekend. I figured it'd be interesting to see people get low on it.

Tarot and Cabala are specific examples of religion/metaphysics that are extremely game-like and played a deeper role than you might imagine in cultural history. Math/family/religion do deserve a bit of revision. So here's an exercise, what specific sets of rules would you identify that were really important between the dawn of civilization and, say, the middle ages?

Regarding left-hand/right-hand:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hWiBt-pqp0E

(not in order of importance, but style)

10. Poetry
9. Crime
8. Dancing
7. Romantic love
6. "What does that cloud look like?"
5. Legos
4. Wine collecting
3. Postmodernism
2. Naming your garage band
1. Dogs catching frisbees
0. Advertising

In no particular order...

Scrabble
Football (or soccer if you insist on calling it that).
Chess
100m sprint
Bridge
Space Invaders
Long Jump
Monopoly
Eye Spy
Sing Star

I'm left handed, and Go, liek, total pwns Chess.

What, no Dungeons & Dragons? The whole point of D&D is to bring your creativity to the table. Some RPGs have focused more on creativity in tactics and strategy, like other games...but other RPGs have really hinged on evoking creativity from their players. And D&D started that whole movement.

Beautiful comments people, each of those lists is equally valid and says something about your particular worldviews.

Naturally, D&D would place on a list involving a more strict definition of games, I imagine, since a whole chunk of currently produced games (RPGs) are basically basterdized versions of D&D (which at this point is a bastardized version of tabletop role playing).

I´m hungry for more lists, show me your biases!

Tarot and Cabala? O_o

Here's my list:

1. Bionic Commando

2. Final Fantasy IV

3. Chess

4. Science

5. Critical thinking

6. Fallout 2

7. The Dark Eye

8. Philosophy

9. ????

10. PROFIT!!!

1. Philosophy. Pointless most of the time, but all it needs to do is throw off one idea like, say, "the scientific method" every few thousand years to demonstrate its value.

2. Competition for status. Innate to social animals, but far more valuable than competition for wealth or sexual conquest in its producive effects.

3. Markets. The proximate cause of most innovation.

4. Politics. Effectively, competition for power within the coercive apparatus of the state, and therefore morally suspect, but certainly preferable to unitary state control.

5. Flirtation and conquest: Not sex in itself, but the game that is played about it. A fundamental driver of human ambition.

6. Academia: The sublimation of ambition and desire for the productive creation of human knowledge.

7. The Arts: The tangible expression of creativity, ambition amd greed in a competitive form that spurs that spurs further novelty and innovation.

8. The Sciences: A medium that transforms ambition and creativity to foster technological advancement and understanding of the universe in esse precisely by ensuring that information is available to all who seek it.

9. Open Source Software: A mechanism to ensure advancement in the algorithmic infrastructure of modern society by according egoboo rather than financial rewards to contributors.

10. The game, formally defined: An entertainment and artistic medium that draws from, and in some cases simulates, the dynamics of all of the above, in the process enlightening its players as to the inter-related, emergent complexities of dynamic systems.

Now I like that, you nest games in general as the last game in the chronology. Then you get to have another list, with the final entry being mods, or something...

Physics
Chemistry
Biology
Evolution
The Prisoner's Dilemma
Diplomacy
Monopoly
Global Thermonuclear War
Hungry Hungry Hippos