Monkspider's Top 25 Countdown: #24 Empire at War (PC)

The next entry in my top twenty five countdown goes to an old favorite on the PC platform, Petroglyph's real-time strategy classic "Star Wars: Empire at War". Although one would think the source material would naturally lend itself to an epic RTS game, all previous attempts were considered huge failures (Force Commander, Galactic Battlegrounds). Fortunately Empire at War was a big success, staying on the PC top ten list for a long time and eventually getting an expansion pack.

The setting of the game is supposed to be shortly before Episode IV, so Luke isn't a Jedi yet, Obi-Wan Kenboi is still kicking it, and Grand Moff Tarkin is still being a badass. One of the most compelling elements of the game when it was first revealed is that it combined both space and ground battles into one game. The game consisted of the usual assortments of vehicles and groud troops you would expect (Stormtroopers, X-Wings, AT-ATs and the like). The most exciting part for me was the hero units you could utilize on both sides, with unique ones for land and space battles. Like in land battles the Empire could utilize Darth Vader, the Emperor, and General Veers and in space the Rebels had the Milennium Falcon, Luke Skywalker's Red Squadron and Admiral Ackbar's Home One.

The single player campaign was decent, it had a couple semi-memorable missions like rescuing some captured wookies from an imperial prison as Han Solo. The most fun to be had in single player though was the galactic conquest mode. Playing as either the Empire or the Rebels you would be looking at a map of the galaxy and using the production capabilities on the worlds you control you would build ground armies, massive space fleets and decide which planets you would want to attack and which ones you want to fortify against oncoming invasions. Would you put all of your fleet in one point or take a chance to spread your forces over multiple worlds? I had lots of fun in this mode with huge "Battle of Midway" style fleet duels, with both sides throwing every capital ship they had into the fight in an all or nothing decisive battle. I also remember losing a space battle and having a rag tag tiny group of troops manage to beat an AI invasion that was ten times bigger just through sheer strategery.

As enjoyable as the single player was, the real reason this game is on the list is for the multiplayer. This was probably the first game that Jay, Rob and I all played together online and it was really a blast. We would always play space battles exclusively since ground battles were marred by overpowered units and a general lack of fun compared to the superb space battles. Eventually over time, our triumvirate became quite the force to be reckoned with.

The landscape of Empire at War's multiplayer was dominated by a handful of huge clans that would try to bully anyone that would dare challenge them. At first we considered ourself the anti-clan, clan-stompers if you will. We would take on all of the best players from any given clan and win with fair consistency. Eventually we decided to form our own clan, calling ourselves Clan Rogue Bantha, after a particularly beloved card from the Star Wars CCG game.



Clan Rogue Bantha quickly earned a name for itself by using a unique system of self-imposed handicaps when playing non-clan players. With different levels of handicaps corresponding to different characters in the Star Wars hierarchy of villainy (Tarkin, Vader and Emperor respectively) we would grant other teams various levels of free resource points to create games where we would have to somehow find ways to win despite fielding numerically and technologically inferior fleets. Despite this, we almost always won these handicapped games and if not we had a good excuse to taunt the other team ("Ha, we were giving you a Vader-class handicap anyway fools!").


Our multiplayer days came to a sad end when Rob's PC crashed one day and he moved away to Florida. After that the band just kind of broke up. But I will always remember the awesome Boba Fett vs (the overpowered) Millennium Falcon battles, our broken surprise bomber rushes that would steal victory from the jaws of defeat,the time where we almost beat one of the game's developers and the sheer satisfaction of finally being able to deploy an Imperial-Class Star Destroyer.

It is these fond memories that propel Empire at War into the number 24 slot on my countdown. Who will be next? Will it be a PC game that I doubt any of you have ever heard of? Probably! So stay tuned, this shit is starting to get real.

-Last minute edit! Okay, snowbot reminded me to mention one other key fact. When you were hosting a game you had to give your game some name of some sort. Most people used generic stuff like "2 vs 2 space" and stuff like that. We used hilariously out of place names for a Star Wars game like "UFO Fight", "Flying Cigar Battle" and "Space Fisticuffs". It was so funny. We would have people join our game and say stuff like" UFO Fight?...the fuck?!?" And yes, Rob was a masterful smack talker who had a knack for making enemy clans absolutely livid with rage upon hearing his victorious banter.

Monkspider's Top 25 Countdown: #25 Super Mario Kart (SNES)

Alright folks, time to kick off the actual countdown proper, and coming in at number 25 is that perennial classic Super Mario Kart. Though many have challenged the throne (Crash Team Racing, every other Mario Kart since then, Star Wars Super Bombad Racing et al) none of them have eclipsed this 16-bit masterpiece. To this day it remains the greatest example of the kart racing genre, and is personally my favorite racing game, period.

One of the things that really put Super Mario Kart over the top for me was it's characters. It seems like these days Nintendo shoe-horns in a lot of awful characters like Daisy and the awful Rare-designed version of Donkey Kong. Super Mario Kart wasn't about this kind of pandering to the lowest common denominator, it was all about the art, baby. It had great characters like Donkey Kong Junior and Koopa Troopa. The two greatest characters to ever star in a Mario Kart game and paradoxically the two that Nintendo dropped from the roster when they created Mario Kart 64.


But Donkey Kong Jr. was just so badass. He was one of the two "heavy" characters so he was slow to accelerate, but he had the highest top speed potential and could use his massive girth to knock pipsqueeks like toad off of the track. Koopa Troopa was a "light" character so he enjoyed quicker acceleration and superior turning capabilities. He was a lot of fun to play since it was so easy to be effective with him and also arguably the most loveable character. DK Jr was more of a thinking man's character.


But the game was really so much fun to play. The courses were all highly varied and well-designed interpretations of various Mushroom Kingdom locales. My favorite tracks were the Boo Houses and the legendary Rainbow Road. Anyone who played that the first time back in the day (which is the last course in the top secret Special Cup) was immediately blown away by it's psychedelic imagery and it's extreme level of challenge.

I have a lot of great memories on this one. The game was really one of the few early games to have a "coop-esque" mode where both of you can race in the same cup against each other and AI opponents. Jason (a highly skilled Yoshi expert as I recall) and I spent many hours playing through the various cups. I remember we always found the Peach to be particularly annoying so we nicknamed her Princess Brandi, after a particularly annoying and snotty girl who went to our middle school.

Of course no article about Super Mario Kart could be complete without mentioning it's battle mode, the game's true multi-player highlight. The game featured a number of rather simple maps where these peaceful characters, once separated from the peaceful world of racing, quickly devolved into violent barbarism. These kart drivers would actually try to inflict mortal injury on their opponent using a variety of weapons including but not limited to koopa shells, feathers, and banana peels. Needless to say, it was some hardcore shit.


Rob and I created a game where we would set up bases and basically agree to not attack each other until the other infringed on the sovereignty of our base somehow, whether by crossing into our territory or by some other perceived slight. Territorial laws aside, that didn't stop us from shooting off massive amounts of shells while we were in our base. Of course we would always try to offer "friendly" warnings to each other about "shell levels being unusually high" and stuff like that. We would also declare voyages of exploration in this mode where we would try to use the feather (which allowed your kart to jump) to glitch our way into unintended areas. Of course we would sometimes take this opportunity to plant a koopa shell in the back of the explorer while he was off on his great expedition. It was an interesting attempt to forge civilization out of the untamed jungle that is battle mode and to this day it is one of my most memorable multi-player experiences.

Super Mario Kart is one of my twenty five favorite games of all time, and I think is an excellent game to kick off this list. Oh, and more thing, anyone who grew up in this time period I guarantee will remember this commercial.

Foreward: Monkspider's Top 25 Games of All Time

Well it's been a while since I have blogged on here, but to bring the blog back with style, and as a fundraiser of sorts for my brother Rob Kreh's upcoming Stephen King film project I am going to do a top twenty five list. I don't pretend that this is some kind of objective critique of any sort. This is merely my top 25 games at this point in time. I am sure there are some great games that deserve to be on this list if I had played them and I am sure this list will change in the future but this is merely where I am at right now. In fact two games that I am playing right now but haven't finished are likely contenders for a future version of this list (Uncharted, Psychonauts).

I have heard some people ask how I could have possibly created such a list. The process was admittedly difficult. I tried to go through each generation of games and list my favorites. I referred to other "top" lists on the internet to see if they thought of any games that I forgetting and then I began numbering my choices starting with my number one favorite on down.

So what games made the list? Which ones narrowly missed out? Just to start things off, I am going to include numbers 26 to 50 just for historical value. These games put up a valiant effort but came just short of making the top 25. They are still some of my favorite games ever though. Expect number 25 to be revealed within the next couple days with an accompanying article.

Here are the "honorable mentions".
50. Super Mario Brothers 2-j/The Lost Levels (NES)
49. Command and Conquer Red Alert (PSX)
48. Ms. Pacman (Arcade)
47. Super Mario Brothers 2 USA (NES)
46. Final Fantasy Tactics (PSX)
45. Mario Brothers (Atari 2600)
44. Duck Tales (NES)
43. The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening (Gameboy)
42. Final Fantasy IX (PSX)
41. River Raid (Atari 2600)
40. Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island (SNES)
39. Star Wars: Empire at War (PC)
38. Mutant League Football (Genesis)
37. God of War (PS2)
36. Gears of War (XBOX 360)
35. Europa Universalis 2 (PC)
34. Resident Evil (PSX)
33. Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time (PS2)
32. Metal Gear Solid (PSX)
31. Super Mario Brothers (NES)

30. Advance Wars 2 (GBA)

Incredibly challenging, but rarely frustrating and highly rewarding. One of my favorite parts was the secret levels in each chapter that would unlock secret AT-AT super tanks until the next level. I really kick myself for selling this one. I guess really what made it so great for was the divine sweet spot of difficulty and the highly strategic gameplay that stimulated the part of my brain that is in sync with my past life as Genghis Khan.


29. The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past (SNES)

Easily the highlight of the Zelda series for me. I loved the dark and light world dynamic, which is incredibly cliche today but was invented with this game. The other thing i really loved it's ireverent sense of humor: attacking chickens repeatedly would eventually cause a sworm of them to mob you until death and there was a weird guy in the desert who would follow you around forever if you stole his sign. A lot of cleverly designed dungeons and great bosses.


28. Final Fantasy XII (PS2)

Although I had mixed feelings about the battle system initially, eventually I decided it had the best sheer gameplay of any FF game. Although the story is not as strong as some, it had some really great characters, including one of my top ten characters in any game, the legendary Dr. Cid.


27. Resident Evil 2 (PSX)

Man, I have such great memories of playing this one with Rob. Truth be told I don't remember a whole lot about the actual story, but I remember playing it over and over, Going from Leon's disc to Claire's back to Leon's trying to unlock stuff. I don't think I was ever as sucked into any of the other Resident Evils as I was with this one. It just had rock solid gameplay and is probably the magnum opus of the tank control Resident Evils.


26. Castlevania: Symphony of the Night

Wow, lots of great memories on this one too. The thing that always comes to mind first is how great the music was. This game is possibly my favorite soundtrack of all time, and easily in the top five. Aside from that, is has some great lines ("Die Monster! You don't belong in tis world!") with some legendarily cheesy voice acting. It was a unique amalgamation of Castlevania, Metroid, and various RPG elements.

One of my fondest memories was back in high school watching Joe unexpectedly get obsesssed with this one. Joe was pretty much a strict RPG guy at the time and he somehow matched the world record for the highest percentage completed, utilizing several ridiculous glitches to access unintended areas. Years later at Jason's house, Jay bought the XBLA version and Joe still to this day was an absolute scholar on this game, citing various statistics on drop rates, analyzing the strengths/weaknesses of various items at length, able to explain to Jason the absolute minutia of every nook and cranny of the map just from memory. It was amazing. This one came soooooo close to making the top 25, I kept flipping back and forth with one other title, but it narrowly lost in the end.

Well that brings us to number twenty five. What game *could* it possibly be? Hopefully I have you on the edge of your seats. Stay tuned as the list continues!