"Can a game be considered outstanding without online play?" I've seen this question argued from dawn till dusk and back to dawn without agreement, so let's take some of the greatest games of all time and some of the greatest games of this generation and see what makes them great.
Since I think most of us would agree that IGN is one of the most credible game cites on the Internet, let's look at their 2007 Top 10 list for the greatest video games of all time.
1. Super Mario Bros (NES)
2. Tetris (NES)
3. Civilization II (PC)
4. Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time (N64)
5. Super Mario Bros 64 (N64)
6. Half-Life 2 (PC)
7. Super Metroid (SNES)
8. Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past (SNES)
9. Final Fantasy III (SNES)
10. Resident Evil 4 (Gamecube)
According to IGN, only one of the greatest video games of all time had online play. But let's not go with what one site says; here's what IGN's reader's said in 2008 (this is what the readers said, not IGN).
1. Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time (N64)
2. Chrono Trigger (SNES)
3. Soul Calibur (Dreamcast)
4. Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past (SNES)
5. Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater (PS2)
6. Super Metroid (SNES)
7. 007 Goldeneye (N64)
8. Metal Gear Solid (PS1)
9. Resident Evil 4 (Gamecube)
10. Shemue II (Dreamcast)
According to IGN's readers last year, NONE of the 10 greatest games of all time include online playability. Let's look at Gametrailers's 2006 poll now.
1. Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time (N64)
2. Tetris (NES)
3. Street Fighter II (SNES)
4 (tie). Super Mario 64 (N64)/Super Mario World (SNES)
5. Tecmo Bowl (NES)
6. Final Fantasy VII (PS1)
7. Grand Theft Auto III (PS2)
8. Metal Gear Solid (PS1)
9. Halo (Xbox)
10. Resident Evil 4 (Gamecube)
None of Gametrailers's top 10 greatest games of all time had online play, either (Halo came out for the Xbox a year before Xbox Live was introduced, and the version of Halo on this list is the Xbox version considering that it scored an average 1.5 - 2 points out of 10 better than the PC version ). Just to get one last credible source before I give my opinion, though, let's look at VGChartz's 2009 poll.
1. Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time (N64)
2. Final Fantasy VII (PS1)
3. Super Mario Bros 3 (NES)
4. Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots (PS3)
5. Super Mario Galaxy (Wii)
6. Super Mario 64 (N64)
7. Resident Evil 4 (Gamecube)
8. Final Fantasy III (SNES)
9. Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past (SNES)
10. Super Mario World (SNES)
According to VGChartz, none of the top 10 games of all time have online play (though it was usually bundled with Metal Gear Solid Online, MGSO is still a separate game; MGS4 does not have its own online play).
So out of those four top 10 lists, only one game had online play. Now I'll give my list of the Top 10 Greatest Video Games of All Time.
1. Super Mario Bros 3 (NES)
2. Legend of Zelda (NES)
3. Super Mario World (SNES)
4. Donkey Kong Country (SNES)
5. Super Mario 64 (N64)
6. 007 Goldeneye (N64)
7. Starcraft (PC)
8. Super Mario Kart (SNES)
9. Halo 2 (Xbox)
10. Starcraft 64 (N64)
I'll give a brief explanation for my choices. Super Mario Bros 3 is, without a doubt, the most outstanding game ever released for the Nintendo Entertainment System, and the fact that it's still an adventure today with a plethora of secrets and the overwhelming hype it got before its release in 1991 without Internet ads makes it, in my opinion, the greatest game in history. Hell, Super Mario Bros 3 was one of the first videos games EVER to have its own strategy guide. When the Legend of Zelda came out in 1987, it was not only the first game to use an internal battery to save data, but it was the first adventure game with a world as massively sprawling as Hyrule. The fact that Nintendo made the game massive enough to design a way to save proves how epic a quest the Legend of Zelda was. Super Mario World, sometimes called Super Mario Bros 4, took everything that was great about Super Mario Bros 3 and expanded it; power ups you can save and use in-game, the ability to save, WAY longer game play with more secrets, and a bigger map to navigate. Donkey Kong Country is considered by many (myself included) to be THE best multiplayer game on the Super Nintendo Entertainment System. Super Mario 64 introduced a beautiful 3D Mario world with dozens of different levels and worlds to explore with several pretty awesome power ups (Metal Mario, Flying Mario, Invisible Mario...yeah, you know it was great). 007 Goldeneye redefined the FPS genre. All you fanboys who say Halo was more influential than Goldeneye...yall wouldn't even have no dang Halo if it weren't for Goldeneye. Except for Wolfenstein 3D, Goldeneye is the most influential FPS game of ALL TIME. Starcraft for PC is one of the games that made the RTS genre great. Think about it like this; if it weren't a LEGENDARY game, would you still be able to find it brand new on Walmart's shelves almost 12 years after its release? Super Mario Kart for the Super Nintendo is on here because of the threshold it broke; using the XBAND service, it was one of the first games to have online play. Halo 2 is on my list because it has, in my opinion, the best multiplayer of any FPS game. The co-op campaign is very well done, and the online play is outstanding. Starcraft 64 is what proved that RTS can work on a console. Was it as good as its PC counterpart? Of course not. Was it still amazing? Heck yes.
So as you can see, only 3 games on my list; Super Mario Kart, Starcraft, and Halo 2; have online play, and people only know usually that two of them had online play; Starcraft and Halo 2, especially since Super Mario Kart's online play disappeared with XBAND shut down. So even I, who say adamantly that online play is minor in terms of what makes a game great or bad, have more games with online playability than any of the 4 lists I cited. Super Mario 3, Ocarina of Time, Final Fantasy VII, Super Metroid, and even Halo and Metal Gear Solid 4 were and are AMAZING games without online play, so why does, for example, Super Smash Bros Brawl's less than desirable online play make it any less of an extraordinary game? A game's greatness should not ignore the quality of its online play, but no online play should NOT make a game inferior to one with online play by default. The Conduit for Wii, for example, has only decent online play, but the campaign, although short, is incredibly fun making The Conduit, in my opinion, and pretty good game.
Here are my sources in case anyone wants to fact check me.
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