Final Fantasy Tactics is available on mobile devices as Final Fantasy Tactics: The War of the Lions

#40

Lost Odyssey (Xbox 360)

Change YoY: +6

The sole reason I ever even considered getting an Xbox 360 back in the day, this was the Final Fantasy game that we never got during the 7th console generation. Everything about Lost Odyssey just felt like it was a continuation of the classic FF games with Hironobu Sakaguchi in charge, from the music composed by Nobuo Uematsu, to the fun turn-based battle system, the well-written characters and interesting story. At the time I saw a lot of critics complain about the game's old-school mentality regarding its gameplay, but that just made me more interested in it after most other JRPGs of the time just couldn't stop trying to reinvent the wheel with their battle systems, often with very mixed results.

Lost Odyssey also contains some of best written and most emotionally charged sequences I've ever seen in any video game I've played, those being the flashback sequences written by Kiyoshi Shigematsu. The rest of the game's story is very good as well, but those flashbacks titled 'A Thousand Years of Dreams' are just on another level. 

Does it work well with touch controls? These menus in the screenshots look quite fiddly for my big grubby fingers. Would prefer that on a device with different controls. But I keep that certainly in mind, thanks for the hint.

It is a pain on a phone because things are rather small but if you have a tablet it should be much more enjoyable.

I do have a tablet. That's cool. Thanks.

#48: One of the later games for the Neo-Geo, but also one of the best - and certainly the best of it's series

Hint #1: The run&gun series is well known for their hilarious and top-notch sprite animations.

Hint #2: In this remake of an early title of this series, you first fight through an army of soldiers, but end up fighting off an alien invasion halfway through the game.

Hint #3: The series has already been found out before, (Metal Slug), but not the correct title yet.

#41: Greetings, Warlord! Let the war begin!

Hint #1: This is an old turn-based strategy RPG, but the series got more known later on for their RTS spinoff series.

#40: A very unusual RTS in space, where you start with a small capital ship and 3 planets to govern, but the map (and thus the number of planets to govern) and fleet grows at specific points in the story when you reach a new rank.

Hint #1: You start this game with your main planet almost in ruins, with most buildings massively damaged.

#38: A PC-exclusive Pinball game with a horror theme.

#37: Bring your console-making back from the brink of death by hiring 2 kids and beat your programmers into submission in RPG-like combats.

#36: Just hearing the fist few notes of it's version of Korobeiniki is enough to let most people know what game this is. Tetris, put in line by Kantor

#35: This Action-Adventure/RPG mix from 2000 is set in a distopian future and is still considered one of the best games to ever come out. Deus Ex, as guessed by Kantor

Funny thing is I think last year I also made a mistake with GH3’s hint now that I think about it. At least I’m consistent.

36: Tetris?

35: Deus Ex?

Well done, both are correct!

Sadly I never played Rebellion. I was introduced to Star Wars with Rebel Assault II, which I think is a year or two newer than Rebellion, so I guess I never got around to it. Not that I didn’t play any older SW games at all, I played Dark Forces and the NES game for example. I did play Empire at War later on, if talking strategy games, but it couldn’t really hold my attention, though it did look great.

Probably true, and that last part is definitely true. At a time I was desperately hoping for an Elite Force III, but I have given up on that a long time ago. It’s sad though that even the new movies didn’t result in any cool games.