Backloggd Canon 2022 (Sight & Sound)
At the end of 2022, the users on Backloggd got together to vote on a canon for the site, inspired by the Sight & Sound top films list released concurrently. 129 separate site members submitted ballots containing 10 games each, with 527 unique games nominated, 113 of which were voted on by three or more people. These are the results, presented here with added commentary from many of the site's most fervent users. Thank you to everyone who participated, as well as those who were gracious enough to write blurbs for each!
You can find the ballots listed here.
You can find the ballots listed here.
113 Games
RANK 81 (3 votes)
RANK 28 (8 votes)
Shin Megami Tensei Nocturne marks the series' first major step into the west, an innovation on its systems, and the last game to effectively wear the facade of "punk rock". The press turn system that still remains in use to this day offers benefits to the players prepared for elemental weaknesses, but more often underlines every encounter with a dose of lethality that would consistently skewer any squad that is built less than prepared for it. Battle themes consist of rock tracks that make use of synths and vocals that care not for being immediately intelligible to a newcomer's ear. All of this tied together through a journey across the desolate and literally warped city of Tokyo, making your way through its demonic denizens, with a light but affecting plot that depicts both the importance of ideology and the futility of it once filtered through an absolute system, which stands as more than the easier to swallow status quo values of later titles. Through all of this, Nocturne wears its series roots into the mass market.
(AG147)
Shin Megami Tensei Nocturne marks the series' first major step into the west, an innovation on its systems, and the last game to effectively wear the facade of "punk rock". The press turn system that still remains in use to this day offers benefits to the players prepared for elemental weaknesses, but more often underlines every encounter with a dose of lethality that would consistently skewer any squad that is built less than prepared for it. Battle themes consist of rock tracks that make use of synths and vocals that care not for being immediately intelligible to a newcomer's ear. All of this tied together through a journey across the desolate and literally warped city of Tokyo, making your way through its demonic denizens, with a light but affecting plot that depicts both the importance of ideology and the futility of it once filtered through an absolute system, which stands as more than the easier to swallow status quo values of later titles. Through all of this, Nocturne wears its series roots into the mass market.
(AG147)
RANK 64 (4 votes)
RANK 81 (3 votes)
RANK 81 (3 votes)
RANK 64 (4 votes)
RANK 81 (3 votes)
RANK 81 (3 votes)
RANK 39 (6 votes)
Following in the footsteps of Warren Robinett’s Adventure six years before, Shigeru Miyamoto’s 1986 masterpiece streamlined role-playing concepts into a slick action game format, pioneering immersive open world design in the process. Simultaneously offered unparalleled freedom to explore and little to no guidance on how to progress, players were left to truly inhabit the enigmatic and dangerous world of Hyrule.
All too often these days the game is dismissed for being obtuse; and to be sure, it is. By modern standards it can seem irredeemably reliant on guesswork. However, things must be put into context. You were not meant to blast through Zelda in an afternoon or two; you were meant to take your sweet time with it – months even – slowly unfurling its mystique, trading tips with friends and scouring for solutions in newsletters and magazines, treating it almost like a cipher of sorts, a mystery inviting you to solve it. In a sense, the game was played outside the console as much as it was within it.
More than thirty-five years later, the original Legend of Zelda remains eminently influential. Its sense of mystery and engendering of real-world cooperation heavily inspired FromSoftware’s Souls series, and Breath of the Wild, currently the latest mainline Zelda entry, sought to reinvent the series by looking to the past – at the game that, through a staggering number of sequels, had not yet been meaningfully outdone. One could argue that it still hasn’t.
(baldur)
Following in the footsteps of Warren Robinett’s Adventure six years before, Shigeru Miyamoto’s 1986 masterpiece streamlined role-playing concepts into a slick action game format, pioneering immersive open world design in the process. Simultaneously offered unparalleled freedom to explore and little to no guidance on how to progress, players were left to truly inhabit the enigmatic and dangerous world of Hyrule.
All too often these days the game is dismissed for being obtuse; and to be sure, it is. By modern standards it can seem irredeemably reliant on guesswork. However, things must be put into context. You were not meant to blast through Zelda in an afternoon or two; you were meant to take your sweet time with it – months even – slowly unfurling its mystique, trading tips with friends and scouring for solutions in newsletters and magazines, treating it almost like a cipher of sorts, a mystery inviting you to solve it. In a sense, the game was played outside the console as much as it was within it.
More than thirty-five years later, the original Legend of Zelda remains eminently influential. Its sense of mystery and engendering of real-world cooperation heavily inspired FromSoftware’s Souls series, and Breath of the Wild, currently the latest mainline Zelda entry, sought to reinvent the series by looking to the past – at the game that, through a staggering number of sequels, had not yet been meaningfully outdone. One could argue that it still hasn’t.
(baldur)
RANK 81 (3 votes)
RANK 64 (4 votes)
RANK 81 (3 votes)
RANK 47 (5 votes)
Abstract art as a whole is all about getting out what you put in: By its very nature, it’s incredibly unintuitive, and if you are not willing to put in the legwork to meet it halfway, you’re never going to truly understand what it’s trying to say. Yume Nikki is gaming as abstract art, an entry in the medium that defies the very mold of a traditional “game” with its free-form structure and minimalist design, and while that can be off-putting to the average gamer, if you’re willing to meet Yume Nikki on its own terms, you’re rewarded with one of the most beautiful experiences to ever grace RPG Maker 2003. Kikiyama’s magnum opus as a one-game wonder has created a ripple so massive with Yume Nikki’s release in 2004 that traces of its influence can be seen in indie games to this day, and it has single-handedly secured Kikiyama’s place in the upper echelon of indie developers.
(ConeCvltist)
Abstract art as a whole is all about getting out what you put in: By its very nature, it’s incredibly unintuitive, and if you are not willing to put in the legwork to meet it halfway, you’re never going to truly understand what it’s trying to say. Yume Nikki is gaming as abstract art, an entry in the medium that defies the very mold of a traditional “game” with its free-form structure and minimalist design, and while that can be off-putting to the average gamer, if you’re willing to meet Yume Nikki on its own terms, you’re rewarded with one of the most beautiful experiences to ever grace RPG Maker 2003. Kikiyama’s magnum opus as a one-game wonder has created a ripple so massive with Yume Nikki’s release in 2004 that traces of its influence can be seen in indie games to this day, and it has single-handedly secured Kikiyama’s place in the upper echelon of indie developers.
(ConeCvltist)
49 Comments
I just want to say thank you again for including me in such a special experience!!!!
Well done! Thanks for tackling this, and thanks for trusting me with a blurb.
Really great to see all this come together, along with more under-the-counter type games nabbing a spot as well. I'd also like to thank you for inquiring me about writing a blurb for an entry I hold dearly, it was a wonderful feeling!
What a special list, I'm extremely glad I could've been a part of it <3
Thanks for organizing everything, good stuff.
Yall did a great job on your writings!! what a fantastic list
rawness incarnate.
Excellent work here!
Hell yes, what a great project.
I mentioned it in the Discord already but I would like to extend my thanks for putting this together. It was a wonderful community effort and I'm glad to have been able to contribute something, no matter how small, to the finished product and to have been allowed to have my writing sit shoulder-to-shoulder with some of the best on the site. Thank you once again!
It's here! Awesome list. Thanks for putting this together and giving me the chance to contribute.
This is so amazing: thank you for including me, and thank you everyone that wrote for this! Seriously, this makes me so happy...
Incredibly based guys 😎
really cool to see everything so well put together!! i'm glad to be part of the blurbs with so many people and friends i admire a lot! thank you and congrats!!!
Incredibly cool.
Having read this list through properly now, I must admit that I feel hopelessly inadequate next to some of these absolutely stunning contributions. Fantastic work, everyone - I'm proud to have stood alongside you!
nice, very well done
doom, katamari and super metroid in the top 10. not bad
So so endlessly bummed that I missed this entirely while it while it was happening
I'm adding yet another thank you to the evergrowing pile of thank yous for putting together something like this, it's something you didn't need to do, but you did. So my hat's off to you.
Thank you for giving me a shot. Glad I was able to contribute and must have been a huge undertaking. Amazing end result.
great work here man, seriously. thanks for letting me take a couple of chances at bat
So happy to have been a part of this killer project. Everyone's prompts were stellar !
awesome work
also i had no idea when i wrote the DOOM piece that it was art #1 on the poll... that carmack quote feels well-placed now lol
Delighted to see this come together. (I have plenty of personal favourites on the list that don't have blurbs, if you're looking for someone to write them)
incredible work from everyone involved, some really great stuff here, but most of all, what a wonderful thing to pull together and create Pangburn!! You should feel immensely proud of what you've put together here. Thank you for letting me be a part of it!
Great job everyone and a huge thank you Pangburn for putting this together!
truly something special. thanks for putting this together, glad i could be included. everyone involved did an amazing job!
jobosno
1 year ago