I really like the Total War series. playing Medieval Total War II a lot. of course Civilization 4 rocks as well.
i wasn't born with a mouse in my hand, in fact the first time i held a mouse was in my early teens so my mouse- eye coordination is not that fast while my brain is overactive so i really don't like boring fps walk around and shoot things games. RPGs are...hmmm ok but the stories can be quite simplistic and the action repetitive. starcraft was fun back in the day and i like Kohan too.

X-com for the win.

Rise of Nations and Company of Heroes. I love RTS games.

I love my Wii too. It's great when friends come around.

for the PC, civ 3 fun

my favorite game is diplomacy then risk

I was hooked on Attack (facebook Risk) for most of the year until I discovered this place. It's fun but Diplomacy makes Risk seem a bit too simple by comparison.
Where do you play Risk online, alamonthe?

I recently got a new computer (early xmas present to myself) and I've been enjoying Civ 4, Crysis, and BioShock :-) Lots of fun

I love Civ 4 - especially the Rhye's and Fall of Civilizations scenario. I have to say that Civ 3 was a better game though, Civ 4 has many awesome new additions but Civ 3 was simply more fun.

I also love the Total War series. I can't wait for Empire: Total War to come out next year.

Oh, Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri is awesome, too.

Especially Santiago and Zakharov.

Total War is great (my former roommate and I have already been hatching a plan to play a French-Russian alliance against our friend, haha). I'm also a huge fan of Europa Universalis II (that's the only one of the series I've played). I can only take it in certain quantities, but it's a very fun game.

Oh, and Starcraft is the original kick-ass RTS.

Age of Empires I, II, and III
Empire Earth
Roller Coaster Tycoon(all of them)

and Sean you kinda left this open-ended question a little narrow when you specified PC game.

i personally strongly dislike(i dont hate it yet) PS consoles
my favorite Xbox(both original and 360) games would have to be Cod4(modern warfare), the halo series, civilization revolution, tom clancy's endwar.

I honestly couldn't single out one game that i could call the best bc there are different categories of games and you cant compare a shooter like CoD4 to a tbg(turn based game) like Settlers of Catan. the functions of game play and game content are not comparable in any way. In their respective category they might be the best but you cant force the rectangle to fit into the triangle's hole, it just doesnt work.

@Steevo
yes, Starcraft is a good game but i would have to say that the game would not be what it is now if it wasnt for the dedication of the developers to constantly release patches and improve every aspect of the game to make it more and more what the gamers wanted from the game.

that amount of care for their game is what made Starcraft special and it is also what allowed it to carry its fan base for such a long time.

they still play Startcraft in korea like mad. they have a professional league set up with a lot of teams.

starcraft 2 is always "just around the corner".

haven't tried the mods on civ 4 yet but i prefer civ 4 than 3 mainly coz of the religions. will check out the rhys and fall soon.

right now i have just dl the Stainless Steel mod for medieval total war.
i want to try a different kind of game so i might try Fallout Tactics, its getting rave reviews, anybody played it?

as for the xbox vs psp vs pc vs wii debate, i cant really say as i've never owned anything but a pc.

@spyman: dominategame.com

The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion
Great game - so much freedom.
I do agree that Medieval Total War is a very good game as well, but Oblivion is going to be hard to beat in my opinion. I don't know if anyone else has played Oblivion, but I recommend it if you don't mind getting addicted to a game and staying up until early hours of the morning playing it.

is it a RPG fanatsy WoW type game?

Yeah, but not online.

I haven't played Civ 4, but Civs 1 - 3 are all classic games that I have spent months and months of my life playing.

Medieval Total War is also an excellent game. For those of you have played both, which do you think is better MTW or MTWII? The second obviously has some improvement over the original like much improved battlefield graphics, improved crusades, improved religion etc, however overall I found MTW to be a much more immersive game.

The cartoony graphics in the strategic map for MTWII were a little too much for me (don't get me started on the stupid "Yes my liege"). The "improved" strategic map in the second was good in theory, but the AI didn't seem capable handling increased demand that the map placed on it. In the first one the Risk style map allowed every countries moves to be executed simultaneous, while in MTWII my opponent's armies would stand completely still while I did laps around them. A step back in my opinion.

Some Classic games that I'm fond of: X-com, Master of Orion, Imperialism II, Conflict Korea, Pirates, Warlords.....ah the memories.

@WhiteSammy
I haven't played Starcraft in ages (I'm in college now and the last time I played seriously was in early high school), but when it was younger it was amazing. I don't know what it's like now (I haven't played at all in 4 years, and that was briefly), but you are certainly right about Blizzard being an awesome development team. By the way, I hate WoW, lol...

wing commander the original

belsherj, actually i really prefer Rome total war and barbarians, i think this era of history and military technology appeals to me more than the Middles ages. plus the Pope is one noisy annoying pain in the arse in the Medieval Total War. the MTWII Map, well yes but it looks SO much nicer and the graphics of the battle scenes are also a hell of a lot better.

i liked the viking invasion expansion to me it was a lot more fun

@ alamothe
Dominate game hey? I have heard about it. Conquer Club is popular too. I play Attack on facebook but I have considered switching to another site, but from what I can gather Attack is the only site that hosts live games, which I think is more exciting.
Diplomacy lends itself to a long thought out process, but Risk is fun on the fly with just 30 second for each decision.

If you like historical accuracy, here is an ancient retro game from 1993 on the PC that is well worth it, if you can get your hands on it!

Fields of Glory - refight the Napoleonic wars - Waterloo, Ligny, Quatre Bras etc - command entire armies in real time!

Despite having appalling graphics (they were ok for their time), it really does play well, and it is fiendishly difficult on the top difficulty rating. Entire battalions quaver in the face of the Imperial guard!

See here for more details:
http://www.abandonia.com/en/games/106/Fields+of+Glory.html

My brother has a PS3 and an Wii - of the games we have, Call of Duty 4 is the best for sheer gameplay, though Mariokart on the Wii is quite good fun too.

have you played medieval total war chris? they also have Rome Total war that runs on the same basic software engine.

i think they are the current gold standard for strategic war and tactical battle planning.
RTS games are fun but hardly realistic.

Sadly not - my PC is not that new, so it struggles to run Age of Empires III - basically, I cannot play any naval battles as for some reason it struggles with the number of ships and just freezes on me!

I've not played Rome Total War either :s I've got Settler's Heritage of Kings, which is ok, but not fantastic.

As for RTS games, I have long held a soft spot for the early Command and Conquer games. Red Alert 1 and 2, and the Generals games are quite good.

Actually, the best, and most underrated game which I played against my brother on Saturday night until 2am, is Total Annihilation - outstanding, and well worth picking up for a fiver off the internet. Yes, it's graphics aren't up to standard, but the gameplay is *awesome*.

I had Fields of Glory!! :)

I can't necessarily pick out a true favorite, but I will list a few games that I've spent countless hours on.

Red Baron II - WWI fighter game
Master of Orion - O.o It's 3am ALREADY!!
Halo 2 - die noob! :)

And a few others...I had an Amiga... :)

Earl Weaver Baseball
The Bard's Tale
Space Quest
The Seven Cities of Gold
Archon
Borrowed Time

...man, I have the urge to play these games now!

Eve Online

www.eve-online.com

I have a friend who is always trying to get me to play eve online. He is seriously addicted. I might give it a go sometime, but it sounds too time consuming.

The advance wars and fire emblem games for gameboy advance/nintendo ds. My PCs got a crap graphics card, so I cant play any games on it, but hopefully I am getting an xbox 360 for christmas so I will be playiing that from then.

Does anyone remember the old PC game, Master of Magic? That one was awesome.

On xbox, Jade Empire is a favorite. It has spoiled me on other xbox games.

Original X-Wing v. Tie Fighter for the PC.

I know these systems were not mentioned, but I want to throw Super Mario World for SNES on here, as well as Medievil for PlayStation I.

Xbox 360-
The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion
I've assembled a respectable collection of games since getting my xbox, and this is by far my favorite (with the possible exception of NCAA Football 2008). The single best game out for 360 I would say, it's an open-world fantasy RPG with organic character growth. The world is simply immense, I still haven't finished the main story because I've been so preoccupied with side quests and guilds!

Wii-
Super Smash Bros. Brawl
It's an obvious choice because of it's multiplayer. The Twilight Princess is an infinitely better single player game, but it doesn't give you the option of beating your best friends to a bloody pulp.

xbox-
Halo 2
With a strong campaign to back up the best multiplayer game of its time, this is another easy choice. I still think this is a better game than Halo 3 because of its maps. My all-time favorites are Ascension, Lockout, Coagulation, Foundation, Turf, and Midship.

Gameboy Advance-
Fire Emblem
This game is seriously addictive. The character growth is what draws me in. The sequel gives you more growth options, but the campaign of the first game is much better.

Haha, I still play Starcraft and Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory because they're fun and low on performance so my weeny laptop can handle them.

Fire Emblem, Age of Mythology, Armagettron FTW

Civilization III

good graphics cards are worth spending money on.
civ 3 people need to play civ 4, corporations and religions are a big factor in civ 4.

@WhiteSammy & SteevoKun

I love everything that Blizzard puts out. Diablo I & II, Starcraft, Warcraft, WoW. If they made a new game called Ice Cream Taco where the point of the game was to control a Giant Taco that poops out Ice Cream I'd play it cause I'm sure that it would be well cared for.

As for console games. The Elder Scrolls III: Marrowind and The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion. Both games are so open ended that you have unlimited freedom to either play the main storyline or to just spend months playing the game and still have tons of things to do.