Hardcore Chooses the All-Time Top Ten Xbox LIVE Games
Published November 6, 2007
Five long years ago, a crush of early Xbox gamers feverishly anticipated the launch of Xbox LIVE®, the console gaming world's first global online service. With over seven million subscribers worldwide, Xbox LIVE has enjoyed enormous success that has paved the way for online console gaming.
Of vastly more importance to yours truly though, Xbox LIVE has played gracious host to a litany of world-class, hardcore competition! And so, let's take a look at my own personal list of the All-Time Top Ten Hardcore Xbox LIVE Games.
10. Guitar Hero, the Third
While it is still just a newbie on Xbox LIVE, the unrelenting rhythm-based gameplay in Guitar Hero 3™: Legends of Rock is exquisitely merciless, and that's just offline. If you dare take your guitar skills online into Ranked matches you will face two ruthless masters, the game itself and your competition. The latter, it seems, is nearly always guaranteed to have completely mastered the two previous games in the series and holed themselves up in their rock-shrine basement since the game's release. Good luck with that.
Can you handle the rhythm?
9. 'Mech Up
MechAssault on its own appealed to a horde of hardcore, arcade shooter fans with its twitch-based gameplay that required refined, precise, environmental-based strategies to succeed. What's more though, because MechAssault helped launch Xbox LIVE as a multiplayer platform, the hardcore early adopters wrung every last morsel of gaming goodness from this sci-fi shooter. Jumping into a match for the first time even within just a month of its release offered a humbling dose of multiplayer reality.
For those that survived the Master Ninja tournament with their gaming ego in check, their action gaming prowess cannot be questioned.
8. Realistic Rainbows
Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six® Vegas represents the pinnacle for realistic shooter fans, who on their own, represent a remarkably hardcore crowd. Couple their raging enthusiasm with a game that rewards precision teamwork, utilizes realistic, real-world weapons where only a few bullets are required for a kill and you have a game that gleefully punishes the run and shoot crowd. Bring a load of tactical know-how, patience, and a willingness to work as a team if you dare to compete here.
7. Virtua Fanatic
Like Guitar Hero 3, Virtua Fighter 5™ is a mere babe on Xbox LIVE, but nowhere on earth will you find a more fanatically dedicated fan base committed to such a detailed fighting engine. Those that have mastered VF5 are artists in their own right, and if you ever wanted to face off against world-class competition, track down the top 100 in Virtua Fighter 5. Your submission to their skills will be swift and gut-wrenching. I can guarantee you that. It's worth it though just to see such skill in action.
The skill level of the top 100 in VF5 is unbelievable.
6. Everybody Was Hyper Fighting
The fighting game that started it all is still alive and well, and responsible for some of yours truly's most inglorious defeats. With Street Fighter® II Hyper' Fighting, the competition you face has been refining their 2-D fighting skills for well over a decade. They're not satisfied with a simple win either. Total, ego-stripping domination is their goal, and against the unprepared (like you), that's exactly what they'll earn.
5. Simply Lumines
True connoisseurs of the puzzle genre latched onto Lumines™ Live! instantly. This musically-enhanced puzzler is both intuitive and maddening as the most unobservant layman can grasp its fundamentals, but only the most dedicated puzzle genius can reach its summit. If you ever considered yourself a puzzle master, try a few ranked matches of Lumines Live! and you'll find out exactly where on the skill-ladder you reside.
4. Spies Vs. Mercs
There may be no greater call for skillful, expertly timed teamwork on Xbox LIVE than the spies vs. mercenaries multiplayer mode made famous by the Splinter Cell series. While Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell® Pandora Tomorrow™ introduced the mode, and Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell Double Agent™ redefined it, those seeking the ultimate slice of online humble pie can go right to Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell Chaos Theory™.
With the hardcore faithful having cut their teeth on Pandora Tomorrow, the skill level for Chaos Theory was and is freakishly refined. If you're looking for the ultimate learning curve, team up with a fellow newbie and challenge a veteran Chaos Theory team. Makes me laugh just thinking about it.
3. Madden Nation
The sports equivalent to Virtua Fighter 5, Maddenites across the nation take their craft seriously. With Madden NFL 08's A.I. so ridiculously smart it could probably best my SAT scores, every online match is rife with the kind of challenge that make grown men call for their Mommy. Add to that a special breed of smack talk found nowhere else on Xbox LIVE, and the hardcore Madden players can't be ignored.
Look no further to challenge the very best.
2. Master Ninja … Yikes!
I had a love/hate relationship with all of Alma's incarnations in Team Ninja's action masterpiece, Ninja Gaiden®, and that was before they ratcheted up the difficulty on a game already directly responsible for two broken controllers. For those that survived the Master Ninja tournament with their gaming ego in check, their action gaming prowess cannot be questioned.
There is good news for those that missed out on the tournament during its live run. You can participate in all the hardcore difficulty settings with the backwards compatible Ninja Gaiden Black, along with a host of new content not released for the original game.
1. Halo Freaks
Halo® 2 and Halo 3 offer what may be the most finely tuned and balanced multiplayer first-person shooter experiences available. There is a reason that only the release of Halo 3 could knock its predecessor from the "most played on Xbox LIVE" throne, and that is the Halo franchise's rare ability to reward pure, unadulterated skill above all else. For the ultimate Halo challenge though, you must pour your energy and talent into the Team Objective playlist. It is there that the truly hardcore reside.
There you have it, my All-Time Top Ten Hardcore Xbox LIVE Games. Debate amongst yourselves if you will, but that's how I see it. Happy birthday, Xbox LIVE!
Article by Hardcore
