I’m taking this to mean games that stand out in or define their genre, are widely considered to be excellent, are timeless, and there’s very little if any fat to trim.
Super Mario Brothers - NES
Super Mario 64
Dark Souls - maybe Elden Ring takes over?
Return of the Obra Dinn
Half Life 2 - honorable mention: Left 4 Dead 2
Diablo 2
Doom
Tetris
Chrono Trigger
Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past
Portal 2
Little Nightmares - honorable mention: INSIDE
GTA SA
Tony Hawk Pro Skater 2
These aren’t necessarily my favorite games, but games I think are well respected. I probably missed a bunch.
I’m shocked to see Donut County mentioned. But you’re right, it’s a perfect pleasant game similar to the perfection of the first Portal. In fact, it’s my son’s favorite video game, by far.
If it’s the one that got them their recognition, it’s little more than arbitrary; luck, place and time; things that don’t have to do with how good the work is. Some “masterpieces” weren’t considered such until they were exposed to people over and over again, like The Mona Lisa at the Louvre or It’s a Wonderful Life on TBS. I’d have a hard time calling a number of games masterpieces that I didn’t care for, because this isn’t objective.
A masterpiece could just refer to a piece of art from a master. It could refer to the quality of an engineering project, or the skill involved in the work’s creation. Are these not objective qualities?
I don’t really think the Mona Lisa is a great image, personally (it’s a boring portrait), but I can still recognize that it was masterfully done.
This gets trickier with games, because an experienced game designer can, for instance, look at the UI design and graphics programming of a Ubisoft open world slopfest, and say those parts were masterfully done (even if the overall game isn’t so fun). And, even the best of video games have bits of them that weren’t as good.
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