Ooooh here's a change, how about a card game… Magic, anyone?
Or Tabletops like Warhammer, Necromunda (my favourit), Warhamer 40k…
I could make a whole list but I'll throw in some games I haven't seen mentioned yet:
- Jagged Allience (1 & 2)
- Team Fortress (the half life mod in my case)
- Test Drive 3
- Total Annihilation
As for the Civilization series… are these even games? I lost years of my life them. If you don't hear from me for the next year I probably installed Civ IV.
well I like the fast paced stuff quake3 and RTCW, there are newer games with more advanced AI, but those were the few games I've played where the characters had… character 
the groans, grunts and gestures of the q3 ones in particular did more for me than the insults hurled in the unreal games. other I Like:
COD2 and 4,
max payne …big fan of stylized weapons handling in movies, so this one got me
starcraft, warhammer, warcraft.
some of those modern titles these days have nothing in 'em, the characters are smarter, but not interesting and most have zero replayability, which is important if u don't do mp…just feels like games development have become purely about graphical and technical "dick measuring" and game design and "game play design" have become an afterthought. and don't get me started about that inane desire for realism…games are supposed to be an escape…to me anyhow, I want to run faster and jump higher not feel bugged down by it.
Suddenly, I discover that I've played many console games in the past 2 years! Here's a list of those I've completed (since I don't feel right talking about those I haven't – and yes, I do not use faqs!).
-PSone-
- Final Fantasy IX - complete
- Chrono Cross - complete
-PS2-
- Kingdom Hearts - complete
- .Hack Infection - complete
- God of War - complete
- Final Fantasy X - complete
- Final Fantasy X-2 - complete
- Final Fantasy XII - complete
- Star Ocean 3 - complete
- Dragon Quest VIII - complete
- Xenosaga I - complete
- Xenosaga II - complete
- Xenosaga III - complete
- Shadow Hearts Covenant - complete
- Rogue Galaxy - complete
- Digital Devil Saga – complete
- Digital Devil Saga 2 – complete
- Persona 3 & P3Fes – complete
-PSP-
- Final Fantasy Tactics – complete
- Final Fantasy VII Crisis Core – complete
-DS-
- Final Fantasy III - complete
Consoles… yay… I don't like to game much in front of the computer with keyboard and mouse control… it feels too much like "work". Thus, I have a nice logitech ps2-like controller/joystick right over there that I plan to "hack" sometime soon for the jME ~work~. There's nothing like layed back luxury gaming, I tell you…
BattleZone II is the best game ever. 8)
Not really a game but second life was the inspiration for starting jme.
Runescape was always too a reason to start in java.
Strange no-one mentioned Theme Hospital / Dungeon Keeper, cq bullfrog series.
For me it's the following games in their respective game categories:
X-Com (series), Diablo (series), Theme Hospital, Dungeon Keeper, Worms, Sanitorium,
Raptor, Master of Orion (series), Warcraft I,II & III (NOT WoW), Black Thorne, Perfect Dark N64.
Ow, and off course: Fallout I & II
God I'm looking forward to III… 
All in all, Blizzard, Black Isle, Interplay & Bullfrog were the companies I grew up with when it came to quality gameplay.
I love how everybody hates World of Warcraft. It is the biggest game in the world–you have to respect that. Sometimes I wonder if it's just that human condition which compels people to be different that causes so many people to dislike things that are so incredibly popular.
Well, you really have to realize who and how those people are that are addicted to WoW … in my opinion, many of them are sickos with reality issues.
First off, I admire the feat Blizzard has done to introduce the genre to so large a crowd.
I also admire the amount of work behind the game and the good it has done for Blizzard (financial & reputation wise).
The problem with WoW is not the technical part of the game, it’s the gameplay part.
It completely takes the fun out of a RPG game. I tried it for around 2 weeks and got sick to my stomach with the generic fetch X of Y item quests. I am ashamed to admit that I also tried it on a illegal server for 4 days, to see if I could put the feeling behind me that I am basically paying to do work. (because that’s what gameplay in WoW feels like). Started with a group of 7 friends, but the feeling came crashing back after the second hour of gameplay.
The Warcraft world has a rich background & storyline, and Blizzard almost totally negates that in WoW.
It makes the whole concept feel cheap.
And it also wins no points at all for originality in my opinion.
Right, there's a huge difference between biggest/most popular, and best.
Strong brand, polished product, ease of access, supporting infrastructure <-- These are things that characterise major commercial successes (not just games).
They probably aren't the first things you put on your list when you wrote down what would make your game fun to play.
True, I hated the WoW quests that were just time-wasters and I agree that the plot doesn't come through in the game, yet it's become so popular that there are still aspects of it which make it a good game. Perhaps it is marketing / infrastructure, but you can't ignore numbers. 10 million active accounts–you can't just scam 10 million people… the game does have some qualities which I feel are largely ignored.
Kudos for the great client (waht other mmorpg had a working client since beta?) the servers (I just can bow my head to the guys who did the server infrastructure).
But as an oldschool roleplayer I hate the game. I have been playing Ultima Online and Anarchy Online for quite some time. Both games allow players to create quests and such things… Things that make up a real roleplaying game.
This "standing in line to finish your quest" mentality is just something that I hate. It's a pitty that people only want to be led through a world and don't have their freedom to take part in the development of the world.
Anybody here playing Ultima 7? Best RPG ever.
Damn, how could I forget about that one.
I really liked the easter eggs, and all the secrets in the game.
(or messing with the time through cheats, really messed the NPC's up…)
I play it through at least once a year.
This game is pure genious.
The Kilrathi-Ship on the field …
Yeah, and the bgm of WingCommander they play… Btw WingCommander… 
Hehehe, wingcommander introduced me to the existence of soundcards.
MY COMPUTER STARTED TO FRICKIN TALK TO ME!!!
for me, the first game, that kept me in front of my computer, was Leisure Suit Larry in the Land of the Lounge Lizards. The original version. I love those text adventures ("press button"). The same is true for Space Quest. It's the humor. Have you ever seen a Orat on a stick?
And yes, World of Warcraft once was one of my favorites too, because Warcraft was one of the best RTS ever. Then came Starcraft, which is still the best RTS until today!
Did anyone mention Sim City? I often caught me sitting in front of my computer for more then 15 hours…
well lets see
the first games i really played for a long time were the command and conquer series and starcraft and i dont know how long i were sitting in front of my cmputer to play baldursgate 2 think its one of the best rpgs ever together with the gothic series and some years ago i really played a lot of counterstrike.
the games i created maps for were first command and conquer 2 and later starcraft which has areally nice map editor with that scripting abilities. later i created maps for cstrike what really made me interested in the whole game development thing 
i dont like wow either because it tries to make the players addicted to it ( and usually with success). this is of course a really good approach to earn as much as possible but doesnt get much points on the morality and responsebillity part.
and there are many examples that good game doesnt have to be successful. my favorite is battle realms which was awesome and somehow had many parallels to the successful warcraft3 it released even 1 year before warcraft 3 but hadnt any commercial success