We've all been there. You strike up a conversation with your "gamer" friend about a particular favourite game, only to be met with the response, "Oh, I've never played that one." Your jaw inevitably drops to the floor and you gasp for air, choking on the very thought that somebody - particularly a gamer! - could never have played such a game. You reel off a thousand reasons why it should have been played, but their expression remains blank. The thing is, despite video gaming having been a popular cultural phenomenon for a good number of decades now, there's actually only a short list of games that meet the criteria for being a necessary, must-play title. Even some of the great games are, in time, forgettable, and it's only the ones that stick around that can really be considered 'landmarks' within the gaming world. Perhaps it was the game every child grew up playing? Or the one that was so ahead of its time it unwittingly defined a genre? Maybe it was a title that was just so unrelentingly fun that it's still being played twenty years after its release, or a combination of all three? Whatever made it special, a landmark game is one that simply MUST be played, no ifs, not buts. These are the games that leave you a better, richer person for having played them, and if for some reason you're now questioning your own gaming cred points, well here they are.
