9 PORTAL

Release year 2007 Last position 14

Cory Look past the meme-worthy songs and the geek-culture-defining in-jokes, and there’s a pretty brilliant puzzle game here. I loved wrapping my head around how to use blue and orange portals to break the laws of physics, especially the momentum-based puzzles. That this was a sideproject is just astounding.

Tony If they’d just given us a game where we solved puzzles by opening holes in reality, that would have been enough. Portal hits that idea side-on at 150mph with the freight-train of wonderful that is GLaDOS, and when you pick yourself up you find you’ve been smashed right into another, bigger game.

Ben That’s it. The best bit, for me, was going on the run through Aperture’s back rooms. I loved its fourth-wall-breaking effect, as if Valve never meant this to happen.