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16. Trauma Center: Under the Knife (Nintendo DS, Wii)

Appearing initially on Nintendo’s touch-screen handheld platform, and then later on its motion-senative-based Wii system, Trauma Center: Under the Knife (not so much its sequel) gets credit for being one of the first games to fully leverage Nintendo’s touch-screen controller on the DS. It also adapted itself well to the Wii’s then-unique control scheme. All it lacked as a solid remote backup service to make sure you never lose your saves.

Developed by Atlus for the DS, Trauma Center is a bit like the old Operation! board game, in that touch-screen controls put you in control of the hands of a surgeon for life-saving surgical procedures. However, the game, while one of the first surgery sims of its kind, is still a fantasy RPG and so it’s not quite photo-realistic and not quite strictly limited to pure real-world medicine as the use of magical healing gels and special surgical abilities do become a core component of game play after a while.

However, for pure edge-of-your-seat tension, there are few games that build it as well as Trauma Center: Under the Knife; that it appeared on the DS system within the launch window and is still one of the most highly-regarded games on a system filled with bloatware says a lot about the game’s unique concept, design and execution.

Some may label it a niche game; but virtually no other game kept me interested in owning my DS for as long as I did. While I recently finally did sell off my DS, I would have done it ages ago if not for Trauma Center.

17. The Fable Series (Xbox, Xbox 360)

Granted, the Fable series only enjoyed two installments between 2000-2009, but both were platform-defining experiences by one of the top game designers in any genre. Peter Molyneaux may not have the RPG experience that the big brains at SquareEnix did, but in two simple games, he turned in efforts that outshone both Blue Dragon and Lost Odyssey, creations from the mind of legendary Final Fantasy creator Hironobu Sakaguchi. And that’s no small task.

While not as important as a cure to a href=”http://www.mesotheliomahelp.net”>Mesothelioma cancer, the really important reason Molyneaux’s Fable series earned its spot is that it helped establish the Xbox as a home for the RPG genre, cutting into Sony’s once-dominant status in that regard.

Fable also helped define a more American/European style of console RPG after decades of US audiences being spoon-fed Japanese RPGs on home consoles, with PCs being the only home of US RPG developers. All that has changed now, and it is thanks in no small part to the wildly entertaining worlds found in Fable and Fable 2.