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Welcome to Game Collector, where GameSpot hunts for great deals on games so you don't have to. This week's edition features the games that earned GameSpot's Game of the Year award from 1996 through 2000, as well as their five closest competitors. If you've been looking for the best games from the recent past and haven't had any luck, or if you've been wanting to find the perfect gift for someone, then Game Collector is the perfect place to start.
The Sims (2000)
Street Price: $39
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Winner of the Game of the Year 2000, The Sims immediately became a hit upon release and continues to be successful today. This virtual-life game is easy and fun to play, and it has a great sense of humor, colorful graphics, and convincing sound effects. Oddly, its rather simple premise of managing a household has captivated the imagination of game players everywhere, but what could be more interesting than a game of life itself?
EverQuest (1999)
Street Price: $10
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EverQuest was our Game of the Year 1999 for its addictive gameplay and colorful 3D fantasy world where hundreds, if not thousands, of players could meet and adventure together online. EverQuest was the first fully 3D massively multiplayer online role-playing game that invited players to try out a number of races and classes, and it's more popular now than ever. If you like RPGs or games with fantasy settings, you shouldn't miss this one.
Grim Fandango (1998)
Street Price: $15
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The wonderful and endearing Grim Fandango, Game of the Year 1998, is considered one of the best adventure games of all time for its engrossing story, its strong characters, its witty dialogue and excellent voice acting, its amazing visual design (inspired by Mexican folklore and art deco), and much more. Although the game wasn't a hit upon its release, its overall quality has made it a classic.
Total Annihilation (1997)
Street Price: $25
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Winner of GameSpot's Game of the Year 1997, the real-time strategy game Total Annihilation features dozens of different and fully 3D land, sea, and air units; a highly refined interface; many original play mechanics; an incredible soundtrack; and much more. Its open style of play, as well as a fantastic multiplayer mode, made it a pioneer in the genre, and because of its depth, it influenced the development of other RTS games.
Diablo (1996)
Street Price: $25
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Diablo was Game of the Year 1996, and it was released during a stagnant period for role-playing games. It single-handedly brought interest back to the genre and broadened its appeal to more-mainstream players. It was definitely more action-oriented than traditional RPGs, but its addictive gameplay helped bring a generation of players to online gaming and made hack-and-slash dungeon crawling fun again.
The Longest Journey (2000)
Street Price: $30
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This outstanding game from last year won our Best Story award, and it's become a new classic of adventure games. As you play as April Ryan, a young woman caught in her own personal dilemmas, you discover that your life is inexorably tied to parallel dimensions whose fates lie in your hands. The game's writing and dialogue are some of the best storytelling in any game to date.
Unreal Tournament (1999)
Street Price: $20
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Nominated in 1999 for Game of the Year and winner of Best Action Game, Unreal Tournament redefined the first-person shooter in terms of team-based games much more so than its same-year competitor Quake III Arena. UT quickly became the preferred choice for many action gamers because of its various play modes and distinctive weapons.
Half-Life (1998)
Street Price: $30
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What makes Half-Life one of the best games of all time is its ability to completely immerse you in the game through the use of several gameplay features, such as seamless level transitions with little or no load times, realistic enemy artificial intelligence, and scripted game events, all in 3D sight and sound. In addition, because of Half-Life, players have come to expect realism from the shooter genre, even if the game involves science fiction or high fantasy.
Jedi Knight: Dark Forces II (1997)
Street Price: $20
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Jedi Knight: Dark Forces II was GameSpot's runner-up for Game of the Year 1997. At the time, it was considered the best single-player action game since Doom, and its innovative level design is still cited today as a hallmark of action game design. In the game, you play as Kyle Katarn, but now you are a Jedi. As you progress and become aligned with the dark or the light side of the Force, the decisions you make help determine your fate.
Quake (1996)
Street Price: $10
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From 1996, Quake was a rite of passage for a generation of action gamers. Today, it's a landmark game that not only showed off hardware-accelerated graphics but also how fun and incredibly addictive a fast-paced multiplayer game could be. As such, Quake is also one of the most influential games of all time, and the legacy it started is still being written today.
Be sure to visit GameBuyer to find more great deals on both classic and recently released computer games.
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