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Are Top Ten Lists Actually Good for Us?

Are Top Ten Lists Actually Good for Us?

In the game journalism world, we see top ten lists all the time. Is it a slow news day? Write a top ten list. Got no content for the weekend? Write a top ten list. Sapped for inspiration? Write a top ten list. You can’t stumble on any gaming website without reading a top ten list.

There is a lot of hate for top ten lists out there, and it’s understandable hate. After all, we routinely see the same entries on every top ten list out there. Best shooters lists always include Call of Duty . Best games of all time include things like Chrono Trigger and Super Mario Bros. 3 . At this point, top ten lists appear to be cleaving to an industry standard rather than expressing any sort of real opinion. In fact, any list that deviates from this accepted norm of games that you should put on a top ten list tends to be discredited offhand as the rantings of either someone incredibly inexperienced with videogames or a rabid fanboy, as if the knowledge of what video games are “best” is somehow an objective fact.

This is exactly why top ten lists are so flawed. They simply regurgitate the information that people already expect. Nothing new is being presented. Nothing interesting is being said. With the small exception of lists that are specifically in the here and now (Top Ten Things we Are Excited About in New Game X, Top Ten Upcoming Games this Month) most top lists are just treading old ground, and so they make very little impact on their reader.

But it’s this treading of old ground that makes them so ingenious, if you think about it.

Are Top Ten Lists Actually Good for Us?

You see, a key aspect of building community is allowing people to identify with each other. Top ten lists do a very good job of this. Any time a game or character is mentioned and people have somehow experienced that game or character, they identify with it. “Oh man, I remember Super Mario Bros. 3 ” they say as they read the list, nodding their head in agreement. Of course, this isn’t particularly deep, but it does build a sense of camaraderie.

That is, unless they don’t agree with the list, at which point you are going to see inflammatory comment after inflammatory comment in the comments section. This keeps people coming back again and again to argue about what list items are wrong and right.

The problem with this, however, is that if the list seems too crazy, people simply won’t put much stock into it. Few will read a list that puts Superman 64 up there as the best game of all time.

And that leads us to another reason why lists are so ingenious: when written correctly, they are safe but inflammatory. You see, there are many times that game fans will argue whether or not Super Mario Bros 3 deserves to be the best game of all time, or the fifth best, or the tenth best, or where it’s positon should be relative to Super Metroid , and so on, but few argue that it shouldn’t be on the list. In this way, the list allows fans to both identify and argue at the same time.

Lists are, for better or worse, a tool. They are rarely used as a way to convey information. Rather, they are simply used to entertain. This is perhaps why people look down on them so often. They can easily be criticized as lacking substance. But as a way to make gamers feel like they are part of a community, they do their job quite well.

What do you think? Do lists actually convey any meaning? Should they? Let us know what you think in the comments.

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