What was the best year in gaming? For me, there are many candidates:

• 1982, when I, a three-year old with a skull engorged with more snot than brain, first discovered the delights of pretending an at symbol was an elf in Rogue on my mother's Unix terminal.

• 1986, when after a night of feverish dreams about Octoroks, I broke into a friend's house while he was on vacation to play Legend of Zelda.

• 1994, when I lost my virginity after my girlfriend and I became aroused by the suggestive manner in which the 'I' piece slid into a mound of blocks to achieve a Tetris.

• 2000, in which I first discovered that pretending to be a girl in Everquest and punctuating every sentence with a *giggle* could be turned into a profitable industry selling high-end raid swag on eBay.

• 2003, when I beat Cliffy B. into a gurgling, garishly dressed mockery of humanity behind a Vegas casino.

But I could probably find similarly important memories for any year: my whole life's been about games.

Next Generation has attempted to look at the subject of Best Gaming Year more objectively, employing a crack team of scientists and philosophers to pin the precise apex of gaming greatness to the Gregorian calendar. Unfortunately, they didn't have much success at narrowing it down between candidates, essentially just citing every third or fourth year as a great one. Which, come to think of it, is a pretty good rule of thumb: 1993's Doom followed by 1996's Quake and N64 followed, of course, by 2000's Daikatana. Florian Eckhardt

The Ten Greatest Years in Gaming [Next Generation]