Action Bucket List

Koholint Island, a Wind Fish and a Game Boy; the dream Zelda.

The sun goddess as a white wolf paints Japan back to life with a brush; Clover's art game.

The SNES Hyrule with a Dark World mirror; the template every 2D Zelda follows.

A cel-shaded Hyrule drowned under a sea, sailed island to island.

The 1986 original: a gold cartridge, no map and "it's dangerous to go alone".

Maximus's quest for revenge in ancient Rome (2000).

Kurosawa's epic of villagers and hired swords (1954).

Brutal, tender post-apocalyptic survival story (2013).

Atmospheric shooter in an undersea dystopia (2007).

Slick roguelike escape from the Greek underworld (2020).

Saber combat good enough that people still duel in it twenty years later.

A beat-em-up set in Gdynia with a broken bottle as a weapon; the most Polish game ever released.

The GameCube launch game: the trench run, the Battle of Hoth and gold medals nobody could reach.

Rotoscoped animation, a rifle and a memory-wiped agent on Titan; the French answer to Another World.

The first game to hand you a lightsaber and Force powers, with live-action cutscenes between missions.

Chloe Frazer and Nadine Ross in the Western Ghats, the only entry without Nathan Drake.

A wounded 47 remembering earlier jobs in a Paris hotel room; the darkest the series has been.

Fisher undercover inside a terrorist cell, with a trust meter that makes every mission two missions.

The Mega Drive entry: 1917 Europe, two playable hunters and a stage that walks up the leaning tower of Pisa.

The series seen down the barrel: a first-person shooter inside a GDI base, vehicles and all.

The dark sequel: the Dahaka hunting the Prince through a time-split island fortress, with a nu-metal soundtrack.

An alien amusement park in orbit and the Wisp powers; the game that pulled the series out of its worst decade.

Mark and execute, interrogations in real rooms, and objectives projected onto the walls.

The 2010 reboot by MercurySteam, with Patrick Stewart narrating and a combat system borrowed from God of War.

Emergence Day itself: Marcus and Dom on the first day of the Locust war, fourteen years before the original.

Open zones for the first time, with a grind rail bolted to a hillside and titans to climb.

The first handheld Metroidvania of the run, with a card system that stacks two decks of magic.