Rock Paper Shotgun has published the RPS 100: Reader Edition for 2025, a community-voted ranking that flips the script on the outlet’s own “best PC games of all time” list. Instead of editors arguing over placements, this one is shaped by reader ballots—effectively a public referendum on what PC players consider the true essentials.
RPS frames the Reader Edition as a recurring tradition (now in its third run) where the audience gets to push back on the editorial list, champion overlooked favorites, and reshuffle the canon. It’s positioned less as a definitive critical verdict and more as a snapshot of collective taste: what people actually replay, recommend, and remember.
### A Fan-Curated Alternative to the Editorial Canon
The Reader Edition exists specifically in conversation with Rock Paper Shotgun’s main RPS 100 feature, which aims to condense decades of PC history into a single 100-game ranking. With a reader version, the same “all-time” premise tends to surface different priorities—often elevating comfort picks, formative multiplayer staples, or genre pillars that defined entire eras.
While RPS is best known as a PC-focused publication, lists like this also double as a living map of how the platform has evolved—from older classics that helped establish modern design language to newer hits that proved PC gaming’s current mainstream pull. For developers and publishers, high-profile community lists can function like free prestige marketing, renewing attention around games that might otherwise fade from day-to-day conversation.
### Why These Lists Still Matter
In an industry dominated by release calendars and live-service churn, reader-voted “best of all time” roundups cut against the present-tense noise. They remind players (and storefront algorithms) which games have genuine staying power, and they spotlight how community sentiment can diverge from critic-driven consensus—especially for long-running, moddable, or endlessly replayable PC staples.
Source: https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/the-rps-100-reader-edition-2025-your-favourite-games-of-all-time |