Top 3 favorite franchises Options

[Roland Deschain]

What is everyone's top 3 videogame franchises? Give a brief description while these games earned your respect.

Heres mine:

The Legend of Zelda
My favorite of all the games I have ever played. To me this series is perfect in just about every aspect. Great, unique storylines to each individual game, steller music soundtrack, fun puzzles/combat/mini-games. Also the game has memorable characters with great personalities and makes you actually care about them. Without Zelda I wouldn't be as much into gaming as I am now.

Resident Evil
Like Zelda, has some nice little puzzles (not nearly as good Zelda) and generally awsome character devlopment. Also resident evil 1-3 scared the hell out of me.

Half-Life
I'm really not sure why I like Half-Life as much as I do. The atmosphere in the game is breath-taking, you easily get immersed into the world. Theres also the story-line, although to me I consider it more in the genre of mystery because of the G-Man who seems to be the center of putting everything in motion, he is indeed a very mysterious individual.

[Ramius]

Fallout
I'm a sucker for post-apocalyptic games and there are not many out there. In Fallout art, story and the game itself simply fits (even the most recent part Fallout 3 is a great game although it suffers from being a multi-platform release imo).

Final Fantasy
Just one word (actually not even a word): ...
Name your character(s) ... or ; or just . and the conversations become amazing! Oh, yeah you also get a nice and interesting storyline.

Grand Theft Auto
The first open-world game I can remember and few other games have such high replayability - even after you finished the main storyline you still have tons of crap to do.

[Carlos Bordeu]

Difficult to say...

Zelda & Half Life would definitively be on my list... but I've really enjoyed some games that never spawned many sequels so I wouldn't know if they would be valid in the category of franchises... like System Shock (Bioshock is different for me) and American McGee's Alice.

[Sr. Dela]

I'd put down Prince of Persia as my first one but the only modern one worth playing is Sands of Time.

[Samuel71]

The Legend of Zelda
Zelda games are very epic, and this combined with the tricky puzzles and dungeons, fantasy characters and enemies, excellent music, and rock-steady gameplay makes the Zelda franchise my very favourite.

Metroid
Metroid games have a great sense of loneliness and seclusion, since in most of the games your protagonist is alone against the world on an alien planet. The games also have the most beautiful and varied environments of any video game franchise, and the number of unique and interesting enemies and bosses is second to none.

Half-Life
Half-Life is all about cinematic, linear, story-driven gameplay. The characters seem real and palpable, as does the plot. This is one franchise where I am always wanting to know what's going to happen next. Also, headcrabs are awesome!

[Ramius]

I'd put down Prince of Persia as my first one but the only modern one worth playing is Sands of Time.

Really? Well, can't argue about taste but "Warrior Within" (the second part of the new series) was superior in my opinion.

[Guest_zeno_*]

Little big adventure
I grew up with this game and still play it regulary. Few people know this game, but it's totally awsome.

Myst
Also a game I played when I was young and still often play.
Especially Riven.

I can't' think of any other franshise that can compete with these, altough there probably are.

[Andres Bordeu]

I'd say my list is Samuel71's list! Though I'm compelled to put Thief in there somwhere. Too bad the last one wasn't as good as I expected. Though 'The cradle' level featured in Thief 3 is the scariest level I've ever played in a videogame!

[Simon Says Die]

I've just about got Samuel71's list, too. Maybe with a little tweaking...

Half-Life: You can say that the game plays like a tech demo. You can complain that the main character is a physicist and not some hulking space marine. However, when it comes to plot-driven suspension of disbelief, no one can do better than Valve. I stepped into the hazardous material, blood-encrusted shoes of Gordon Freeman, and not once in the whole series did I step out. I cried when key characters died, and I laughed when vortigaunts blew antlions to hell (or when I blew a microwave burrito to hell). I nearly shat myself in Ravenholm. No other series has ever taken me through that vast spectrum of responses.

Total War: I love history. It's a passion of mine. And, because I'm a red-blooded male, I tend to follow military history. Imagine my delight, then, when I can engage in awesome, grand-scale historical battles? Total War games portray ancient warfare about as accurately as it gets; rather than commanding individual units, you command small legions of them, and the response time is dulled (but not to an annoying extent) to represent the relay of orders. Moreover, there is a fantastic sense of accomplishment when, with the enemy routed, you zoom down to head level to see your troops tromping over a field of the corpses of your foes. Total War games have never lost their grandiose touch, but likewise they have never skimped on the importance of the real history.

Legend of Zelda: Only second to Half-Life on the ability to immerse me, the Legend of Zelda games do a great job of sculpting the world of Hyrule on every facet. The music reflects its rolling hills, icy cliffs, and dark caverns, as does its sound and character design. Everything in Hyrule weaves together perfectly; never do I see a creature or place that looks like it doesn't belong unless it is intentional on the part of the game's creators. Combine that with intense, satisfying boss battles, interesting takes on the classic dungeon-crawling theme, and a classic good-versus-evil plotline that has nevertheless grown more nuanced over the years (take the puppet-evil of Zant, for example) and you have a series that has never failed to let me down.

Honorable Mentions: Metroid, The Elder Scrolls, Fallout, System Shock (including Bioshock)