15 AAA Games That Changed Gaming: Super Mario 64 to Baldur's Gate 3
From Super Mario 64 to Baldur's Gate 3: 15 landmark games that shaped 3D, open worlds, online play, and cinematic storytelling, with years and studios.
Some games sell well and fade away, but others change the "defaults" for countless games that come after them. These are the games that first offered convincing answers to questions like how to handle a 3D camera, how to tell a story, and how to play together online.
In this post, we introduce, in release order, 15 big-budget games from the mid-1990s to the 2020s that were built by large teams and changed the course of gaming. For each one, we list the release year, the developer, and why it matters. Sales and award figures are taken only from the corresponding English Wikipedia articles.
The 1990s: Laying the Foundations of 3D Games
1. Super Mario 64 (1996, Nintendo)
The first 3D game in the Super Mario series, launched alongside the Nintendo 64 and directed by Shigeru Miyamoto. Its 360-degree analog stick movement and free camera that follows the player became the standard for 3D platformers. Tom Hall of id Software even credited it with defining the 3D platformer genre. By 2015 it had sold about 11.91 million copies, making it the best-selling Nintendo 64 game.
2. The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time (1998, Nintendo)
The first 3D entry in The Legend of Zelda series. It popularized Z-targeting (lock-on), which fixes your view on an enemy, and the context-sensitive button, whose function changes with the situation. It is often cited as the origin of the "target lock" combat that 3D action games now take for granted. With a Metacritic score of 99, it ranks among the highest-rated games of all time, and it sold more than 7 million copies.
3. Half-Life (1998, Valve)
Valve's debut game, published by Sierra Studios and built on GoldSrc, a heavily modified version of the Quake engine. Its biggest innovation was telling the story through scripted sequences within the first-person view the player controls rather than through separate cutscenes. It won more than 50 PC Game of the Year awards, and because its development tools were released, mods like Counter-Strike were born and grew into standalone games. Valve originally expected it to sell around 180,000 copies, but it sold 9.3 million at retail alone by 2008.
The Early 2000s: The Console Era Shifts
4. Halo: Combat Evolved (2001, Bungie)
Made by Bungie, which Microsoft acquired in 2000, and released alongside the Xbox. At the time, first-person shooters were widely seen as clumsy to control on consoles, but Halo changed that with a design that read the player's intent and assisted aiming. Designs like automatically recharging shields and a two-weapon limit were copied by many later shooters. It is credited as the single biggest reason the Xbox established itself in the market.
5. Grand Theft Auto III (2001, DMA Design)
Developed by DMA Design of Edinburgh, Scotland, which later became Rockstar North, and published by Rockstar Games. The first 3D entry in the GTA series, it popularized the 3D open world, where you could freely roam an entire city on foot or by car. Its influence was so great that similar games were called "GTA clones," and it also sparked major controversy over its depiction of violence. It sold about 14.5 million copies by March 2008.
6. World of Warcraft (2004, Blizzard Entertainment)
An MMORPG set in the Warcraft universe. Since its release on November 23, 2004, it has continued with expansions for more than 20 years. It peaked at 12 million subscribers in October 2010, and its cumulative revenue exceeded $9.23 billion by 2017. It is credited with rewriting the MMORPG standard with its so-called "theme park" structure, where players progress by following quests.
The Late 2000s: Online Play and Cinematic Spectacle
7. Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (2007, Infinity Ward)
Published by Activision, it was the first game in the series to leave World War II behind for modern warfare. The real innovation was in multiplayer. Its progression system of leveling up with experience to unlock weapons and perks, Create-a-Class for building your own loadout, killstreaks rewarding consecutive kills, and Prestige for resetting your level became the basic grammar of online shooters. It was the best-selling game worldwide in 2007 and sold 15.7 million copies by November 2013.
8. Uncharted 2: Among Thieves (2009, Naughty Dog)
An action-adventure game published by Sony as a PS3 exclusive. With large-scale cinematic set pieces that flow seamlessly during play, like the opening that begins on a train dangling off a cliff, it earned the description of a "playable blockbuster." It was also the first game in the series to include online multiplayer. It won more than 200 Game of the Year awards and took 10 categories at the D.I.C.E. Awards, including Game of the Year.
The 2010s: Vast Worlds and Stories
9. The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim (2011, Bethesda Game Studios)
An open-world RPG in which you freely explore a vast fantasy world. With an endless stream of user-made mods created with the official Creation Kit, it has been re-released on multiple platforms for over a decade after launch. It is credited with popularizing the large-scale fantasy open world and had sold 65 million copies as of July 2026. It won Game of the Year at the D.I.C.E. Awards.
10. The Last of Us (2013, Naughty Dog)
A PS3 action-adventure led by Bruce Straley and Neil Druckmann. Centered on the relationship between Joel and Ellie as they cross an America collapsed by a fungal infection, it showed that games could deliver deep emotional drama. It won top honors at the BAFTAs, D.I.C.E. Awards, Game Developers Choice Awards, and more, and in 2023 it drew major attention again as an HBO series.
11. The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt (2015, CD Projekt Red)
An open-world RPG based on the novels of Polish author Andrzej Sapkowski. The Polish studio self-funded it and spent about three and a half years making it. Each side quest was praised as being as polished as a short story, changing the perception that "open-world quests are just errands." Its 16 free pieces of additional content also made headlines. It won Game of the Year at The Game Awards 2015 and had sold more than 65 million copies as of May 2026.
12. The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (2017, Nintendo EPD)
Directed by Hidemaro Fujibayashi and produced by Eiji Aonuma, it was a launch title for the Nintendo Switch. Using a physics engine and a "chemistry engine," it created a world where fire, wind, electricity, and metal interact, and let players climb almost any wall. Its design, which lets you solve problems in many ways without a fixed order, is considered a milestone in open-world design. It won Game of the Year at The Game Awards 2017 and sold about 35.76 million copies, becoming the best-selling game in the series.
13. Red Dead Redemption 2 (2018, Rockstar Games)
An open-world action-adventure set in the American West in 1899. Rockstar united multiple studios into a single team and developed it for over eight years, with about 2,000 people involved. Its densely crafted world, down to weather, wildlife ecology, and interactions with townsfolk, was hailed as "a new standard for realistic game worlds." It earned more than $725 million in its first three days, setting the record for the biggest opening weekend in entertainment history, and sold more than 87 million copies by June 2026. Meanwhile, reports of long working hours during development reignited the crunch debate in the AAA industry.
The 2020s: Expanding the Boundaries of Genres
14. Elden Ring (2022, FromSoftware)
Directed by Hidetaka Miyazaki, with author George R. R. Martin contributing to the world-building, and published by Bandai Namco. By combining notoriously difficult "Soulslike" combat with a huge open world, it lifted the Soulslike from a niche genre to a mainstream hit. Because you can explore elsewhere first when you get stuck, it was also called the most accessible game in the series. It won Game of the Year at The Game Awards 2022 and sold 30 million copies by April 2025.
15. Baldur's Gate 3 (2023, Larian Studios)
An RPG made by Belgium's Larian Studios based on the Dungeons & Dragons 5th Edition rules. It was first released in early access in 2020, then fully launched in August 2023. An independent developer, not a major publisher's first-party studio, achieved industry-leading sales and acclaim at the same time with a classic PC RPG whose story branches heavily depending on your choices. In April 2024, it became the first game to win Game of the Year at all five major award shows: the Golden Joysticks, Game Developers Choice Awards, D.I.C.E. Awards, BAFTAs, and The Game Awards.
All 15 at a Glance
| Year | Game | Developer | Key contribution |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1996 | Super Mario 64 | Nintendo | Standard for 3D controls and camera |
| 1998 | Ocarina of Time | Nintendo | Z-targeting (lock-on) combat |
| 1998 | Half-Life | Valve | Cutscene-free first-person storytelling, mod culture |
| 2001 | Halo | Bungie | Console FPS, recharging shields |
| 2001 | GTA III | DMA Design | Popularizing the 3D open world |
| 2004 | World of Warcraft | Blizzard | Bringing MMORPGs to the mainstream |
| 2007 | Call of Duty 4 | Infinity Ward | Online progression, killstreaks |
| 2009 | Uncharted 2 | Naughty Dog | Cinematic real-time set pieces |
| 2011 | Skyrim | Bethesda | Fantasy open world, mods |
| 2013 | The Last of Us | Naughty Dog | Emotion-driven storytelling |
| 2015 | The Witcher 3 | CD Projekt Red | Quality of quest storytelling |
| 2017 | Breath of the Wild | Nintendo EPD | Physics-based free exploration |
| 2018 | Red Dead Redemption 2 | Rockstar Games | Ultra-realistic open world |
| 2022 | Elden Ring | FromSoftware | Bringing Soulslikes to the mainstream |
| 2023 | Baldur's Gate 3 | Larian Studios | Revival of choice-driven RPGs |
Trends Revealed by This List
Lining up all 15 games reveals a few trends. In the 1990s, the central challenge was "how to control and present things in 3D space"; in the 2000s, online connectivity and cinematic presentation became the weapons of big-budget games. From the 2010s on, bigger, denser worlds and the freedom for players to make their own choices within them became what mattered.
Another notable point is that history-changing games didn't always come from the biggest companies. Half-Life was a new studio's debut, and The Witcher 3 and Baldur's Gate 3 were made by independent developers who took on the risk themselves. It's fair to say that the question of "what to do differently," rather than the size of the budget, has driven the history of games.