Rules: just pick 1 and explain why.
I’ve been playing since the NES and despite being from a low income family I had the luck of being able to play and own many consoles over the 3 decades of my life, plus some pc.
If you ask me right now? Resident Evil 4 (2005).
A before and after in gaming, to this day still extremely fun to play even for casuals but 20 years ago it was THE masterpiece. And everyone took notice of it, everyone played it, even players that didn’t cared about resident evil. The gameplay was so good that it got photocopied by everyone right after in the action genre.
Arguably the last big innovator in videogames minus Minecraft and… PUBG (Fortnite did it better I know).
Try to NOT pick your favourite game, that’s a different thing.
Yeah it’s very skill based but unlocking guns really helps out by helping with the RNG and unlocking characters also like the health tent. Finding the bonus levels is also really good since it’ll get you more supplies while making the run longer.
For sure it’s not for everyone but this thread is a lot about opinions anyway so I’m leaving this one as mine since I love the feeling of overcoming seemingly impossible challenges with skill like Dark Souls, Hollow Knight and Celeste.
I did experience the same feelings as you did and I so many times I thought “This is bullshit” but I put faith in my brain to figure it out and there was a small but noticeable difference in every 1h session. More health, more chance of beating bosses without getting hit and such. In the end I beat the high dragun which made everything worth it and somehow it’s still fun and challenging to play. That’s why I put it as my pick as the GOAT.