Best FIRST game...

[mathking]

I think my personal favorite is probably 2012. It was fun to play and easy for observers to understand. For exciting match play, 2005 ranks pretty high. It was so easy for their to be big score changes really fast. (You complete one or two rows and take one or two away from you opponents.) On second thought, I think 2006 was probably just as good (and accessible to observers) a game as 2012, it's just that our robot was not as good in 2006 as in 2012.

The great thing is I have never gone to an FRC competition and not had fun. There have been plenty of times when I was frustrated and had fun, was elated and hand fun, was annoyed and had fun... but I have always had fun. Already some people have identified my least favorite game (Lunacy) as their favorite. Which is part of what makes FIRST cool. My initial reaction to the game this year was a resounding "meh" or something like close to it. But I have still been happy, entertained and engaged through the build season. Every time I have been underwhelmed by a game on kickoff day the reality has been an improvement.

[Oblarg]

Minus the problems with reffing, I'd say Aerial Assist is my clear favorite. After that, Overdrive or Ultimate Ascent.

[bigbeezy]

I can't really comment on 2011 or 2012 as I wasn't involved with FIRST at all during those 2 years... but my rankings since 2005 would be:

2007 - Love placing games. good strategy and climbing onto alliance partners was awesome
2014 - excellent strategy game and fun to watch with teams who knew what they were doing
2005 - Lifting heavy game pieces well over 10' was pretty cool, especially as a rookie; crowds had no idea what was going on or what the final score would be
2013 - fun fast paced game with a difficult and exciting end game
2006 - was fun at the time but compared to more recent games there really wasn't much to it
2010 - soccer ew...but really, i liked the end game and the bumps made things entertaining
2008 - unless you were driving it was pretty boring
2009 - ...

[pandamonium]

2005 - Tough Challenge, good strategy, switch to 3v3
2007 - AMAZING for Strategy
2006 - I really liked the way they did different periods.
2013 - Pyramids!?!?!
2012 - interesting
2010 - Soccer and 469 + 1114 How did that alliance loose!!!?!?!
2014 - Really good set of matches on Einstein
2011 - Best Auto End game was worth way too much points
2008 - So Confusing
2009 - I never really liked bumper cars.

[c.shu]

I guess I'm the only one here that preferred 2010 Breakaway over the rest. I don't mind a little physicality in a game, I think it adds to the excitement for the spectators.

[Kevin Leonard]

My favorite games have to be the past two years, Ultimate Ascent and Aerial Assist, in that order.
They were both games that were exciting to watch, and had a variety of strategies that could win the game.
I like games where an inferior Alliance can beat a technically superior Alliance by playing the game intelligently, but robot skill still matters.
With that in mind, I prefer games that give the advantage to the offense rather than the defense, and as such my favorite games are as follows:

Ultimate Ascent
Aerial Assist
Breakaway
Rebound Rumble
Aim High
Overdrive
Logomotion
Rack and Roll
Raising the Bar
(Everything else)

[Briansmithtown]

Originally Posted by Kevin Leonard

My favorite games have to be the past two years, Ultimate Ascent and Aerial Assist, in that order.
They were both games that were exciting to watch, and had a variety of strategies that could win the game.
I like games where an inferior Alliance can beat a technically superior Alliance by playing the game intelligently, but robot skill still matters.
With that in mind, I prefer games that give the advantage to the offense rather than the defense, and as such my favorite games are as follows:

Ultimate Ascent
Aerial Assist
Breakaway
Rebound Rumble
Aim High
Overdrive
Logomotion
Rack and Roll
Raising the Bar
(Everything else)

In Aerial Assist, our last match of NYC, we were downed 2 robots, and I was left to drive. Lets just say I might of gotten a little aggressive, but in the end, the score was 108 to 137. Granted, we lost, but 108 by yourself is some kind of feat. Just a little story for you.

[K-Dawg157]

I've only been on FIRST for 3 years, so my favorites go as such:

2014 Aerial Assist. Gosh was it fun. When driving you were having fun and able to work with other teams and last minute moves could mean a win or loss for your alliance (I was the operator and in one of my alliance's semi-finals matches I released a truss shot right before the timer went off and it gave us the extra points to win the match... you could say I was excited ).

2015 Recycle Rush. I think this year is going to be a good one. I think that it will be more strategy and selectively choosing alliances. Especially in the playoffs when top seeded alliances will probably go for teams that can do what their robot can't instead of three amazing robots that could do the same exact thing and one being downgraded. I like that your robot almost has to have a specialty to do well. Should be good.

2013 Ultimate Ascent. I don't know, I didn't love this one. It was more of an in the air game than down on the robots' level (shooting frisbees high with no passing or such interaction like Aerial Assist). It is definitely my least favorite so far.

[Jared Russell]

I have participated in every game since 2001, and here are my thoughts on the games that I have observed.

Ultimate Ascent (2013) and Rebound Rumble (2012) were heads and shoulders above the games that came previously (or since). Excellent mix of scoring challenges, a good offense-defense balance, linear scoring, a nice mix of autonomous challenges, fun to watch, AMAZING endgames, some mobility challenges to consider (going under/over obstacles), worthwhile vision challenges, relatively easy to explain. Oh, and relatively open parts utilization rules compared to prior seasons. Some nits to pick (like the Coopertition Bridge aspect in 2012, and the fact that climbing should have been worth more points in 2013), but all around excellent games.

Next I put Aim High (2006). It was a simple high volume shooting game, and the first time the vision challenge was worthwhile.

FIRST Frenzy (2004) was a nightmare to explain, but it was a fantastically intricate challenge with many ways to score and led to highly varied designs.

Triple Play (2005) had an elegantly simple game mechanic (tic tac toe) and was always exciting to watch (though they should have done something different with the endgame).

Breakaway (2010) was a great idea, but would have been executed better with more lenient robot rules regarding ball possession.

Rack N Roll (2007) too often degenerated into a defense-fest, but it was a nice scoring challenge and a really interesting endgame. Would have been better with linear scoring and some sort of mechanism for limiting defense.

Overdrive (2008) was exciting to watch, but a little too simplistic for my liking. Would have been better with an additional game piece or a more heavily emphasized endgame objective.

Aerial Assist (2014) was awesome during Championship eliminations, and painful to watch just about any other time. The rules led to too much referee subjectivity, the autonomous challenge was such that you were better off not to try than to try and fail, and 4 out of 6 robots had no offensive objective at any given time, leading to scrums. I maintain that the game would have been MUCH more interesting if the truss had been only 18" off the ground

Logomotion (2011) remedied the defense balance of 2007, but maybe a little bit too much. The endgame challenge was the worst that FIRST has ever given us, and the scoring system was terrible. The IRI rule changes made the game a little more palatable.

Stack Attack (2003) had the original autonomous mode, and some interesting strategic aspects due to the nontraditional scoring mechanism, but was once again totally broken by having too much defense (and said nontraditional scoring mechanism).

Zone Zeal (2002) was a stump pulling contest.

Lunacy (2009) was like watching children play rugby.

Diabolical Dynamics (2001) is alone at the bottom because without robots interacting, who cares?

(I will not rate Recycle Rush until after the season, but you can probably infer my opinion from my ranking of similar games...)

[Jscout11]

For me, it's Ultimate Ascent (2013). Nothing else comes close.

[fr05ty27355]

1.) Ultimate Ascent
- Huge mix of robot designs and challenges (shooting, climbing, picking up off floor, etc.)
- Very exciting to watch; lots of robot movement and action

2.) Logo Motion
- Minibot challenge was fun to design and work with
- Fun game to watch

3.) Rebound Rumble
- Many different cool robot designs
- Triple balancing was very exciting to watch

[Addison4300]

I've only done 1 other competition which was Ultimate Ascent in 2013. It was outstanding and changed my outlook on how I was going to plan the rest of my life. So I'd have to say Ultimate Ascent.

[jman4747]

2011 best endgame, 2009 best feild... or perhaps...

Seriously, 2013 easy. Best field, main game, game piece, best rule set, and best overall. The Frisbee shooter is still the coolest thing in our shop, and the ammo doesn't wear out or deflate. 2012 for best endgame and 2nd best field, balancing on the bridge was incredibly fun.

[Loose Screw]

I've been in FRC since 2009, and coached FTC for the last few years. I've looked into past games, but my favorite has to be....

2013-14 FTC Block party

This game (from my viewpoint) was perfect.
Rookies could contribute to winning alliances by driving forward (onto the ramp) in autonmous, and then spin the flag in the endgame. Easy points that impact the game, but don't break it.

Teams that could do more could hang for a few more points than spinning the flag, but that still could be outscored by a team that scored a lot of blocks. And just scoring blocks wouldn't be enough to beat an alliance that did a combination of tasks. Autonomous modes could be as simple as scoring into a container and parking on the ramp, or going for the IR container and juking the opposing robots from blocking you from the ramp.

Matches at the highest level of competition were really exciting. Both teams had to score as many blocks as they could or they'd lose. If they missed the flag or a hang they lost. The division finals in the Iowa super regional had two double hangs in a match.

TL;DR
This game was just as hard for rookies as it was for veterans. Most importantly, EVERY PART OF THE GAME WAS IMPORTANT. I have yet to see a game as well balanced as Block party.

[waialua359]

I like games where we dont kill ourselves during the build season.
2013 and 2014 were fairly easier for us compared to many other years.

2006 Aim High, by far my most favorite game.