First thing’s first, here is Sanderson’s top 10:
10. Katamari Damacy
9. Undertale
8. Fallout: New Vegas
7. Super Mario World
6. The Curse of Monkey Island
5. The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild
4. Halo 2
3. Final Fantasy X
2. Bloodborne
1. Civilization VI
You can go to Sanderson’s original blog post to read a few of his thoughts on each game, but we have a few thoughts on this list (and how it ties into his work) that you won’t get from Brandon himself.
Before we even get into the individual games, one thing that stands out right away is just how diverse it is. There’s practically a game for every genre in here — 4X strategy, first-person shooters, action games, RPGs, and even Katamari — which, it’s fair to say, is a genre unto itself. No one would have expected Sanderson’s list to stay beholden to his chosen literary genres of fantasy and science fiction, but it’s fun to image the ways that games like Undertale or Super Mario World have seeped into his work.
There are, of course, a few entries on this list that seem a lot more related to his literary work, and even a few that help explain his worlds and writing. Games like Bloodborne and Breath of the Wild seem like natural companions for Sanderson’s fantasy worlds and work, fraternal twins tied together by the thoroughness of vision in their settings and the sense of adventure and experimental challenge they offer players. Meanwhile, games like Curse of Monkey Island and Fallout: New Vegas seem like perfect indicators of Sanderson’s sense of humor and the kind of irreverence he occasionally brings to his books as well.
But the real skeleton keys to his work on this list are Final Fantasy X and Civilization VI. Anyone who’s read Sanderson’s Stormlight Archives series and encountered the way he blends together dozens of cultures and countries in its world should recognize the fact that it comes from someone who’s clearly spent hundreds of hours in Civilization, pushing the borders of their country’s influence through trade, culture, or simple warfare. Meanwhile, the blog post mentions that Sanderson is a lifelong fan of the Final Fantasy series, and it’s clearly shaped the way he views magic in his written worlds. It would take hundreds of pages to fully unpack the relationship between his Cosmere and the worlds of Final Fantasy, but for now, it’s enough to know that X is his favorite entry.
Sanderson has never been particularly private about the art he loves, or the ways it’s influenced his writing. But with this list of favorite games as a starting point, let’s hope he delves more into how these games have influenced him sometime in the future.