In some articles PC Games Hardware has taken a look at the different special effects, objects or characters and how they are realized in PC games. That's nice so far, but which are the top games in each category?

With this question we are going to deal in a special series, consisting of (at least) two parts. We selected all in all 18 categories and will nominate the three games that stick up in each of them. The choice is based on the opinion of the editors and is of course not a universally valid list. Besides the game we think to offer the be the visually best we also took "historically valuable” games into account if they set new standards in a category and are still regarded to be some of the best examples. Besides that Crysis (Warhead) is not listed in every category although the game would actually be a hotshot in almost any ranking because even for today its graphics care just impressive. The one category we would like to direct your attention at is "Courageous Graphics”. Here we want to award games like Borderlands that don't stick to the established visual style patterns and try to spice up the market with different ideas.

In this first part of the special series we want to take a look at the following categories:
• Water
• Fire
• Explosions
• Shadows
• Vegetation
• Characters
• Snow and Ice
• Courageous Graphics

In the following part(s) we will deal with the categories below:
• Reflections
• Sky
• Cars
• Aircrafts
• Spacecrafts
• Monsters
• Overall Graphics (covering all effects)
• Atmosphere (the graphics that transfer or support a game's atmosphere best)
• Best MMO Graphics

Do you miss a category? And in which category you think other than us about the ranking of the games? Post a comment and tell us what you think.





More special articles at PC Games Hardware
• The sky in games - development from 1984 until 2009
• Snow and ice in games - a walk around wintery pixel worlds
• The evolution of fire in PC games
• Special: Remarkable explosions in games