Start off choosing the type of CPU you want to use then select a suitable CPU for your Needs then a M'Board that suits that CPU then RAM to suit your Needs a OS to suit the amount of installed RAM and so on.
Personally despite what some others may say I personally Prefer Intel CPU's and Chip Set M'Boards. They might be slightly more expensive though I don't personally see it but they are far less subject to Incompatibilities that the nVidia Chip Set M'Boards are.
So for a High End Gaming Rig I would chose a i7 CPU, a Gigabyte M'Board
http://www.gigabyte.us/products/product-page.aspx?pid=3870#sp
Depending on the Game Types you plan on using maybe 16 GIG of Corsair RAM in 1 X 16 GIG Kit
http://www.corsair.com/memory-by-product-family/vengeance/vengeance-16gb-dual-channel-ddr3-memory-kit-cmz16gx3m4a1600c9b.html
A suitable 64 Bit OS which owing to the games tends to be some form of Windows I suppose.
A SATA Optical Drive maybe a Blueray Burner I personally prefer the Sony ones but that's just me any should be OK.
For HDD I prefer Seagate but owing the the Floods in Thailand they may be in short supply when you are ready to buy any so Samsung seem to work quite well and don't have the failures that WD Drives or Hitachi Drives have.
I personally Love Antec Cases and Power Supplies which are just simple to use no sharp edges to cut you and ready for Liquid Cooling if you want to go that path. Not to mention all but Tooless with most of them. ;)
http://www.antec.com/Believe_it/product.php?Family=NA==
http://www.antec.com/Believe_it/product.php?Family=MzM5
Just a word of warning here the Skeleton may look [b]"Different"[/b] and may encourage some to want to use one but they are not the easiest things to change things on if you plan of making numerous changes over the life of the system and may lack the ability to stuff enough bits into it. ;)
If you want to go the AMD Route maybe a one of the FX Processors
http://www.amd.com/us/products/desktop/processors/amdfx/Pages/amdfx.aspx
a Gigabyte M'Board like this
http://www.gigabyte.us/products/product-page.aspx?pid=3988#sp
The Same RAM as suggested above well more or less everything else as suggested above.
The only thing I have left out is a Video Card as these are very much personal Preference and if you are not using a Intel Chip Set M'Board you need to be very careful choosing something suitable and this all depends on the M'Board Chip Set. Si if you have a Intel Chip Set any Video Card is likely to work provided it's one of the High End Types, but with nVidia Chip Set M'Boards I would stick with nVidia Chip Set Video Cards and ATI Chip Set M'Boards which are the new standard for AMD CPU's because AMD make them for their CPU's I would use one of the High End ATI Video Cards
So a chip Set like this for nVidia
http://www.gigabyte.us/products/product-page.aspx?pid=4006#ov
and one like this for ATI
http://www.gigabyte.us/products/product-page.aspx?pid=3693#ov
Though you can use any Makers Video Card I find that the Gigabyte ones have been more reliable for me and my customers. ;)
Col
