William "B.J." Blazkowicz - The toughest Nazi fighter in the entire world!

How can you not love the storyline of Wolfenstein 3D? You are trapped in a Nazi prison at the bottom of an old castle, and you must fight your way out through Nazi soldiers and their dogs in order to escape from Castle Wolfenstein.

This was the first FPS that I ever got into and, over the course of the series, I developed an affinity for Mr. Blazkowicz; I also found that I enjoyed the shoot-em-up aspect of the game. It was one of the first games that didn’t have a lot of puzzle solving that really engaged me, and I got a kick out of it.

Photo courtesy of GameSpot, a CBS Interactive site.

Sonic the Hedgehog - If speed is your thing, Sonic is your guy.

The Sonic games are fast-paced and engaging and have translated well from platform to platform. Sonic the Hedgehog is a character that stands the test of time; I enjoyed the character when I was young, and my 6-year-old loves him too — in video games and in the cartoons that he has inspired.

Sonic is one of my favorites because his shtick is all about speed, yet it wasn’t a racing game. In the Sonic games, the trick is always to find the path that allows him to maintain his velocity.

The jingle from the cartoon Sonic X contains a line that also sums up the games well: “Gotta go fast, gotta go faster, gotta go faster, faster, faster, faster, faster.”

Photo courtesy of GameSpot, a CBS Interactive site.

Lara Croft - Some gamers don't even know there is a game inside the box.

I was a teen lusting after Lara Croft way before Angelina Jolie took the character to flesh and blood from the 8-bit world where I met her.

Lara Croft always stuck with me because she was the first female video game character I remember. It helps that I was a fan of the genre (level/puzzle) and that the series was always very well done.

Photo courtesy of GameSpot, a CBS Interactive site.

Ken and his brother from another country, Ryu.

Street Fighter probably cost me more quarters than any other arcade game; I even had dreams about this video game on a regular basis. Ken is my favorite of the bunch, though I did have a soft spot for Dhalsim. Ken was my favorite because of his uppercut. I always loved to land that punch and watch him fly to the top of the screen, while my opponent got acquainted with the pavement.

Photo courtesy of GameSpot, a CBS Interactive site.

The Stranger - Lord British brought us the world of Ultima and the hero named The Stranger.

The Stranger was my introduction to adventure gaming and RPG video games. I had played D&D for years at that point, so the mythology that Lord British brought to the game was very engaging. Castles, towns, dungeons, monsters, and an in-game economy gave me the ability to build The Stranger into a hero for the ages.

The protagonist from the Ultima series didn’t look like this when I played as him — he was little more than an ASCII stick figure.

Photo courtesy of GameSpot, a CBS Interactive site.

Arthur Dent - Don't panic and make sure you know where your towel is at all times. You never know when you will have to hitch a ride on a Vogon ship.

Arthur Dent is one of my favorite characters in literature, so being able to play as him, even if only in a text-based game, was great; plus, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy game was my favorite of the text-based adventure genre. Arthur Dent, the hapless Englishman, was a welcome hero in a galaxy that could easily cause one to ignore the “Don’t Panic!” label on the front of the Guide. (Unfortunately, I couldn’t find a photo of the Arthur character.)

Photo courtesy of GameSpot, a CBS Interactive site.

SweetTooth - If you hear the music from his ice cream truck, it is already too late.

The evil ice cream man from Hell has appeared in a number of titles in the Twisted Metal series. SweetTooth isn’t my favorite character in Twisted Metal to play, but man does he make an impression on the box. The flaming head, a grin reminiscent of Nicholson’s Joker, and the t-shirt made for an iconic character.

My favorite game in the series is Twisted Metal: Black, which evolved into the first game I played competitively on the Internet, Twisted Metal: Online. My favorite character to play was Yellowjacket from Twisted Metal: Black. His special weapon was explosive spikes that jutted out from under his car. You got bonus damage when you used turbo to ram another car. I really loved getting up close and personal with folks.

Photo courtesy of GameSpot, a CBS Interactive site.

Master Chief and me - The full size hero meets the plus size gamer.

Master Chief, the protagonist from the Halo series, is easily my favorite video game character. Master Chief is my idea of the ultimate soldier. A man who almost single-handedly turned around a war that humans were losing, and then sacrificed himself to the depths of deep space to wipe out the last specter of the alien menace and the organism that could turn people into virtual zombies. What’s not to love?

This photo is from when I visited Bungie headquarters a couple of weeks before Halo 3 was released in 2007. Three years later, I’ve racked up more than 4,500 matchmaking games in Halo 3, along with a thousand Grifball matches.

Photo credit: Andy Moon.