gaming company teams.. ^.-, which do you favor? Options

[DivA]

as the topic suggests ~ out of all teams that design games for consoles & pc's, which one stands out as your favorite amongst favorites? for myself, i would have to say Level 5 ~ as of late, this one is pushing the boundaries with beautiful games - for TFLO & their newest one, Dragon Quest VIII ~ it's looking good.. =)

honorable mentions..
Crystal Dynamics (Soul Reaver II & III), Konami JP (Castlevania) & ST (PsO)

[Crushinator]

I think Tri-Ace stands out as a first-class dev team. They made Valkyrie Profile, and the Star Ocean series. These are about the only Japanese-style RPGs I can stand to play...they are simply excellent games.

Konami's KCET is great for their work on the Silent Hill series, and the home conversions of DDR. Of course KCEJ is great too, with MGS, MGS2, and ZOE2 under their belts, and MGS3 forthcoming.

On the SEGA front, I like Amusement Vision (Monkey Ball series, F-Zero GX/AX, Daytona USA (DC)), Smilebit (Jet Set Radio series, Panzer Dragoon Orta), and of course Sonic Team (PSO, Samba De Amigo, Nights, and of course Sonic series). With the new SEGA restructuring, the new Smilebit might not be pumping out the same qualilty software as before though (although Amusement Vision is even better because of it).

Atlus' Cave is a great (if not the best) shooter dev...Donpachi series is amazing, E.S.P. Ra De and Guwange are works of art, and the forthcoming E.S.P. Guwange is looking excellent.

From Nintendo, I like Intelligent Systems, most notable for the "Wars" series.