Obviously

Hmm... Final Fantasy X, Dragon Quest VIII and Shadow Hearts : Covenant.

I haven't played the other two games you mentioned (though I have watched FF10 videos; the game badly needs a cutscene skip option and the postgame's balance is atrocious), but as a long term Dragon Quest fan I found DQ8 to be rather disappointing when I played it. I actually enjoyed Romancing SaGa: Minstrel Song, which was released in the US around the same time, more than DQ8.

(Interestingly enough, I noticed that RS: MS has full voice acting (including every minor town NPC), which seems rather surprising for a game that wasn't expected to do as well in the US, while DQ8 English PS2 version only has certain scenes voice acted.)

Neverwinter nights was my favorite engine, but not my davorite rpg. Legends of Leefe was my favorite rpg, but that makes me sound egotistical because it was my server on nwn, but I had so much fun building and playing it for years.

My favorite in 2010 was alpha protocol. I'm not sure if it fits in just under or over the wire of time. It was a mess. I hated a lot of the bugs and the drm destroyed the game at first. But it was the best risk I'd seen in a long time and the game was really fun to play.

I like to tinker with RPGs but I dont often finish all the way through because the story becomes obvious, the gameplay becomes stale, or the game's intentions outlive my hard drive. But I finished alpha protocol in a week. It was only 14 hours long, but still. That's a lot if straight playing for me.

I'm a big fan of BG, IWD, ToEE and plenty of others and that I probably enjoyed more overall, but nothing haf that remarkable rush of Alpha Protocol.

Depends on who you ask.
To me, yes, they are mostly because the story tends to play out like a RPG.

Probably Titan Quest.

Then mine would be Monster hunter tri!
I just can’t get into the Witcher series. Didn’t like the combat system for Witcher 1 and I think that put me off trying the rest of the series

THIS

Really liked the way the combat... flowed (just except the moments when the camera positioning when swarmed made it hard to target properly). What bothered me was how they went overboard with the bad consequences and I was... afraid to continue for quite a while, before forcing myself to push through, due to the feeling that if I did one thing I'll break three others later.

Just started Witcher 2 though and the combat in that felt very... console-y. System couldn't quite handle it then though, and current one doesn't even have a dedicated video card so even less so, so didn't try again, but did feel off-putting.

1. Dragon Quest VIII
2. Diablo II
3. The Witcher
4. Skies of Arcadia
5. Final Fantasy XII
6. Final Fantasy IX
7. Disgaea Hour of Darkness
8. Final Fantasy Tactics
9. Torchlight
10. Borderlands

That is a good game. Its the one that got me into that series in the first place.

The one I played a whole heck of a lot?

Deus Ex and it was totally worth all the time I put into it.

DQ VIII was such a beautiful game for the Ps2, it felt like being in the cast of a Toriyama anime back then that was the appeal for me, with a vast world and simple classic gameplay.

FF X was the first to grant ingame control to the aeons / summons, was very linear but had ton of Asian charm and quite endearing characters, intriguing story, technically very, very imrpessive for ps2 hardware.. Mostty choked full of pure fantasy.

Ahh.. Shadow Hearts... They take some of Lovecraft lore with a MC able to morph into monsters at the cost of sanity points iirc, great comedy moments with crazy cast of characters and a unique combat system called "the wheel" where every action is tied to a clockwork where you hit the button to stop the hands for either safe hits or risky criticals, even to try and win discounts in shops; very original and addicting systems. First game was flawed but good enough, promising, second direct sequel was genuinely great and third ... New main character, forgettable.

Actually, I think I can explain my issues with this game:
1. The beautiful graphics come at a cost, in both load times and the speed of combat. (I believe the English version's orchestral soundtrack also contributs to the load times.)
2. The inclusion of a skill point system with no respect. In Dragon Quest 6 and 7, it wasn't that painful to learn the skills you didn't learn in the post-game, in order to see what they're like; in Dragon Quest 8, it is. Also, there's the fact that, when you level up, you *must* spend all skill points gained right then and there, forcing the player to make an irreversible (remeber, there's no re-spec) decision before the game can continue.
3. You don't get the option of playing with different parties. You can't play with a magic-heavy or physical-heavy party the way you can in, say, Dragon Quest 3; you *have* to have two fighter-types (one of whom doesn't even get good physical damage options) and two spellcasters (one of whom gets the most powerful physical skill available to the player). It doesn't help that the characters aren't balanced with each other. I could also mention that the silent protagonist is forced to be male, which I consider inexcusable in a series that used to offer a female main character as an option (see DQ3 and DQ4; the option appears again in DQ9 but is apparently absent again in DQ11 (DQ10 should not have been a numbered entry, and should have been a spin-off)).
4. Dragon Quest 7 may have had too many skills, but Dragon Quest 8 dropped too many of them. Among the skills that DQ8 lacks are the skills that let you trade health or defense for more damage (double-edged slash, double up) and skills that allow the character to take damage meant for other characters, resulting in fewer strategic options for the player.
5. A few other things: You can't store your money until relatively late (compared to other DQ games), so a party wipe could end up costing you a lot of money, especially if it happens right before you get the option to store your money. Random encounters are easy, except when an enemy decides to do the Dance of Death (an ability the player could use in DQ6 and DQ7, but not DQ8 and it's now much more deadly) or cast (Ka)thwack and wipe out 3 or 4 of your characters, at which point the game isn't being fair. Disruptive wave, which now destroys tension as well as magical effects (making tension a non-viable strategy when a boss uses it), is way too common in boss fights, and, like Dance of Death, is no longer player-usable (it was in DQ5-DQ7, and in DQ4 there was an item with a similar effect when used).

It is these sorts of reasons why it is one of my least favorite Dragon Quest games, along with Dragon Quest 5 (though for mostly different reasons).

Edit: DQ8 is still better than Final Fantasy 7, however (but FF7 isn't from the 2000s, and hence is outside the scope of this topic).