What are the most influential games?

[voodoolily]

I.e., why did you start gaming?

Me: Oregon Trail was what we had to do instead of recess on the many rainy lunch periods of my childhood. I PWNED those fucking buffalo!

[schild]

Oregon Trail was big for me. But really it was Where in the World is Carmen San Diego, Mario and a little later Journeyman Project (1). Journeyman Project was positively massive for me.



Love.

[Margalis]

My first favorite game was probably "Venture" for the Colecovision or "Robot Odyssey" for the Apple. In Robot Odyssey you had robots and you would wire them together to make them do stuff, like if the robot hits a bumper it fires of an engine. It got really complicated with different gates (OR, NOT, etc), lots of parts, etc.

And I grew up to be a nerdy engineer. Imagine that.

[Yoru]

I actually can't recall when I started gaming. This is because one of my earliest memories is standing in front of a TV with an Atari controller in hand playing Pacman.

My early computer gaming experiences were mostly Apple II-based: Oregon Trail, Prince of Persia, Math Blasters, Lemonade Stand, and some sort of game-like thing that let you stick 2D scenes together based on a background and 2D monochrome sprites, then type in a few lines of text to make a story and print it out (on old-style fanfold paper!) into your very own book.

My first PC was a 386 with some form of DOS on it, on which I played Civilization, Secret Weapons of the Luftwaffe, SimCity, Master of Orion and Wolfenstein 3D.

The game that really got me into computers was SimCity 2000, which I played the living hell out of for a good 2 years. It put me on the track of learning about hardware, as I had to not only upgrade to a blazing-fast 486DX2, but also needed a graphics card with Super VGA support. This was also when I played games like DOOM/DOOM2, which introduced me to mods later on... That ol' DX2 also later ran my first Windows OS: Windows 3.1.

In junior high, I found a little game called ZZT that let you play (and make!) ASCII-mode terminal games (similar in presentation to nethack, but with more structure) - which would be the first time I made a game, or game level, really.

Eventually I got an internet connection (9600 baud AOL, it was the premiere ISP at the time), in which I played my first online game - a text MUD called Alan Lenton's Federation. It was also my first brush with catassery and my parents banned the game after I ran up a $300 AOL bill one month.

[Velorath]

My early gaming was done on my neighbor's Intellivision at first (Astrosmash in particular).  Then my father picked up a Colecovision (complete with Smurfs) for our first console.  Computer-wise, the elementary school I went to had several Apple II's in the library.  In addition to the standard Oregon Trail, we also had one of the Carmen Sandiego games, Jumpman, Gertrude's Secrets, and Number Munchers.  Oh and for some reason one of my classrooms had Pitfall II which I loved playing.

[stray]

Defender of the Crown -- It's simplistic now, but at the time, that game offered a little bit of everything. Map based strategy and army building, political ally making and subterfuge, castle sieges, swordfighting, adventure like dialogue, jousting events. I've been wanting all games to have this kind of variety ever since.

Super Mario Bros -- Killed the arcade and kept me at home.

Excitebike -- Probably the first game where I did absolutely nothing but built things and messed around with game mechanics just for the hell of it.

Nobunaga's Ambition -- Defender of the Crown had variety, but this was my first intro to depth. 9 year olds should never be so immersed (especially in something as obscure as 16th century Japanese feudal history). Like Defender of the Crown, I've been chasing this game ever since.

Full Throttle - Compelled me to buy dozens of adventure games afterwards. Storytelling and un-juvenile settings existed before Full Throttle, but this was the gold standard for me.

Wing Commander -- My "Doom" before Doom.

[Stormwaltz]

My dad was an early adopter of the Atari 2600. I think he got that when I was in first or second grade. I went through grade school with Combat, Asteroids, etc.

But if you mean computer gaming (which most here seem to have inferred), Sid Meier's Silent Service. I played it on my friend Max's Commodore 64 when I was in 6th grade. Stalking or rampaging through Japanese convoys, trying to sneak out from under depth charge attacks... there was nothing remotely that sophisticated on the 2600. (It probably helped that occurred near the beginning of a long fascination with Pacific War history). Once I knew that games like that existed, consoles just couldn't hold my attention anymore.

[Johny Cee]

Romance of the Three Kingdoms for the SNES > Nobungo's Ambition,  though both were good.

My first favorite video game was River Raid,  I think.  That or Combat (tanks and had to use the wheel controller, right?)

[Viin]

I didn't play many games until almost high school, but I do remember the very first game I played for hours and hours: Aces of the Pacific. I still have it in the original box somewhere around here. The F-19 Stealth Fighter game from Microprose was also a time consumer. Full Throttle and Myst were also 'ground breaking' games, from where I was sitting.

Since I was a poor boy and my momma didn't believe in spending money on video games (or a computer) most of the games I played were at a friend's house. Once I got into high school and had access to a lab of computers, the game of choice was any number of MUDs since they were free and only required telnet (particularly Kobra, a star-wars themed PvP game and Tron, a PvP olypmic tournament-style game based on Tron (obviously). Genocide introduced me to the idea of multi-team round-based pvp combat).

After high school I would say Asheron's Call, because it was the first graphical MMO I played that didn't look like complete crap. Yes it wasn't great, but it was a long sight better than Meridian 59. Half-life was pretty good when it came out, but it was overhyped in my opinion. The real mover came as a mod: Counter-Strike.

Next up on my list is Battlefield 1942, for giving us large scale FPS multiplayer games that wasn't just deathmatches on UT or Quake.

I haven't really seen much else since then that's note worthy. Sure, some games have cool graphics or an interesting concept or two, but I haven't seen anything that changes the way we expect games to be from this point on.

(But! If I forget a game because I wrote this in 10 mins without really thinking very hard, I reserve the right to edit the above list).

This is PC games only - the only console games I like are Project Gotham Racing and Soul Caliber .. I haven't played many others.

[Margalis]

I'm scarred for life thanks to the bat from the Smurfs. You know what I'm talking about! Damn those Smurfs were some true losers - a bat, a weed, maybe a stalactite - oh noes!

[UnSub]

I played quite a few games on the C64, but I'm damned if I can remember any names other than Sentiel and Double Dragon. My brother used to love playing Run Monty Run (and I can still hum the theme music).

Played a lot of arcade games too - Double Dragon was a favourite, but the one I really liked was a sideways scroller with a guy in an orange space suit called Xexon or something like that. After you beat the level boss you went into your space ship for some sideways scrolling shooting in space.

When I got a bit older, Mutant Fighter was awsome at the arcade. I went as either Dragon or Hercules (with his "You are a bug to me!" battlecry... good times...).

On the 386, Hero's Quest I (retitled to something else) was probably the first game I stuck through to the end. Oh, and I put a lot of time into Ultima 1. Still got the Ultima 1, 2 and 3 pack somewhere...

[stray]

Romance of the Three Kingdoms for the SNES > Nobungo's Ambition,  though both were good.

Didn't have an SNES. Had an SMS and NES, and then went full Sega Fanboi for the next few generations. Didn't even have an N64.

Either way, the same principle stands for both games. For a kid (as I was then), Nobunaga stood in sharp contrast to Bubble Bobble, Dig Dug, and Mario.

My first favorite video game was River Raid,  I think.  That or Combat (tanks and had to use the wheel controller, right?)

I had River Raid on the Atari 5200. It was a poor man's Spy Hunter imho ;)

Combat was great (don't remember anything about Paddle controllers though). Tanks were intense. Bi-plane battles never failed to crack me up.

[Zetleft]

All the original Police Quest, Kings Quest, Space Quest and Leisure Suit Larry games got me hooked early.... damn I loved me some Sierra.  After that Silent Hunter and Gunship got me into simulations I later played to death like Aces over the Pacific/Europe and the original Mechwarrior games (yes its a simulation damnit).  Guess you can add xwing to that list too, played that alot in my autocad class. 

Another World and Flashback, now those are two games I played over and over even after I finished them, as a matter of fact think I'm gonna play them again soon.  Alone in the Dark 1 classic creepy game.  The Geiger inspired Darkseed games were great too.  Some of you already mentioned Pirates! but hell it bears repeating.  Can't forget Guantlet for first taste of co-op greatness. 

Nothing beats the original MOO for space empire building.  Xcom started my love of turn based strategy games.  Better stop now or I'm gonna keep going like this all night.

[Rasix]

Heh, I distinctly remember the game that turned me into a "gamer":  Final Fantasy 1.  Once I found what I considered my first good console RPG, I was hooked. Early games like River City Ransom sealed the deal.  Gaming was for me. 

Warcraft 2 was what turned me into a PC gamer. I spent crazy hours playing that on a local BBS.

Edit: Nobunaga's Ambition was the shizzle.

[MisterNoisy]

I got my start playing 'Adventure' on a terminal connected to a monstrous mainframe in my dad's office at the age of 5 or 6.  Right about that time, we also picked up a 2600 and a copy of Combat and I was hooked, but good.

> xyzzy

[Cyrrex]

This is an interesting question.  Like a few others in the thread, my mommy generally didn't approve of the whole video games thing...which didn't mean she tried to stop me from being interested, but rather refused to plunk down the money for something like an Atari or Intellivision.  So while I may have enjoyed some of the games my friends had on those early consoles, none of them really drew me in.

I did see and play a lot of arcade games at an early age, however.  There were a number of good ones, but two of them stand out the most in hindsight.  The first was that Star Wars flight-sim thing (it might have just been called Star Wars?)...the one with all the wire-frame graphics and the Death Star attack runs.  Holy fuck!  Every single quarter I dropped into that machine was filled with sweaty anticipation and utter euphoria.  I simply couldn't believe they could create such a thing.  The other game, oddly enough, was Dragon's Lair.  When it first came out, it was visually superior to everything that preceded it, and it's strange world scared me just a little.  Ironically, I never dropped a single quarter in the machine...it's like I was too overwhelmed to try it, but I could watch the big kids play for hours.

In my early teens, I acquired my first console - good old vanilla NES (and no, mommy didn't pay for it, I did).  Again, a number of quality titles such as Mario, Excitebike, Kung Fu, etc.  The two that stand out as opening my eyes up to the real possibilities of gaming were probably Dragon Warrior and Nobunga's Ambition.  I wasn't even aware of their respective genrés until I started playing them, and I was completely blown away.  Honorable mention would go to the original Ninja Gaiden...that game had amazing atmosphere for an NES game.

Years and years later, my roommate in the military had acquired one of them new fandangled SNES machines.  He had a couple of games for it, none of which I can remember.   One day the local PX got in a new arcade machine...Street Fighter 2.  Like most masculine persons of that age, we fell instantly in love with SF2.   Imagine our surprise and utter joy when we would later find that we could purchase it for his console.  And it was generally as good as or even better (control-wise) than it's arcade counterpart, and the graphics were pretty close too...which to me was unthinkable at the time.  Thousands of hours of multiplayer fun later, it easily makes my list as one of the most influential and most fun games ever.

Several years would pass, and while there were new games and even new consoles, none of them really sucked me in too deep.  And then came Gran Turismo and FFVII for the PS1.  Both of these games gave me similar feelings of WTF how did they do this?!  I think it was around this time were I could finally admit to myself that gaming was no longer for kiddies, and that I would probably be hooked for life.

The original Jedi Knight game for the PC is what hooked me into PC gaming.  People probably look back at it with scorn or indifference now, but it was fucking marvel at the time as far as I am concerned.  Not only could I run around with a lightsaber and force powers in a convincing Star Wars setting, but I could do it against other human beings.  Multiplayer, clans, and even real competitions.  This was really my first view into the possibilities of PC (and internet) gaming, and I'm still looking for an experience equal to it in caliber.

And that's it.  There have been other games since JK that have sort of kept me going and have been important in their own way (like SWG getting me back into PC gaming as well as being my first MMO, Far Cry with both it's physics and amazing graphics, Oblivion for it's depth), but honestly - I'm still waiting for that next "holy fuck!" experience to come along and alter my perceptions as to what is possible.

[Trippy]

Umm...Pong in the lounge of a Continental airlines flight (back before deregulation when planes actually had large lounges in the middle)? Actually probably Adventure (the Don Woods version) on a TOPS-20 system. I used to sneak out of the house as a child in the wee early mornings on the weekends (accounts had time limits that didn't start until like 9am) to bike down to the university to play games on that system.

[Tebonas]

My first game ever was Tron on some Unix machine.
My first own game was Hunt The Wumpus, written in basic.
My first commercial game was Manic Miner on the ZX Spectrum


But the game that started my infuriation with games? Sundog - Frozen Legacy on my trusty Atari ST. Space+Planet exploration, Space Fights, Trading, meeting strange people in seedy bars, building your own city , that fucking game seemed to have everything.

[Strazos]

Hmmm....

Well, I got a NES when I was 4 years old. Ran through all the old classics, such as the SMB series and Zelda.

My next system was a Genesis when I was 7. Sonic, early Madden, early NHL series, General Chaos, tons of other games. I did a lot of rentals and shit at this time.

Next system was a SNES when I was 9. Link to the Past, Megaman X, etc etc. Lot more rentals. Really got into RPGs with this system; Secret of Mana, FF, etc.

Technically, I never had my own PSone, so I just used my sister's. FF7, FFT, NHL 98...I actually did not have a lot of PS games. I did get a PS2 eventually (like 2 or 3 years after release), originally for GTA 3. I had a few other PS2 games...but I eventually traded in the system for an Xbox - I simply could not find many games I actually Liked on the system...sure, there were a lot of RPGs, and people here say they were good...but I don't care. Why?

Because by this point I had thoroughly forsaken console gaming for the PC.

My really early PC stuff was Yukon Trail, a few C64 things (I think it was a C64...it was a hand-me-down, and we didn't have it long), and some other forgettable titles. A friend eventually got me in WC2. I actually didn't play it a whole lot, but I liked it. But eventually, my household got Prodigy. The service in itself wasn't great, but it had one game that put me on the trail towards PC and online gaming:

Gemstone III (now IV). For those who do not know, it's a MU*. I think it's a great MU*...hell, I still think it's a great game, and still go back to it every 2 years or so. Anyway, back when I first started, you had to pay hourly...I was 12 or so, so I didn't realize that my parents had a shite plan and I had to actually pay that hourly rate....

I quickly racked up a bill of something like $160+, and so we did not have internet in my house for about a year after that.

Later, we got a better PC in our house, and I started reading PC gaming mags, and saw an ad and later article about a game that looked like it would be quite awesome.  My friends and I had started to play AD&D at some point, so this looked like it was right up my alley.

Baldur's Gate. This game, and this game alone, it was converted me from a dedicated console player who played on the PC sometimes to a hardcore PC gamer. It was everything I thought it could be, and more.

So, in summation. BG got me playing on the PC, and GSIII got me playing online with lots of people. Sure, I had Diablo too, but I only played that with a couple of friends. I still have not found any other games that I found to be as...influential.

[Cyrrex]

Baldur's Gate. This game, and this game alone, it was converted me from a dedicated console player who played on the PC sometimes to a hardcore PC gamer. It was everything I thought it could be, and more.

Somewhere, probably all scratched and dusty, I have a copy of BG and at least one expansion that I bought from the bargain bin and yet NEVER played.  NWN was the first Bioware offering I'd ever played...and I liked it enough that I was sure I could easily get into BG, even if it was a few years older.   But when I loaded it up for the first time, I just couldn't get past the really dated graphics.  Am I really missing out so much that I should force myself to plow through the initial graphical letdown, or is the game so dated now that it isn't worth the bother?

[Signe]

I actually can't recall when I started gaming. This is because one of my earliest memories is standing in front of a TV with an Atari controller in hand playing Pacman.

My early computer gaming experiences were mostly Apple II-based: Oregon Trail, Prince of Persia, Math Blasters, Lemonade Stand, and some sort of game-like thing that let you stick 2D scenes together based on a background and 2D monochrome sprites, then type in a few lines of text to make a story and print it out (on old-style fanfold paper!) into your very own book.

My first PC was a 386 with some form of DOS on it, on which I played Civilization, Secret Weapons of the Luftwaffe, SimCity, Master of Orion and Wolfenstein 3D.

The game that really got me into computers was SimCity 2000, which I played the living hell out of for a good 2 years. It put me on the track of learning about hardware, as I had to not only upgrade to a blazing-fast 486DX2, but also needed a graphics card with Super VGA support. This was also when I played games like DOOM/DOOM2, which introduced me to mods later on... That ol' DX2 also later ran my first Windows OS: Windows 3.1.

In junior high, I found a little game called ZZT that let you play (and make!) ASCII-mode terminal games (similar in presentation to nethack, but with more structure) - which would be the first time I made a game, or game level, really.

Eventually I got an internet connection (9600 baud AOL, it was the premiere ISP at the time), in which I played my first online game - a text MUD called Alan Lenton's Federation. It was also my first brush with catassery and my parents banned the game after I ran up a $300 AOL bill one month.

Is this an excerpt from your memoirs?

[Soln]

stuff on my friend's Dad Apple II -- like Loderunner and other stuff I can't remember.  And Adventure on the university's DEC-100's.  

[Riggswolfe]

Baldur's Gate. This game, and this game alone, it was converted me from a dedicated console player who played on the PC sometimes to a hardcore PC gamer. It was everything I thought it could be, and more.

Somewhere, probably all scratched and dusty, I have a copy of BG and at least one expansion that I bought from the bargain bin and yet NEVER played.  NWN was the first Bioware offering I'd ever played...and I liked it enough that I was sure I could easily get into BG, even if it was a few years older.   But when I loaded it up for the first time, I just couldn't get past the really dated graphics.  Am I really missing out so much that I should force myself to plow through the initial graphical letdown, or is the game so dated now that it isn't worth the bother?

To answer your question, Baldur's Gate was the single most important PC game to me ever. I've replayed it probably 3 times, not bad, since with the sequel and both expansions you're talking some amazing amount of time investment. And like Strazos it is the one game that moved me from console player to pc player.

In my early years, my most formative games were probably Romance of the 3 kingdoms/Nobunaga's Ambition. and some of the early Square RPGs. (Final Fantasy 1 and Dragon Quest.). These games showed me depth (Romance/Nobunaga) and got me hooked on RPGs. (The square games.)

Man, I'll tell you the one thing that killed the last few Romance of the Three Kingdoms games for me. No or very limited multiplayer. My friends and I were the kinds of nerds that would rent Romance of the 3 Kingdoms and waste a weekend trying to rule ancient China.

[Sky]

I got my start playing 'Adventure' on a terminal connected to a monstrous mainframe in my dad's office at the age of 5 or 6.  Right about that time, we also picked up a 2600 and a copy of Combat and I was hooked, but good.

> xyzzy

> plugh

Same age, same story, substitute grandfather for father. Gramps used to run a regional construction firm that was ahead of its time in computer integration. Loved Adventure. There were a few other games on there, some crazy star trek game using icons, you'd fly around the galaxy graphically (well, ascii-ly). But Adventure was always my favorite, I used to get excited when I could go into the office with him.

We had a pong console, and of course the atari. Adventure on that wasn't the same, but I did play it enough to find the secret area on my own. I probably played way too much atari adventure and it warped my brain.

Then I got a C64 and learned BASIC and wrote my own text adventures. I was playing a lot of infocom stuff then, and then joined a software piracy group (based in a church), so I dabbled in just about every game that ever came out for the c64, Ultima 4 was my favorite. Leaderboard golf was a great drinking game. I ran a BBS out of my house with my omg1200bps modem (which was uber then). Played the c64 while I was on the road with the band (not much, though, took me over a year to play Ultima5).

That got stolen in 1992 and I got my first pc (a 486/33 with a 100MHz coprocessor upgrade) in 1994. In between I played lots of Dune2 at my girlfriend's dad's house. We'd compete for high score. First few games I really dug on the pc were Ultima 7/7.5 and Civilization (for DOS, eventually got a windows version). I stuck with DOS until w95 came out :)

Given my Ultima obsessions, I got online in 1997 specifically to play Ultima Online, which I had read about in PC Gamer (Multima!).

So, going by that: Adventure (mainframe), Adventure (atari), Ultima 4,5,7,7.5, Leaderboard Golf, Civilization, Dune 2 and Ultima Online. Odd when I lay it out like that.

edit: I forgot the TRS-80, which I also used while learning BASIC (schools had them). Don't remember any games connected with them, though. And there was some early 'pc' like that in 5th grade that the teacher allowed advanced students to use. My group finished the 5th grade curriculum in half the time and played a hell of a lot of some Hammurabi game that was basically resource management. I went on to write an adventure style game using that as a setting that he added to the computer later.

[murdoc]

Like Zet, it was the Sierra games that really got me into gaming. Mostly Kings Quest, Police Quest and Space Quest. If I remember correctly, Kings Quest IV was 8 disks for the Apple. Kings Quest III was frustrating for me, since I had to replay pretty much the whole game because I had used one of the spells I made earlier in the game and you couldn't complete it if you had done that. That, and the stupid walking path from the Wizards Tower was nasty to navigate.

I remember we had Zaxxon, Conan, Where in the World is Carmen Sandiago, and a couple text games (Forbidden Castle, Voodoo Island) for the old Apple IIc. I never actually owned a console until the Playstation, but spent many a hour over at friends place to play theirs (yeah, I was THAT kid). Frogger and Combat were the big games I remember playing on the Atari.

Sierra though takes the credit for me playing videogames now though.

[Ironwood]

Did anyone ever complete Xenomorph ?

[WayAbvPar]

Adventure
Return of Heracles
Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves
Galactic Adventures
The Bard's Tale
Seven Cities of Gold
Ultima IV

[Yegolev]

My first game was Pac-Man.  It was in the entranceway of the TG&Y in my hometown.  I didn't understand what I was supposed to do, ramming the ghosts and dying.  Fine, since my mom was waiting in the car for me.

Some haze.  My cousins, although poorer than me, got an Atari 2600.  I figured out how Pac-Man worked.  The game that really hooked me, though, was Combat.  You know, the blocky tanks/airplanes?  It was pretty much over for me at that point.  Combat, and all of the other popular games that I can't really remember, were all far more entertaining than picking peas/beans, shucking corn, cutting grass, or anything else I normally did.  I also learned of the existence of George Plimpton.

[Ironwood]

Influential Games.  Hmmm.

1 - Lords Of Midnight
2 - Elite
3 - The Bards Tale
4 - Dungeon Master
5 - Ultima Online.


There's five for me, each of which has a story, each of which had a huge influence both on my life and the Games Industry.  I'm not going to go into it, because it's boring.

Suffice to say, I could quite literally go on for about 50 games worth.  X-Com, for example, was next.

[Sky]

Ah, I forgot about Seven Cities of Gold. Was that the one where the natives would start getting pissed off and beating the war drums until you had to high-tail it out of the village? That game rocked.

I also was tempted to put Colonization instead of Civilization because I still feel it was the stronger game. Mechanics in that game could make Civilization a better franchise still, the way you could set up schools, train natives, put together industries.

[Signe]

Leather Goddess of Phobos.

The name is better than the game.

[Ironwood]

Nonsense.  It introduced Scratch and Sniff to gaming.

[HaemishM]

Pong, bitches!

Leisure Suit Larry
Police Quest
King's Quest
Wasteland
Earl Weaver Baseball
some old PC-XT DOS game called NFL Football (it was all X's and O's coaching strategy, but outstanding)
Starflight
Sentinel Worlds
Midwinter
Ultima 7 and Wing Commander
Ultima Online and EQ
Tie Fighter
Chuck Yeager's Air Combat
Deus Ex
Thief
Command and Conquer
Duke Nukem
Doom
Unreal and Unreal Tournament
Half-Life/Counterstrike

[WayAbvPar]

some old PC-XT DOS game called NFL Football (it was all X's and O's coaching strategy, but outstanding)

I remember that one! It was so cool, because X's and O's were what the coaches actually used  :-D Wasn't there a Trac-ball arcade version of it too? I seem to remember pumping quarters into a tabletop version at the local Pizza Hut when I was a wee tot. Or a teenager.

Earl Weaver Baseball

God, what a great game. We got into it heavily when I was a freshman in college. One kid on the floor had a computer (LOL! I am so old), and we all started playing. Over a holiday weekend, the kid who owned it went through and created like 500 actual major leaguers (including stats/ratings), and then we had a draft. We were allowed to create one custom player with maxed ratings. Everyone in the league created fireballing pitchers who were nearly unhittable. I created a studly right fielder named Roy Hobbs.

There was much wailing, gnashing of teeth, and rending of garments as I pwned the league. Good times.

[HaemishM]

Yeah, the black and white trackball arcade football game came first. The PC version was just calling plays and watch the action unfold, plus it had NFL rosters (though didn't use names, only numbers).

Earl Weaver was just the shit for me my freshman year in college. I plugged in all the stats for like 6 teams, then the next year did all 30 teams. It was obscene how much time I blew on that game, writing out season schedules by hand and tracking it all.