Games that changed your life

[ian_scho]

After years of playing i come to point where found that creating own games make more fun from playing.

My sentiments exactly. Well said. Recently I've bought games and then got bored even before installing them!

[Jan]

Ahhh..... Hired Guns! We spent one whole winter playing it! Four people at one computer... these were great moments... although it was Amiga...

[Narjhan]

Ok here my 2 cents:

- L' Aigle d'Or (Thompson MO5): my 1st game ever so
- The Goonies (Atari 800XL): I can still see myself and my buddies spending long saturday afternoons trying to solve the various riddles/puzzles. Took us weeks to finish the game.
- The Last Ninja (C64): my cousins in Bordeaux told me they had bought a new kickass game I should definitively try. They were damn right !
- Defender of the Crown (Amiga): basically, we just bought an Amiga after having seen screenshots of that game. Apart for one exception, I never regreted it. I had all the Cinemaware games, and I still play them from times to times.
- Dungeon Master: when I saw the reviews on the magazines, and I saw the look on my ST Friends faces, I felt really desesperate. Until of course the game was ported to Amiga
- Wing Commander II: I wasnt really aware of the impact the first WC had. But when I saw some trailers for WC2, I realized then that it was time to switch to the PC.
- Ultima 7: I havent played the previous ones so I cant really debate if the Black Gate is the best Ultima ever but this one got me hooked for months.
- Street Fighter 2: best fight game ever hands down
- UFO: Marcel Pecheur, Olga Tymoschenko, the sneaky Alien hidden god knows where that prevents you from finishing your mission,... Come to think of it, I'm not sure I have beaten the game
- Civilization: except for Call to Power, I was and I still am a big fan of Sid Meier's classic.
- Final Fantasy VII: great storyline, great soundtrack, kickass game possibilities. Eventhough I might recognize that FF VI is superior, I still feel closer to the VII.
- Half-Life/Counter Strike: spend 2 years of my life doing wars in a clan. Enough said ^^
- Diablo 2: one night I was a bit drunk and I decided to sort my mules. Of course I ended deleting my lvl 93 Javazon with godly stuff. I was so addicted that I started a new one the next day.
- Resident Evil: zombies, hot chicks with guns, thats more than enough for me
- World of Warcraft: those Blizzard guys are really really dangerous folks Im telling you.

[linflas]

- L' Aigle d'Or (Thompson MO5): my 1st game ever so

Ahhhh... Thomson, loin devant !!! Ton parcours est vraiment typique d'un joueur français.

I just realised that i haven't posted here yet. I've put in bold letters the ones that can't be missed :
- Donkey Kong on Nintendo Game&Watch, early 80's. First attempt with some technologic thing.
- Pong on my grand father's Colecovision. I was quite young and shy, just watching my older cousins playing but they didn't give me the joystick a lot
- Super Mario Bros on NES : i didn't own one, i used to play at the supermarket EVERYDAY.
- Thomson TO8D was my first computer. I played many games but i won't forget Sorcery (everyone knows it), Game Over (a classic 2D shoot), Mission (isometric 3D shoot) and Sapiens, which was veeery immersive : first RPG game with IA, 3D landscapes, fighting with axes and spears, and the famous carving interface to make your own weapons !
- Dungeon Master of course, first game ever *seen* on Atari platform.
- Speedball 2, most played game in my entire life (Atari version and then CD32 version on Amiga 1200). I can't even think how much hours i spent with that one, probably all my teen years have been wasted because of it. Half-dozen friends were coming at my home to challenge me regularly and after hours of losing, they just came and watch me finishing a Cup or a Knockout against computer. I was and am still a Brutal Deluxe addict.
- Kick Off Player Manager and Sensible World of Soccer were played a lot. That's funny because now, i simply hate soccer games.
- I loved 2's : Xenon 2 Megablast, Lotus Turbo Challenge 2, Super Cars 2, Lemmings 2 The Tribes (best in the series imho).
- Odyssey, a beautiful arcade/adventure game on Amiga, it's a must-see if you haven't tried it. Pity that it runs quite buggy on WinUAE.
- Street Fighter 1 (not 2) and International Karate + on Atari : fighting games must have ONE button. I can say that SF2 adjusted my game preferences because i didn't play it more than 1 minute.
- Doom, Duke 3D, Half Life of course changed my gamer life but i prefered Unreal and all the series following. FPS are the games i play the most. I prefer the "story" games than the arena ones, such as Fear, HL2 (all episodes) and recently, Mirror's Edge.
- Severance, the Blade of Darkness. I've already talked about it on a previous topic. It is laggy, quite ugly on models but beautiful in ambient lights and decors, very hard to come to grips with but the combo system is the best i've ever seen and NO game has been able to do better !
- finally I can mention Oblivion, that made me lose my girlfriend, so yes, it changed my life too...

[Ameena]

Narjhan - Ooh a mention of Diablo II - I still play that from time to time, in case you're ever on there. My username there is the same as it is here (and practically everywhere else ).
Linflas - I played Speedball 2 a lot too. Great game, that one. Possibly the only sports game I ever really enjoyed. I liked getting a decent Centre-Forward and then coming up against, say, Revolver, and mashing through their team (yaaay 10 points every time you knock someone out ).
I just thought I'd post in reply to some mentions of games I know. I've probably already contributed to this thread further back, though I'd say that no game specifically "changed my life", as such - I've pretty much grown up with them so I'd say they kind of are my life, or at least contributed to my upbringing in no small way .

[Trantor]

I get a lot of memories reading through this thread. I agree with Narjhan on several games; I still love Last Ninja 1 and 2 (3 is terrible, though) and have downloaded them both for my Wii. Those were probably the two games I spent most time on my C64. I also agree that Street Fighter 2 is the best fighting game ever (though IK+ was also great linflas!), and I already wrote a ton about the positive shock I got from first playing Resident Evil.

It's interesting what you say about Final Fantasy VII. Personally, I think I like FFVI just a little bit more and feel a little closer to it, but FFVII will always have a special place in my heart. The main reason for this is Aeris/Aerith. Had I ever met such a girl in real life, I would have fallen head over heels for her. Strong-willed, pure, hoenst, caring, funny and beautiful - what more can a guy ask for? She is still my favourite character from any game, ever, and will likely always remain that. Oh, and FFVII had two incredible tunes, Cosmo Canyon and of course One-Winged Angel, though all in all, I prefer the soundtrack to FFVI (Tina in particular is such an incredible track).

[Narjhan]

* Linflas: hehe oui, je vois ça^^. Tu as dû surement connaitre Tilt et Gen4 et peut être trouveras tu ton bonheur ici : http://www.abandonware-magazines.org/do ... hp?num=326. Rahh j'avais oublié Sapiens

* Ameena: well, Im not on D2 anymore, waiting for D3 (cant believe Im waiting for another Blizzard game !!). And since I have a lot of catchup to do on CSB and custom dungeons, means I'll probably be busy for a while ^^

* Trantor: Yeah Last Ninja 3 was bad. Sad sad way to end the serie. IK+ was fun, I remember the bouncing balls sequences . And same here for Resident Evil.
About Aerith, well, you nail it right on target. Sweetest video game character ever. She is with Lisa Hayes from Robotech my 2 favourite fictional characters.

* Ameena: I agree with you as well. All those games are part of my life

[Jan]

Oblivion, that made me lose my girlfriend, so yes, it changed my life too...

[Ameena]

My dad's really looking forward to Diablo III. I think it does look cool, but I'm not as excited about it as I was about Spore. That's not to say I'm not looking foward to it, but I have other stuff to get in the way before it comes out (which may be looking like around Christmas this year, apparently).
My copy of Overlord 2 just arrived so I shall be playing that once I'm done checking my forums and stuff and have had some lunch. Nom. Woot .

[Narjhan]

Yeah I suspect DIII will be out around Christmas though I wonder how and when they're going to release Starcraft 2 then

Didnt check Overlord2 yet, I'll be waiting for your review

[MitchB1990]

My list contains the following, some more recent than others.
-DM (Really was one of my first games ever! Dad would always play and let me play DM from his lap, hated the wasps they always scared me, still make me jump )
-Magic the Gathering (Both Online and Offline, so much time and money is needed to feed this habit)
-Dungeons and Dragons (Got into it around 3rd grade with my friends I loved the illustrations in the books, I would always throw together random adventures and my dad would humor me and play through them, Not 4th edition, yuck)
-Mass Effect (Simply amazing storyline, EXCELLENT MUSIC)
-Diablo Series (Again excellent gameplay and a pretty decent storyline to boot)
-Starcraft (Spent too many hours playing with friends and at LAN parties)
-Counter-Strike/Half-Life/Half-Life 2 (Again, too many hours at LAN parties with my friends and great storylines, these were my major backbone games of the late 90's and early 2000's)
-Bubble Bobble (Wasted so many quarters to beat this at my favorite pizza parlor)
-Pacman (Vivid memories of beating someone's highscore when I was 6 or 7)
-Super Mario 64 (the N64 was the first console I owned and this was the only game we had for a long time, so it's sentimental, sunk so much time into it getting those stars after school with my friends)
-Pok'emon Blue/Tetris/Warioblast/Super Mario World (Some of my first Gameboy games, some of the best I've played since.)
-Spore (I waited so long after some obscure magazine interviewed Will Wright, I think 4-5 years before initial release, but I wanted it so bad even back then when it was just an idea being thrown out. I can't believe how much it's changed just from the original keynote. They didn't wreck my vision of the game but changed it and I like it just as much.)

There are so many not included on this list but I'll add them when I remember their names.

[Ameena]

You play Spore too? What's your username - can I add you or is your account full of dodgy stuff like giant knobs and stuff? If you want to check out my stuff my username there is the same as it is here (and practically everywhere else ). It's mostly creatures. I expect I'll be making a whole bunch more stuff eventually, when I get back to it from playing other stuff. That's the thing with Spore - it's such a massive thing, it's not a game you can really play through and finish and then leave it, 'cause you can always go into the editors and make stuff (which, really, is the point, isn't it? ). There is sort of an ending (reaching the Galactic Centre), and I suppose if you get every medal in the Space Phase on a race and every Achievement on your account, then you could consider the game finished. But there are so many Achievements, and some of them must be so hard to get (like the one where you have to have one of your creations featured on the front page of the website), that I bet very few people (if any) have managed to get them all.
Aaanyway, I'm starting to derail this thread so I'd better stop now. It doesn't help that someone keeps flyign across the room and putting yet more holes in my poor fleece I have draped over me so he doesn't gouge bits out of my back. Silly noisy feathery sod .

[beowuuf]

Ollie's back!

Umm....I hope...

[MitchB1990]

You play Spore too? What's your username - can I add you or is your account full of dodgy stuff like giant knobs and stuff? If you want to check out my stuff my username there is the same as it is here (and practically everywhere else ). It's mostly creatures. I expect I'll be making a whole bunch more stuff eventually, when I get back to it from playing other stuff. That's the thing with Spore - it's such a massive thing, it's not a game you can really play through and finish and then leave it, 'cause you can always go into the editors and make stuff (which, really, is the point, isn't it? ). There is sort of an ending (reaching the Galactic Centre), and I suppose if you get every medal in the Space Phase on a race and every Achievement on your account, then you could consider the game finished. But there are so many Achievements, and some of them must be so hard to get (like the one where you have to have one of your creations featured on the front page of the website), that I bet very few people (if any) have managed to get them all.
Aaanyway, I'm starting to derail this thread so I'd better stop now. It doesn't help that someone keeps flyign across the room and putting yet more holes in my poor fleece I have draped over me so he doesn't gouge bits out of my back. Silly noisy feathery sod .

Lol My username is the same, MitchB1990, or MitchB1990 [at] gmail dot com, I've always loved spore. But never even made it to galactic center, everytime I come close spore decides to corrupt my saves, at least on my pc it did. But now it runs perfecto on my macbook pro

[Ameena]

I got to the Galactic Centre easily enough with my first race - had already reached Omnipotent, had the best interstellar drive, etc. Stocked up on a few full energy restorers, and headed in - was a Shammy race so had Return Ticket - sod trying to fly back out through the Grox-infested space as well, lol . Do you have GA as well, or just normal Spore? GA is cool - the Adventure creator is great, though I've only made one Adventure in it so far.
And Wuffy - Yes, I thought I might have already mentioned this somewhere (KoL maybe?) - the bird is back .

[MitchB1990]

I got to the Galactic Centre easily enough with my first race - had already reached Omnipotent, had the best interstellar drive, etc. Stocked up on a few full energy restorers, and headed in - was a Shammy race so had Return Ticket - sod trying to fly back out through the Grox-infested space as well, lol . Do you have GA as well, or just normal Spore? GA is cool - the Adventure creator is great, though I've only made one Adventure in it so far.
And Wuffy - Yes, I thought I might have already mentioned this somewhere (KoL maybe?) - the bird is back .

Of course I got all the expansions as soon as they came out! Also getting the drive and omnipotence was easy enough. I wasn't a Shaman, I was a Trader (all Neutral). I had started to make my way to the core with plenty of Repairs and Shields, and planting colonies after bombing Grox Planets. I was 4 or 5 jumps away when my game went poof, VERY VERY frustrating seeing as its happened multiple times, so I just stopped trying at that point. I have all my Sentient races but none of their planets anymore

[beowuuf]

@Ameena You mentioned the possibility a while back of getting Ollie again. Now we need more sound clips!

[Ameena]

Hehe, I could record some if you want. He's not making any noise atm though, but was going a lot earlier. Right now he's just mooching about in his cage. I think he's trying to decide which toy to start destroying next...

[ragge]

Dungeon master on my atari st
Millenium 2.2 addictive as hell there is a remake to pc nowadays.
deuteriuos its millenium 2.2 game 2 space adventure, really really fun.
quake after that, especially the mod called Teamfortress, played it more then dm even.
but after quake i played the most addictive game ever, and i still play it today (like really often)
and thats Dark ages of camelot mmorpg been playing it for 8 years in a row.
bet ive played that game for 1000 days actual ingame time

Its stil uber funny.

[Ameena]

I've heard of DAoC - it was around when we started EQ - that was a game I was on for about four years. It had its tenth birthday this year (back in April, don't know the exact date). But with all the expansions and stuff it sort of changed far too much from the game I'd started playing back in 2001 - it was like a different game. I just sort of stopped playing it. That's the only MMORPG I've played. I still go on Diablo II every now and then but that's not really an MMORPG. Neither is Spore. Anyway, those are about the only online-ish games I play these days. That is, online as in playing with other people, rather than just single-player, browser-based games and the like .

[ParuNexus]

With very much shame I do have games that have changed my life but sadly the order of which i found\played, stopped and replayed etc I can no longer remember. So here is my list of games and reasons why I like them.

Dungeon master - I think one of the earliest games I've grown to love\change me. one of the first games that got me alittle scared but excited when playing. My brother and sister use to play it and I would RUN out of the room when the worm level I was so scared. I also jumped up almost hitting my head the first few times i heard the death scream. This is what most likely started to enjoy First person games. plus various other things people mentioned already.

Soul Reaver\Legacy of Kain - sometime before the xbox came out my brother had a ps2 and rented some games. I watched him play Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver 2. At this time I was already a big fan of Reboot, so one of the major factors was screaming: "OMG it's MEGABYTE!!!!!!!" I loved the action and the semi-free movement you had in the game. What really has the icing on this cake was cut scene's and story. There are few game series with such a deep story so well connected. Something that even Dungeon master lacked. I've since tracked down i think every game in the series on every port that was released. SR2(soul reaver 2) and defiance are what i would say the best of the serries, thou playing for the first time esp for story wise do the games in this order: Blood omen(LoK), SR, SR 2, LoK: D, BO2. This involved time travel with younger and older versions of main characters and npc. Also various settings that are important for story.

Metroid - one of the first games I got when I had my original nes. I had never seen such a game before, the graphics and sound made me really think it was alien, the map system was amazing, I really didn't mind getting lost or not being able to win when i first started playing. The different regions with different graphics and sound was so cool. But what really changed me was the narration or lack of for the hero of this game. I was shocked and amazed when i saw the "proper" ending: OMG Samus Aran the galaxy's best bounty Hunter IS A GIRL! at this point few games have had female leads or even strong female roles. I beat it, heard about Metroid 2, then Super Metroid. I've since collected & played every game that came out. the story line keep me interested in this, I really enjoy the FP for the metroid prime serries. It has the feeling of the FPS games but also tethered to the metroid games making it unique. I'd say Super Metroid(snes) is the best followed by Zero mission(GBA).

Starcraft - first of all before mentioned the amazing story I have to say there is one feature in this game that I've never seen used Quiet as good in any other RTS. The Ability to capture units and keep the mas they are! yeah so this is more favorite then change me... but dang it I wish that all RTS could do it and not do the cop out "ok Jedi mind trick sith to jedi side, oh sith unit now jedi". While the SP game doesn't always offer you the chance to do it often it is fun playing protos and making a zerg and terran colony at the same time.
The story is a rich, dark and moody semi post apocalyptic space civilization. Each race looks and feels very different, the mission briefing adds much to the characters personality and story line for this series. Esp for Jim Raynor and Sarah

Spoiler

"queen of blades"

Kerrigan! Those 2 remain one of the major focus in the series. Yuo get a real sense of each alien race, how they act what they think not just the typical "im just another faction in this game that doesn't have any story or plot involved". I'm VERY EAGER to play Starcraft 2 when it comes out!

Ultima - the freedom of exploring like a world, this unique D&D like game, the different and amazing long story thread from the series are a few of the things that changed me. The first game i played in the series like so many others wasn't 0(akalabeth) but Ultima 1 itself, I think the next game I plated after that was ultima 4 with the unique character creation(gypsies, questionnaire) . Like so many others also... I found 7th game to be best., played them all each the Mt Dash "ultima" game. Never got into the UO. All of these reasons lead to do a special project for this series(dvd sized collection of games\ports, audio, maps, etc, side projects, patch's etc).

Cave story - wha? i'm picking an "indie" game? yep! Sometimes the best products are not created by big companies but by Indie creations! So why has this been listed? the anime-like character make it kinda cute and enjoyable, the game play while very hard is one of the funnest I've played in a LONG time. The story is amazing and has made me laugh, cry, hopeful and glad. and can't wait for the wii version!

3. Any MMORPG. I've come to the conlcusion that if you sit me down with any MMORPG and it has a community around it, then I'd enjoy it! I'm currently hooked up to a free one called Atlantica Online but there are a gazillion out there now for the PC (a concequence of piracy, me thinks?).

and I need to comment on this as well. the first mmo game I rember seeing that i was so exccited was Sony first talked abotu EverCRACK. I saw some of the pictures and was like "OMG THAT LOOKS SO GOOD" and to be fair at the time it was AMAZING. I hade some friends play it durring the 2nd expansion release I tihnk played for like 3 months before quiting. I never really got into the interweb community just like random partying online. Since then i've played alot of different ORPG(not all of them are "mmo" status). I gave Phantasy Star Online a shot, found it to be ok. the current (MM)OPRG that have changed me and that i still play are Everquest: Shards of Dayalahttp://www.shardsofdalaya.com/
lineage 1http://www.friskycowreborn.com/ and Euohttp://swut.net/euo/

I could list more games, list more why reasons and even expand the stories i've told here but this is long enough and i have other things to do. hope you enjoy this and give these games a try. btw: several of those games I also enjoy like wizardary and the Amber games, so thanks for sharing those stories.

[andilist]

Good morning everyone,

25 years ago I played "Phoenix" on a slot machine. It was the first video game I ever played. And what a great one!

Kind regards,

Andi

[andilist]

One more:

I really loved to play "The Great Giana Sisters" on my schoolmate´s ST. My favorite jump and run game of all time!

Kind regards,

Andi

By the way: If you own the original, check prices on eBay and be surprised!

[Duckman]

I am probaly one of the few which didn't have dungeon master as a "life-changer" game. Actually nowadays I try to let the games affect rest of my life as little as possible. But back to my days as a lad i were much more easily affected. Age of Empires and Keen 1-6 were the strongest affector because I played them MUCH more than a 3-8 year old should. (It would have been best if I had not seen a computer during that age, it still has it's marks at my skills at gym, I am for example bad at climbing to trees and even worse skating at ice). Actually they sometimes affected me so much I ended up being violent.

About 10 years old I had learned a bit marginal between virtual and real. I stopped playing those two games very much, and instead I started RuneScape, and I also got DMjava. I had still lot to learn about responsible gaming but years brought them to me. Probaly because of my child experinces I now put much of my time to the opposite things (dynamic apnea training for example), and I take computing gaming as somewhat disgraceful, like many people see smoking for example.

I tried to quit gaming totally few times, two first if I remember failed because of my relatives (they see computer gaming bit differently I do) were against my plan, plus my laziness, third one failed because I broke my leg and thus had nothing to use the time I were away from computer (again relatives gave me final fail push), last one I managed to do it but after few months my relatives convinced me back (again!). I still play Age of empires and Keens, but only a little. Most of my time at computer goes to RuneScape, these forums or at some of the dungeon masters.

[Mikkaelson]

5 games that "Changed my life" - all my own bias opinion

1) Into the Eagles Nest - Commodore 64 (The greatest computer game ever made!)

2) Championship Manager - PC (Lost years of my life whilst "studying" at university)

3) Street Fighter 2 - SNES (The greatest 2D fighting game)

4) Super Mario Kart - SNES (The greatest version of this amazing racing game)

5) Wrestlefest - Arcade coin op (All my pocket money went into this every weekend in the early 1990's)

[Jan]

Oh, you seem to prefer more action games. I was never good at fast mouse / keyboard / joystick operation.

Into the Eagles Nest

I don't seem to remember fully - is it something like the original 2D Wolfenstein?

[oh_brother]

No dungeon master on the list? Tut tut.

I did not play Championship Manager, but I loved (and spent ages playing) Premier Manager.

5) Wrestlefest - Arcade coin op (All my pocket money went into this every weekend in the early 1990's)

Me too! After school a friend and I would go to the chipper on the way home and play for ages! I had completely forgotten about that.

[oh_brother]

Reading over this topic I am surprised that I had not written anything myself!

(i) Dungeon Master I think was the first irreplaceable game I played (i.e. there were ones before I really loved, but if I had never encountered them I would probably have found something else just as good). I still remember reading the review in ST Action for months before we finally got it (or maybe it was days...time seems much longer when you are a child). And when I clicked on "Enter" on the screen I actually shouted out "wow!" when the dungeon doors started to open. Sounds a bit silly now, but I was impressed by that at the time.

(ii) Legend (by Mindscape) was the next big one. It seems that not so many people loved or played this one, but it sucked in hours of my time.

(iii) Kick-off 2. My brother bought this when I was about 10 or 11, and we sat down to play it. We played it for hours non-stop. In the end someone interrupted us to watch the TV (the New Statesman was on, if I can remember that I guess it shows that the game really affected me!). But when we stopped we both felt really sick and really dizzy - apparently an entire day staring without blinking at a fast moving screen does that to you.

(iv) Baldur's Gate/Baldur's Gate 2: these really got me back into computers after a bit of a break. I mentioned in various other topics how much I loved them.

(v) Maybe somewhat controversially I am going to include a very recent game: Dragon Age:Origins. After playing games for so long it is hard to be impressed, but this did it for me. Not that it is particularly innovative or ground-breaking, just that it was a genre I really liked done incredibly well.

[beowuuf]

Wow, even a non sport/football playing person such as myself remembers kick-off! And the new statesman

[oh_brother]

Yeah, I was a big football fan as a kid. I would watch even random games, read all the sports pages in the paper, and watch all analysis shows on TV (especially Saint and Greavsie, I loved it). Kick-off 2 and Premier manager were great.

I don't think it would be the same if I played them now, I don't have that interest anymore.