Of course, the first game that comes to mind is Dungeon Master. It must have been February or March 1991. I was 12, got an Amiga for Christmas 1990 and did little else than play games on it. Several months before, I started reading a gaming magazine (the PowerPlay of course, for those Germans out there), and it spoke of that brilliant game Dungeon Master from time to time. Then, one day, a guy from school told me he actually had that game. I -ahem- borrowed it from him, and when I entered that dungeon, I set in awe in front of the screen. Incredible graphics, completely playable with that weird mouse-thing (hey, I was only used to joysticks from my C64!), and completely in German! I saw the Hall of Champions, picked the first four characters I came across and eventually found the entrance to the real dungeon. The game felt incredibly complex from the get-go, but somehow, everything about it was so intuitive, everything I did felt "right" in some way. When I descended the stairs, I trembled with fear. Simply putting a torch in an empty hand to get light was such a wonderful, clean, easy concept, it was incredible! Then, I saw the mummy behind the portcullis. My heartbeat went faster. After several moments of mental preparation, I opened the door and tried to kill the mummy; I was successful, but not before the mummy took down two of my heroes. Shortly after, my first experience ended due to time constraints, but I did little else than play DM for the next weeks. Those very first moments will always be in my heart, and I felt it. I instantly realized that this game was special, that this was something I've never seen before, a milestone in gaming and something I would always remember.
I guess most of us have a similar story to share about DM; so what about other games that evoked the same feeling in me?
The next special game after DM for me was Amberstar, a German RPG made by Thalion, the same company that released Dragonflight two years before. After reading a favourable review of Amberstar in the PowerPlay in the spring of 1992, I bought the game, installed it, created a character and jumped right into the adventure. Wonderful music reached my ears, and a poetic text told me I was standing on the graveyard of Twinlake, in front of my parents' grave, mourning over their death caused by an orc ambush. It was a moment of pure magic, a beautiful, poetic text that touched me in combination with the fantastic music. This mood, this atmosphere struck me completely unprepared. From today's standpoint, Amberstar's interface is a bit tedious, and of course the plot is full of clichés. The game certainly didn't age as well as DM (funnily, both were developed for the ST and ported for the Amiga shortly after). But the music, the sheer size and the great atmospheric texts will always mean something special to me.
By 1994, my interest in games had dwindled. I still played them, but they weren't quite the centre of the galaxy anymore they had been 2 or 3 years before. Then, one of my friends called and said he had Doom. I had read about it, that it was an amazing shooter and very violent, so I was ready to enjoy some splatter-action. What came then was a shock. I couldn't imagine that graphics this awesome were possible. We played with cheats on and just enjoyed seeing the great graphics and blasting everything to bits with unlimited ammo and in godmode. Eventually, we started playing without cheats, and we realized that Doom didn't just look incredible, it played just as well. Fantastic level-design, great monsters and weapons made Doom a one-of-a-kind experience. Later, we discovered the joys of building own maps and playing Deathmatches with friends. The result was that for the next 2 years, I played little else than Doom, and I still consider it unequalled in the first-person shooter genre.
Apart from Doom which became part of my life, games didn't fascinate me as much anymore, though, especially on consoles. As much as I loved my SNES, I couldn't imagine buying another system just for games. When my friend (the very same who introduced me to Doom) bought a PlayStation in 1995, I was curious. We played Ridge Racer, Battle Arena Toshinden and various other games, and while I had fun, I was perfectly sure I didn't want such a console for myself. When my friend showed me some screenshots of an upcoming horror game with zombies and crows, I was looking forward to some more mindless splatter-action, but wasn't terribly excited. One day, he called me and said "I have Resident Evil... you know, that game with the crows." If I wanted to come over and have a look at it? Sure. Half an hour later, I knew I had to have a PlayStation. I didn't care that the dialogue was silly or that the acting in the live-action intro was pretty bad. This was pure cinema. It looked, sounded and felt like watching a horror movie. I couldnt get enough of Resident Evil, I played it over and over and over again. In later years, RE:Code Veronica was the main reason I bought a Sega Dreamcast, and the remake of the first game was the main reason to buy a Gamecube. I regretted neither.
Though my gaming spirit was rekindled with the PlayStation - after all, it had lots of other fantastic games like Tomb Raider or Final Fantasy VII -, I eventually lost interest again around 2001. Whatever game I played, I always had the feeling I had seen and played it all, just with simpler graphics. And though I still have that feeling today and games play a rather small role in my life now, I once again experienced the wonderful feeling of a game completely taking over your mind in early 2005. Capcom had finally released Resident Evil 4. After copying the formula of the first game way too often, my interest in the franchise had become rather low. So I was pleased that Capcom threw everything out of the window for part 4. Gone were the movie-like fixed camera angles, the silly puzzles and the repetitive zombies. Instead, Resident Evil 4 was pure action. I didn't really understand what was going on; the game was so simple, so mindless, but it played so unbelievably well, and the presentation was so incredible, I couldn't stop myself playing. After many years, I felt addicted to a video game again, and I loved every second of it, even though I still don't quite understand what it is that makes the game so fantastic.
So, there you have it. These five games were the ones that had the greatest impact on me the first time I played them, the games that completely blew me away. I'm keeping my hopes up that Resident Evil 5 may be able to do the same thing for me that part 4 did. We shall wait and see; the release date is under two months away!
What about you? Are there games that completely sucked you in, where you knew in the first few moments that this is a game you will fondly remember until you die?
(Oh, and if you read the whole post, congratulations, it's probably one of the longest on the whole forum.
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The rest a that level however was a different story. Figuring out that solid key was a &^%&! I remember back-tracking several times, scanning the floor very carefully... then I found it! YAY! Soon after I discovered the worms, that was when the fear begun. Many times, I'd heard dad go "Oh, ^%&$! It a pack of worms! I'm toast!". I shared that fear...
That's some posting effort!
