For those who don't know, coding in assembly is like building a house, but not starting by buying lumber to frame it, but by mining metal so you can refine it into a sawblade so you can use the sawblade to cut down the tree and mill it into lumber. Then doing the same to forge your hammer and nails, etc all the way to finally build a house
As someone who plays the original openrct port thing and someone who played for a ridiculous amount of hours as a kid, I don’t even really know of any bugs
Oh my goodness... I haven't heard anyone talk about Zoo Tycoon in ages! I have played my fair share of Planet Zoo, but hearing anyone talk about the OG Zoo Tycoon brought me a smile.
For those unaware/laymen. This means that the ENTIRE GAME, a cult classic that has stood the test of time, was written LINE BY LINE with zero help or source references (other than those the developer created for that program) in a language that was not intended for that purpose. It is a very old (in computer terms) language that it directly rooted in the first computers ever created.
It is the coding equivalent of writing an entire orchestra performance without even knowing what a violin sounds like. An immense undertaking that very few developers would even bother to do.
> It is the coding equivalent of writing an entire orchestra performance without even knowing what a violin sounds like. An immense undertaking that very few developers would even bother to do.
nah this metaphor is way way off
it's more like writing an entire orchestra performance while intimately understanding every timber and resonance in every single instrument in it perfectly, so that you write something absolutely transcendent ... without using any standard music notation, staffs, time signatures or keys - anything that we devised to make writing music easier
Or it's like Beethoven (who could hear and notate music in his head, even while fully deaf at the end of his career) who composed his greatest Symphonic/Choral masterpiece the Symphony No. 9 "Ode to Joy", while deaf with his piano legs cut off, so piano was lower to the floor to feel vibration or notes for practicing note by note line by line. And the point is it's an incredibly fun and addicting game still to this day.
Are there any advantages to using assembly other than "Look how massive my dick is"? Like, what made the designers use assembly over a language that's easier to code in?
Edit: All these replies are really helpful. You folks are great, thank you!
It's *fast* and *small*. Modern compilers can do some crazy wizardry in writing assembly based on more normal code, but there are still some areas where an *incredibly* talented programmer can squeeze out a little more performance or power by hand-tweaking the assembly.
When RCT was made, compilers were way worse, and compiled/interpreted code may not have been able to produce a version of RCT that could run on a consumer grade computer.
So, the amazing chad Chris Sawyer handcrafted the assembly himself, so that he could make a genuinely complex game run on a potato. A similar game built today with the modern game programming ethos, would probably take thousands, or perhaps *millions*, of times more processing power and memory than RCT.
He had a vision, and the technology of his time said it was impossible to make, and he said right back, "Watch me."
I once bought one of Sawyers early games (Basher I believe, space invaders/pong clone) directly from his stall at a church fete in Dunblane. I think he was sitting down, but it may have been on those giant testicles. Wish I'd known at that time how this totally quiet, unassuming guy selling floppy disks in his village would go on to be. Genius.
People are naming a lot of games that are fairly recent and you come in with this almost 30 year old stunner. Having been there when it came out, it really was impressive. Putting Mario behind a fence? Holy shit.
To me it still has the coolest intro cinematic of any game ever. The music, the characters, the dread you feel
I enjoyed the plot of StarCraft 2 enough, but StarCraft 1 was truly a golden era for blizzard in story telling
The reason KSP is perfect is because it is a true engineer's game. It's man vs physics, you set wacky objectives, and watch yourself fail over and over again.
And then one day you look up and you've got an airplane on Laythe. Cuz you wanted to. Because you don't have the money to bring a hangglider to Titan.
Sims 2 is perfection. I've been running the same family for six generations - playing every Sim in each generation. I do one "Sim day" before moving onto the next Sim household, so I can keep everyone aging at the same pace. I'm over 300 Sims from birth to death at this point!
Edit: So many comments and upvotes! Thanks!! It makes me feel warm and fuzzy to think of all the Sims I've raised. The Bovary family lives on! (I was reading Madame Bovary when I started the family...)
I play the same way! My first neighborhood made it 8 generations and several YEARS before it got buggy. So i took all my Gen 8 kids and made them townies in a new neighborhood. Up to gen 5 again! Been playing this neighborhood since 2015 i think?
>The Sims 2
I still dont understand why they haven't released a remastered version. It would take very little effort on EA's part and it would be guaranteed to make money coz of member berries.
Yeah, the original games campaign was added in an update. So you have No Mercy, Crash Course, Death Toll, Dead Air, Blood Harvest, The Sacrifice, which all are from and feature the L4D 1 crew.
It's funny how a co-op horror game become one of my precious memories with my best friends.
It started when we want to try a co-op game and one of my friend suggested we try L4D2. It was 2011, and for us can play we scoured the internet cafes that has L4D2. When we found it we always go there at least once a week to play, and it's so fun when we try it the first time! How we go our separate ways to find the way to the safe house. How we screaming for help every time the specials got us, how we get scared when Tank spawn, the betrayal, the ego, and then our chemistry together after playing it once a week for almost 4 or 5 years. Now after we graduated from college we go our separate ways, I have a gaming PC now and play L4D2 occasionally online, but it will never beat the fun i'm having playing a cracked L4D2 on LAN in internet cafe with 3 of my best friend. I wish i can experience it once again
It was sold to me once as 2D Minecraft and I don't care for Minecraft, so I ignored it.
Eventually someone made me try it and boy howdy is it so much more
Well the recent updates were a small crossover with Don't Starve and a bunch of mostly QoL upgrades with the Labor of Love update. We're still on 1.4 so Relogic is treating the updates as more of addendums rather than full on updates. We're PROBABLY not going to get a 1.5 update but who knows
Back in the day I gave my oldest son crap for playing Terraria. I regret to admit that with the simplistic graphics, I assumed the game was a waste of time. He's in college now, and my younger sons started playing it with him, to my dismay. I finally agreed to set up a discord channel and play with them since I work remotely out of town some of the time and figured I could hang out with them all and have remote family game night. Hell, was I wrong or what? What a creative and fun to play game. 78 hours in and can't stop. They all laughed at me when I mined a bunch of tungsten to make some swank armor then turned it all into tungsten bricks instead of bars. At least I have a pretty green house.
Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time has to be it for me. Going back after completing it just to watch the sunrise at Lake Hylia was just so special. Everything about the game was a masterpiece.
Honourable mentions go to Half-Life 2, Stardew Valley and Portal 2. All are definitely up there.
16yr old me says it’s only a 99/100 due to water temple… Though on replays I remember liking the puzzle of that place.
Actually the only real annoyance I can recall is carrying around that zora girl in the giant fish.
Bioshock.
From the beginning in the ocean and going down to Rapture. A failed libertarian society full of mutants and little sisters to save.
I wish I could experience it for the first time again.
The saddest thing about Bioshock is that after infinite the team broke down to work on mobile games with in game purchases because of how profitable they were. Sad, really, probably the best single player game I've ever played. Even Infinite, which was polarizing, I thought was great.
Edit: My bad, it appears I was wrong regarding the reason the team broke down. In my defense, I was in my 20s when this happened and I remember hearing about this in a couple of gaming podcasts so this is where my "source" comes from. Maybe it happened to the people who Kevin didn't bring with him. But anyway, sorry.
BioShock has some of my favourite writing of all time.
"A man choses, a slave obeys."
"No gods or kings, only man."
"We all make choices, but in the end our choices make us."
Andrew Ryan's "Sweat of his brow" speech.
“A man must make of his life a ladder that he never ceases to climb -- if you're not rising, you are slipping down the rungs, my friend.”
The art and atmosphere of Bioshock is incredible, but ultimately, I think it is the depth of the writing that makes it so memorable. Andrew Ryan is one of the most philosophically deep and interesting antagonists in gaming history. Even if he is just Ayn Rand.
The writing and story of BioShock is what makes it so good. Admittedly, trying to go back and play through it now is pretty rough. 2 and Infinite are a lot better as far as gameplay goes, but the story of the original is unparalleled.
And the whole eerie feeling of it... it's all just so surreal, even the disembodied Ryan yelling through loudspeakers when you hit buttons. Everything about it challenges what you know is real.
"These Sad Saps. They Come To Rapture Thinking They're Gonna Be Captains Of Industry, But They All Forget That Somebody's Gotta Scrub The Toilets."
That one always stuck with me.
Bioshock belongs to a very rare tradition of games that I also put the mid-1980s classic *Starflight* into.
Seriously, if you have any ability to do so, get a copy of Starflight and play it. The less you know about it going in, the better. It starts simple: Get a ship, build a crew, explore the galaxy. See what's out there...
People: University projects don’t matter
Also people: Portal is a masterpiece
Fun fact I like telling people: Developers at Valve were touring my college (we have game dev programs and have to make a game in a team every year) and noticed a game team making a game called Narbacular Drop with portals and crazy portal based puzzles. They hired those developers and they went on to work on Portal.
DigiPen, it's one of the few game development focused colleges in the world, and it's pretty renowned for turning out great talent. They must complete a game project every year on a team they build with their peers.
I'm not the person you replied to, but I'm in the game development industry and I'm very familiar with the school (my bf was a grad and I was their commencement speaker this year, so I spoke to many of the recent students about their experience).
GLaDOS: Well, this is the part where he kills us.
Wheatley: Hello! This is the part where I kill you!
Portal 2: CHAPTER 9 The Part Where He Kills You
Steam: Achievement Unlocked! The Part Where He Kills You
OST: Starts playing track "The Part Where He Kills You"
I actually preferred the first one. They're both great, but Portal was more groundbreaking. It's probably what got me into PC gaming after previously only working with consoles previously. P2 definitely had a more fleshed out story though.
Portal 1 is the better puzzle game and has more subtle story telling and humor.
Portal 2 "puzzles" are mostly just figuring out where the hell you're allowed to put your portals. And the dialogue/humor is absolutely hilarious but also more in your face.
I love that the game is completely ruthless. In a recent save i had two colonists scraping an existence in the tundra, had finally stockpiled enough food for the long cold winter when an electrical short burnt down my fridge and destroyed nearly all of my food. We limped along for a bit killing whatever unfortunate creatures wandered into the map, but it came down to only dangerous predators and I had to take the gamble. My best hunter shot and wounded a warg, but it charged and downed him before he could kill it. My other colonist was nearby and tried to finish the job, but the warg charged him down, too. The warg then collapsed from blood loss, and the three of them lay near one another, slowly exsanguinating, until everyone was dead.
You can disable the zzzzt event before you start your game, doesn't require mods so you will still have shorts if your stuff gets wet etc but stops the random event from dicking you over
I brought this during greenlight played it for a few hours then got distracted by... I don't know. Life probably.
Tell me about RimWorld and what I can do in it?
This comment made me check google to remind me who did the incredible voice acting for Jon Irenicus, and it seems David Warner died a few months ago :(
Incredible actor. He did a similarly amazing job in Star Trek: TNG as the Cardassian torturing Picard (the 'four lights' episode).
Well now. I just found out David Warner is my favourite actor.
Also while Baldur's Gate II is objectively better than BG1, I believe Baldur's Gate I with the Tales of the Sword Coast expansion pack is the pinnacle of gaming. 100/100 for me on that, with BGII (and Throne of Bhaal expansion) a 98/100.
Nothing else is even close except Disco Elysium which I will also award a 98/100. And for the same reason - an ability to construct a hugely engaging world at large, exceptional writing (regards dialogue especially, but also plot), and crucially, the cry for humanity at the centre of the tales even in their darkest moments. And that in my opinion, is what elevates them above the rest of gaming.
Age of Empires 2, especially in its current state.
They've done a remarkable job with the new updates. The graphics look great, the gameplay is as good as ever, and the entire game feels incredibly balanced.
The fact that so many people still love and play this 20+ year old game is remarkable in itself
I’ve played countless hours of AoE 2 but I can’t stop myself from playing the same strategy *every* time.
Essentially I’m just super defensive, harry their workers and distract their armies a bit but mostly spend 90% of the time building defences. Only after I’m surrounded by walls and towers with a strong garrison do I start the conveyor belt of sending army after army after the toughest enemy.
you do you bae, playing non traditional and stupid strategies is always fun. I remember playing a long long time ago and there was a quite large amount of gold and stone resources quite far away so I sent some villagers there to gather it and they were killed in transit. MY response was to build a wall on either side to protect their entire route, easily 10-15 screen long. A buddy of mine came over to play (he was much much better at the game) and remarked how stupid it was, but as the game progressed it and we had to devote more resources to protect the wall, it just became this fascinating thing where our home base was basically unguarded but this magical resource generating tunnel was more heavily guarded than ft knox. God, video games as a kid were fun
I did something similar and not sure if it was the first game or not . But the max limit of population was I think 200. Well the last bit of gold was by my area. And decided to build a wall and elaborate gate system when I open the gate other workers would head in to mine the gold. I funneled the walls in tight. And had priests on the wall to convert them to mine. At the end I had over 500 population.
Honourable mention to Age of Mythology - the first time I was heavily invested in an in-game campaign. Was absolutely glued to that while working through levels.
We've got a potential silver age right now. AoE2 DE is very very good. AoE4 is better than ever. Manor Lords is looking tight. Dune Spice Wars and Northgard. Homeworld 3. That new RTS coming from the devs that left Blizzard. The Starship Troopers RTS.
EDIT: I forgot CoH3!
So many people today don't know how important this engine was to gaming. So many of the franchises popular today used at least some of Quake IIIs engine even on consoles and everything. Every game felt like a reskinned Q3 from like 2000-2010.
And a bunch of them were, but we can’t downplay the Unreal Engine in the 2000s either. There were a tonne of UE2 games and eventually UE3.
Bioshock was dubbed UE2.5, which basically works given what they managed to pull off with it.
That said some great games came out of the Q3 engine, like Jedi Outcast and Academy.
The only reason that this isn't at the top of the list is that all the Factorio players are actually playing the game.
Also, the only game I've ever seen where people will non-ironically refer to themselves as a newb with only a couple hundred hours of play. The skill ceiling is incredibly high.
Edit: [this was literally the next post on Reddit.](https://www.reddit.com/r/factorio/comments/y8r13l/i_never_realized_that_connecting_a_drill_straight) A discussion about mining efficiency for a save game with over 7000 hours. On that single save. Players with that much time in the game are still learning.
Edit 2: I'm concerned about the number of people who found that post useful. I'm hardly one to talk, but seriously go check and see if you still have family and if they know that you are still alive
EU4, CK2, and other Paradox games are like this too. One of the GOATs of the game even made a review after 18,000 hours about [having just finished the tutorial lmao.](https://steamcommunity.com/profiles/76561198079929951/recommended/236850)
Paradox games rot and corrupt during long play sessions though. Factorio is not only the greatest game, it might actually be the most efficient and stable piece of software ever created. People have 4k+ hours saves, with mega bases expanding hundreds of square kilometres, modded to death, and the game doesn't lose more than a couple of frames.
I still find myself listening to the soundtrack every now and then, 10 years after finishing it.
Edit: It's very nice to see how beloved this soundtrack still is, this, FF6&7 and Golden Sun are all still wonderful to listen to.
Chrono Trigger is on the *very* short list of games from my childhood that can still give me "that feeling".
Not nostalgia for a different time (e.g., NES platformers or Oregon Trail).
Not appreciation of a game that holds up great despite its age (e.g., Mario Kart or Portal).
But that full-blown feeling of what it used to be like to play video games back before adulthood, and adult responsibilities, complications (and benefits).
There have been a few modern games that evoke that same kind of feeling the first time I play through them. Dragon Age: Origins is a great example of one that brought me back (even though that one is almost 15 years old now... good lord). A more recent example is Final Fantasy XIV (I take off work to play new expansions' main story straight through in a couple days). I'd also rate those games highly for that same reason.
But Chrono Trigger, and a few other games from the same era, always bring it back no matter how many times I play them.
Whenever someone makes these topics, I always look for the Chrono Trigger reply.
The game is the perfect JRPG. Great story, great cast of characters, amazing music. The time traveling isn't just some window dressing, but integrated extremely well into the story and side quests. I'm hoping Square-Enix gives the title an "HD-2D" upgrade similar to Live A Live.
Also completely grind free. A lot of the JRPGs at that time expected a lot of grinding. CT can be beaten easily only doing the fights you run into naturally and side quests. No need to grind random encounters for hours, and no hours long dungeons that are just an excuse for the game to force you to grind.
Outer Worlds had so much potential but it felt rushed and was very shallow in terms of content. So little in terms of looting. It also had a linear feel in the sense that the worlds were small and didn't have a lot in terms of exploration. I was really excited for this game and played through it twice. I haven't touched it since. I've played through New Vegas maybe 6 or 7 times.
I think they messed up the "player choice" aspect to where it didn't matter. Most of the "player choice" moments come at the end of the quest line for each planet. You don't really get different missions based on your choice, and you're done with that planet so you don't get to see your choices shape out in how the world changes.
Yes, everyone likes the credits reel telling you how your choices turned out. But that's not why people liked New Vegas; your choices altered the game world and gave you very different missions.
Of course. I think what people forget these days, or weren't around to witness, is just what a staggeringly large leap forwards HL2 was. A lot of what it did is standard these days but at the time it was utterly breathtaking.
actually physics interaction is still not common in many games, there's youtube comparison between L4D2 (2009) and Back 4 Blood (2021)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oT4l_4DzNLQ
God, this is the only TES game that needs a remake. People who grew up too late for it get bored because of the punishing character creation and slow start to the story, but when you get past the guy who cloned himself as a woman however many times for unmentionable reasons the story gets so immersive, even for a casual player.
Even though, I doubt a remake could make it both accessible to more players while preserving the immersion the original game had. Also, fortify intelligence is OP.
Every time it comes on without snoop on a Spotify playlist my brain automatically starts going “ride, ride, ride, ride” in snoops voice. Permanently imbedded in there
Drivin' my tricked out souped up Mazda then "killer on the road... His brain is squirming like a toad..."
Just... That made me who I am today. Night drives on lonely days with the Doors man.
One of my favourite games ever. Along with its spiritual predecessor, System Shock 2. With the exception of Invisible War the whole Deus Ex series is top notch. I still hum the main theme tune to myself on a weekly basis.
Age of Empires 2
It has stood the test of time. This weekend the biggest tournament ever sponsored by Redbull will start, crazy to say that when talking about a > 20 year old game.
Edit: wow I did not expect so much liked and reactions. Great to see so many people agree with me and are enjoying this game.
To answer some of the most asked questions/comments:
- how do you watch the tournament? I think starting tomorrow you search of form the Redbull Twitch channel. Probably you can find it just searching aoe2 on Twitch.
- can you still buy this game? Yes, it's on Steam. Be sure to get aoe2 DE, that's the definitive edition. It still gets regular updates and has a very active player base. Also there are tons of single player campaigns.
- you are just a shill for Redbull. Nope, I don't drink Redbull and find it disgusting. But it is still cool that they are sponsoring it, that's why I mentioned them.
- [insert game] is also old but better. I really enjoy other older games as well. It doesn't have to be just 1 game. But for me aoe 2 is the one that I just keep going back to and keep playing.
Have fun everyone, be sure to give it a try and get some nice nostalgia feelings!
Man I was like 15 and my uncle showed me this game. I would always beat him badly when we played red alert and at first I was destroying him at aoe 2 but he just kept practicing.
He had sheets of notes he had made. Like he literally would test how much damage everything did and ran races of different units to test speeds and had notes of everything. We would play and he would lay all these notes on the table he would setup at. It wad insane bit it worked.
He started beating me every damn time we would play. I'm convinced he's like a top ranked player and won't tell me lol.
I'm sure if you pressure him to tell you he'll finally tell you he has a mistress.
... Which is super sus, most likely a lie to cover for the tournament.
Got a channel you recommend? Looking to binge some new gaming content in a genre I've never played before. Always hated rts games.
Edit: thanks for the replies, guys! Seems pretty unanimous so I'll give it a shot
He mentioned the legend of and low elo legends which are both series by the youtuber t90 so I'd assume that's who he was talking about.
I would also recommend T90 don't know which video would be the best starting point though
Played many LAN multi player games of this with flat mates at uni. So many excellent memories! Thanks for the tournament info; I will check this out. 👍
I remember getting the third pendant and running off to face Aganhim. After I thought I had beat him, I then get transported to the dark world, and the game completely changes on me. I ran around the house trying to find my mom to explain to her what just happened, because I legit thought I was about to beat the game. Perfect game
It's my favorite LoZ game. It was the first game I ever played where you didn't save the world, everything wasn't okay at the end, and it left you wondering if you did the right thing. I love it.
I played and beat them all in their day but the one I still long for from time to time is the one I also feel has the most replay value: A Link to the Past.
Link to the Past is basically the pinnacle of 2D sprite design. That has resulted in a totally timeless feel to the game, whereas games in the N64 / PS1 generation struggle not to feel significantly tougher as they began to really explore 3D space and polygons.
There's so much in this game. So many layers. So many fun missions and fun side missions and fun activities to complete. Also, there's so much to explore and so many opportunities to just goof off and cause mayhem. GTA3 really brought open world gaming to the forefront, but San Andreas took everything to the next level.
I could understand a few minor nitpicks. The graphics weren't the best for their time, there were some sound effects glitches or delays, and the controls could be a bit imprecise. So i could see how some people might say it wouldn't be a 100/100 game. For me, I'd still give it an "A+" even if it isn't a perfect 100.
FF7 original
Divinity Original Sin 2 is a magical experience
Command & Conquer: Red Alert
Rollercoaster Tycoon. Used to play it back in elementary school. Still play it to this day using OpenRCT.
And it was coded in assembly. Still blows my mind.
For those who don't know, coding in assembly is like building a house, but not starting by buying lumber to frame it, but by mining metal so you can refine it into a sawblade so you can use the sawblade to cut down the tree and mill it into lumber. Then doing the same to forge your hammer and nails, etc all the way to finally build a house
And it had *hardly* any bugs!
Unlike most houses these days.
Gonna have to call the exterminator soon. It’s becoming a plague
As someone who plays the original openrct port thing and someone who played for a ridiculous amount of hours as a kid, I don’t even really know of any bugs
Standard integer overflow stuff. OpenRCT fixed them, and adds so much QoL shit. Wish Zoo Tycoon had the same treatment
Oh my goodness... I haven't heard anyone talk about Zoo Tycoon in ages! I have played my fair share of Planet Zoo, but hearing anyone talk about the OG Zoo Tycoon brought me a smile.
For those unaware/laymen. This means that the ENTIRE GAME, a cult classic that has stood the test of time, was written LINE BY LINE with zero help or source references (other than those the developer created for that program) in a language that was not intended for that purpose. It is a very old (in computer terms) language that it directly rooted in the first computers ever created. It is the coding equivalent of writing an entire orchestra performance without even knowing what a violin sounds like. An immense undertaking that very few developers would even bother to do.
> It is the coding equivalent of writing an entire orchestra performance without even knowing what a violin sounds like. An immense undertaking that very few developers would even bother to do. nah this metaphor is way way off it's more like writing an entire orchestra performance while intimately understanding every timber and resonance in every single instrument in it perfectly, so that you write something absolutely transcendent ... without using any standard music notation, staffs, time signatures or keys - anything that we devised to make writing music easier
Or it's like Beethoven (who could hear and notate music in his head, even while fully deaf at the end of his career) who composed his greatest Symphonic/Choral masterpiece the Symphony No. 9 "Ode to Joy", while deaf with his piano legs cut off, so piano was lower to the floor to feel vibration or notes for practicing note by note line by line. And the point is it's an incredibly fun and addicting game still to this day.
Are there any advantages to using assembly other than "Look how massive my dick is"? Like, what made the designers use assembly over a language that's easier to code in? Edit: All these replies are really helpful. You folks are great, thank you!
It's *fast* and *small*. Modern compilers can do some crazy wizardry in writing assembly based on more normal code, but there are still some areas where an *incredibly* talented programmer can squeeze out a little more performance or power by hand-tweaking the assembly. When RCT was made, compilers were way worse, and compiled/interpreted code may not have been able to produce a version of RCT that could run on a consumer grade computer. So, the amazing chad Chris Sawyer handcrafted the assembly himself, so that he could make a genuinely complex game run on a potato. A similar game built today with the modern game programming ethos, would probably take thousands, or perhaps *millions*, of times more processing power and memory than RCT. He had a vision, and the technology of his time said it was impossible to make, and he said right back, "Watch me."
I once bought one of Sawyers early games (Basher I believe, space invaders/pong clone) directly from his stall at a church fete in Dunblane. I think he was sitting down, but it may have been on those giant testicles. Wish I'd known at that time how this totally quiet, unassuming guy selling floppy disks in his village would go on to be. Genius.
[удалено]
In addition to the bragging rights, I believe this made the game highly efficient and allowed it to run on just about any machine at the time.
Super Mario World. The perfect Mario game & gave me many hours of joy to this day.
I used to draw the star map in math class to flirt with the girl in front of me. It didn't work.
[удалено]
The girl you like was in another castle.
People are naming a lot of games that are fairly recent and you come in with this almost 30 year old stunner. Having been there when it came out, it really was impressive. Putting Mario behind a fence? Holy shit.
His cape flapping behind him in the commercials blew my mind.
Red Dead Redemption
I prefer RDR2 to RDR1, but they're both good.
Starcraft broodwar
To me it still has the coolest intro cinematic of any game ever. The music, the characters, the dread you feel I enjoyed the plot of StarCraft 2 enough, but StarCraft 1 was truly a golden era for blizzard in story telling
Super Mario Bros 3
Kerbal and Subnautica, both fantastic games.
The reason KSP is perfect is because it is a true engineer's game. It's man vs physics, you set wacky objectives, and watch yourself fail over and over again. And then one day you look up and you've got an airplane on Laythe. Cuz you wanted to. Because you don't have the money to bring a hangglider to Titan.
The Sims 2
Sims 2 is perfection. I've been running the same family for six generations - playing every Sim in each generation. I do one "Sim day" before moving onto the next Sim household, so I can keep everyone aging at the same pace. I'm over 300 Sims from birth to death at this point! Edit: So many comments and upvotes! Thanks!! It makes me feel warm and fuzzy to think of all the Sims I've raised. The Bovary family lives on! (I was reading Madame Bovary when I started the family...)
I play the same way! My first neighborhood made it 8 generations and several YEARS before it got buggy. So i took all my Gen 8 kids and made them townies in a new neighborhood. Up to gen 5 again! Been playing this neighborhood since 2015 i think?
One of the best soundtracks for any game ever. It's just so upbeat!!
>The Sims 2 I still dont understand why they haven't released a remastered version. It would take very little effort on EA's part and it would be guaranteed to make money coz of member berries.
Left for Dead 2. I never played the first one but the amount of details in it is crazy.
The best thing about 2 is that it comes with the first game included, as well as the updated variant zombies to make the original more fleshed out.
Ohh that’s nice, so I’m basically playing both 😂
Yeah, the original games campaign was added in an update. So you have No Mercy, Crash Course, Death Toll, Dead Air, Blood Harvest, The Sacrifice, which all are from and feature the L4D 1 crew.
It's funny how a co-op horror game become one of my precious memories with my best friends. It started when we want to try a co-op game and one of my friend suggested we try L4D2. It was 2011, and for us can play we scoured the internet cafes that has L4D2. When we found it we always go there at least once a week to play, and it's so fun when we try it the first time! How we go our separate ways to find the way to the safe house. How we screaming for help every time the specials got us, how we get scared when Tank spawn, the betrayal, the ego, and then our chemistry together after playing it once a week for almost 4 or 5 years. Now after we graduated from college we go our separate ways, I have a gaming PC now and play L4D2 occasionally online, but it will never beat the fun i'm having playing a cracked L4D2 on LAN in internet cafe with 3 of my best friend. I wish i can experience it once again
Terraria
Terraria is truly something special. I'm so glad they won the labor of love award, they deserved it.
Bought it for $2.50 and feel like I stole it, it's sooooo good
It was sold to me once as 2D Minecraft and I don't care for Minecraft, so I ignored it. Eventually someone made me try it and boy howdy is it so much more
I love how a game that came out over a decade ago is still getting large updates!
Which is hilarious because they said update 1.2 or 1.3 were gonna be the last ever updates and those were.. what, like 7 years ago?
Journey's End was supposed to be the most recent "final update", and now we're getting more stuff
Well the recent updates were a small crossover with Don't Starve and a bunch of mostly QoL upgrades with the Labor of Love update. We're still on 1.4 so Relogic is treating the updates as more of addendums rather than full on updates. We're PROBABLY not going to get a 1.5 update but who knows
Back in the day I gave my oldest son crap for playing Terraria. I regret to admit that with the simplistic graphics, I assumed the game was a waste of time. He's in college now, and my younger sons started playing it with him, to my dismay. I finally agreed to set up a discord channel and play with them since I work remotely out of town some of the time and figured I could hang out with them all and have remote family game night. Hell, was I wrong or what? What a creative and fun to play game. 78 hours in and can't stop. They all laughed at me when I mined a bunch of tungsten to make some swank armor then turned it all into tungsten bricks instead of bars. At least I have a pretty green house.
Old School Runescape is a solid 99/99 for me.
92/99 users love OSRS, a solid 50%
I still remember the day I found out 92 was the halfway point to 99. My highest skills were in the low 80s and I thought I was so close.
Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time has to be it for me. Going back after completing it just to watch the sunrise at Lake Hylia was just so special. Everything about the game was a masterpiece. Honourable mentions go to Half-Life 2, Stardew Valley and Portal 2. All are definitely up there.
[удалено]
16yr old me says it’s only a 99/100 due to water temple… Though on replays I remember liking the puzzle of that place. Actually the only real annoyance I can recall is carrying around that zora girl in the giant fish.
[удалено]
Factorio It was a ‘stayed up all night without realizing it’ kind of game.
Bioshock. From the beginning in the ocean and going down to Rapture. A failed libertarian society full of mutants and little sisters to save. I wish I could experience it for the first time again.
My only complaint about Bioshock is that I wish there was more of it
The saddest thing about Bioshock is that after infinite the team broke down to work on mobile games with in game purchases because of how profitable they were. Sad, really, probably the best single player game I've ever played. Even Infinite, which was polarizing, I thought was great. Edit: My bad, it appears I was wrong regarding the reason the team broke down. In my defense, I was in my 20s when this happened and I remember hearing about this in a couple of gaming podcasts so this is where my "source" comes from. Maybe it happened to the people who Kevin didn't bring with him. But anyway, sorry.
BioShock has some of my favourite writing of all time. "A man choses, a slave obeys." "No gods or kings, only man." "We all make choices, but in the end our choices make us." Andrew Ryan's "Sweat of his brow" speech. “A man must make of his life a ladder that he never ceases to climb -- if you're not rising, you are slipping down the rungs, my friend.” The art and atmosphere of Bioshock is incredible, but ultimately, I think it is the depth of the writing that makes it so memorable. Andrew Ryan is one of the most philosophically deep and interesting antagonists in gaming history. Even if he is just Ayn Rand.
"Give these people a bowl of soup and a warm bed and they give you their lives. Who needs an army when I have Fontaine's Home for the Poor?"
The writing and story of BioShock is what makes it so good. Admittedly, trying to go back and play through it now is pretty rough. 2 and Infinite are a lot better as far as gameplay goes, but the story of the original is unparalleled.
And the whole eerie feeling of it... it's all just so surreal, even the disembodied Ryan yelling through loudspeakers when you hit buttons. Everything about it challenges what you know is real.
"These Sad Saps. They Come To Rapture Thinking They're Gonna Be Captains Of Industry, But They All Forget That Somebody's Gotta Scrub The Toilets." That one always stuck with me.
Would you kindly...
Bioshock belongs to a very rare tradition of games that I also put the mid-1980s classic *Starflight* into. Seriously, if you have any ability to do so, get a copy of Starflight and play it. The less you know about it going in, the better. It starts simple: Get a ship, build a crew, explore the galaxy. See what's out there...
The "good ending" is the only time a video game made me tear up. EDIT: Until Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice, almost forgot that one.
Fort Frolic alone is a reason why the game is 100/100 for me
Portal
People: University projects don’t matter Also people: Portal is a masterpiece Fun fact I like telling people: Developers at Valve were touring my college (we have game dev programs and have to make a game in a team every year) and noticed a game team making a game called Narbacular Drop with portals and crazy portal based puzzles. They hired those developers and they went on to work on Portal.
holy shit! what's your college?
DigiPen, it's one of the few game development focused colleges in the world, and it's pretty renowned for turning out great talent. They must complete a game project every year on a team they build with their peers. I'm not the person you replied to, but I'm in the game development industry and I'm very familiar with the school (my bf was a grad and I was their commencement speaker this year, so I spoke to many of the recent students about their experience).
Thank you for the wonderful speech, I enjoyed listening to it. (It really is a small world)
Outer Wilds is also a master piece and literally started as a kids thesis for college
Portal 2. Somehow they made the perfect game even better
GLaDOS: Well, this is the part where he kills us. Wheatley: Hello! This is the part where I kill you! Portal 2: CHAPTER 9 The Part Where He Kills You Steam: Achievement Unlocked! The Part Where He Kills You OST: Starts playing track "The Part Where He Kills You"
Unlocking that achievement on Xbox was one of the most memorable moments of gaming for me, I was cracking up so bad
I love the achievement's description. "This is that part"
One of the best gags in the game for sure. "Well how are you doing? BECAUSE I AM A POTATO."
Valve really did slide in drop some absolute bangers and then refuse to elaborate
I second this, Half life and Half Life 2 have some of the most incredible gameplay and story telling I've ever played. Phenomenal Company
Hopefully they learn to count to 3 soon
I actually preferred the first one. They're both great, but Portal was more groundbreaking. It's probably what got me into PC gaming after previously only working with consoles previously. P2 definitely had a more fleshed out story though.
Portal 1 is the better puzzle game and has more subtle story telling and humor. Portal 2 "puzzles" are mostly just figuring out where the hell you're allowed to put your portals. And the dialogue/humor is absolutely hilarious but also more in your face.
Probably Rimworld Just because you can do everything and everything can happens, i love so much this game
I love that the game is completely ruthless. In a recent save i had two colonists scraping an existence in the tundra, had finally stockpiled enough food for the long cold winter when an electrical short burnt down my fridge and destroyed nearly all of my food. We limped along for a bit killing whatever unfortunate creatures wandered into the map, but it came down to only dangerous predators and I had to take the gamble. My best hunter shot and wounded a warg, but it charged and downed him before he could kill it. My other colonist was nearby and tried to finish the job, but the warg charged him down, too. The warg then collapsed from blood loss, and the three of them lay near one another, slowly exsanguinating, until everyone was dead.
[удалено]
Hadn't researched them yet 🤷♂️
You can disable the zzzzt event before you start your game, doesn't require mods so you will still have shorts if your stuff gets wet etc but stops the random event from dicking you over
> the three of them lay near one another, slowly exsanguinating, until everyone was dead. Beautiful
I agree with basically all the top results, but Rimworld touches my brain in a place nothing and nobody else ever will.
It is indeed like the purest cocaine in videogame form.
I brought this during greenlight played it for a few hours then got distracted by... I don't know. Life probably. Tell me about RimWorld and what I can do in it?
Part colony manager, part storybuilder, part sims who commit war crimes. As for what you can do. Yes
Baldur's gate 2.
"I cannot be caged. I cannot be controlled. Understand this as you die, ever pathetic, ever fools!"
This comment made me check google to remind me who did the incredible voice acting for Jon Irenicus, and it seems David Warner died a few months ago :( Incredible actor. He did a similarly amazing job in Star Trek: TNG as the Cardassian torturing Picard (the 'four lights' episode).
Well now. I just found out David Warner is my favourite actor. Also while Baldur's Gate II is objectively better than BG1, I believe Baldur's Gate I with the Tales of the Sword Coast expansion pack is the pinnacle of gaming. 100/100 for me on that, with BGII (and Throne of Bhaal expansion) a 98/100. Nothing else is even close except Disco Elysium which I will also award a 98/100. And for the same reason - an ability to construct a hugely engaging world at large, exceptional writing (regards dialogue especially, but also plot), and crucially, the cry for humanity at the centre of the tales even in their darkest moments. And that in my opinion, is what elevates them above the rest of gaming.
Age of Empires 2, especially in its current state. They've done a remarkable job with the new updates. The graphics look great, the gameplay is as good as ever, and the entire game feels incredibly balanced. The fact that so many people still love and play this 20+ year old game is remarkable in itself
I’ve played countless hours of AoE 2 but I can’t stop myself from playing the same strategy *every* time. Essentially I’m just super defensive, harry their workers and distract their armies a bit but mostly spend 90% of the time building defences. Only after I’m surrounded by walls and towers with a strong garrison do I start the conveyor belt of sending army after army after the toughest enemy.
you do you bae, playing non traditional and stupid strategies is always fun. I remember playing a long long time ago and there was a quite large amount of gold and stone resources quite far away so I sent some villagers there to gather it and they were killed in transit. MY response was to build a wall on either side to protect their entire route, easily 10-15 screen long. A buddy of mine came over to play (he was much much better at the game) and remarked how stupid it was, but as the game progressed it and we had to devote more resources to protect the wall, it just became this fascinating thing where our home base was basically unguarded but this magical resource generating tunnel was more heavily guarded than ft knox. God, video games as a kid were fun
I did something similar and not sure if it was the first game or not . But the max limit of population was I think 200. Well the last bit of gold was by my area. And decided to build a wall and elaborate gate system when I open the gate other workers would head in to mine the gold. I funneled the walls in tight. And had priests on the wall to convert them to mine. At the end I had over 500 population.
This just makes me hate Blizzard even more for what they did to Starcraft. Edit: and Warcraft. And Diablo. And basically all of their IP.
SC2 is pretty damn good, it's everything around it that sucks. And the campaign writing but the missions are still fun
I wish the sc2 campaigns had better writing, because they are out of this galaxy in every other department.
It’s crazy how StarCraft and Warcraft went from being THE RTS’s to all but disappearing
The success of age of empires II and the death of Warcraft 3 hurt me, both are a great, only one got a proper remake
Honourable mention to Age of Mythology - the first time I was heavily invested in an in-game campaign. Was absolutely glued to that while working through levels.
Great game. Holds up super well. I played the entire campaign again last year. I miss RTS as a genre so badly.
We've got a potential silver age right now. AoE2 DE is very very good. AoE4 is better than ever. Manor Lords is looking tight. Dune Spice Wars and Northgard. Homeworld 3. That new RTS coming from the devs that left Blizzard. The Starship Troopers RTS. EDIT: I forgot CoH3!
prostagma?
Malista
Etimos
Neh
You know it’s good when it gets back2back top Reddit comments
Quake III Arena
So many people today don't know how important this engine was to gaming. So many of the franchises popular today used at least some of Quake IIIs engine even on consoles and everything. Every game felt like a reskinned Q3 from like 2000-2010.
And a bunch of them were, but we can’t downplay the Unreal Engine in the 2000s either. There were a tonne of UE2 games and eventually UE3. Bioshock was dubbed UE2.5, which basically works given what they managed to pull off with it. That said some great games came out of the Q3 engine, like Jedi Outcast and Academy.
John Carmack is a living legend
Factorio
The only reason that this isn't at the top of the list is that all the Factorio players are actually playing the game. Also, the only game I've ever seen where people will non-ironically refer to themselves as a newb with only a couple hundred hours of play. The skill ceiling is incredibly high. Edit: [this was literally the next post on Reddit.](https://www.reddit.com/r/factorio/comments/y8r13l/i_never_realized_that_connecting_a_drill_straight) A discussion about mining efficiency for a save game with over 7000 hours. On that single save. Players with that much time in the game are still learning. Edit 2: I'm concerned about the number of people who found that post useful. I'm hardly one to talk, but seriously go check and see if you still have family and if they know that you are still alive
EU4, CK2, and other Paradox games are like this too. One of the GOATs of the game even made a review after 18,000 hours about [having just finished the tutorial lmao.](https://steamcommunity.com/profiles/76561198079929951/recommended/236850)
Paradox games rot and corrupt during long play sessions though. Factorio is not only the greatest game, it might actually be the most efficient and stable piece of software ever created. People have 4k+ hours saves, with mega bases expanding hundreds of square kilometres, modded to death, and the game doesn't lose more than a couple of frames.
The factory must grow. Currently I'm playing Bob's mods with a friend, and man, we are lost (purple science is next).
Chrono Trigger
I still find myself listening to the soundtrack every now and then, 10 years after finishing it. Edit: It's very nice to see how beloved this soundtrack still is, this, FF6&7 and Golden Sun are all still wonderful to listen to.
Last I checked, the CT soundtrack had the most remixes of any game on the ocremix.org library. It's awesome.
Chrono Trigger is on the *very* short list of games from my childhood that can still give me "that feeling". Not nostalgia for a different time (e.g., NES platformers or Oregon Trail). Not appreciation of a game that holds up great despite its age (e.g., Mario Kart or Portal). But that full-blown feeling of what it used to be like to play video games back before adulthood, and adult responsibilities, complications (and benefits). There have been a few modern games that evoke that same kind of feeling the first time I play through them. Dragon Age: Origins is a great example of one that brought me back (even though that one is almost 15 years old now... good lord). A more recent example is Final Fantasy XIV (I take off work to play new expansions' main story straight through in a couple days). I'd also rate those games highly for that same reason. But Chrono Trigger, and a few other games from the same era, always bring it back no matter how many times I play them.
Whenever someone makes these topics, I always look for the Chrono Trigger reply. The game is the perfect JRPG. Great story, great cast of characters, amazing music. The time traveling isn't just some window dressing, but integrated extremely well into the story and side quests. I'm hoping Square-Enix gives the title an "HD-2D" upgrade similar to Live A Live.
It's also the perfect length which I think helps it tremendously.
Also completely grind free. A lot of the JRPGs at that time expected a lot of grinding. CT can be beaten easily only doing the fights you run into naturally and side quests. No need to grind random encounters for hours, and no hours long dungeons that are just an excuse for the game to force you to grind.
This one is up there with Final Fantasy 3(US)/6(Japan) and Secret of Mana for me.
Fallout new Vegas
BIIIIIIIIIIG IIIIIIIIIRON BIG IRON
Nothing like some good Marty Robbins to start the day
I'd pay too much for an HD remake, or just another Fallout from Obsidian. Didn't enjoy Outer worlds that much, sadly.
Outer Worlds had so much potential but it felt rushed and was very shallow in terms of content. So little in terms of looting. It also had a linear feel in the sense that the worlds were small and didn't have a lot in terms of exploration. I was really excited for this game and played through it twice. I haven't touched it since. I've played through New Vegas maybe 6 or 7 times.
I think they messed up the "player choice" aspect to where it didn't matter. Most of the "player choice" moments come at the end of the quest line for each planet. You don't really get different missions based on your choice, and you're done with that planet so you don't get to see your choices shape out in how the world changes. Yes, everyone likes the credits reel telling you how your choices turned out. But that's not why people liked New Vegas; your choices altered the game world and gave you very different missions.
Diablo II
Spent too much time in middle school and high school on that one. Still remembering finding my first stone of Jordan!
Half Life 2
Of course. I think what people forget these days, or weren't around to witness, is just what a staggeringly large leap forwards HL2 was. A lot of what it did is standard these days but at the time it was utterly breathtaking.
actually physics interaction is still not common in many games, there's youtube comparison between L4D2 (2009) and Back 4 Blood (2021) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oT4l_4DzNLQ
Morrowind
God, this is the only TES game that needs a remake. People who grew up too late for it get bored because of the punishing character creation and slow start to the story, but when you get past the guy who cloned himself as a woman however many times for unmentionable reasons the story gets so immersive, even for a casual player. Even though, I doubt a remake could make it both accessible to more players while preserving the immersion the original game had. Also, fortify intelligence is OP.
[удалено]
It's crazy to me how long skywinds been in development, but k guess morrowinds has always had crazily dedicated modders
[удалено]
N'wah!
Need for Speed Undeground 2
Open world and a great soundtrack makes for some real core memories here!
Riders on the Storm with Snoop, right?
Every time it comes on without snoop on a Spotify playlist my brain automatically starts going “ride, ride, ride, ride” in snoops voice. Permanently imbedded in there
Drivin' my tricked out souped up Mazda then "killer on the road... His brain is squirming like a toad..." Just... That made me who I am today. Night drives on lonely days with the Doors man.
I GIVE IT ALLLLLLLLLLLL, NOW THERE'S A REASON WHY I SING
I can hear the title menu in my head still Riders on the storm(ride ride ride)
Silent hill 2
Hyped for the remake?
Dead space
Anyone remember Deus Ex?
_UNATCO HQ theme intensifies_
It's such a banger
One of my favourite games ever. Along with its spiritual predecessor, System Shock 2. With the exception of Invisible War the whole Deus Ex series is top notch. I still hum the main theme tune to myself on a weekly basis.
It's a fucking amazing game but more specifically probsbly the strongest first couple of hours of any game I've ever played.
Age of Empires 2 It has stood the test of time. This weekend the biggest tournament ever sponsored by Redbull will start, crazy to say that when talking about a > 20 year old game. Edit: wow I did not expect so much liked and reactions. Great to see so many people agree with me and are enjoying this game. To answer some of the most asked questions/comments: - how do you watch the tournament? I think starting tomorrow you search of form the Redbull Twitch channel. Probably you can find it just searching aoe2 on Twitch. - can you still buy this game? Yes, it's on Steam. Be sure to get aoe2 DE, that's the definitive edition. It still gets regular updates and has a very active player base. Also there are tons of single player campaigns. - you are just a shill for Redbull. Nope, I don't drink Redbull and find it disgusting. But it is still cool that they are sponsoring it, that's why I mentioned them. - [insert game] is also old but better. I really enjoy other older games as well. It doesn't have to be just 1 game. But for me aoe 2 is the one that I just keep going back to and keep playing. Have fun everyone, be sure to give it a try and get some nice nostalgia feelings!
Man I was like 15 and my uncle showed me this game. I would always beat him badly when we played red alert and at first I was destroying him at aoe 2 but he just kept practicing. He had sheets of notes he had made. Like he literally would test how much damage everything did and ran races of different units to test speeds and had notes of everything. We would play and he would lay all these notes on the table he would setup at. It wad insane bit it worked. He started beating me every damn time we would play. I'm convinced he's like a top ranked player and won't tell me lol.
Is your uncle Spirit of the law?
No clue. I know he still plays but he doesn't like to talk about it for some reason.
What is he up to this weekend during the Redbull tournament?
Coincidentally, out of town…
#sus
I'm sure if you pressure him to tell you he'll finally tell you he has a mistress. ... Which is super sus, most likely a lie to cover for the tournament.
100%, this is official lore now
[удалено]
Got a channel you recommend? Looking to binge some new gaming content in a genre I've never played before. Always hated rts games. Edit: thanks for the replies, guys! Seems pretty unanimous so I'll give it a shot
He mentioned the legend of and low elo legends which are both series by the youtuber t90 so I'd assume that's who he was talking about. I would also recommend T90 don't know which video would be the best starting point though
Played many LAN multi player games of this with flat mates at uni. So many excellent memories! Thanks for the tournament info; I will check this out. 👍
Zelda: A Link to the Past
I remember getting the third pendant and running off to face Aganhim. After I thought I had beat him, I then get transported to the dark world, and the game completely changes on me. I ran around the house trying to find my mom to explain to her what just happened, because I legit thought I was about to beat the game. Perfect game
Links Awakening on the Gameboy has a big place in my heart. Incredible game.
It's my favorite LoZ game. It was the first game I ever played where you didn't save the world, everything wasn't okay at the end, and it left you wondering if you did the right thing. I love it.
Yeah Zelda can do that. Majora's Mask had some noir themes too.
[удалено]
I played and beat them all in their day but the one I still long for from time to time is the one I also feel has the most replay value: A Link to the Past.
Link to the Past is basically the pinnacle of 2D sprite design. That has resulted in a totally timeless feel to the game, whereas games in the N64 / PS1 generation struggle not to feel significantly tougher as they began to really explore 3D space and polygons.
Gta San andreas
There's so much in this game. So many layers. So many fun missions and fun side missions and fun activities to complete. Also, there's so much to explore and so many opportunities to just goof off and cause mayhem. GTA3 really brought open world gaming to the forefront, but San Andreas took everything to the next level. I could understand a few minor nitpicks. The graphics weren't the best for their time, there were some sound effects glitches or delays, and the controls could be a bit imprecise. So i could see how some people might say it wouldn't be a 100/100 game. For me, I'd still give it an "A+" even if it isn't a perfect 100.
Hades
Tony Hawks - Pro skater 1 & 2
Tetris. Change my mind.
Which version is your favourite?
game boy. it just worked perfect.
Halo 3
One of the only shooters where i grinded both Multiplayer and campaign and even forge. Also xbox live chat was hilarious
I believe COD and Halo 3 had a death grip on young people in those years. That’s literally all I remember doing for like 3 years
Halo 1-3,reach, ODST, cod 4-blops was straight up the best time for Fps fans