What do you say when asked what the best PC game ever is/was?

I'm pretty positive the TRS-80 got Oregon Trail as I remember playing it on one of mine (yes, I had two trash80s - a model I and a model III). This was well after the old thermal printer terminal...the days of games like Midway, Airport Controller and the whole slew of Scott Adams adventures.

 

No way, all games kneel before pre-expansion Ultima Online

 

Oh cool, maybe that was my first or one of my first PC games then. I was going by Wikipedia (yay, another example of why you shouldn't use wikipedia as a definitive source).

Although looking back through there, it's possible I played it on an Apple as early as 78 as there was a "type in" Integer BASIC version in Creative Computing. Something I'm sure many school teachers might have typed in by hand for their fledgeling computer classes, assuming you were lucky enough to have a high school forward looking enough to have a few machines back then.

Regards,
SB

 

AADV: Soul Reaver, it defined a great deal of action adventures to come. Half of Batman - Arkham Asylum is essencially Soul Reaver mechanic (no coincidence, lot's of old staff).
RPG: Morrowind, the abs. alter-ego sandbox, eg. jump 1000x times and at the end of the day you can jump higher; total foreign concept in other RPGs, too bad. Just missing casting 1000x fireballs, eod cast them faster (instead of leveling-up).
TRPG: Temple of Elemental Evil, only game of the Tactical-RPG genre as I see it, even though maybe Ambermoon counts as well.
ARPG: Titan Quest, makes almost everything exactly right for infinite duration cooperative bashing; especially with people that are no computer/game-nerds
ADV: Silent Hill 2, too bad there are not much more psych-games (I mean were fe. the interior of the actor gets a physical exterior representation, or were you really search something inside of yourself without being aware; it definitely does not have to be horror-genre)
ADVRPG: Planescape Torment, genre of it's own, also a psych-game in my book, and sorta interactive-story/book epic Moorcock-style cynic hero fantasy
Shooter: Turrican / Gods (side-scroller genre), The Chaos Machine (top-scroller genre), Quake (multi-player part), Halflife 2 (story)
Other: Populous (Black & White was just a clone), let's see the next one to come

Uhm, let's see I never deinstalled any of the named games for another reason as "not working anymore" after Amiga/Windows-Update iterations ...

In general I don't find shooters very memorable, I sort of lost reflex-game interest a 10 years before they became AAA, Quake is the last shooter I played till insanity (and ported to the Amiga on an 50MHz 68030 with a Picasso II graphics-card when the leaked code hit the streets ).
Preference and perception changes with time, these games maybe not cool games today, but they were the best PC-games of their time (to me), and surprisingly some of the Amiga games actually are still the best of their genre.

 

I just know which games that I think fondly of. I can't make a black and white call and justify a "best game".

 

I dunno, black and white wasn't bad, a lot of people really liked that game.

 

i saw that coming.

 

The single most fun I ever had whilst sitting at my PC was definitely with Wing Commander games. I remember loving taking down Jalkehi heavy fighters by hitting the afterburners and then going head-on with a dumbfire missile. You'd take some serious damage, but it was worth it since taking just one down could swing the fight.

Actually, Prophecy was the game of the serious that I had the most fun with, though it's probably not considered the most memorable chapter. I can't believe WC doesn't have a modern chapter.

 

This.
Its hard to name ONLY one, but if i had to say, i would probably said HoMM 3, just because there are no gamer on earth that didnt like it.


If I had to name best games i played it would be tie of those ones:
EVE Online, Jedi Knight: Outcast, Total Annihilation, Quake 1, Tekken 3, Mortal Kombat 3, FIFA 95-2000, Actua Soccer 1 [so ahead of its time], all HoMM games to 4 [with IV included], Medal of Honor: Allied Assault Multiplayer.
I actually love RPG genre, but i havent played any RPG to death like those games. I lost so many hours on those that its not even funny [2-3k+ hours each!].

 

2D CRT days:
Unreal2 XMP, Star control 2 , draw!

3D DLP days:
Borderlands (recfg'd extensively, playing with falcon controller )

 

nolf, planescape, mechwarrior 2, red alert, descent, the longest journey, and deus ex of course.

in more recent years l4d.

its not really possible to choose a single game, maybe by genre or year, but not best ever.

 

Deus Ex for me.... although I keep hearing awesomeness about "Outcast".

 

Diablo?

 

I have 3 that i allways say


1) Ultima 4 - didn't sleep for 3 days playing it

2) Civ 2 - got me through highschool

3) system shock - there were moments that scared me enough not to be able to sleep



sometimes i would say ultima online. It was really a game changer for me. First time logging in to an online world with a 14.4 modem and interacting with people from all over the world and going on adventures... Amazing .

 

Most of the coolest games have already been mentioned, but there are some other moments that stand out for me.

The Ultima VII games, which had full day/night schedules for all the NPCs and even some wild animals, creating the impression of a world that was doing its own thing even without the player.
Wing Commander 3 with the SVGA graphics, the live footage cinematics; Strike Commander with the first textured terrain in a flying game.
Of course the Death Star trench run in X-wing has to be one of the most memorable experiences from those years.

Betrayal at Krondor was an amazingly well built RPG. Eye of Beholder still stands out from the rest of similar games, and I was amazed to discover a few years ago all the little puzzles I've never noticed in it.

Command and Conquer took Dune 2's gameplay and made it a lot more exciting, while looking pretty good too. Of course Blizzard perfected it all with Starcraft a few years later There was also Master of Magic and Master of Orion, some memorable strategy games.

Doom for the first time, then Quake for the first time. Then Quake for the first time - on a 3DFX Voodoo Then Unreal on a Voodoo2, with that camera flying around the castle and that music.

Monkey Island and the rest of the Lucasarts adventure games, and of course all the Sierra ones I've only read about. Alone in the Dark, Another World (I think it had a different title for the US?), Epic, some of the first games experimenting with polygon graphics.


Trying to select any one of them as the best would be useless, IMHO.

 

Yes Unreal that was a fantastic game. Such athmosphere and locations and few enemies but challenging ones. Sad many FPS games these times barely holds a candle vs Unreal. Had Voodoo 2 8MB running it and my jaw was collecting dust on my carpet.

 

All these titles being listed and more is why I can't list just ONE game as best ever. I couldn't even list 10 or 20 as best ever. Which is why I went with first x86 PC game that floored me.

Heck there's Wasteland, the spiritual predecessor of Fallout 1 and 2 mentioned. Or the inspiration for Eye of the Beholder...Dungeon Master by FTL.

And there's always the iconic Another World (Out of this World in the US).

The Incredible Machine was absolutely fantastic.

Interstate 76 remains the best driving game ever.

Bah, I'd better stop here or I could easily list out a hundred absolutely incredible classic games. There are so many incredibly talented and ground breaking developers that just don't exist anymore.

Hell just look at how many classics were released by Dynamix (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dynamix ). Imagine any current PC developer trying to keep a release schedule like that with that many AAA games. Game developement is just so much more involved now days especially if you want to make a high budget one.

Regards,
SB

 

Deus Ex...

 

So many to choose from but Doom 1/2, Tie Fighter and Oblivion all jump to mind.

 

I honestly have to say Q2 was really nifty for me at first. There was something about it that really tickled my funny bone at the time. I mean Doom was a big deal too, but different. Maybe that is b/c I really played multiplayer in Q2 first.

edit:

I had no time previously, but the reasons which are not unique to Q2, but came together well are as follows:

First time I used the mouse (that is my fault obviously)
Extensive but not over the top colored lighting
Hub levels
A story line that actually made sense (unlike Q1)
gl_shadows 1 made it look cool
semi-dynamic lighting (if when you started you broke through the window and shot your blaster under that dark sewer area is just seemed extremely cool to see the light flowing through)
breakable geometry
great mods for multiplayer (though Q1 had good mods too)

Most of the stuff had already been done including in Q1 mods (mexx9 comes to mind), but this is how it came from the package.