by mracoon
These are all the game that have appeared on my (ir)regular blog of the same title. They are in no particular order and I'm going to update it as I go along.
Showing 1-10 of 150 items
As the updated Secret of Monkey Island: Special Edition was just released it made sense to start with this game. Back in the 90's I was young and hadn't experienced many adventure games. So when my older brother told me to play this knew game he just bought I was blown away. This game wasn't just fun it was funny. The characters were memorable, the setting was novel, the dialogue was witty and the puzzles were just the right difficulty. From the first moment you find out your character's name is Guybrush Threepwood you know this game is going to make you laugh.
The game continued LucasArts' trend of not punishing players for getting things wrong like Sierra adventure games. Guybrush can never die but if you try to do something that won't work out he'll just say 'I don't think that's a great idea' or something of the sort.
The game was also the writing debut for one of the best game writers ever: Tim Schafer. Together with Ron Gilbert and Dave Grossman they crafted a story about a naive wannabe-pirate who must save the love of his life, Elaine, from the evil ghost pirate LeChuck. His adventure takes him around the where he must use his ingenuity and insult sword fighting skills to defeat LeChuck.
I'm really lucky that this was the first adventure game I'd played because it got me into a genre which has many great games and is recently seeing a resurgence with developers like Telltale and even LucasArts themselves after the release of some of their back catalogue on Steam. With the SE just coming out on XBLA and Steam you have no excuse to not play one gaming's masterpices.
Controlling transport infrastructure of a city doesn't seem like a fun concept for a game but somehow TTD takes a mundane task and turns it into an addictive simulation game. The game isn't overly complicated or dependent on too much micromanagement but instead is simple and straightforward; build a train network to transport timber to city that needs it and you'll get more money, if doesn't then you won't.
While not as vast as a game like SimCity, by focusing on single aspect of city management TTD was able to give a lot of options. You could use rail, ferry, bus, air or other modes of transport to get goods and passengers to their required destinations.
TTD may not be the most visually impressive game but the isometric viewpoint serves its purpose really well as it lets you see all that you need to. You've also got to remember that this was basically made by Chris Sawyer himself so I'd say he's done a pretty good job. The music, on the other hand, is brilliant and you'll be humming along to all the catchy jazz tunes as you build roads and whatnot.
The game's biggest legacy is that it started the whole '____ Tycoon' genre, which has spawned some good games, RollerCoaster Tycoon, and some not so good games, Carnival Cruise Line Tycoon (yes it's a real game and I'm glad that nobodies made a Wiki page for it).
If you want to check the game out you can download the free open source version of the game called OpenTTD. It's free and it's the same game so there's no harm in giving it a try.
This, surprisingly, was the first game that I ever played. I don't remember too much but just that I spent way too much time on my Amiga because of this. The game is a sequel to the original Bubble Bobble (something I didn't realise until much later because I always referred to it as just Rainbow Islands) but it gameplay mechanics are quite different. Your ability in the game is to create rainbows which can kill enemies and help you get to higher platforms.
Being very young at the time I didn't know the real depth the game had. There were three different ending depending on which items you collected along the way. It's all very complicated (no. 3 on the page) and was too much for my little head to grasp. That didn't stop me from enjoying Rainbow Islands and it's always got a special place in my heart as it was the game that got me into gaming.
Easily one of the best arena shooters of all time, Quake III is a classic and it was a game that popularised competitive multiplayer for many people. I never personally played that much multiplayer because I wasn't very great but I could always understand why people did enjoy. It was fast, frantic and rewarded highly skilled players.
A browser based version of the game, Quake Live, has entered beta so you can try to enter it if you want the same experience but with the convenience of being able to play the game in a browser. I haven't checked it out yet myself but I've heard it's just the same game, which isn't a bad thing.
It might be very recent but that doesn't stop Castle Crashers from being an extremely fun experience. I'd hadn't played many other side-scrolling beat 'em ups so CC's gameplay was still quite fresh to me. The ability to unlock new combos, weapons, characters and pets also stops the game from becoming repetitive and also adds a ton of replay value.
The biggest reason I added this game to my list is because it's the first game I played in co-op with my sister. Although she doesn't play many game CC's adorable visuals and easy to grasp controls made it something she would want to play and a game that we had a lot of fun completing together.
I'll tell you know that all the Half-Life (main) games will be mentioned in these blogs so be warned. This is probably the worst of all the Half-Life games but that doesn't mean it's a bad game at all. It's actually a great game but its major problem is that it's too short. That shouldn't be a problem for episodic games but Episode 1 is an episodic game done on Valve time.
The game itself plays just like all the others in the series and, most importantly, continues the story of the game. Episode 1 takes place immediately after the events of HL2 and puts you right back into the action as Gordon and Alyx must help evacuate City 17. Throughout the story we find out more about the Combine, get to know Alyx better, encounter Zombine and overall just further the HL mythos, which is all I could ask from the game.
As an RTS fan, Rise of Nations was a game that exceeded all my expectations. Though if I'd done some research into it I would have realised that it was in good hands from the start. Created by Brian Reynolds of Alpha Centauri, Civ II and Colonisation fame, this was the first game developed by Big Huge Games and what a way to start a games company.
The game didn't really bring anything brand new and took it's gameplay from RTS's before it like Age of Empires and C&C. What the game did best was take these mechanics and refine and improve them to create an engaging experience where there was always something going on. Things move at a frantic pace and before you know it you've developed from the medieval age, where you have knights and pikeman, to the modern age, where you have fighter bombers and ICBMs.
On top of all that RoN gave you a large selection of civilisations and units to choose from. I never felt like I was missing out on something while playing the game. Rise of Nations isn't the best RTS I've played but it's a damn good one and it'll keep you hooked for a long time.
For me KOTOR is my favourite Star Wars game. I'm not a person who cared to much for the actual Star Wars universe but KOTOR made me want to find out more about the galaxy far, far away because it was so well written. All the characters from Revan to Carth to Bastila and (especially) HK-47 are amazingly well thought out and you want to know more about them and their back story. On top of that you have a fleshed out galaxy to explore using the Ebon Hawk in which there are numerous side quests to choose from.
Choice is another big deal in KOTOR. In the end all your choices come down to the binary decision of choosing good or bad but it's still fun to be able to mold your character in the way you want. Also this is one of the games which popularised moral choices so it was still a relatively fresh concept at the time.
The creation of a great world didn't have any effect on the quality of the actual gameplay mechanics. The turn-based fighting of the game is designed in a way so it feels like your actually doing more then you really are. This makes the game more active and takes away from the grind of other RPGs.
As soon as the Star War license was given to BioWare it was inevitable that they would make a game that was a masterpiece. For all the talk of developers putting more emphasis on story BioWare is one of the few that actually follow through on it. If you're a fan of RPGs, good stories, Star Wars or just good games in general, then this is must play.
Peggle is one of those games that you plan to play for five or ten minutes but after your done you realise the whole day has gone by. The concept is so simple yet it's so addictive. It's a game which brings out the obsessive and the completionist in people as you're always trying to get the highest score in the least amount of shots.
This is one game which doesn't need a story at all yet the characters and their goals are so charming that you can't help but come engrossed in what little plot there is. It's also just fun to have lots of different abilities, whether it be Bjorn's Superguide or Kat Tut's Pyramid power.
The original Prince of Persia and Sands of Time are tied as my favourite games in the series. Sands of Time does everything you want in a PoP game: it's got great acrobatic movement, precise platforming, flowing combat and an immersive Persian environment, but it also adds the ability to control time.This mechanic is vital throughout the game and isn't just there so the publishers can put on the back of the box. Every time you make a mistake you can just rewind time and get back straight into the action and you don't have to go to an unnecessary loading screen.
Platforming is also at its purest in SoT. Every jump, leap and wall run chains together so smoothly and if I made a mistake I always thought it was something that I did wrong instead of something that was wrong with the game. The combat also fits in with the fast pace of the game as fights don't take too long and they always involve some sort of acrobatic manoeuvre to take down an enemy.
The story is also pretty good and you ending getting attached to The Prince and Farah and their quest to take down the Visor. I still don't understand why they had to create some sort of emo/goth Prince for the later games in the series and the dark tone of those game just wasn't a good fit in my opinion.