Tell me what you play and I tell you who you are…
I’m very proud to be born in a period where the computer game find one’s feet. The first popular ego shooter (Doom), text adventures (Larry, Manic Mansion), new ideas (Lemmings) and new technique like parallax scrolling (Shadow of the Beast) all this during my childhood. If somebody ask me “Tell me the TOP 10 games you every played“, then I must say that there could be no real answer. Every year, every decade has his own favorite and due to the fast computer development it’s not possible to compare a game like Pitfall with FarCry 2. But I can give you a list of the TOP 20 games which impressed me during the last 25 years.
I will call this list my personal gameography, here it is :
- Pitfall 2 (Atari 2600, 1986)
- Elite (C64, 1987)
- The Bard’s Tale III (C64, 1988)
- Zak McKracken (Amiga, 1988)
- Pirates (Amiga, 1989)
- The Faery Tale Adventure (Amiga, 1989)
- Lotus Turbo Esprit Challenge (Amiga, 1990)
- Sim City (Amiga, 1990)
- Railroad Tycoon (Amiga, 1991)
- Populous (Amiga, 1991)
- The Secret of Monkey Island (Amiga, 1992)
- Dune II (Amiga, 1993)
- Rick Dangerous (Amiga, 1994)
- Dungeon Masters 2 (Amiga, 1995)
- Command & Conquer (PC, 1996)
- Half Life (PC, 1998)
- StarCraft (PC, 1999)
- Grand Theft Auto III (Playstation 2, 2001)
- Knights of the Old Republic (PC, 2003)
- Deus Ex : Invisible Wars (PC, 2003)
* The year behind the title is the year when I played the game (as good as I can remember it), it’s not the published date
What is your gameography ?
alex.rabe 
Hallo Alex,
als User Deiner klasse Gallery war ich beim Surfen eben doch erstaunt, dass Du auch mit “funktionierenden” Computern gespielt hast 😉 Meine Gameography wäre ähnlich, nur dass noch Sid Meier’s Pirates und der klassische Football Manager (C64) und Bundesliga Manager (Amiga) sowie Links 386 (PC) dazukommen und ein paar andere wegfallen. Aber hinweisen wollte ich Dich als ehemaliger C64 Programmierer/Musiker, dass die Technik “Parallax Scrolling” natürlich vom Spiel Parallax (C64) stammt und damit 5 Jahre vor Psygnosis Shadow of the Beast entstanden ist …
Ahhh,
Pirates hatte ich vergessen! Natürlich, das gehört auf jede Liste. Du hast Recht, Shadow of the Beast hat das Parallax Scrolling nicht erfunden, aber doch am Besten umgesetzt. Ich kann mich noch gut daran erinnern das für mich die Grafik für Jahre unerreicht blieb…
For text adventures it is hard to beat Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy.
Working out how to get the bable fish was a calssic puzzle.
It seems that you’ve played nearly the same games that i grew up with, but my “game career” started with magnetic scrolls “Guild of the Thieves” and continued after that with “Fish”. Fun to know that even to date there are interpreters for the gamefiles on several operating systems:
http://msmemorial.if-legends.org/magnetic.htm
Marc
Oh God, Command & Conquer is my all time favorite! I love RTS games. This one especially created a revolution in the genre.
I have yet to play C&C 3 but I will when I get the time. Probably after I am graduated from College and Running a successful business and have the money and the time. hehe
deus ex 2… why not deus ex? historically better, longer, more various… why?
I never played the first deus ex as far as I know….
hello Alex,
suppose we begin to play at the same period, my first computer was a vic 20 and my first game was a text adventure, treasure’s island, but you have forgotten, cause I’m sure you have played to, the wonderful games made by delphine software, future wars in primis. And, believe or not, sometimes I still play to next generation, I love that game…
Happy new year to you all.
ehm, sorry, I was talking about D-Generation, not Next Generation.
hey, this is fun 🙂
that would be:
1987 Elite (C64)
1987 Seven Cities of Gold (C64)
1988 Impossible Mission (C64) – Highscore about 00:50:00 min for completion 😀
1988 Gunship (C64)
1988 the bards tale (C64)
1989 Earth Orbit Stations (C64)
1993 Railroad Tycoon (PC)
1993 Silent Service II (PC)
1993 Formula One Grand Prix (PC)
1995 Capitalism (PC)
199x Wizardry 7 (PC)
199x Ultima 6 (PC)
all the time: Championship Manager/Football Manager series (PC)
2005 Saga of Ryzom (PC)
Hitchhikers –> SimCity –> Myst –> Long Break For Boring Life Stuff —> and now….World of Warcraft.
For me there was only one game. I played solo until I found other players on Kali. I played it until the operating systems no longer supported it. RIP Descent – I miss you *sniff*
Products of Blizzard Entertainment (WarCraft, Diablo, StarCraft, WoW) has been a loyal companion when we (my late blossom friends and I) were young and dateless. With all due respect, I think the makers of Wolfenstein 3-D would disagree with you regarding your comment on Doom being the “first” popular ego shooter. I’m also surprise to see that popular console titles the likes of Mario Bros., Zelda, Final Fantasy, and Double Dragon not represented in this Gameography: where are they now? Anyone for some (up,up,down,down,left,right,left,right,B,A,Start) action?
*:p
@Chi
I’m a early Amiga boy, and never had the SNES, N64 so I played Zelda only on the Wii
Wasteland was a great time sucker for me. I ws complex and you could emotionally invest in the characters you created. It was the first role playing game I can recall. And the first time I ever played a game that decisions you made early in your adventure effected the ending of the game. Zork was one but it was more channel and decision branching than the holistic feeling provided by Wasteland. Fallout was a great revolution to that genre but I thought too quickly you could create a god of a character and I found myself bored.
Found your website when looking for a non wordpress gallery.
My top 3 games are:
Counter-Strike 1.6, source
Call Of Duty 4+
Civilization
I liked
Alpha Centauri
BOOM
Bust-a-Move
Pac-Man
Cruisin Exotica
The list in uncompleted without the games: Bubble Bobble, Larry, Raiden, Pang, Street Fighter 2, Mortal Kombat (I now there are many more to add here 🙂 )
Das liest sich ja wie meine Jugend …
Kann ich unterschreiben.. Hach das waren schöne Zeiten… Good ol’ times 🙂 Danke für die Erinnerung an diese Klassiker!
Turrican? Was ist mit Turrican? Monkey Island, Indiana Jones 3+4, Leisure Suit Larry (alle 🙂 ), Silkworm 1+2, …
Ich glaube wir brauchen bald eher eine Top 50 Liste 😉
Meine ersten Amiga Spiele waren immer noch die besten:
– Giana Sisters
– F18 Interceptor (mit dem konnte man sogar rueckwaerts fliegen!)
– Sim City
– Test Drive 2
– Silent Service 2
– Railroad Tycoon
– Monkey Island
– Populous 1+2
– Pirates (ausser dass ich immer ueberaltert bin dabei)
– Civilization (mein letztes Spiel auf dem Amiga, super!)
Ein Spiel mit dem ich nichts anfangen konnte damals war “Die Stadt der Loewen”… 12 Disketten oder so 🙂
Deus Ex 1 habe ich spaeter gespielt, fand ich auch super, geniale Handlung etc.
Gute alte Zeiten… 🙂 heute leider kaum Zeit zum spielen.
Sim City habe ich auf dem Amiga auch gehabt einfach geil die 2D Grafik. Dazu kamen “Wing of Fury” und “North an South” beides auf dem Amiga 1200. Auf dem alten Amiga 500 war es glaueb ich “personal Golf inferno” mein erster 2D Shooter :D.
I’m just suprised not to see Descent I, II, or III listed. First 360 full motion make you sick to your stomach game. That was fantastic back in 91.
Good list,
I’ve been getting back into retro games lately,
if you’re a fan of them watch Gamecenter CX
Japanese show with Subs on youtube.
CHIEF ARINO #1
great jobs “Wing of Fury” und “North an South” beides auf dem Amiga 1200. Auf dem alten Amiga 500 war es glaueb ich “personal Golf inferno” mein erster 2D Shooter