Games We've Loved...

[Alec]

What was a game that had a profound effect on you? Maybe it was one of the first times you ever got hooked on a game, or maybe it even made you think about your life in a different way. Maybe you just had a really good time playing it! I'm curious what you find meaningful in the games you remember most fondly.

Final Fantasy 6



For me, Final Fantasy 6 was the first game to totally blow me away.

The opening sequence .... Snow falling, the lone figures march towards a faint light in the distance. And the music. It drew me into the world, the characters and the emotion.

From then on I was invested in helping Terra through her journey. Intense and desperate bosses were fought, secrets were uncovered. The world broke, characters changed and grew up. The Party continued to expand.

I was battling Umaro at the Opera House. The only remaining member of my party was Locke, and he was down to no health. If he died, I'd have to replay the entire segment over again. I resigned myself, and hit "Fight". Out of nowhere, Locke fires some giant green beam and BLAM. Umaro is defeated. At the time, I thought it must have been scripted! I didn't realize that FF6 actually had limit breaks.

I also remember drawing out battle strategies for the tactical battle against Kefka during class, debating various points of the game with friends and day dreaming about what the airship interior would look like from one of the character's perspective.

The ending sequence features brilliant music by Uematsu that ties all the themes together and a scene for each character, shown how they've developed over the course of the game. It was bittersweet... one of the most satisfying game endings, but it also signaled the end of the game world. There would be no more adventures, no more mysteries to unravel. You can only play a game for the first time once.

And at the very end, the Prelude starts playing, as snow starts falling towards the screen... looping endlessly until you decide to turn off the console...

[Derek]

When Zelda 3 came around, wow!  That first sequence when you're wandering around in the rain, trying to follow Zelda's voice, was a pretty mind-blowing experience for me.  The atmosphere was incredibly tense for me.  Plus I was such a huge Zelda 1 fan... it was everything I could hope for in a sequel.  I can't imagine that any game will ever have that kind of impact on me again.



Phantasy Star II - Wonderful RPG for the Sega Genesis.  Along with having great presentation, it also contained one of the saddest events in videogame history: the death of Nei to Neifirst.  An impossible fight for a companion that was there with you from the beginning.  *Sniff* 



Street Fighter II - My friend's dad would make us say Buddhist mantras 1,000 for a single quarter to play this game, and we'd fucking do it just because we were so obsessed!  Seriously, it was all we talked about for like 3 years.  Until this game came along:



Doom II, natch!  I won't say much about this one.  I was approaching my teens when this came out and, what can I say, I dug the great graphics and extreme violence.



Castlevania: SOTN - Pure 2D bliss.  The game that was like a ray of light breaking through the storm clouds for me.

[Krissy]

Ecco the Dolphin is my most loved gaming franchise. I loved all apects about it. The music. The gameplay. The story.
It was beautiful in it's own right. And up to this point there is no game that has duplicated it's uniqueness.







Chrono trigger is a loved rpg for many. And the bad part about it is that SquareEnix dosn't know it. Chrono trigger was a definiement for rpgs for me. The first rpg I ever played.
I consider this bigger than final fantasy.





Super Metroid & the metroid series before the 3d age. I didn't know anything about the metroid franchise before Super metroid came out. I'm glad the game quickly eduacated me on what I missed out on before SM. Sadly the series is dead to me now since going 3d. In my mind Nintendo lost what made super metroid & the metroid franchise what it was when the creator Gumpei Yokoi passed away.

[Tom]

I played nothing but doom1&2 for 3 years so I can relate to that one. I miss having an attention span.


I'll probably never have this much fun playing a game ever again. It oozed with character and it was really fun to explore. I wish I could start all over without knowing a thing about it.


The double dragon formula married to rpg bean counting and exploration had me hooked.



The levels felt insanely huge and it was fun running around digging for secrets instead of just rushing through the levels like in the original super mario.
I would drive that boot to work if it were possible.



I didn't really care much for any other megman games but this one was really fun.  Really cute art direction and freedom to explore at your own pace was great.

[Derek]

That is a hilarious pic!

[vitaminNewB]

Hey guys and girl-e.  I'm a kind of new around here.  But man, this forum is growing.  This seems like it's going to be fun.  I thought I'd start by doing one for this area.  This post just brought back a ton of mems.

But Dang it!  You guys took my precious games!  I loved you Zelda.   Super Mario.  You too Nobuo.  And my sweet, sweet Flipper.

I'll just move on over to my Sega Genesis for now.

I've always been the type who would always devour VG mags and make sure that I only got the creamiest of the crop of games.  That was my long/short term goal when i was a wee pup.  I tried to stay away from the stinkies, but every now and then I ripped cartridges from my black box and poured lighter fluid on them, by accident.

Anyway.  On to the Goods.

Gunstar Heroes.

I should stop here but.....i can't.

Remember those games that you played in the summertime when school was out, and it was melting hot outside and you couldn't play b-ball?  This was one of them.  This is the first game that I ever played for an entire day switching back and forth between friends, and beating it.  Seriously.  I woke up, played, Capn' Crunched, played, Saminch, played, Din Din, played, played, played, played, beat, more breakfast, sleep.  It was hard, fun, and extremely satisfying at the same time.  I'll never forget it.  EVER.

The flow of the game from level to level, even though it was a shooter, was a treasure that only TREASURE could dream up.  ****sorry****

The story line was nutts. It had Giant dice rolling semi-mini games.  But the boss battles. 
 

(new gba vers is a pretty neat revamp)
Le sigh.  Le purrrrrr.

The boss battles in this game were some of the most intense, and rewarding, battles that I had ever played.  Never in my short life-span had I seen a boss that transformed 3 times, Optimususes  Primeous style, before it freakin' died.  And a giant running robotic dog.  What in the schmoly holy.  I was scarred for life.  There is so much more about this game (graphics tricks wise)  that was considered a top notch feat back THEN, but i'm gonna stop.  Trust me when i tell you the screen shots do the game no justice.

So that's one for now b/c my stomach just said my name.  If you guys don't have an emula.........uh, i mean, SEGA Genesis, uh yeah, get one now and do yourself a favor and play the heck out of this game!  It might be a shooter, but it's FUN.  And  sometimes we all need to just have a little pointless fun.

I'll dig up some more later.  (these froggies are neat)

[ryan]

So, all mine are from a pretty standard library of NES/SNES/GENESIS, but these are the ones that really take ME back...



1. CABAL: My favorite NES game ever. The silly heel-clicking dance when you've killed them all, the crazy rolling, the gut-renching CHUNK-CHUNK-CHUNK sound when you bite the big one. I LOVE THIS GAME



2. FLASHBACK: Philip K. Dick meets Earthworm Jim-- sucha a moody, COOL platform game. The pace at which the story unfolds is unbeatable.


3. SECRET OF MANA: This game made my love RPGs all over again. So MANY secrets... So MUCH mana!


4. DUDE. DID YOU CHECK THE TOILETS. ON. THE. RIGHT?

5. Couldn't find a screenshot but, EMPIRE 1: World Builders, EMPIRE 2: Insterllar Sharks, were my main jams (on the Apple IIgs) for like 4 years straight. USE LASGUN. KICK DEAD. RUN CUSTOMS.

as for right now....

6. Current Obsession #1[/img]

[Derek]

2. FLASHBACK: Philip K. Dick meets Earthworm Jim-- sucha a moody, COOL platform game. The pace at which the story unfolds is unbeatable.

Damn, that was one hardass game!  I could never get far in that, or the game that inspired it, Out of this World.

[Tom]

Gunstar Heroes.

I should stop here but.....i can't.

Remember those games that you played in the summertime when school was out, and it was melting hot outside and you couldn't play b-ball?  This was one of them.  This is the first game that I ever played for an entire day switching back and forth between friends, and beating it.  Seriously.  I woke up, played, Capn' Crunched, played, Saminch, played, Din Din, played, played, played, played, beat, more breakfast, sleep.  It was hard, fun, and extremely satisfying at the same time.  I'll never forget it.  EVER.

The flow of the game from level to level, even though it was a shooter, was a treasure that only TREASURE could dream up.  ****sorry****

The story line was nutts. It had Giant dice rolling semi-mini games.  But the boss battles.

This thread is giving me a warm fuzzy feeling about simpler times. I remember blowing through Gunstar Heroes in a single day with my brother because we rented it. My favorite level was the space shooter level with the optimus prime, crab, handgun boss.

[vitaminNewB]

This thread is giving me a warm fuzzy feeling about simpler times. I remember blowing through Gunstar Heroes in a single day with my brother because we rented it. My favorite level was the space shooter level with the optimus prime, crab, handgun boss.

That level was Awesome.  Stop, no more!  the memories are too powerful!
@.@



Hey you guys are good man.  Derek, believe it or not I just played Another world/Out of this world 2 years ago.  Amazing work by one person, too.  Pure Genius!

This game was actually the first game I played that made me know that games most  definitely are ART. 

box snippet



Streets of Rage 1
Remember this? Double Dragon on Steroids?  And the soundtrack.....for part 1......whoa, my.  I used to actually plug my radio into the machine and record the music from the game.  What a dweeb!




Part one was still the best one.  EVER.

[vitaminNewB]

Bio-hazard Battle



I should really stop posting, but this game is a must play.

This is one of those "full-package"  side scrolling shooters on par with the R-Type series.

And once again this is one of those games that I was happy i bought.  This is one of those rare  games that had the superb sprite animation(lots of secondary sprite anim going on), excellent pacing, unbelievable bosses, scenery, and the soundtrack......  What you hear in the youTube video below is not even a taste of the entire games soundtrack.  Each track some how fits your location in the world perfectly.  Unlike the frenzied pace of Gunstar Heros, this one has more of a flow to it.  Everything that happens in the game is seamlessly timed.

I think the story line could have been a little bit deeper, but hey what can you expect from a story about a bio-mechanical group of ships fighting on a planet infested with multi-winged-floating-things and mechanical swarms of giant wasps.  But an overall great game(not a one day-r though)

And guess who's getting this one too.  Wiiiiiiii!  I need a Wii so, so bad.

Here's the YouTube
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oT-Pn8H3wj4

and the screenshot

[Giant Underwater Potato]

I really like Rygar.

[Derek]

Here's the full box art from Out of this World/Another World.  Courtesy of 4cr.

Speaking of box art, check out this box art from another one of my favorite games growing up:



That is a TERRIBLE painting!  But the game was amazing.  I had a Genesis before I got a Super NES, so my introduction to the 16-bit era came in the form of Strider and Ghouls and Ghosts.  And ALTERED STATES... I mean, ALTERED BEAST.  And really odd games, like:



Fighter Masters!  This was a really strange fighting game, and I have to say, I really enjoyed it.  It was recommended to me by a good friend of mine in elementary school.  That guy was a pathological liar, and when he described this game to me, I totally thought he was pulling a fast one on me.  It was absolutely ridiculous.  You could have a robot fighting a guy with an elephant's head... or a crab man lifting some fat freak with 100 nipples into the air and then bodyslamming him.  Mind you, this could be taking place on the damn MOON.

[Tom]

I really like Rygar.

Did you ever get the chance to play the newer one on ps2? It looked pretty good, but I'm not sure.

[ryan]

i forgot to mention:

SMASH TV!  fuck yes, what an absolute delight. It was like a weird dystopian, philip k. dicki meets the running man nightmare. I LOVED YOU, SMASH TV





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