icemann on 28/12/2016 at 17:12
DDO (Dungeons and Dragons Online) sure has a fair bit of content. That said though, you can only access a very small amount of it without either:
A) Spending a shitload of hours questing (every quest is repeatable) to get the best completed difficulty runs which nets you rep related currency which can be used to unlock extra areas / quest hubs. The catch being that you only get the rep currency once unless you go for a higher difficulty, in which case you get a slight amount more on each higher difficulty. Second catch being that you eventually hit a brick wall progression wise until you unlock more content.
Good side being that the currency + unlocked content is shared account wide, so making additional characters nets you more of it. You can also use the currency to unlock extra races and classes, further increasing the possible net total possible.
B) Go the fast way and just pay for it all.
I played the game for about 2 months and only unlocked one of those. Note that the game offers you 2 choices - Free accounts and paid accounts. The free ones require the rep currency grinding whilst the paid ones give you everything unlocked. I think KOTOR Online went for a similar method, though I've not played much of that so can't say for certain.
Sulphur on 28/12/2016 at 17:31
What Thirith said about Ultima 7. There's really no comparison to the first time you start a game up, and five minutes later, realising there's a quiet, electric prickle running down your spine, a voice in your head saying: 'This is something special'. The feeling of a game open up to offer you a vast, interconnected world rippling with sheer possibility is still one of the things I cherish about the time I spent gaming as a kid.
The only other game that made me obsess about it as much was Descent, and I still remember gaping at the first few minutes of the first level, where I realised I was piloting a ship in a mine in zero-g, and that I could play the entire level upside down and there were hidden rooms in the ceilings (floors)? Mind = blown. Really, the best thing about being a kid in the 90s? Video games.
mensch on 28/12/2016 at 19:00
The Dark Project first and foremost (The Metal Age as a close second). At first I was amazed by the briefing videos and the general art style, while wholy uncomprehending the gameplay. I just try to kill everyone (and failed rather miserably). When I 'got' stealth a whole new world opened up.
Star Wars Jedi Knight: Dark Forces II holds a special place because it made me feel a real Jedi. I mean, you get to swing a lightsaber! Also, the full motion cutscenes were great, especially in a time when ingame cutscenes were rather terrible. Back in the day I thought it was a shame the original Deus Ex used the game engine for its cutscenes.
Grim Fandango is a special game for another reason. Apart from being a great adventure, it was the first game that genuinely moved me. The ending just choked me up. The Number Nine, the music, everything worked.
Edit:
Oh! I forgot the original Duke Nukem by Apogee, because it's the very first game I actually completed from start to finish.
Shadowcat on 29/12/2016 at 00:42
Quote Posted by Sulphur
Descent [...] I still remember gaping at the first few minutes of the first level, where I realised I was piloting a
ship in a
mine in
zero-g, and that I could play the entire level upside down and there were hidden rooms in the ceilings (floors)? Mind = blown.
I know exactly what you mean. My introduction to Descent was watching someone else playing this unknown game... I've never forgotten how they flew out of a tunnel into a chamber, headed for a hole in the 'ceiling', and were suddenly in a tunnel again -- which I knew was perpendicular to the original one,
but you couldn't tell any more. My brain did a triple-take, and probably started reorganising bits of itself. WHAT JUST HAPPENED?!? If the metric were "time-to-mind-blown" then Descent would be my pick, no question.
System Shock is my most memorable game. For me, no other game raised the bar in so many ways in one fell swoop. Perhaps if I'd played certain other games before it then I might have a different answer, but at the time I played System Shock it was an absolute revelation for me, and I'm confident that no other game is ever going to top that experience.
heywood on 29/12/2016 at 15:20
I want to say System Shock. I want to say Deus Ex.
But the truth is Quake. It was the first 3D game I played that had intuitive controls and fluid movement that really became like second nature. It was also the first true 3D game I played with varied and interesting level architecture that didn't feel like a claustrophobic maze. And it was the first game I played with 3D acceleration, which provided a smooth frame rate at high enough resolution that you were never squinting at pixels trying to recognize what you were looking at. The world of single player Quake wasn't a particularly interesting one, just doors & keys, powerups, and monsters. It didn't have anything close to the depth of System Shock. But when playing System Shock, I always felt like I was trying to master a game, whereas Quake offered moments where it was like being in another virtual reality, especially when playing multiplayer with real people I know. Before Quake, my experience with multiplayer was mostly playing a console sports game split-screen on the TV, or an arcade racing game. But playing Quake with coworkers after hours or during a lunch break or with friends for a LAN party was just the best. Other things that made Quake so memorable was that it spawned the first real online gaming community and the first "real" mods.
icemann on 29/12/2016 at 18:07
I still say that Quake 1 was the best of the "Quake's". The mix of medieval, future-tech and hellish elements + that soundtrack from Trent Reznor made it the unique game that it is. Quite unique enemies as well.
Multiplayer was a heap of fun, and Machinema sprung up around this time as well.
Quake 2 was good sure, but it doesn't hold a candle to it. The later games even less so.
Nameless Voice on 29/12/2016 at 18:51
I just recently replayed Quake 1, and can report that it is indeed awesome.
One of the first fully-3D games in more sense than one. The levels were incredibly three-dimensional, constantly working at different levels with tons of vertical movement and sections criss-crossing over each other.
It seemed that they loved the idea of 3D movement and tried to get the most use out of it via lightning-fast elevators, swimmable water, stairs, drops, and anything else that they could think of.
Can't say I found it especially memorable, though, since I'd mostly forgotten it by the time I replayed it.
faetal on 29/12/2016 at 19:47
Quote Posted by icemann
Quake 1 was the best of the "Quakes".
I strongly agree. Why they never revisited the setting is beyond me.
demagogue on 30/12/2016 at 00:22
Before the 3D era, my most memorable game I guess would have been Bard's Tale 2.
That's the one where we drew maps on graph paper and kept a notebook of everything going on.
Kind of like the Skyrim of its day, the mid-80s.
Brad Schoonmaker on 30/12/2016 at 01:18
Quote Posted by demagogue
Before the 3D era, my most memorable game I guess would have been Bard's Tale 2.
That's the one where we drew maps on graph paper and kept a notebook of everything going on.
Kind of like the Skyrim of its day, the mid-80s.
I did that with the original Might & Magic and some of the Ultimas for that matter. I thought I was the only nerd for that sort of thing.
