Classic games of the past

poopinmymouth

Ok as some of you know, I got into games very late. I never had a console till I got a 32x sega console two years after it came out, and I only bought a couple games for it. My first FPS was Tresspasser (which I liked)

I've never played quake, doom, quake 2, doom 2, fallout 1 or 2, or any other "classics"

I want to go back and play some of them, what would you say would be your list of classic must play PC games?

One quick note, if the art has dated too badly, I don't think I can stomach it. When Tomb Raider 4 came out, I wanted to play the first 3 in preparation, and I couldn't play 1 or 2 because the art was just too dated for me. So if the art style hasn't stood the test of time, I'd probably have to pass.

ElysiumGX

Worms2

KeyserSoze

I think the appeal of playing classic games is the nostalgia of it, which wouldn't really apply to someone who never played the games in the first place. There are a few that are still entertaining today, but I can't think of any that I'd recommend (I'm not hardcore enough).

CheapAlert

You MUST play Doom and Doom2 (ignore the Final Doom and other addons), as well as Quake. Those are solid timeless PC classics, period.

Also, nothing is like playing classics on the real vintage computers themselves - and I have plenty of 'em

eXpendabLe

Here's a few to try:

Crusader: No Remorse or No Regret
Commandos series
Syndicate
Cannon Fodder
X-wing vs. Tie Fighter
Grim Fandango
Privateer (not wing commander series)
Diablo

CheapAlert

Also, a bunch of other recommendations, most of the games mentioned are of the 1991-1995 era, and ALL of these (except battlezone) use a standard VGA graphics mode as default, so if 256 or 16 colors is not your thing, then ignore this list entirely:

Out of this World (Another World for you ZED sayers)
Nethack
4D Boxing
The Incredible Machine
Lemmings (The original UNCUT dos version from 1991, no cd or Windows rereleases)
Star Control II
Jagged Alliance (and Deadly Games if you got other nostalgia-filled friends around)
Day of the Tentacle
Sam & Max
Scorched Earth
Jazz Jackrabbit (great game, if you can stomach the furry content and the phallic gun you carry)
Betrayal At Krondor
Duke3d
Castles (beats Firefly's Stronghold by far)
Blake Stone (oops, this is an fps, but it's a "smarter" Wolf3D, if you can't take wolf's basicness)
Amulets & Armor (extremely obscure doom engine based RPG)
Alone in the Dark
Tempest 2000
Tyrian (v1.1, because 2.0 and 2000 bastardize the Arcade mode's gameplay a bit)
One Must Fall 2097
X-COM
Battlezone (1998)
Rise of the Triad

Note that Win2k/XP can barely run DOS classics, you'll either have to use DOSbox or set up a Win98se rig with a Sound Blaster AWE64 (any cpu/mobo is ok, though some games ONLY work with the 486 and Pentium/586 processors (i.e. Crusader, Blackthorne) as well as booting into pure DOS.)

Thermidor

heh , i loved Trespasser too , very under rated. You ever see the monolith ?

if you can get the build engine working, Blood.

UFO/xcom apocolipse were all good fun (like cheap says)

Im playing through a really old clascic called Dungeon master at the moment (well a java conversion)

You might be able to get away with running a dos bootdisk for some old stuff, i think theres a sound emulation thing available for xp called vdm sound, its alot like dos box and emulates sb16 cards and there Irq/Dma settings.

http://www.deathmask.net/buildxp/ for some info on getting blood and Duke3d working

Mongrelman

Cannon Fodder (everyone loves Jools and Jops)
The Monkey Island games
The Indiana Jones games
Syndicate (as stated above) and Syndicate Wars
Strike Commander
System Shock 2 (you can even download a patch to update the graphics). You have to play SS2, it is a brilliant game.

Grim Fandango
Mechwarrior 3
Minesweeper
Freespace 1&2.
Max Payne
Half-Life

AstroZombie

[ QUOTE ]
I think the appeal of playing classic games is the nostalgia of it, which wouldn't really apply to someone who never played the games in the first place.

[/ QUOTE ]

I agree. I tried to play Starcraft for the first time a few months ago, and while a great game, I could not get past the graphics.

On the other hand, I did play through and enjoy Quake 2 for the first time just a couple of years ago.

thnom

I'd avoid "classic" games that have similar stuff to today, like that of Quake, Q2, and HL, just because they just feel poor, and not classic.

I enjoy games past that, such as Super Mario or Grim Fandango (no new real adventure games).

oXYnary

If you play Quake YOU MUST I repeat YOU MUST play it with the Trent Reznor soundtrack (and make sure you upgrade to glquake). Its just not as fun without it.

classic must play PC games:
Grim Fandango
Quake
Deus Ex
Diablo II (classic by this point in my book)
Re-Volt
Worms World Party
Baulders Gate

Ancient DOS:
Mechwarrior.
The Art of War.
The Oregon Trail.
Leisure Suit Larry
Heros Quest.
D&D Pool of Radiance.

Slayerjerman

All very great games, although I doubt he'll stomach playing Diablo1 at the shitty rez of 320x240

Xcom1/UFO Defence rocks my nuts off even to this day.
If you need the "fixed" EXE for xcom to run on winXP/2k let me know.

I insist that YOU MUST play atleast Fallout 2 and/or Fallout Tactics.

CheapAlert

[ QUOTE ]
All very great games, although I doubt he'll stomach playing Diablo1 at the shitty rez of 320x240


[/ QUOTE ]

Diablo was a 640x480 game, I remember how much it "pageflipped" on my brother's 486 dx2 66mhz like 3fps or so.

Slayerjerman

LOL - ok well perhaps has been that long ago that i dont even remember what 640x480 was like

JBoskma

Prince of Persia
Commander Keen: 1,2,3,4,5,6.....
Heretic
Duke Nukem 1,2

Creamy_Goodness

> Here's a short list of some of my favorite classics...

Quake 2
Tetris 2
Super Mario Bros. 3
Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past
Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time
Zombies Ate My Neighbors
King's Quest 7
Secret of Mana
Gradius 3
Ultimate Wizard

Hooker with a Penis

Strife
Fallout Series
Doom 1 and 2, naturally
Quake (Feel free to skip Quake 2, it's not old enough yet)
Hexen
Heretic
Duke Nukem 3D
Blakestone (Nobody will remember this)
Wolfenstein (Doesn't hold up too well, but eh)
Ultima 4 and Ultima 7 (Only those two, the rest aren't that awe-inspiringingly fun)
Daggerfall
Arena
System Shock 1 & 2 apparently, although I've never played them (well, I have SShock 2, just never played it before now, and I'm a pansy, so it's hard)
I have to be completely honest and say I wouldn't recommend Monkey Island. It does not hold up at all these days as far as I'm concerned. You would pretty much find it extremely tedious and boring.

danr

if you're after a real classic that hasn't dated at all, try The Curse of Monkey Island - that could have been released yesterday, you'd never know. It's just a bit short, which is a shame.

Gmanx

Anything by Looking Glass.

Another vote for System Shock 1+2 (Play 2 with the rebirth update).

Terranova was squad based play years before swat/rainbow six etc and had fmv cut scenes which actually told a decent story.

Sean McBride

Hooker i remember blakestone. I've still got a cd of the collection when it was released. You listed a ton of my favorites. Any of the kings quest and police quest games are fun. The hugo games are pretty good too. Dagger of Amanra is great.

Notice a pattern yet.

EmAr

My list goes:
Discworld 2
Red Alert
Theme Hospital
Z
Warcraft*
Legend of Kyrandia*
Final Fantasy 7(PSX graphics but cool game anyway)
If you don't like adventure/strategy/RPG at all:
Raptor*
Abuse*
MDK 2
The marked ones are rather old games and they are for DOS.

arshlevon

you would really be suprized at some of the awesome games you can download FOR FREE.. some classics are now abandonware.. check this site for details and downloads

http://www.abandonia.com/index2.php

some dont work because they were dos.. but i got blood to work.. god i love that game...

some of the cool titles you will find on that site..

decent
blackthorn
flashback
the orginal GTA
MDK
prince of persia 1 and 2
beneath a steel sky
day of the tentacle
kings quest 1 through 6
leasure suit larry 1 through 6
little big adventure(this game was sooooo fun)
and lots more.. check it fool!!

arshlevon

crap.. looks like the esa got to the site since the last time i went there.. a lot of the games have been taken down .... assholes!!!

danr

i have to say, i never understood the appeal of Little Big Adventure. One of the most clunky, unfriendly, deeply anti-player games i ever played. Autosaving is a fine art, this had no idea.

btw, i believe Beneath a Steel Sky is freeware now. Cracking game, and though it hasn't aged well, it comes off better than something like Deus Ex imo ...

lkraan

The old LucasArts adventures...Day of the Tentacle, Sam & Max, the Money Island series. I also loved Dark Forces (first Star Wars FPS).

John Warner

that's a lot of varried opinions...

personaly i think that a game has to have qualities to make it timeless to warent being a clasic. doom, although ground breaking, has none of these what so ever. in fact, one of THE REASONS that people didn't like doom 3 was that it had too many stupid simple nonsense oldschool throwbacks, like monsters in closets. that happens ALL the time in doom 1. if you were to make doom 1 with an updated graphics engine, people would say it's shit.

the true clasics have something going for them. starcraft plays like no other RTS i've tried. to that end i don't give a damn about the graphics.

system shock 2 is the best story i've ever seen in an FPS, possibly on PC. probably the best ambiance that i've ever seen period.

i'd suggest getting a hold of an SNES emulator and playing crono trigger, final fantasy 3, and a few of the old square games, if you're prone to story driven stuff.

BY THE WAY! a few people might be quite happy to learn that System Shock 2 is up for download at the under dog's website. ( www.the-underdogs.org ) is it??? i dunno. it's not even that old, it still looks nice in my opinion. it's a shame nobody ever played it. my vote says it was ahead of it's time.

oXYnary

Forgot to add Thief 1 and 2

swampbug

System shock 2, hands down.

And Omikron: Nomad Soul.

Showster

O.N.E M.U.S.T F.A.L.L 2097!!!! prolly the first beat em up I played,, well pc beat em up anyhow...

Rise of the Triad !!!

Blood

Shadow Warrior

...

most the other stuff I played been mentioned...

cholden

quick list off the top of my head

arcade/atari/etc
pacman
asteroids
combat
donkey kong
pole position

NES
super mario bros 1, 2 and 3
Double Dragon
Legend of Zelda
metroid
Dragon Warrior
Bionic Commando
Castlevania 2
Gradius
Megaman 2
Mike Tyson's Punch Out

SNES
Legend of Zelda Link to the Past
super metroid
Final Fantasy 2
Final Fantasy 3
crono triger
secret of mana
street fighter 2 turbo
out of this world
Super Mario World

GB
tetris
Legend of Zelda Links Awakening
Mario vs Donkey Kong
pokemon red and blue

monster

I was a big fan of David Perry designed games, until he started Shiney. They always had amazing animation.

Alladin on the Sega Genisis
Earthworm Jim
Wild 9

Oh, and anything by Treasure.

http://www.mobygames.com/browse/games/treasure-co-ltd/developed-by/offset,0/so,1a/list-games/

Joshua Stubbles

in no order:

- Populous
- Power Monger
- Magic Carpet
- Syndicate Wars
- Cobra Triangle
- Xevious
- 1942
- Metal Slug
- Doom 1&2
- Wolfenstein 3D
- Lemmings
- Dig Dug
- Rampart
- Rampage
- Mortal Kombat II

Damn, I've got more, can't remember them =\

Scott Ruggels

Recommendations:

-Quake2 (The art only improves with tons of custom player models from Polycount, and a good bot addon).
- Doom and Doom 2, but only on something like a cel phone so you get the full effect of a good game on crappy tech.
- WingCommander2
- Duke Nukem (You of all people will enjoy the one liners. Though art waise the game has dated.)
- Air Warrior (if it's still "alive")
- Sands of Fire (excellent Tank Sim)
- Harpoon (Rts with ships where the graphics really didn't matter because the graphics were plots on a war board and ship stats.)
- Colony Wars 1 and 2 (Babylon 5 for your play Station)
- Armymen I, II, III: Toys in Space. IV: World War. (goofy low brain power RTS games for the PC. World war also had cut scenes animated by the team without approval by nmanagement so we got away with murder, often alomostliteraly on screen)
- Karateka (done by the guy who did all the Prince of Persia series)
- Some ssubmarine game with decent grahics that I forget.

Scott

Scott

CheapAlert

[ QUOTE ]
- Some ssubmarine game with decent grahics that I forget.


[/ QUOTE ]
688 Attack Sub, Aces of the Deep, Seawolf, Jane's 688i, Silent Hunter 2. They're great (then again what sub sim isn't?)

NuclearTes

These are some of my favourite classic games:
<ul type="square">[*]Monkey Island 1, 2, 3 (there is also a fourth game, but I haven't played that one yet)
[*]Simon the Sorcerer 1 and 2
[*]Lemmings
[*]Gobliiins 1, Gobliins 2 and Goblins 3
[*]Woodruff and The Schnibble of Azimuth
[*]Jazz Jackrabbit
[/list]You can run most dos games with Dosbox. ScummVM can be used to run all Lucas Arts' games that use the Scumm engine. You can also run several other games with ScummVM, but most of the time you will only need Dosbox.

MoP

Jazz Jackrabbit ruled!

arshlevon

yeah that was fun.. you can download the sequel for freee!!
http://www.abandonia.com/games/294/JazzJackrabbit2.htm

CheapAlert

Too bad the sequels drowns all the "badass" parts of Jazz and puts goofy crap in it's place

oh and this q3a mod to be standalone game is porting jazz2's multi to 3d (and not working well imo)

oh and finally, Outlaws is a classic spaghetti western fps, I recommend getting the actual CDs because the excellent soundtrack makes up it's atmosphere definitely, as well as the great cutscenes that drive the story.

Ninjas

I have tried to play the Monkey Island games a bunch of times, but for an adult - nostalgia, they never 'grabbed' me. Sam and Max (same genre) I played just last year and is really great.
The games I have gone back and played that were still good:
For PC-

Master of Orion
Civ

Console-

Super Metroid
Phantasy Star 4