Imagine that, but multiplayer, each with their own Robot. There were I think 4 different robots, one of which turns into a giant tank the size of a skyscraper. Good times !
Gamebiz 3. Though it would be better for having an end goal, something to strive for other than pushing higher numbers.
...and I thought of how all those people died, and what a good death that is. That nobody can blame you for it, because everyone else died along with you, and it is the fault of none, save those who did the killing.
YES! God I got this the day it came out. I remember that the Aliens online were so overpowered. Games were unfair. I remember having to lift up my controller and speak into that mic. Haha.
Major props to whoever mentioned Faxanadu, Robotrek, and UN Squadron.
Imagine that, but multiplayer, each with their own Robot. There were I think 4 different robots, one of which turns into a giant tank the size of a skyscraper. Good times !
I'll just casually punch this robot through this here skyscraper. That seems like the kind of game that needs a current gen remake.
Linespider5ALL HAIL KING KILLMONGERRegistered Userregular
edited November 2011
What's that? You want a semi-turn-based RPG set in a quasi-eastern fantasy setting, with sidescrolling hand-to-hand combat, day/night weather cycles, alchemy, shamanism, eating and sleeping, and the ability to pilot a chinese junk? Made in 1989?
I give you WINDWALKER:
This was kind of a sister series to Ultima, in that it was also made by Origin, and the designer of Windwalker, Greg Malone, also developed an in-game persona of Moebius to enlist and guide you in the travels. This is actually a sequel to a similar game called Moebius, but which was understandably cruder. I'm quite certain in another universe, Windwalker may have gone on to be a successful series with many iterations. I think it was just too damn ambitious for its own good in a lot of ways.
It was pretty unique. I mean, for a game from 1989, it had a certain compelling beauty, and I loved the mixture of a tile-based world with an ever-present horizon line complimenting a dramatic sky. There are also buildings and caves and things you can explore, which are just overhead views. Yes, in the game world you're kind of a face and so is everyone else, but everyone also has a routine to their day: fishermen get on their boats and collect catches, farmers go out to the fields, guards patrol, all that stuff. Where you meet a person can matter just as much as who you meet.
The combat was pretty rough, in that you really had to learn the timing and count frames in order to learn when to land different hits. I suppose the icon-based mouse clicking didn't really make it any easier either. My friends could not play it at all. But then I showed them how to kick ass, and I felt like a tiny god. Also, in this game, you can enter a monastery and train as a monk, which will ultimately grant you an awesome robe and a staff for putting enemies down.
The game is about a lot of things: Toppling a warlord that has thrown the emperor in jail and taken over the nation, exorcising demons that manifest in holy temples during the eclipse (yes, there is a lunar cycle in this game too), getting the alchemical components needed to make a potion of immortality, and untangle the secrets scattered throughout the land. And there's quite a lot to learn, and quite a lot to explore. Once I had 'won' I was still roaming the seas, hoping I could find something more, more lands, more people, more stuff.
Here's on of the rare youtube videos of the game, but the guy playing it is not particularly good at it. Feel free to skip ahead, he lets the credits roll in the middle of the intro:
I would've loved to see what the mechanics of this game could've developed into in a few more years. If there'd been a third game in like 1995 or something, I'm certain this series would've exploded.
EDIT: Digging a little deeper, I'm delighted to report that it runs just fine with DosBox! I can still play this game from 22 years ago! Amazing.
Not the greatest game, but still pretty awesome. I try to bring it up in all the "poll" threads. Matrix the path of neo. It follows through all the games and does a really good job. A fairly good standard beat em up that was given enough time to flourish and be developed after all the movies came out. For the PS2 era of graphics, it had extremely good lighting effects and reflections. Its a little floaty at times as you can see at the start of the video, but its fair to give it that to do some of the coreography, combos and manipulative enviroment that it manages to pull off. The story continues to add to the universe of the movies, extending scenes to places that they wanted original but were cut, and having parts thrown in that were never able to bring in. Theres a good bit about the training Neo undertakes after before and after becoming the one where the setting is like old samurai movies. Theres a level where the merovingian traps neo in an mc escher painting and it is pretty incredible. Giant fire ants do come out and alot of people complain about that part, but to be fair it is in line with the paintings, and this world also had vampires and werewolves and the twins that were very supernatural. As far as I can tell, everyone did their characters voice acting and it wasnt half assed.
The ending is the best, because the wachowski brothers pause the game before the end for a bit of dialogue where they say "martyrism isnt a good way to end a high paced beat em up, so we told the studio to go fucking crazy and make the final boss a mega ultra 50ft tall agent smith made out of the little smiths" and then end the game with that douchebag kid running through the halls of zion shouting "its over! we won!" while 'we are the champions' play. Its amazing they got this all actually filmed.
You is crazy. I thought Enter the Matrix was awesome. I just wish they would make a really awesome game like it. Make they camera and animations not so bad. My biggest problem with Path of Neo is his hand-to-hand Basically consisted of 5 moves, while Niobe and Ghost had awesome non-stiff melee fights.
I would have to disagree here, if you only had 5 moves in path of neo, you were not playing the game right. Enter the matrix I felt just turned into mortal kombat every time you ran into a dude who wouldnt get shot in the face. It wasn't terrible(or the problem I had with it), I mainly found most of the rest of the game awful. But the combat consisted of "block, attack/combo mash, counter" in enter the matrix so I am confused on why you would say its so limited in path of neo. PoN was closer to how the new Batman/Arkham series played.
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GoodKingJayIIIThey wanna get mygold on the ceilingRegistered Userregular
I have such a warped sense of what was played a lot and what wasn't. My friends and I just traded games with each other that we thought we awesome.
Freespace 2 is a great one I think a lot of people didn't play. I'm also still waiting for a sequel to the F-Zero game for the Gamecube. I remember the day we found a code to unlike ALL the car parts (including the ones from the arcade machine version). That was like the second coming.
Not the greatest game, but still pretty awesome. I try to bring it up in all the "poll" threads. Matrix the path of neo. It follows through all the games and does a really good job. A fairly good standard beat em up that was given enough time to flourish and be developed after all the movies came out. For the PS2 era of graphics, it had extremely good lighting effects and reflections. Its a little floaty at times as you can see at the start of the video, but its fair to give it that to do some of the coreography, combos and manipulative enviroment that it manages to pull off. The story continues to add to the universe of the movies, extending scenes to places that they wanted original but were cut, and having parts thrown in that were never able to bring in. Theres a good bit about the training Neo undertakes after before and after becoming the one where the setting is like old samurai movies. Theres a level where the merovingian traps neo in an mc escher painting and it is pretty incredible. Giant fire ants do come out and alot of people complain about that part, but to be fair it is in line with the paintings, and this world also had vampires and werewolves and the twins that were very supernatural. As far as I can tell, everyone did their characters voice acting and it wasnt half assed.
The ending is the best, because the wachowski brothers pause the game before the end for a bit of dialogue where they say "martyrism isnt a good way to end a high paced beat em up, so we told the studio to go fucking crazy and make the final boss a mega ultra 50ft tall agent smith made out of the little smiths" and then end the game with that douchebag kid running through the halls of zion shouting "its over! we won!" while 'we are the champions' play. Its amazing they got this all actually filmed.
You is crazy. I thought Enter the Matrix was awesome. I just wish they would make a really awesome game like it. Make they camera and animations not so bad. My biggest problem with Path of Neo is his hand-to-hand Basically consisted of 5 moves, while Niobe and Ghost had awesome non-stiff melee fights.
I would have to disagree here, if you only had 5 moves in path of neo, you were not playing the game right. Enter the matrix I felt just turned into mortal kombat every time you ran into a dude who wouldnt get shot in the face. It wasn't terrible(or the problem I had with it), I mainly found most of the rest of the game awful. But the combat consisted of "block, attack/combo mash, counter" in enter the matrix so I am confused on why you would say its so limited in path of neo. PoN was closer to how the new Batman/Arkham series played.
Sweet Jesus my post made me sound like a ghetto poser. The only one I meant was "you is crazy". You are mostly right the game can be awful, but I only thought on some parts. The helicopter boss fight, the Niobe driving sequence (Shit, every driving sequence), the ending ship sequence. However, I loved the ground sequences. The Chinatown sequence scared the shit out of me when I was a kid, all those Smiths running after you. I loved the rooftop level with the agents though. I would make it a challenge to kick them off the roof. The funny thing was, is that when you did this, I'm pretty sure all you saw in the alleyway was a SWAT guy. Some of the areas, like the airport warehouse area where there is SWAT everywhere, that was annoying. Also shooting the plane's tire annoyed me.
Something they need to do in the future, is make an open world game that mixes in the Kung Fu fighting of the Matrix and the bullet time gunplay of Max Payne. Mix in some city take-over like the Godfather games.
Otogi 1 and 2. Regular Xbox. Nuff said. If anyone even knew what I was talking about I'd be highly amazed.
Pray for the Lost; Rejoice for the Saved; Cry for the Damned.
There are creatures out there who want your soul, creatures that are willing to rip away your husk of a body in order to obtain it. They hunger in darkness and hunt in blood. Will you be lost...saved...or damned? Your choice.
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VariableMouth CongressStroke Me Lady FameRegistered Userregular
I promise people will
I never got them but they were highly praised around here.
Does Shadowrun for the SNES count in this thread, cause I still boot that one up every few years. Just love that game, but not sure how much everyone else did.
This world needs a new philosophy. No more, "Could be worse..." I say SHOULD BE BETTER!
Imagine that, but multiplayer, each with their own Robot. There were I think 4 different robots, one of which turns into a giant tank the size of a skyscraper. Good times !
I'll just casually punch this robot through this here skyscraper. That seems like the kind of game that needs a current gen remake.
I'll second R.A.D, I played the shit out of this game with friends in my early 20's and everyone with a passing interest in videogames who would stumble across us playing at our place would be hooked.
The part you're leaving out is that you just didn't beat up each other with giant mechs, you played as a little boy or girl and had to control said giant robot using a remote control that looked suspiciously like a PS2 controller. You literally had the L2/R2 controlled each leg, so you'd have to toggle LEFT, RIGHT, LEFT, RIGHT to walk with any sort of fluidity. The the sticks would control the arms, throwing uppercuts and jabs with the appropriate motions. Then you had REALLY awesome shit like sticking your robot-arm out and firing a fucking ROCKET FIST into the other robot standing down the street and sending him through 3 buildings. They'd highlight how horrific the damage was to the town after each fight too, and there was a hilarious sub-plot throughout the single-player game regarding how you constantly would destroy an orphanage and force some little girl to find a new home over and over.
And it wasn't just "3rd person giant robot fighting" either. Your boy/girl had a jetpack to be able to get to advantageous vantage points in order to view and control the robot, which was cumbersome but AMAZING when you figured it out. If you were really awesome you could jetpack up to your own robots shoulder and control him like some sadistic pirate's parrot, and if you got rocked by an opponent your little dude would be sent flying and have to scramble back to the fight scene in order to regain some control before your robot got pummeled while out of your view.
Basically an old-school Castlevania clone, not the Metroidvanias we get these days. It has unusually high production values for a doujin game, having full VA and all that. I know next to nothing about Touhou, so over half of the plot flew over my head, but still a pretty great game. Very nice art too.
Armada was an amazing game. The map is nearly endless, or at least it seems that way. You just keep going further and further in hyperdrive, gaining level after level...
So many good titles mentioned. MAD props for mentioning Way of the Samurai right out of the gate. The fact that you can literally walk into town, first thing, and walk down the road that leads out of town, and the game just fucking ENDS, because you CHOSE TO IGNORE THE TOWN COMPLETELY... THAT'S AMAZING.
Also, zomg Warzone 2100 I played the demo for that on PS1 non-stop. I loved it so much, wish I got it back in the day.
It controls horribly now and I don't think it did great in the review department, but goddamn was its mix of shooting and platforming SO FUN. It was also one of the first cinematic games that played out so action packed like that for me, which I loved as a kid. Now every CoD game feels like a better playing One to me.
This game getting passed over the way it did is fucking criminal. It had fantastic side-scrolling platformer gameplay and the whip mechanic was unique, tricky and super well done. The music, the atmosphere and the gameplay were all top notch and the game is hard, but fun. And everything is packed with character. The sound effects just stick with you. I'll always loved this game.
Terrible voice acting aside, just play the game. You technically play this kid who has what looks like an RC car controller in their hands. You find a vantage point (by running around and jumping from building to building. They give you hover boots so you can get on top of tall buildings fast.) and then that vantage point is your only camera angle for when you use that controller to control a giant robot that attacks other giant robots.
I can't properly express to you in words how amazing this idea is, and this game pulls it off pretty damn well. Not the best production quality in the world by any means, but I'll be fucked if this game isn't absolutely fantastic to play. The concept is so bizarre (you control each limb separately too, except for the legs. so it's hard to fall down, but not impossible) and it's executed well enough to have a blast with it while understanding the idea they had for the game all the same. Hard to describe how satisfyingly hilarious it is to play the 2-player mode of this game with a willing friend.
So what I'm getting is that a lot of people here thought R.A.D. was, well, pretty rad! I never played it, but from that video I bet I would have liked it. Probably I would have spent hours just levitating around -- jetpacks were my favorite video game feature in the PS1 era. :P Around that time I spent a lot of time flying around in those VRML setups that were briefly popular on the web.
Ha, it does seem like RAD is getting lots of love. I remember buying it used after trying it out randomly on a demo PS2 in a Best Buy. Right in my wheelhouse.
To the guy who recommended Path of Neo: good on you, it is a fun game (although the ant part really is annoying and overlong). However, I do have to correct you - I think the only actor they got to return was Morgan Freeman. Everyone else was a soundalike. Also, there is no new filmed footage, just reused movie footage as well as a bit of CG here and there.
One of my absolute favorite rare(ish) games is Starflight for the Genesis / Megadrive. Basically a Star Control 2 clone, except Star Control 2 was actually a clone of it. While originally a computer game, the Genesis version is definitive in my opinion - better graphics and a streamlined interface and gameplay that loses none of the good type of complexity.
For the uninitiated for what this type of game involves, you're broadly tasked with solving a galaxy-wide problem, and are given a ship to explore the galaxy freely and hopefully figure things out. On the way, you'll meet all sorts of strange aliens, land on hundreds of planets, find ruins of destroyed civilizations, and of course mine to earn the cash for fuel as well as upgrading the weapons, shields, and engines of your ship.
If you're familiar with Star Control, then it's basically the same except you don't start near Earth (it's long been lost to humans), there are no multi-ship battles, and the writing is a bit more serious with a bit more generic alien races. That said, the atmosphere is definitely also more creepy and desolate, and I personally think mining and exploring on planets is more fun.
Silent Bomber was amazing. My friend had a ton of demo disks he was going to throw away, but I said I'd play through them all first. This game was on there, with no explanation or even translation, from what I remember. I immediately checked to see if it ever actually came out here, then tracked it down. You fire bombs everywhere and blow shit up continuously. Great fun. And then the last boss is completely different from the rest of the game, so I stopped playing. Looking it up at the time, most people had the same reaction.
I played a whole hell of a lot of Cubivore, and made a few serious stabs at beating it, but as far as I can tell it just repeats for eternity each time you beat a species. I don't know if there is an actual ending or what. Great concept, though. Great everything, really.
I keep thinking of more games I've never heard of outside my living room.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W2znbx3mErU
TimeStalkers for the DC. Took characters from Ladystalker and Landstalker and a bunch of other things and kind of dropped them together in a weird Azure Dreams-like gameworld and playstyle.
Oh, and speaking of which.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2L-pYth9NsM
Azure Dreams for the PSX. Great dungeon crawler with monster collection, romance storylines, and town-building aspects that really set it apart from the rest.
I think Cubivore is one of the greatest games of all time.
youtube
I played a whole hell of a lot of Cubivore, and made a few serious stabs at beating it, but as far as I can tell it just repeats for eternity each time you beat a species. I don't know if there is an actual ending or what. Great concept, though. Great everything, really.
I think in order to get to the ending, you have to get a certain number of mutations. I can't remember exactly. There's definitely an ending.
Alternate Reality: The City and The Dungeon for the Atari 8-bit line of computers (it's the first two and only released games in a series of seven planned installments, which all were supposed to be interconnected).
They were released in 1985 and 1987, and (imo) still are the most advanced CRPGs ever released. They're non-linear sandbox games that feature, amongst a myriad of other things (which people were still discovering 20 years after release), NPCs with memories and personalities, NPC reactions based on what you wore, carried and your alignment, shopkeepers you could haggle with, rivaling guilds, disease carrying monsters with incubation times on the diseases and each disease carrying different symptoms, the ability to get drunk, starved, or bloated, tired (with blackouts as a result) and overencumbered (with slow movement as a result), weather simulation which included wind which could make your character cold (and prone to get a cold), magical weapons with their own personalities (if you were a good guy who stole a Sword of Demons, it would scream at you and summon more demons), and the list goes on and on and on... you could bribe zombies with corpses from other monsters you've killed for crying out loud!
Also, it was released seven years before Wolfenstein 3D, yet features smooth scrolling texture mapped and mip-mapped 3D graphics. All in 128kb of memory.
Yes, they were amazing games.
The Dungeon even had a creature that would come and eat items from your inventory if the player amassed too many things (The Devourer) simply as a memory maintenance tool (because the game couldn't handle you carrying more than 250 items, or something like that).
Switch: SW-7690-2320-9238Steam/PSN/Xbox: Drezdar
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syndalisGetting ClassyOn the WallRegistered User, Loves Apple Productsregular
I don't know if this counts as it shows up on top 10 lists for best RPG of all time fairly often... but
Panzer Dragoon: Saga
The game showed up at End of Life for the Saturn in America, and they printed a comically low number of copies. And then they advertised the fact that you will probably never get to play it.
Linked, because it is a 1.9MB scan. Basically, it says that cutting out a mask of the protagonist and wearing it will probably be the closes you will ever get to playing it.
They took out this full page ad in most of the gaming publications.
SEGA America was a cockstain during the Saturn era.
SW-4158-3990-6116
Let's play Mario Kart or something...
So many good games in this thread, but I haven't seen this one yet. Awesome Mech/Jet game where you could change from walking to flying with the push of a button. Hard as nails too.
The controls were fairly clunky but the atmosphere in this game was so damn good, the music was especially good at being unnerving.
Solar shield for the win. I always loved when you got to grab a biplane in the first era, and I loved most of Java and whatever the 60s city was. Great game, and the line of descent to their later GTA series is clear, but the combination of ugly blocky Samus-hero and the first level being all yellow, all the time probably prevented a lot of people from taking a second look at it. Also I hated the hovercraft levels.
Azure Dreams was awesome back in the day, I wish I still had my copy. In fact, this may warrant some serious searching when I go to my parents' house for the holidays.
My friend and I used to play a game for the PSX that was part strategy, part action game. I can't remember much about it except that you controlled this little monster army on a big hex map, and when you ran into another enemy monster the battle switched to a little arena. There were a bunch of different monsters but I think the main guy was like a big green lizard with a huge mouth. Whatever it was, we played it for months.
I loved Breakdown for the Xbox. A first person shooter/beat 'em up that never leaves that perspective (first person puking :shock:). Basically, it starts as a mediocre FPS where you gun down military dudes who are trying to kill you. However, an hour or two in you start coming across enemies called the T'Lan (aliens or something; I don't really remember) that are immune to bullets, so you have to run up and beat them down. Boy, does it feel good to beat them down.
Gladius is one I always wished would get a successor. Just something more historical for me. I can't believe there's never been a historical gladiator game. I'm not really counting Shadow of Rome and that other one that came out at about the same time. They were too arcadey/not really about gladiators.
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That looks awesome!
Imagine that, but multiplayer, each with their own Robot. There were I think 4 different robots, one of which turns into a giant tank the size of a skyscraper. Good times !
Nothing's forgotten, nothing is ever forgotten
YES! God I got this the day it came out. I remember that the Aliens online were so overpowered. Games were unfair. I remember having to lift up my controller and speak into that mic. Haha.
Major props to whoever mentioned Faxanadu, Robotrek, and UN Squadron.
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loved that game
@Premier Kakos
agree with Uplink.
I'll just casually punch this robot through this here skyscraper. That seems like the kind of game that needs a current gen remake.
I give you WINDWALKER:
This was kind of a sister series to Ultima, in that it was also made by Origin, and the designer of Windwalker, Greg Malone, also developed an in-game persona of Moebius to enlist and guide you in the travels. This is actually a sequel to a similar game called Moebius, but which was understandably cruder. I'm quite certain in another universe, Windwalker may have gone on to be a successful series with many iterations. I think it was just too damn ambitious for its own good in a lot of ways.
It was pretty unique. I mean, for a game from 1989, it had a certain compelling beauty, and I loved the mixture of a tile-based world with an ever-present horizon line complimenting a dramatic sky. There are also buildings and caves and things you can explore, which are just overhead views. Yes, in the game world you're kind of a face and so is everyone else, but everyone also has a routine to their day: fishermen get on their boats and collect catches, farmers go out to the fields, guards patrol, all that stuff. Where you meet a person can matter just as much as who you meet.
The combat was pretty rough, in that you really had to learn the timing and count frames in order to learn when to land different hits. I suppose the icon-based mouse clicking didn't really make it any easier either. My friends could not play it at all. But then I showed them how to kick ass, and I felt like a tiny god. Also, in this game, you can enter a monastery and train as a monk, which will ultimately grant you an awesome robe and a staff for putting enemies down.
The game is about a lot of things: Toppling a warlord that has thrown the emperor in jail and taken over the nation, exorcising demons that manifest in holy temples during the eclipse (yes, there is a lunar cycle in this game too), getting the alchemical components needed to make a potion of immortality, and untangle the secrets scattered throughout the land. And there's quite a lot to learn, and quite a lot to explore. Once I had 'won' I was still roaming the seas, hoping I could find something more, more lands, more people, more stuff.
Here's on of the rare youtube videos of the game, but the guy playing it is not particularly good at it. Feel free to skip ahead, he lets the credits roll in the middle of the intro:
I would've loved to see what the mechanics of this game could've developed into in a few more years. If there'd been a third game in like 1995 or something, I'm certain this series would've exploded.
EDIT: Digging a little deeper, I'm delighted to report that it runs just fine with DosBox! I can still play this game from 22 years ago! Amazing.
I would have to disagree here, if you only had 5 moves in path of neo, you were not playing the game right. Enter the matrix I felt just turned into mortal kombat every time you ran into a dude who wouldnt get shot in the face. It wasn't terrible(or the problem I had with it), I mainly found most of the rest of the game awful. But the combat consisted of "block, attack/combo mash, counter" in enter the matrix so I am confused on why you would say its so limited in path of neo. PoN was closer to how the new Batman/Arkham series played.
Freespace 2 is a great one I think a lot of people didn't play. I'm also still waiting for a sequel to the F-Zero game for the Gamecube. I remember the day we found a code to unlike ALL the car parts (including the ones from the arcade machine version). That was like the second coming.
Sweet Jesus my post made me sound like a ghetto poser. The only one I meant was "you is crazy". You are mostly right the game can be awful, but I only thought on some parts. The helicopter boss fight, the Niobe driving sequence (Shit, every driving sequence), the ending ship sequence. However, I loved the ground sequences. The Chinatown sequence scared the shit out of me when I was a kid, all those Smiths running after you. I loved the rooftop level with the agents though. I would make it a challenge to kick them off the roof. The funny thing was, is that when you did this, I'm pretty sure all you saw in the alleyway was a SWAT guy. Some of the areas, like the airport warehouse area where there is SWAT everywhere, that was annoying. Also shooting the plane's tire annoyed me.
Something they need to do in the future, is make an open world game that mixes in the Kung Fu fighting of the Matrix and the bullet time gunplay of Max Payne. Mix in some city take-over like the Godfather games.
There are creatures out there who want your soul, creatures that are willing to rip away your husk of a body in order to obtain it. They hunger in darkness and hunt in blood. Will you be lost...saved...or damned? Your choice.
I never got them but they were highly praised around here.
I'll second R.A.D, I played the shit out of this game with friends in my early 20's and everyone with a passing interest in videogames who would stumble across us playing at our place would be hooked.
The part you're leaving out is that you just didn't beat up each other with giant mechs, you played as a little boy or girl and had to control said giant robot using a remote control that looked suspiciously like a PS2 controller. You literally had the L2/R2 controlled each leg, so you'd have to toggle LEFT, RIGHT, LEFT, RIGHT to walk with any sort of fluidity. The the sticks would control the arms, throwing uppercuts and jabs with the appropriate motions. Then you had REALLY awesome shit like sticking your robot-arm out and firing a fucking ROCKET FIST into the other robot standing down the street and sending him through 3 buildings. They'd highlight how horrific the damage was to the town after each fight too, and there was a hilarious sub-plot throughout the single-player game regarding how you constantly would destroy an orphanage and force some little girl to find a new home over and over.
And it wasn't just "3rd person giant robot fighting" either. Your boy/girl had a jetpack to be able to get to advantageous vantage points in order to view and control the robot, which was cumbersome but AMAZING when you figured it out. If you were really awesome you could jetpack up to your own robots shoulder and control him like some sadistic pirate's parrot, and if you got rocked by an opponent your little dude would be sent flying and have to scramble back to the fight scene in order to regain some control before your robot got pummeled while out of your view.
Basically an old-school Castlevania clone, not the Metroidvanias we get these days. It has unusually high production values for a doujin game, having full VA and all that. I know next to nothing about Touhou, so over half of the plot flew over my head, but still a pretty great game. Very nice art too.
Also, zomg Warzone 2100 I played the demo for that on PS1 non-stop. I loved it so much, wish I got it back in the day.
But, my picks:
One
It controls horribly now and I don't think it did great in the review department, but goddamn was its mix of shooting and platforming SO FUN. It was also one of the first cinematic games that played out so action packed like that for me, which I loved as a kid. Now every CoD game feels like a better playing One to me.
WILD 9
This game getting passed over the way it did is fucking criminal. It had fantastic side-scrolling platformer gameplay and the whip mechanic was unique, tricky and super well done. The music, the atmosphere and the gameplay were all top notch and the game is hard, but fun. And everything is packed with character. The sound effects just stick with you. I'll always loved this game.
R.A.D.
"Robotic Alchemic Drive"
Terrible voice acting aside, just play the game. You technically play this kid who has what looks like an RC car controller in their hands. You find a vantage point (by running around and jumping from building to building. They give you hover boots so you can get on top of tall buildings fast.) and then that vantage point is your only camera angle for when you use that controller to control a giant robot that attacks other giant robots.
I can't properly express to you in words how amazing this idea is, and this game pulls it off pretty damn well. Not the best production quality in the world by any means, but I'll be fucked if this game isn't absolutely fantastic to play. The concept is so bizarre (you control each limb separately too, except for the legs. so it's hard to fall down, but not impossible) and it's executed well enough to have a blast with it while understanding the idea they had for the game all the same. Hard to describe how satisfyingly hilarious it is to play the 2-player mode of this game with a willing friend.
To the guy who recommended Path of Neo: good on you, it is a fun game (although the ant part really is annoying and overlong). However, I do have to correct you - I think the only actor they got to return was Morgan Freeman. Everyone else was a soundalike. Also, there is no new filmed footage, just reused movie footage as well as a bit of CG here and there.
One of my absolute favorite rare(ish) games is Starflight for the Genesis / Megadrive. Basically a Star Control 2 clone, except Star Control 2 was actually a clone of it. While originally a computer game, the Genesis version is definitive in my opinion - better graphics and a streamlined interface and gameplay that loses none of the good type of complexity.
For the uninitiated for what this type of game involves, you're broadly tasked with solving a galaxy-wide problem, and are given a ship to explore the galaxy freely and hopefully figure things out. On the way, you'll meet all sorts of strange aliens, land on hundreds of planets, find ruins of destroyed civilizations, and of course mine to earn the cash for fuel as well as upgrading the weapons, shields, and engines of your ship.
If you're familiar with Star Control, then it's basically the same except you don't start near Earth (it's long been lost to humans), there are no multi-ship battles, and the writing is a bit more serious with a bit more generic alien races. That said, the atmosphere is definitely also more creepy and desolate, and I personally think mining and exploring on planets is more fun.
Silent Bomber was amazing. My friend had a ton of demo disks he was going to throw away, but I said I'd play through them all first. This game was on there, with no explanation or even translation, from what I remember. I immediately checked to see if it ever actually came out here, then tracked it down. You fire bombs everywhere and blow shit up continuously. Great fun. And then the last boss is completely different from the rest of the game, so I stopped playing. Looking it up at the time, most people had the same reaction.
I played a whole hell of a lot of Cubivore, and made a few serious stabs at beating it, but as far as I can tell it just repeats for eternity each time you beat a species. I don't know if there is an actual ending or what. Great concept, though. Great everything, really.
TimeStalkers for the DC. Took characters from Ladystalker and Landstalker and a bunch of other things and kind of dropped them together in a weird Azure Dreams-like gameworld and playstyle.
Oh, and speaking of which.
Azure Dreams for the PSX. Great dungeon crawler with monster collection, romance storylines, and town-building aspects that really set it apart from the rest.
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That and Jade cocoon are my two favourite PSX games ever.
I think in order to get to the ending, you have to get a certain number of mutations. I can't remember exactly. There's definitely an ending.
Yes, they were amazing games.
The Dungeon even had a creature that would come and eat items from your inventory if the player amassed too many things (The Devourer) simply as a memory maintenance tool (because the game couldn't handle you carrying more than 250 items, or something like that).
Panzer Dragoon: Saga
The game showed up at End of Life for the Saturn in America, and they printed a comically low number of copies. And then they advertised the fact that you will probably never get to play it.
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/6705693/Panzer-Dragoon-Saga-USA.jpg
Linked, because it is a 1.9MB scan. Basically, it says that cutting out a mask of the protagonist and wearing it will probably be the closes you will ever get to playing it.
They took out this full page ad in most of the gaming publications.
SEGA America was a cockstain during the Saturn era.
Let's play Mario Kart or something...
Own them both, incredibly disappointed that they are not compatible on the 360.
Solar shield for the win. I always loved when you got to grab a biplane in the first era, and I loved most of Java and whatever the 60s city was. Great game, and the line of descent to their later GTA series is clear, but the combination of ugly blocky Samus-hero and the first level being all yellow, all the time probably prevented a lot of people from taking a second look at it. Also I hated the hovercraft levels.
My friend and I used to play a game for the PSX that was part strategy, part action game. I can't remember much about it except that you controlled this little monster army on a big hex map, and when you ran into another enemy monster the battle switched to a little arena. There were a bunch of different monsters but I think the main guy was like a big green lizard with a huge mouth. Whatever it was, we played it for months.
Steam: MightyPotatoKing
God of War Schmod of War.
This game is apparently the origin of the Dead Rising games. I can definitely see some Agrippa in Frank West.
And Panzer Dragoon Orta. Why does Microsoft hate SEGA so much? I mean other than them being SEGA.
Gladius
SOOOO good until everybody starts getting those insta-kill weapons toward the end.
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