What did I play, you ask? SimCity, SimCity 2000, SimPark, SimIsle, SimFarm, SimAnt ...and a bunch of really, really obscure games like Orbiter and JezzBall (and Colonization, Kings Quest IV, Oregon Trail and a few others that are more wellknown). That was on the ol' computer of '93 - when hard drives were smaller than RAM is now. Windows 3.1, I salute you.
You really like those Sim games dontcha?
Will Wright spoke a few months ago at the MS campus, as part of the MS Research talks. He spent a lot of time talking about how he designed all of those Sim games, in particular The Sims. Brilliant, brilliant guy. Also, very entertaining to listen to. He's also very fond of ants. Someone asked him if he would ever revisit SimAnt and make a sequel and I think he said he'd think about it, but that obviously they're busy with Spore.
If ya wanna expand your library with some older titles, there are some titles that still are and forever will be full of massive amounts of win. These are some games I've grown up with, that have left a mark on the industry and that are just plain awesome. Oh, and you can probably pick them up cheap from any retailer.
Probably all mentioned in the thread allready, but anyhoo:
Baldurs Gate series
Heroes of Might & Magic 3
Morrowind
Sam & Max
Max Payne
Planescape Torment - a massively underappreciated title. It's in no way technically brilliant by todays standards, but it still blows most, if not all, of todays titles out of the water in regards to writing on storyline.
Civilization 3
Sappy113 on
People are bastardcoated bastards with bastard filling
Typing of the Dead is the first game I put on a new Windows install, and anyone who doesn't like it is a terrible person. Also, I'm given to understand that it's available on Gametap now.
If you like Civ any, I would immediately suggest all of Paradox Interactive's games.
the addictiveness of Hearts of Iron 2 (a WW2 game) and Europa Universalis 3 (a 1450-1850 game) makes Civ4 look like shit.
While I appreciate the in-depth nature of Paradox games (and greatly enjoy their modability), there's a significant shift when going between the two groups (and somewhat of a smaller one between individual paradox titles). I'll still heartily recommend them if you love grand strategy, minor historical basis and a love for modifying things (or you just enjoy complex things) - but someone sold on Civ has a high probability of being overwhelmed/bored/annoyed at the complexities and (often present) lack of description of features and functions.
The cheating AI irks me to no end; it's worse, but often more subtle, than the Civ games. Of course, usually it's much easier to exploit, too.
That all sounds like I'm bashing the Paradox games, but if you enjoy implementing grand strategies, thinking game-years into the future and playing for long periods of time (while still willing to climb the Everest-like learning curves), there's nigh-endless fun in there. It's like the mission planning of Rainbow 6, with the overmap of the Total War games with some Civ thrown in (also, sprinkle on a little bit of RTS resource management). It tastes delicious, you've just gotta crack that hard outer shell.
Also, you have to not care about graphics (ask yourself: "Am I satisfied looking at a Risk board game?"
Edit:
And if we're going for must haves, I'll still recommend SimCity 3000 above Sim City 4.
UltimaGecko on
The facehuggers want to play with you in the AvP LP. Facehuggers also want you to check out the TF2 cards here. View the in-progress RE mansion recreation for L4D here.
For recent (Mostly 2007 releases) games I'd go with, some of which you already have but anyway. Oh, and italics indicates favourites of mine which happens to be a fair few of them:
/* Strategy */
Supreme Commander + expansion
Company of Heroes + expansion
Command and Conquer 3
Age of Empires 3 + expansion
World in Conflict Galactic Civilizations II: Dark Avatar
DEFCON
Sid Meier's Civilization IV + expansion(s)
Settlers 6
If you like Civ any, I would immediately suggest all of Paradox Interactive's games.
the addictiveness of Hearts of Iron 2 (a WW2 game) and Europa Universalis 3 (a 1450-1850 game) makes Civ4 look like shit.
Wait, Europa Universalis is good? Sigh, I thought it sucked and never really tried it.. I think I have a copy floating around here somewhere but unfortunately I think it's lost..
If you like Civ any, I would immediately suggest all of Paradox Interactive's games.
the addictiveness of Hearts of Iron 2 (a WW2 game) and Europa Universalis 3 (a 1450-1850 game) makes Civ4 look like shit.
Seconded! I would just recommend EU3 over 2 for a first time Paradox gamer because it is way more open ended then EU2. IE more "like a Civ game" then other Paradox games. Meaning you can have fun things like Poland colonizing North America!
If you are having problems with SS2, I think you are supposed to right click the actual exe and have XP run it as 98, 95, ect. I went through the entire list until I found one that didn't crash. It was worth it, just haven't played due to the controls.
If you are having problems with SS2, I think you are supposed to right click the actual exe and have XP run it as 98, 95, ect. I went through the entire list until I found one that didn't crash. It was worth it, just haven't played due to the controls.
There's default control setups you could load from the control menu which are more like a regular fps.
If ya wanna expand your library with some older titles, there are some titles that still are and forever will be full of massive amounts of win. These are some games I've grown up with, that have left a mark on the industry and that are just plain awesome. Oh, and you can probably pick them up cheap from any retailer.
Probably all mentioned in the thread allready, but anyhoo:
Baldurs Gate series
Heroes of Might & Magic 3
Morrowind
Sam & Max
Max Payne
Planescape Torment - a massively underappreciated title. It's in no way technically brilliant by todays standards, but it still blows most, if not all, of todays titles out of the water in regards to writing on storyline.
Civilization 3
Also, most of these are on Gametap.
Baldur's Gate I & II, Planescape: Torment, the new Sam & Max series, Heroes of Might and Magic (all of them), and Civ III & IV are all on there. Plus, it's only 99 cents for the first month, and if you don't like it you can just cancel it.
The only forseeable downside is that you can't really run any mods for some (if not all of them) because of the way Gametap stores files on your computer. It's definitely not a deal-breaker, though, at least for me.
EDIT: Also, for System Shock 2, there's a Windows 2000/NT/XP patch available around teh intarwebz, though I always had trouble with it on my multiprocessor machine nonetheless. If you want to play it, I'd have to recommend you do it on a single core machine, just for ease of use.
I just wanted to say that if you like RPG's you should get the Morrowind Gold pack and the entire Baldurs Gate series. Those should keep you occupied for quite a while.
I just wanted to say that if you like RPG's you should get the Morrowind Gold pack and the entire Baldurs Gate series. Those should keep you occupied for quite a while.
I just noticed they are selling all three Gothic games (with expansion) in one box for $30 at Best Buy.
Don't complain about the control scheme - learn it and embrace it, and you will find some of the best gaming to be had. Oh yeah, laugh at the terrible voice acting, but not at what they are actually saying, because the story is quite intruiging.
Agreed. It was perfectly designed so that the player learned how to manipulate it better alongside the player's character becoming more proficient in battle.
Warcraft3 & The Frozen Throne
Orange Box, all of it.
Fallout 1, +Fallout 2, I think. I've heard it's good but haven't played this one.. only recommending it because you can eBay the collection on one disc for around 10dollars.
I do not recommend Hellgate:London. I don't know who did, but they have it in for you imo 8-)
I do not recommend Vampire: Bloodlines until you have some spare time - it's ok but I'd hardly call it a must have. Also, I forget what the moniker was but I enjoyed the first one much more. I think it has aged decently except for the meatball right hand It was about 5 times as polished as Bloodlines and 1/5th as cliche, imo.
fadingathedges on
0
freakish lightbutterdick jonesand his heavenly asshole machineRegistered Userregular
I got Bloodlines for ten, they sale it now and then.
My friend got it for five on halloween ;p
Redemption - right!
Bloodlines is graphically superior - it's what 5ish years younger? - but the dialogue is so painful so much more often than Redemption. The plot and presentation are also just worse all around in BL, in my opinion.
fadingathedges on
0
freakish lightbutterdick jonesand his heavenly asshole machineRegistered Userregular
edited January 2008
All other things aside, the game is probably worth $20 just playing through the game as Malkavian. Honestly.
Bloodlines' dialog is painful? Its plot and presentation are worse? Blasphemy! I can understand someone preferring Redemption's plot (and not much else), but Bloodlines is a masterpiece of the genre that does everything right, plus a ton of bugs.
Bloodlines' dialog is painful? Its plot and presentation are worse? Blasphemy! I can understand someone preferring Redemption's plot (and not much else), but Bloodlines is a masterpiece of the genre that does everything right, plus a ton of bugs.
Until Nines talks?
In Redemption - the dialogue between Christof & Anezka was somewhat painful early on, but in Bloodlines almost all of the dialogue is horrid.
There are some exceptions - the security guard and the afro salesman at the back of the truck have some good lines. The radio is occasionally good. The TV made me laugh once, when it was like
blahblah the warehouse exploded, at this time the police think it was... YOU
but their isn't enough to make me love it ;p I'm nearing the end now, I think, and mostly just playing it to finish it.
fadingathedges on
0
freakish lightbutterdick jonesand his heavenly asshole machineRegistered Userregular
edited January 2008
Which vampire clan did you pick? If it's not Malkavian, quit and start one. Right now.
If it is, there's something horribly, horribly wrong with you.
Diablo II + Lord of Destruction Exp Pack. One thousand times over. It's amazing. You cannot respectfully call yourself a PC Gamer if you haven't at least tried it. Doesn't matter if you like it or not. Just play it. Chances are you'll love it anyhow.
Also Starcraft + Broodwar Exp Pack. Prettty much the same explanation as Diablo II.
And Warcraft III + The Frozen Throne Exp Pack.
Jedi Knight II was an excellent FPS. The multiplayer on that game was awesome. I'm not really sure how the online community has held up as of late, but I imagine there is still a fair amount of people who play that game.
Star Wars the Best of PC isn't a bad purchase for the price. If only just for Republic Commando. A game that really needs a next-gen online co-op remake already.
Inquisitor on
0
augustwhere you come from is goneRegistered Userregular
edited January 2008
More like a sequel - Empire Commando. Hunting down rebel scum.
Yes I'm Malkavian. My dialogue is pretty ok, it's the entire world around me I have a problem with. The game - dialogue and otherwise - has yet to surprise me. To expound on that, it has yet to not have exactly what I expect around every corner and in every discussion. Every problem is expected and has the expected solution. That doesn't make for much fun, imo. I specifically remember being suprised in Redemption waking up in the Society of Leopold - the 'scene change' if you will was very cool, and Christof transitioned at that point from being a whiny emo douche into embracing what he had become. It took half the game to do it, but that makes it much more believable, imo.
Christof was kindof a douche, but his dialogue was at least somewhat forgivable because of his origins as a knight in the middle ages.
Anezka gets alot less vapid after Prague.
All of the quests in Bloodlines make me feel like I'm running errands for assholes.
All the quests in Redemption (that I recall at least, it's been a few years) were great fun. The golem in the jewish district of old Prague? Being forced to move around during the day to enter the cathedral, sticking to shadows? Playing as a human for awhile made the game better as well imo.
In Bloodlines you fight a cheapass, bland boring prescript of Dr Steinnman from Bioshock (Stan Gimble) who drops a human arm you can swing at people. The whole experience bored me.
In Redemption you may have found a secret panel in an altar that slides away to reveal the forearm & hand/claw of some dead saint / vampire / i forget and it's a relic that you can wield along with a riot shield and deal aggravated damage :P I gave it to my nossy, Sam I think his name was. This delighted me.
Yes I'm Malkavian. My dialogue is pretty ok, it's the entire world around me I have a problem with. The game - dialogue and otherwise - has yet to surprise me.
Well that's your problem right there. Malkavians have a strong insight into everything and the dialog gives away every plot twist and turn 2 hours before it even happens. They're fun for a second playthrough so you can get into arguments with stopsigns and hear the television anchor talk to you but for a first playthrough you're just spoiling the game for yourself, because your crazy brain telegraphs everything for you before it happens.
To start I'd say Quake1-4(there is an Ultimate Quake package with all 4 that sells for 50 bucks or less), Doom3+expansion, Heroes of Might and Magic 2,3 and 5(with the latest expansion, makes the game A LOT better), MDK (if you have a fry's store, they sell a double pack with 1&2 for 5 bucks), Serious Sam First and Second Encounter (different from Serious Sam 2, which wasn't that great imo), Nox (a fun diablo clone that is unique with great multi, but sadly no one plays the multi anymore), Painkiller, and it might be extremely difficult to find the retail version, but Close Combat 1 is a really fun war game.
In a nicer list:
-Quake1-4
-Doom3+expansion
-Heroes of Might and Magic 2, 3, 5 (5 with Tribes of the East expansion)
-MDK1
-Serious Sam First and Second Encounter
-Nox
-Painkiller
-Close Combat
If ya wanna expand your library with some older titles, there are some titles that still are and forever will be full of massive amounts of win. These are some games I've grown up with, that have left a mark on the industry and that are just plain awesome. Oh, and you can probably pick them up cheap from any retailer.
Probably all mentioned in the thread allready, but anyhoo:
Baldurs Gate series
Heroes of Might & Magic 3
Morrowind
Sam & Max
Max Payne
Planescape Torment - a massively underappreciated title. It's in no way technically brilliant by todays standards, but it still blows most, if not all, of todays titles out of the water in regards to writing on storyline.
Civilization 3
Also, most of these are on Gametap.
Baldur's Gate I & II, Planescape: Torment, the new Sam & Max series, Heroes of Might and Magic (all of them), and Civ III & IV are all on there. Plus, it's only 99 cents for the first month, and if you don't like it you can just cancel it.
The only forseeable downside is that you can't really run any mods for some (if not all of them) because of the way Gametap stores files on your computer. It's definitely not a deal-breaker, though, at least for me.
EDIT: Also, for System Shock 2, there's a Windows 2000/NT/XP patch available around teh intarwebz, though I always had trouble with it on my multiprocessor machine nonetheless. If you want to play it, I'd have to recommend you do it on a single core machine, just for ease of use.
Does Gametap work on x64 Vista yet? Last time I tried it was a few months ago and the main program wouldn't even launch. They also said there were "no plans" to support it, which seems ludicrous to me.
P.S. Please don't tell me I shouldn't be using Vista because it sucks, or that Gametap shouldn't support it because it sucks, etc. I'm just interested in knowing if they've fixed the problem or have any plans to at this point.
PuddingSenator on
0
freakish lightbutterdick jonesand his heavenly asshole machineRegistered Userregular
edited January 2008
From what I've read, there are a couple of issues with x64 Vista support. First, a bunch of games won't run under Vista for one reason or another. Second, part of the disk management system Gametap uses isn't x64 compatible, and it's not something they developed in-house but licensed from some other company. So no, I don't think there's going to be support for it anytime soon. Sorry.
Posts
You really like those Sim games dontcha?
Will Wright spoke a few months ago at the MS campus, as part of the MS Research talks. He spent a lot of time talking about how he designed all of those Sim games, in particular The Sims. Brilliant, brilliant guy. Also, very entertaining to listen to. He's also very fond of ants. Someone asked him if he would ever revisit SimAnt and make a sequel and I think he said he'd think about it, but that obviously they're busy with Spore.
- Don't add me, I'm at/near the friend limit
Steam: JC_Rooks
Twitter: http://twitter.com/JiunweiC
I work on this: http://www.xbox.com
Probably all mentioned in the thread allready, but anyhoo:
Baldurs Gate series
Heroes of Might & Magic 3
Morrowind
Sam & Max
Max Payne
Planescape Torment - a massively underappreciated title. It's in no way technically brilliant by todays standards, but it still blows most, if not all, of todays titles out of the water in regards to writing on storyline.
Civilization 3
the addictiveness of Hearts of Iron 2 (a WW2 game) and Europa Universalis 3 (a 1450-1850 game) makes Civ4 look like shit.
+ Grim Fandango + The Longest Journey.
Titanquest is lovely if you enjoy frantically clicking.
SimCity 4 for the aspiring city planner in all of us.
While I appreciate the in-depth nature of Paradox games (and greatly enjoy their modability), there's a significant shift when going between the two groups (and somewhat of a smaller one between individual paradox titles). I'll still heartily recommend them if you love grand strategy, minor historical basis and a love for modifying things (or you just enjoy complex things) - but someone sold on Civ has a high probability of being overwhelmed/bored/annoyed at the complexities and (often present) lack of description of features and functions.
The cheating AI irks me to no end; it's worse, but often more subtle, than the Civ games. Of course, usually it's much easier to exploit, too.
That all sounds like I'm bashing the Paradox games, but if you enjoy implementing grand strategies, thinking game-years into the future and playing for long periods of time (while still willing to climb the Everest-like learning curves), there's nigh-endless fun in there. It's like the mission planning of Rainbow 6, with the overmap of the Total War games with some Civ thrown in (also, sprinkle on a little bit of RTS resource management). It tastes delicious, you've just gotta crack that hard outer shell.
Also, you have to not care about graphics (ask yourself: "Am I satisfied looking at a Risk board game?"
Edit:
And if we're going for must haves, I'll still recommend SimCity 3000 above Sim City 4.
/* Strategy */
Supreme Commander + expansion
Company of Heroes + expansion
Command and Conquer 3
Age of Empires 3 + expansion
World in Conflict
Galactic Civilizations II: Dark Avatar
DEFCON
Sid Meier's Civilization IV + expansion(s)
Settlers 6
/* RPG */
The Witcher
Neverwinter Nights 2 + expansion
Titan Quest + expansion
/* FPS and FPS/RPG */
The Orange Box
BioShock
STALKER
/* Adventure */
[New] Sam and Max
Secret Files: Tunguska Wait, Europa Universalis is good? Sigh, I thought it sucked and never really tried it.. I think I have a copy floating around here somewhere but unfortunately I think it's lost..
P E R I P H E R A L P A R A D O X
Seconded! I would just recommend EU3 over 2 for a first time Paradox gamer because it is way more open ended then EU2. IE more "like a Civ game" then other Paradox games. Meaning you can have fun things like Poland colonizing North America!
There's default control setups you could load from the control menu which are more like a regular fps.
Baldur's Gate I & II, Planescape: Torment, the new Sam & Max series, Heroes of Might and Magic (all of them), and Civ III & IV are all on there. Plus, it's only 99 cents for the first month, and if you don't like it you can just cancel it.
The only forseeable downside is that you can't really run any mods for some (if not all of them) because of the way Gametap stores files on your computer. It's definitely not a deal-breaker, though, at least for me.
EDIT: Also, for System Shock 2, there's a Windows 2000/NT/XP patch available around teh intarwebz, though I always had trouble with it on my multiprocessor machine nonetheless. If you want to play it, I'd have to recommend you do it on a single core machine, just for ease of use.
I just noticed they are selling all three Gothic games (with expansion) in one box for $30 at Best Buy.
Don't complain about the control scheme - learn it and embrace it, and you will find some of the best gaming to be had. Oh yeah, laugh at the terrible voice acting, but not at what they are actually saying, because the story is quite intruiging.
Warcraft3 & The Frozen Throne
Orange Box, all of it.
Fallout 1, +Fallout 2, I think. I've heard it's good but haven't played this one.. only recommending it because you can eBay the collection on one disc for around 10dollars.
I do not recommend Hellgate:London. I don't know who did, but they have it in for you imo 8-)
I do not recommend Vampire: Bloodlines until you have some spare time - it's ok but I'd hardly call it a must have. Also, I forget what the moniker was but I enjoyed the first one much more. I think it has aged decently except for the meatball right hand
My friend got it for five on halloween ;p
Redemption - right!
Bloodlines is graphically superior - it's what 5ish years younger? - but the dialogue is so painful so much more often than Redemption. The plot and presentation are also just worse all around in BL, in my opinion.
Until Nines talks?
In Redemption - the dialogue between Christof & Anezka was somewhat painful early on, but in Bloodlines almost all of the dialogue is horrid.
There are some exceptions - the security guard and the afro salesman at the back of the truck have some good lines. The radio is occasionally good. The TV made me laugh once, when it was like
but their isn't enough to make me love it ;p I'm nearing the end now, I think, and mostly just playing it to finish it.
If it is, there's something horribly, horribly wrong with you.
Also Starcraft + Broodwar Exp Pack. Prettty much the same explanation as Diablo II.
And Warcraft III + The Frozen Throne Exp Pack.
Jedi Knight II was an excellent FPS. The multiplayer on that game was awesome. I'm not really sure how the online community has held up as of late, but I imagine there is still a fair amount of people who play that game.
Christof was kindof a douche, but his dialogue was at least somewhat forgivable because of his origins as a knight in the middle ages.
Anezka gets alot less vapid after Prague.
All of the quests in Bloodlines make me feel like I'm running errands for assholes.
All the quests in Redemption (that I recall at least, it's been a few years) were great fun. The golem in the jewish district of old Prague? Being forced to move around during the day to enter the cathedral, sticking to shadows? Playing as a human for awhile made the game better as well imo.
In Bloodlines you fight a cheapass, bland boring prescript of Dr Steinnman from Bioshock (Stan Gimble) who drops a human arm you can swing at people. The whole experience bored me.
In Redemption you may have found a secret panel in an altar that slides away to reveal the forearm & hand/claw of some dead saint / vampire / i forget and it's a relic that you can wield along with a riot shield and deal aggravated damage :P I gave it to my nossy, Sam I think his name was. This delighted me.
Well that's your problem right there. Malkavians have a strong insight into everything and the dialog gives away every plot twist and turn 2 hours before it even happens. They're fun for a second playthrough so you can get into arguments with stopsigns and hear the television anchor talk to you but for a first playthrough you're just spoiling the game for yourself, because your crazy brain telegraphs everything for you before it happens.
But let's stop hijacking.
OP: play both and tell us which game experience you preferred.
In a nicer list:
-Quake1-4
-Doom3+expansion
-Heroes of Might and Magic 2, 3, 5 (5 with Tribes of the East expansion)
-MDK1
-Serious Sam First and Second Encounter
-Nox
-Painkiller
-Close Combat
Does Gametap work on x64 Vista yet? Last time I tried it was a few months ago and the main program wouldn't even launch. They also said there were "no plans" to support it, which seems ludicrous to me.
P.S. Please don't tell me I shouldn't be using Vista because it sucks, or that Gametap shouldn't support it because it sucks, etc. I'm just interested in knowing if they've fixed the problem or have any plans to at this point.