Star Control II & Secret of Mana

They both set my expectations for how much fun a game can be.

Secret of Mana as a template for what kind of world I want to live in (minus the monsters and whatnot)
and Star Control II as a template for how to write a fun adventure.

Many games cemented my love for video games. Jak and Daxter, Ratchet and Clank, Prince of Persia… God of War, parents didn’t give a fux back then, the pixels weren’t that realistic.

Seeing Sonic the Hedgehog as an eyecatcher on a tv in a tv store.

Mario ofcourse. Super Mario World 3 on a cracked playstation.

Spyro

I’d say it set the stage for the kind of games that I enjoy and the amount of effort I should have to put in to get that enjoyment.

I also liked Crash Bandicoot a lot, but it was much harder than Spyro so I would typically gravitate towards the latter.

Most influential… it might be Castle Adventure on MSDOS or something like Alleyway on the Gameboy simply because they were the first games I remember playing. Or an old Mac program like Factory or Maelstrom or Power Pete with which I wiled away many hours. Quake III Arena and Unreal Tournament was the first time I messed around with modding and that computer literacy and problem solving certainly had an impact.

I didn’t go into any computer-related fields, I just really like video games and they’ve been both a solo hobby and social catalyst for my entire conscious life. Maybe Super Smash Bros Melee or Star Wars Battlefront 2 or Halo because the early 2000s cemented some of my longest friendships and those were at the forefront.

Falling sand is why I like/crave physics interactions in games

Clash Roayle, wasted too much life time with it.

(was very popular back then)

Kingdom Hearts 2. I think my parents randomly got it with the ps2 slim they got me for christmas or a birthday when I was a kid. I knew nothing about final fantasy or anime, but I absolutely loved disney movies. I don’t really know too well why it got me hooked so much. I had a head injury when I was 15, and have heavy amnesia of my life before it. The fact I remember so much about that time is really a testament to the impact it had on me.

I remember the aesthetic was completely new to me and I thought it was really cool. In hindsight final fantasy characters hanging out in disney movies is pretty weird, but they just looked like really cool guys fighting evil in the background of the movies.

Roxas’ story was also super compelling for kid me, the entire prologue felt dreamlike, emotional, and thought provoking. It was like I was playing a novel. For context, the games I had played up until that point were essentially just pokémon, spyro, smash bros, and mario kart. So the idea that a game could be emotional and have an interesting story was completely new to me.

Now I can see the flaws and oddities in the series, but I still love it and it’s had a ridiculous impact on my life. I sometimes worry a little that if the people in my life played the series they might see the inspiration for so many habits I have now and pretty much my entire sense of style is heavily influenced by the idea of Tetsuya Nomura design blended with disney vibes.

MechWarrior 2: 31st Century Combat

It had an archive in the game. It detailed the social structure, military structure, customs, and history of the Clans, which you play as a member of, from an outside perspective. I was only 8, but I read through the whole thing, end-to-end. I put an album of it on Facebook for posterity when I was in high school.

I decided I wanted to be like them when I read it. I have a much better understanding of them now, and I do not agree with everything. The concepts behind some core tenants still stand for me. Individuals are valued within the context of the Clan. One’s value is based on their contribution to society, but society must value them in order to expect their contribution. If a leader acts in their own interest and not that of the Clan, their subordinates are obligated to challenge them. If the conflict stands, they face in a Circle of Equals. Generally, personal disputes are delayed and adjudicated, but there is a Trial of Grievance if the parties can conduct if they cannot delay. In the real world, I translate these to a value in community, a mandate to not tolerate poor leadership, and good practice in letting cooldown time followed by direct dispute resolve conflict.

Of course, there are questionable things. A caste system, though some Clans allow more mobility than others. Eugenics based on combat prowess for the warrior caste. Promotion by combat for the warrior caste. Poor military strategy based on the concept of honor.

I still consider myself a Clanner, to some degree. Sometimes I try to see if others took it as much to heart as I did, but I am afraid of rejection. I do not know if I could pass various Trials. I know I am too old, now, or at the very least, approaching that. Maybe someday, I will find other children of Kerensky.

Myst, I wanted to write books that linked to worlds. Figured the closest thing was programming.

Civilization 1, patients, economics, frustration.

Doom, was just a shit ton of fun and got me into networking so we could play against each other.

First the settlers 2 and Caesar 3, a bit later and with a lot more impact Guild Wars (1).

Halo 1-3

They are some of the best games ever, playing halo 1 for the first time after getting an xbox for christmas hit me like a freight train and to this day my love of fps games is in large part to the endlessly interesting tactics in halo multiplayer and how much fun I had/have learning them.

Playing a big team battle halo infinite seems like replaying a memory I never actually had in the best way.

Still to this day even if I haven’t played halo in years, I will kick your butt.

As a child, has to be Diablo 2. I had no idea what I was doing but I had fun. And it got me into reading, actually. I read some books now and then, but wasn’t an avid reader. But when I played Diablo 2, I found out there are books from the Diablo world and got one. I remember when I got home I was like “ok, since I got the book I will read one chapter and then go to playing” - well I didn’t turn on the PC for 3 days until I have finished the book. And then went to get more.

Another was World of Warcraft (though I was not exactly a kid by then). It made me fall in love with MMOs, a genre which I still love (though no game holds me today quite as WoW did - still hope for one though). And thanks to it I got to know people I’m friends with to this day.

I would say Age of Empires 2 which was where I first used the name that I still have on here, over 25 years later. Its amazing editor also resonated with my urge to create my own games without requiring programming knowledge that I just didn’t have at 11 years old. I went on to create custom content for Warcraft III, Neverwinter Nights and Morrowind, eventually studied computer science and joined some indie gamedev communities where I made a lot of friends, some of whom I still meet in person once or twice a year. I never became a full time game developer but I worked on some stuff part time in the mid 2000s and still do it as a hobby.

Ocarina of Time - it was mindblowing to have the open world at the time (I didn’t play Ultima 7 until much later) and the music is incredible.

DOOM. It blew my mind when i played it. I learned a new genere, how fast paced a game can be and how clever map design makes a good game. I also learned about shareware which lead to a broader interest in the internet as a whole. Later i got a computer with a soundcard and when i fired up DOOM with music for the first time, it felt like a revelation.