Landmark computer games of the 20th and 21st centuries

[mpdox]

Nobody said anything yet about Dune 2 or Monkey Island? Hmm... I was playing Dune 2 until the next morning, wondering how I would resist during the next (boring) school hours... It started the real-time strategy genre, for sure...
And Monkey Island? I started to learn english with with it, playing a little, pausing, checking the dictionary... Ok, it didn't start anything originally, but during the time it was played, it was the greatest adventure game, something everything else was compared to...
Maybe I'm subjective, in fact, for sure I am, but for me, these games are important landmarks...
Now I'm so nostalgic, I'm pressing the submit button and getting the emulator back ASAP...
See you next morning :-)

[KennyR]

No. Populous came before Powermonger, and by quite a bit.

[KennyR]

Monkey Island was a good game, but it did not define the point-and-click adventure. I've no idea what did, but perhaps earlier games like Maniac Mansion. Remember, a landmark game doesn't need to be a good game, and not all great games are landmarks.

As for Dune2 - I'm unsure. Was it really the first RTS?

[mpdox]

KennyR wrote:
Monkey Island was a good game, but it did not define the point-and-click adventure. I've no idea what did, but perhaps earlier games like Maniac Mansion. Remember, a landmark game doesn't need to be a good game, and not all great games are landmarks.

As for Dune2 - I'm unsure. Was it really the first RTS?

Well, for sure Monkey Island wasn't inventing anything new, that's why I said in my post that it was for *ME* an important landmark...
About Dune 2, yes, it was the first in its genre... Just think about how many games, clones (warcraft comes to mind first), were influenced by it...
If I have to think as an impartial man, I have to say, it looks like Doom also deserves the crown.
About adventure games? Who knows, maybe Zork?
Maybe I can't see the whole picture because I got my first computer in 88, and didn't get to play Pacman, Space Invaders or Pong when they came  out?

[seer]

No. Populous came before Powermonger, and by quite a bit.

Yes, but there are some big differences, Powermonger is less god more rts, and is not 3D (Well, you know what I mean, polygon stuff)

[Wain]

Dragon's Lair(It's in the smithsonian w/ Pac-Man and Pong)

Civilization

Wing Commander

Wolfenstein 3-d

Speedball (for being the only fun sports type game ever made, I hate sports games)

Whatever the first of the cinemaware movie type games is

Zork

Elite

Maniac Mansion

Kings Quest

Fallout (for redefining the modern RPG)

[Crumb]

Double Dragon
Street Fighter II
Diablo I (now you have 20000 clones of it, even Vampire Redemption)
Starcraft (ok, it's modern but I think that it was the first time the different razes you could choose were truely different... in other games like dune2 or warcraft2 the razes were too similar and played almost the same...)
Pang
Dungeon Master
Super Mario Bros
Monkey Island (it wasn't the first, but I think that graphic adventures became quite popular thanks to this game)
Quake3 (ego shooter but with only deathmatch)
Tomb Raider (I guess Max Payne wouldn't be here without it)
I would say Half-Life, but I would put it in the Wolf3D genre...
Sim City

[SlimJim]

One of the landmark games technically is certainly Dungeon
Master, the first real "first person" real-time game. And still
better than most of those that followed.
.
SlimJim

[uncharted]

12) Gran Turismo = Inspired thousands to buy Vauxhall Novas (old Opel Corsas) and fit howitzer sized exhausts

Yeah.  I've heard that the next version will have a special mode where you can drive over-customised Ford Fiestas whilst playing bad Garage music very loudly along Southend seafront at 5mph :lol:

[KennyR]

@Crumb

Quake3 definitely isn't a landmark, IMO. Most of your others I agree with, except the newer ones I haven't played. (And popularity has nothing to do with it, as I said.)

[Hardboy]

"Eye Of The Beholder 2", allthough the first one also was great, for me, the sequel was the landmark. Eye of the beholder was still considered one of the best games made years after its release.

"Pirates!", so many hours after hours of playing. Wow, noone have made a game like that ever since. Even the C64 version was AWESOME!!

"Kick off "&"Kick off 2" - does I have to explain why?

"Super off road", yeah, I still don´t I have completed it. To bad it doesn´t on any other thing that an a500.

I´ll be back!

[KennyR]

"Pirates!", so many hours after hours of playing. Wow, noone have made a game like that ever since. Even the C64 version was AWESOME!!

Whaaaaaat??? The C64 port of Pirates! SUCKED. It was incredibly slow, and liked to crash all the time. Not suprising, since the thing was written in BASIC!

One of the worst C64 games of all time, IMO. The Amiga version was so much better. Definitely a landmark in gaming. Not surprising, since Sid Meier was behind it.

[KennyR]

Ok, as I suspected I think some of you are confusing landmark games with your favourites. A sequel can't usually be a landmark, since it's just an advaned version of the first game! (In most cases, that is). Try to think genre.

I have another landmark that has never been surpassed - Audiogenic's Exile.

[jeffimix]

Reach For the stars (first turnbased 4X game ever, available on Amiga, and I don't think anything else IIRC, the original that is)
Natural selection (rather recent PC game, its a half-life mod, the only combination FPS and RTS game that's worked well that I've ever seen)

[Matt_H]

Theme Park! An evolution of Populous, there are countless clones of it flooding the market these days.

How about Syndicate? Has anyone mentioned that yet? I haven't played it yet, but I have a copy on order. It's supposed to be pretty excellent. I'll find out soon enough :-)

Megaball is still the best game of its type.

[KennyR]

I mentioned Syndicate in the first comment.