Which game took your world by storm?

[Afrospinach]

C&C Tiberian Dawn.

The cut scenes, the in game music. it all worked to make the game seem a lot better than it was. It also for me ushered in that utmost level of imagination. The world was just so compellingly presented I always wanted to know more. In the end you were just moving units around the map, seems a bit silly now lol. In some ways that makes it even more special.

Some honorable mentions: Diablo, Quake 2, half life, fallout.

I almost crave that more interspersed level of story telling again. Today they tell you too much and run themselves in knots. The most recent games that really rocked my world in this regard are Mad Max and Wasteland 2.

[Akka]

I started playing video game a long time ago (in the late 80'/early 90'), so to me it wasn't really "a" video game, but the fact that video games existed at all, which took my world by storm.
Seeing things on the screen which I could control with my pad/mouse. It was incredible ! Also, at that time, games could (and often were) litterally created by one guy in his garage, and they were new so they had little to no expectations or codes, so there was TONS of creativity, from weird and nonsensical games to incredibly ambitious (in context), through interesting gimmicks.

I keep a special fondness for Legend of Zelda and Speedball from the time, though, which were probably my two most striking early discoveries.
They aren't the games I find the "best" by a long shot (there is dozens "better" games today, and even by then I quickly found games I spent more time in), but they were the ones that rocked my world at the time, simply because they were the firsts. My early years of video game were basically a long string of moments of awe, seeing the marvels that existed in this new world.

[Xaath]

Chrono Trigger was the first RPG I played where I really got hooked on the story. It surely isn't the first to tell one, but first for me that was like "this could've been a book!" thing.

How many games by today let you do what Populous: the Beginning did? Spells could completely remodel the map. If you feel like it, you can sink your opponent's entire village into the sea. If you cast a volcano in the middle of it, there's now a huge mountain in their village and it stays there. Also how diffrenet means of attacking buildings would have different effects (What do you mean hitting it with a sword DOESN'T set it on fire??!!). If there were villagers inside buildings they had to be dealt with. Or set on fire. Or blown away with a tornado.

Diablo didn't have much of a story, but it had amazing atmosphere about it. Butcher is obviously one of the most memorable encounters, but there were plenty more like Lahdanan, Zhar the Mad, even the lore books - especially the rhyme for Halls of the Blind. And since I barely knew any english when I first played it, that's where I got most names for weaponry and armor from

As far as just pure gametime goes I think it's Heroes of Might and Magic franchise. I might've played some other games more, like wow, but that's mostly from Mists onward so it's not excatly a "this was my childhood" thing as much as HoMM games were.

Can't forget Warcraft 3 map editor. I loved the main game sure, but the sheer ammount and scope of stuff people did with this thing was always amazing. WC3 is also one of the first games me and my brothers bought legit on our own and played online extensively.

[Wildmoon]

Obviously WoW.

[Eleccybubb]

Definitely FF11 and Phantasy Star Online.

2 of my most favorite RPG franchises of all time getting an online game? Hell yeah!

[Tenjen]

Wow, ofcourse. Played it for 11 years before life came in the way too much.
Mass effect and Dragon age. Undertale. Metal Gear Solid and Breath of fire.

Half life 1 and 2. Warcraft 3. Diablo 1 and 2.

They had a profound effect on how I judge other games and what to expect.

[Morgaith]

Dragon age origins was my first proper rpg.

[Tiwack]

Lemmings and Raptor got me started on gaming then my list is:
TTD
Worms
Populus
Warcraft2
Pokemon
Dune2000
HMM3
Sims
Diablo2
Settlers4
NFS U2
ES Oblivion
WoW
Minecraft
DA2
DmC: devil may cry
Darksiders games
KSP
Undertale
Newest series of Paradox Interactive games

Many more I don't remember the names of from my childhood.

[MiseryIndex]

As a kid, D2. Played until I felt like my eyes were drying out and my back was turning to wood. A straight up unhealthy amount of hours on that game. WoW I've taken enough breaks from that I can't say it's been unrelenting. Not quite on the same scale, but addictive in a way that was extremely reminiscent of my D2 days was Borderlands 2. Wish TPS had been a worthy follow up, but that was not the case. Oh well.

[Deleted]

WoW, A link to the Past...... Baldurs gate 2.

Possibly Breath of the wild even though i had to emulate it on my pc.

[Deleted]

Stalker: Shadow of Chernobyl sucked me right in....


still waiting and hoping for Stalker 2

[Azerox]

Linage 2 C1-C4 and WoW

Been playing(only) that the past 16 years.

[Mirishka]

Hello champions, good to see you, as always!

So, tell me, coz I'm curious: Which game took your world by storm? Which game made you realize the potential of video-games?

For me, it is Deus Ex. Deus Ex, to me, is still unmatched in its freedom of gameplay choices, immersion and world building. So many open world games lack immersion, and a game from 2001 still does a lot of things better than current gen games.

And you?

Super Metroid was the first game to show me that a game could actually make me feel something.

System Shock 2 was the first game to legitimately terrify me. Resident Evil tried, but the god-awful voice acting and horrible FMV actors deflated any hope that game had of scares for me.

Bioware's RPGs were the first games where I legitimately cared about what happened to the characters. Like 'oh god will this decision get this companion killed??'

Bethesda's games, buggy as they may be, were the first to show me that games could offer not just 'levels' but an actual massive piece of world to explore. World of Warcraft obviously took that kind of thing to the next level (and then some) but it was Morrowind that had me like... holy shit, so much to explore!

Thief and Deus Ex were great games for player agency and choice, and like Lotus said, I'm not sure either have really been matched in that regard since.

[Sellest]

Baldur's gate. That game forced me to learn English. It was from my favorite universe Forgotten Realms (my favorite books were from R.A. Salvatore). From other remarkable games I would say Age of Empires (1+2) and HoM&M III but those weren't as impactful as BG.

And of course WoW I made friends back there with who I play with even now. Heck I even have a wife which I met in wow back in vanilla on lvl 20ish. Second daughter's name is Sylva according to our warchief! (and because we kinda liked the name)

[Rusken]

Runescape was my first. First MMO, first addiction. Kept me going mostly until WoW, with myriad N64/Gamecube games filling the space between 2003-2006. Then of course WoW, which has somehow held me captive for the majority of 12 years.

Outside MMO's, Dark Souls is the only other singular game that jumps to mind. It totally destroyed my ability to enjoy any game that wasn't Dark Souls or WoW for a good 5 years. And still, no single player game I've bought has paled in comparison Dark Souls 1.

I'm also currently obsessed with Overwatch, it's an ever-evolving world that also happens to be an incredibly addictive FPS.

[Yizu]

All Blizzard games i guess? Except HotS

[Sixy]

Suikoden 2 and Suikoden 3 both absolutely blew me away. I have yet to play another game that can compare to them, and I just end up replaying them every couple years.
Kotor is the only game that even came close tbh, so thats my honorable mention.

[Leih]

Considering I'm still playing it, like, 12-13 years later? Can't post in a topic like this without saying WoW. Not the only or even the first MMO I've played but the only one that I loved enough to still be playing it now. It helps that I was a big Warcraft RTS fan before the game came out. Warcraft III was the shit.

Other honorable mentions have to go to Diablo 2, which was probably my first big investment in terms of online multiplayer and Zelda LTTP which is probably the first game I ever played which wasn't a simple platformer / action game and opened my mind to the idea of Adventure and RPG.

[Aeula]

Fable 2, being able to ignore the game and do anything (and anyone) I wanted. Like settling down and getting married for example.

Spending weeks in bowerstone trying to marry and impregnate every woman I could get my hands on.

At one point I had two divorces for every marriage and close to a hundred STD’s.

[Suluhu]

The Settlers (first one). I played that so much when I was a small child.
Then the Bullfrog games - Theme Park, Theme Hospital and Dungeon Keeper

And finally World of Warcraft. That was the biggest one.