Games that broke the mold.

[AlexanderAstartes]

Conker's Bad Fur Day.
Any or all the Oddworld games.

Looking to the future, Spore looks to break conventions, but then again when has Will Wright not?

 

[Soycopter]

Do we even need to mention portal anymore..?

Half Life series, mostly the Gravity Gun in HL2. It made physics fun! FUN! I remember decapitating my first headcrab zombie with a saw blade.. and lighting combine on fire... oh so fun!
Im going to have to say the original Super Mario Bros. on the NES. It was absolutly amazing. I dont remember any games like it back when it came out.

 

[BuckminsterF]

Tetris, Beyond Good and Evil, and Bioshock

 

[Playboyninja]

Unreal - I loved the fly around the castle menu screen. The first time game scenery took my breath away when I exited the prison ship
Unreal II - I only say it because the last level when the ship lists and the level turns too and it really freaked me out.
Farcry - FPS with free enviroments and stunning graphics
Terminal Velocity - Endless levels
Battlezone - Mix of Simulator and RTS
Metal Gear Solid - Amazing story ... and I have to give it props for taking place in my home state
Ground Control - free camera and TRUE 3d units and enviroment
Half-Life and Opposing force - who cares about the gravity gun when you have Snarks!!!

 

[Saevus]

Half-Life. Other people already explained why.

Thief. First First-Person-Sneaker.

Morrowind. First RPG I played.

Far Cry. Great mix of stealth, freedom, great AI and the physics (by the way, six months before HL2) and the graphics came as a great bonus (yay for polybump). Also, I liked the Trigens. Though the story wasn't that good. Oh well, can't have everything.

Portal. Other people already explained why.

How is Morrowind breaking the mold? Look up Daggerfall. Point out some games that actually did something really new and exciting and (in general)failed utterly because they didn't suit the zeitgeist.

"I'm interested to find out what games struck you through your gaming years as different and unique in terms of art style, gameplay mechanics or simply because they were different from the rest."

Point conceded, now that I consider how utterly alien Morrowind's world was from traditional fantasy.

 

[SeaCalMaster]

How has no one mentioned Uplink yet? Seriously, get it. As far as I know, there is nothing else out there that is even remotely similar.

Also, more people need to play Earthbound. It's like dropping acid, but safer!

 

[gamshobny]

If you play it nowadays, Max Payne offers a relief in the most non-relieving way. Even with the bad model details and the lack of physics, it's a story driven 3rd person shooter. It is one of the few games that has bullet time (was the first game to have that, btw) and doesn't cock it up. The atmosphere is so well set that it's dark nature scared me away the first time, and as you progress, you realy feel thesame the character feels: that the reason you keep going is the fact that that's all there's left to do.

As for a more modern game: mass effect is the first good blend of a 3rd person shooter and rpg I've played, and the fact that it comes from EA makes that even more astounding. I think they did not ment to break it, but the mold is broken anyways.

 

[revolverwolf]

The wii broke the mold .

The Wii is pure evidence it's not always a good thing to break the mold! [My opinion]

I think the wii was a great idea regardless.

I have a wii and I think its a great console...

Also I think a few games that broke the mould were Tetris, Portal and Abes Oddessy.

Who would ever think to make a game where people could shred on cheapo plastic guitars in their own living room?

And Guitar Hero was a great game! It was a fun and new take on a failed idea.

 

[Unmannedperson]

Half-Life
Half-Life 2
Black and White
Medieval: Total War
Civilization
Civilization 4
SimCity 1, 2, and 3 (4 was kind of meh, and Societies sucks horribly)
CoD4

and the winner is:

PORTAL!!! (big surprise)

 

[rosiethorn]

Portal, Okami, and The Sims.

 

[gim73]

The wii breaks the mold as much as a stupid gimmick controller like robbie the robot or the power glove breaks the mold. Nintendo really hasn't broken the mold on a system since the SNES (their best system ever) based on a lack of good third party support. Their first party effort has been mostly good, but I'm gonna have to go for other systems over it.

games that break molds:
Final Fantasy 7 (cussing, cross dressing, girlfriend killing mold)
Baldurs Gate 2 (seamless 2nd edition D&D videogame)
KoTOR (first real decent d20 system game, considering Neverwinter nights, Temple of Elemental Evil, Ruins of Myth Drannor were so dissapointing)
Suikoden (108 characters and multiple endings based on recruitment)
Suikoden IV (broke the mold of good suikoden games by reducing your party to 4)
World of Warcraft (broke the mold that a MMORPG has to always be in a party to level, here you can easily reach max levels without ever grouping)

 

[Bass_man]

Deus Ex definitely broke the mold for me as it was innovative and great looking for its time.

 

[blank0000]

DDR- Love it or hate it, you knew it was different

METAL GEAR solid 3!!

Half life 2 "der"

Team Fortress 2- It taught me to laugh again,in this cold world of ultra-realistic next gen games

 

[ForestFox]

Theif

Splintercell

Farcry 1

Elderscrolls

Mech warrior

and DeUS EX!

 

[Splitter]

I may be wrong on some of these but I don't have the hugest knowledge of games so correct me if I'm wrong...

Prince of Persia; first to modify platforming so much (running up walls and shit), and as far as I know the first in which you can literally rewind time.

Shogun: Total War; I don't think there was a game quite like this before...

Impossible Creatures; first RTS in which your units were combined animals made by you. (difficult to explain, look it up)

Black and White; first time you actually are a god as opposed to metaphorically being one in games like Sim City, AoE or Civilization

Ocarina of Time; Speaks for itself.

Rockband; took guitar hero, merged it with singstar and threw in some drums. Not a huge way to break the mould but still first to do it...

 

[TIMESWORDSMAN]

the only games in the world that really stood out in my life were Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time and Sonic Adventure 1. I've seen good games and bad games before and since those two but they really stand out.

 

[Aries_Split]

Definitely Metal Gear Solid for the ps1. It helped introduce more cinematic game play elements, as well as stealth game play.

 

[Whoolpurse]

The first GTA broke the mold. alot.