Older Games You Remember That No One Else Seems To

[IOwnTheSpire]

Anyone ever have the experience of playing a game from way back when, but it's hard to find people who remember it or played it?

When I was a kid, there was an old 90s PC game that I played, you played as a purple-skinned blonde kid or something like that, it was so long ago. I can't even remember the title, but it's still there in my memory.

I think there are certain things we remember fondly, even if we feel like we're the only ones who enjoyed them.

 

[Diablo2000]

Commender Keen?
I don't think it applies to "no one remembers", a lot of people remember Commander Keen fondly.

 

[IOwnTheSpire]

Commender Keen?
I don't think it applies to "no one remembers", a lot of people remember Commander Keen fondly.

No, it wasn't Commander Keen, that's for sure.

 

[Euryalus]

Well for the longest time it was Glover, but then I went on to the internet and realised there's not a game I could mention that no one's heard of so... yeah. Glover?

 

[BloatedGuppy]

I'm almost 40. I've been gaming since the Intellivision and Commodore 64. Given the average age of this forum it's safe to say there are HUNDREDS of games I remember that no one else seems to. Some days I feel like Grandpa Simpson prattling away about aging classics that were forgotten before half of you were even born.

And we tied an onion to our belts, which was the style at the time.

 

[Newway12]

Battle Bugs

 

[Shoggoth2588]

There are a ton of arcade racing games that don't really get love in general...games like Daytona USA and Hydro Thunder are well known sure but I also really loved San Francisco Rush (and SFR2049), Arctic Thunder and one wherein you race 18-wheelers across the United States. I guess people do remember the Rush and Thunder series but only arcade fanatics and possibly Dreamcast owners would remember 18-Wheeler Racing or whatever it was called.

 

[MalkavianLunatic]

Oh Gods, I'm sure there are a few, but the one that sticks in my mind the best that nobody I know has ever heard of was the Nintendo video game adaptation of the cartoon, "Bucky O'Hare".

 

[Vigormortis]

Oh yeah, plenty. Been gaming since the last 80's, on numerous consoles, handhelds, and PC. So I've seen my fair share of the classics and the obscure.

But as for ones I will often recommend; to play, to listen to for the music, to appreciate for the art/character/level designs, etc; here are a few I almost never see on this forum:


Lemmings
MechWarrior 2 / Ghost Bear's Legacy
Jet Force Gemini
Conker's Bad Fur Day
Pitfall: The Mayan Adventure
Lode Runner: The Legend Returns
Wetrix
Chu-Chu Rocket
MechCommander 2
Wipeout64


I'm gonna stop here, if only because if I don't force myself to stop I'll just keep going and going. If I think of others that I feel I shouldn't leave out I'll re-post.

I'm almost 40. I've been gaming since the Intellivision and Commodore 64. Given the average age of this forum it's safe to say there are HUNDREDS of games I remember that no one else seems to. Some days I feel like Grandpa Simpson prattling away about aging classics that were forgotten before half of you were even born.

And we tied an onion to our belts, which was the style at the time.

I'm 31 and I feel the same way at times. So I can imagine how much more pronounced it must feel for you.

But just out of curiosity, what PC classics (obscure or not) from any time prior to 1987 would you recommend? Specifically, for someone who relishes in delving into gaming's past and loves analyzing games for their design and industry influence just as much as he does playing them for fun.

 

[Imperioratorex Caprae]

I'm sure there's a ton of games I remember from my past that are from odd shareware discs I acquired from friends way back when. Will others remember them? Probably some of the games are high on people's lists like the original Duke Nukem games and Commander Keen. Others might not be so easily remembered, some I don't even know the name of because they were just executables in a directory.

 

[Something Amyss]

The internet makes it harder to find truly obscure games. For example, people around here (where I live, not The Escapist) didn't even believe a Hunt for Red October game existed, though I had it. On YouTube, you can find video playthroughs. There was also a Willow game that played sort of like a Zelda game. There was a Shanarra point and click adventure/puzzle/whatever game, and so on.

Rolling Thunder was one nobody I knew knew of, though we had an arcade cabinet in town for years. For a while, it was right next to the Street Fighter II CE cabinet.

It was only when AVGN covered the Odyssey 2 that I finally found people who had played the damn thing. It was my first console, and while a lot of the games I had were basically clones of arcade titles, they were by and large my intro to gaming. Hell, my first computer included a lot of games that were clones, too.

I don't know. I never know which games are going to be well known. My expectations are usually subverted.

I'm almost 40. I've been gaming since the Intellivision and Commodore 64. Given the average age of this forum it's safe to say there are HUNDREDS of games I remember that no one else seems to. Some days I feel like Grandpa Simpson prattling away about aging classics that were forgotten before half of you were even born.

And we tied an onion to our belts, which was the style at the time.

I thought I knew you from somewhere.

Didn't we meet back in nineteen dickety seven?

 

[BloatedGuppy]

But just out of curiosity, what PC classics (obscure or not) from any time prior to 1987 would you recommend? Specifically, for someone who relishes in delving into gaming's past and loves analyzing games for their design and industry influence just as much as he does playing them for fun.

Oh, many. M.U.L.E. is pretty much essential, it was hugely influential on a number of today's preeminent game designers and is still just as fun and slick today as it was when it was made. Sid Meier's Pirates got remade, and the remake was excellent, but the original came out in...1986 or 1987. All the original Ultimas, I believe I-IV at least and possibly V are all prior to that time, and IV and V in particular were groundbreaking RPGs. Some of the original Sierra Adventures are from around that time...the early Space Quests and Police Quests in particular were excellent. Legacy of the Ancients was a quirky CRPG, I've never really played anything like it since. That was true of the old Phantasie games as well. Defender of the Crown was an extremely entertaining game...it was a graphical tour de force back in its day, which I imagine seems rather funny now. I think they're a bit later than '87 but Knights of Legend and Omega are two seldom-talked-about oldies...the former was an extremely complex (for its time) isometric combat heavy RPG, the latter was a game in which you actually coded the AI for your own tank to see how it would perform in combat. I have fond memories of old action games like Raid on Bungling Bay or Mission Impossible, but I'd be hard pressed to describe either as classics. The old Wizardry and Bard's Tale games came out around that time...the first installment of the latter series remains a favorite to this day, I revisit it sometimes through old emulators (and still have my old graph paper maps). Starflight came out in the 1980's I believe, and is the progenitor of the space exploration RPG...it was rather ably copied (ripped off) in the campaign mode for Star Control 2. I believe the first gold box games came out in the mid-late 80's, Pool of Radiance first among them (and arguably one of the very best among them, they became swiftly derivative). Not to be confused with the loathed later reboot of Pool of Radiance that would format your hard drive when uninstalled. If you wanted to go REALLY far back there are the text adventures like Zork or Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.

There's more. There's a lot more. Memory gets a bit hazy when I go quite that far back. Definitely the Ultimas and MULE though. Definitely Pirates. Definitely Bard's Tale. Some real classics from back then.

 

[CrystalShadow]

Commender Keen?
I don't think it applies to "no one remembers", a lot of people remember Commander Keen fondly.

How about Jazz Jackrabbit? XD

To be honest, when it comes to old games it can get really hard to find them unless you remember the exact name.

I had this game in my head for ages but it took more well more than a year and several very indirect bits of evidence to ever figure out what it was. (And I've forgotten the name again. Go figure... XD - Well, I'm sure I've got a bookmark somewhere)

Also now I'm thinking of Star Goose... Which... I honestly have no idea if that can be called obscure or not... XD

 

[Jingle Fett]

Well for the longest time it was Glover, but then I went on to the internet and realised there's not a game I could mention that no one's heard of so... yeah. Glover?

Yay, another person remembers Glover!


Hm, what else lets see.
-Buck Bumble for n64. Would love to see a modern take on it.
-I would have said Mischief Makers, but apparently the internet seems to love it (nobody I know personally does tho).
-Marble Drop for PC, that was a great game. Still have the disc too
-Captain Crunch's Crunchling Adventure, PC.
-Gizmos and Gadgets
-EV Nova
-The Neverhood
-Star Wars Galactic Battlegrounds. The Star Wars version of Age of Empires 2. Damn that game is good, been playing it again

 

[Conner42]

That's a good question.

The Lost Vikings may not be the most obscure or forgotten thing in video games, but no one I know talks about those two games. And, really, those games were awesome. I honestly think that if Nintendo wants Mario to do the whole co-op thing, they need to take notes from The Lost Vikings to make co-op a unique experience for the series.

There are a couple of mentions that I remember fondly here like The Neverhood, Jazz Jackrabbit, M.U.L.E.

Also, Star Fox...okay, actually, everybody here would probably remember Star Fox, unless your Nintendo, apparently, because they haven't released a damn game for that franchise since the Gamecube.

 

[Vigormortis]

snip

I've actually played M.U.L.E. In fact, I think I have a copy of it sitting somewhere on a spare drive.

Can't say I've ever played any of the Ultima games, but I've heard much about them. Generally positive, too.

Omega sounds fantastic. I'll definitely have to look that one up.

I vaguely recall playing Bard's Tale at some point.

And as for Zork...
I've played pretty much all of them. I basically grew up on a combination of NES/SNES games and PC games like Zork (DOS) and Zork: Grand Inquisitor (as well as Doom and MechWarrior 2).

Still, thanks for the suggestions. I'll have to peruse GoG to see if they have them. Especially Omega.

 

[Ravenier]

I still fondly remember Cosmo's Cosmic Adventures - a sidescrolling platformer from my (very) early childhood days.
You basically played as an Alien kid that had suction cups for hands. This seems completely awesome until you realize that you have suction cups for hands.

 

[aozgolo]

Given the nature of the internet, I can't say no-one else remembers these games but these are the ones I am surprised at running into people who've played them:




Cosmic Osmo and the Worlds Beyond the Mackerel: I first played this game in grade school during technology class on a Macintosh... it's been somewhat of a cornerstone of my childhood now as it's one of the earliest computer games I recall playing on a computer.


Shadow Madness: Really shouldn't be that obscure but good luck finding someone else who played it. By far one of my favorite settings and story for a RPG despite rather lackluster and mediocre gameplay.


Darkfall Online: A very niche subscription based MMORPG that was a huge open world fantasy game with always-on PvP and full loot on death that focused heavily on clan-based warfare and the ability to siege and claim cities and hamlets. It's now defunct, replaced by it's sequel Darkfall Unholy Wars which I didn't really get into as well. I originally started playing after being burnt out on WoW and it's lack of real consequence for anything you do, I liked Darkfall's stakes in that if you die you lose everything on your body and how you can own an entire town until someone more powerful takes it from you.


Magic of Scheherazade: A NES game featuring zelda-like action combat mixed with a separate turn-based party battle system that had many cool features that were really innovative and ahead of it's time like academies that taught you battle tactics and spells that only worked during special events like eclipses. Definitely a game I highly recommend.

 

[Thyunda]

Nobody ever really seems to have heard of Steel Empire and every time I look away from the word I forget it. I think there's some mind-magic going on.

 

[FPLOON]

Lemmings

That series is still boss... Despite still remember playing one version on an old Mac computer, I'm more familiar with Lemmings Revolution on my mom's old PC nowadays...

Conker's Bad Fur Day

Is that a total gaming [cult] classic, though?

Chu-Chu Rocket

To be honest, I only remember that catchy commercial for this particular game...

OT:

I can think of only two:

Virtua Quest: Yes, it's a spin-off of Virtua Fighter... No, I'm not making this up... Yes, I did LP this game TWICE; one on the GameCube and the other on the PS2... No, it's just THAT mediocre of a game, which is why not that many people actually know about it... No, I have no idea how many times I have mentioned this game on this forums...

Odama: No, not "Obama" because X-Play already made that joke... Yes, it utilized the GameCube mic in terms of overall gameplay... Yes, the game can get a bit luck-based if you either suck at Pinball or suck at giving out voice commands, even though I won't blame you on the latter since you could literally just say anything and that may or may not make your army do "something", at least... Yes, it's better than Virtua Quest in my opinion, but that's not saying much...

And FUCK YES, both these games deserve a sequel! (Wait... Who am I talking to again? *moral bar decreases*)

Then again, I do know two other people on this site who have played those games as well, son there's that...

Other than that, since Winter Christmas is coming, there was this one Christmas-themed game where you're trying to prevent Santa from getting kidnapped by gathering clues (and a net) in the form of answering math-related problems so that you can stop the [imposer] elf from kidnapping Santa... or something like that... I don't know... For me, whenever I did confront the culprit, they'd always jump out the window, I would jump after them, and the game resets with [other] elfs now trying to throw snowballs at me for some reason...

Honorable mention to this 3D dino game I remember where you're a herbivore trying trying to find 6 dino eggs scattered across the land while avoiding both lava and carnivores...