Gaming

Red Dead Redemption. Probably stuck with me more than any other game Ive played. The story, the characters, the world, all of it.

Really hope it gets a rerelease

Hollow Knight and Ori Will of the Wisps pop up in my head constantly. They're atmospheric masterpieces.

Death Stranding. Beautiful landscapes with awesome moments like treking through a snowstorm to reach a distant prepper outpost. Waiting for rain to stop while playing the harmonica for bb. Definitly could have had one more zone to round it all off, or maybe expanded the final boss area zone to full size.

Kenshi. Kenshi is the single most unique game I have ever played I think. There is no campaign, you are just sent into one of the largest maps ive heard of in a video game with the goal of "survive". So many ways to play, I've had so many different adventures in that game, with stories that I crafted that have stuck with me for years. I am still heartbroken I lost my saves from 2019 :(

Second choice is prototype. I dunno why but I just adore the shapeshifting combat, and edgy early 2000s aesthetic. Alex Mercer is one of my all time favorite supervillian/hero characters, he's just cool, man.

Basically all Blizzard games between '95 and '04 (So Warcraft 2 up until World of Warcraft). I just loved them all. Great gameplay and awesome music. The soundtracks for the games of that era are just permanently recorded in my brain and they'll randomly start playing in my mind very often.

Diablo 1 was my first ARPG and I remember playing it online and not knowing what the hell people were talking about because I wasn't familiar with the lingo yet. I loved playing online with the overpowered duped items like the Godly Plate of the Whale and the Arch-Angel's Staff of Apocalypse. It was great.

Diablo 2 was even better than the first one. My favorite ARPG of all-time and in my opinion still the best one ever made. I've spent hundreds of hours on this game online and I still wish I could relive those days. One of the greatest games ever.

Warcraft 2 was also one of my favorite games, the soundtrack was especially great. I know every note of every piece of music in that game by heart. Sometimes a random piece of Warcraft 2 music will just pop in my head and start playing on repeat for hours on end.

World of Warcraft was the first MMORPG I got addicted to. I played others before, but WoW just had me hooked. I've played this game religiously up until the end of WotLK when the game lost its magic for me. I've played all the expansions that came after that but not much, usually just one or two characters to max level and then I get bored with it.

Outer Wilds and Omori. Both beautiful games and if I had to choose one to play through for the first time again, I couldn't.

Black & White 1 and 2

Well I would answer Outer Wilds (in particular, with the DLC), but since you already said it, ummm....

Probably Hollow Knight. I remember just loving the exploration in that game, and the difficulty made everything feel well earned. I haven't played Elden Ring yet, but it sounds like people had a similar reaction to that, but in 3D.

Neverwinter nights and it's expansion packs still sticks with me

Started thinking about it and turns out I have a few:

• Thomas Was Alone for the overall vibe, music and writing
• Celeste for the the story and gameplay
• Hollow Knight for the world, music and mechanics
• Metroid Prime for being generally incredible
• Overwatch for being my intro to online games and the friends I made playing it
• Halo 3 because a mate of mine and I played it so damn much

When I finished Life is Strange 1, it just felt I lost a friend and it lingered for weeks. Whenever I was hearing the soundtrack, I felt really sad because of stuff that happened in the game.

Red alert 2 and counterstrike will be with me forever. I played those games so much growing up that I always find myself going back to them.

Persona 3 FES. It was a pivotal game for me. Beating that game was my gateway to more challenging RPGs and made me start paying attention to voice actors due to the amazing performances in that game.

Not a fantastic game, but the first Walking Dead Telltale series really hit me in the feels and so has stayed with me. The Witcher 3 definitely affected me, but it's hard to seperate that feeling from the books.

I'd say Kerbal Space Program, Factorio and Rimworld because whenever I play those it's like coming home, but since I'm always playing at least one of them, it feels a bit like cheating.

The feeling of the Tribes games is always there in my mind. I occasionally go back but the freedom of movement in that game is just so liberating. I never know why they aren't more celebrated. (Titanfall 2 comes close, but still not quite the same).

Battlezone 2 is IMHO another unsung classic. I loved the mix of RTS and FPS. Another one from before the mechanics of FPS and the general feel of motion had standardised (to a fault) which I think helps it keep it's hooks in me.

I received Eternal Darkness for Christmas in 2002. I will NEVER forget the feelings that game inspired in me thanks to the unique "sanity" system and creepy lovecraftian atmosphere.

I remember my brothers and I huddled around the basement TV into the wee hours of the morning over our Christmas holiday totally creeped out but so driven to complete the story that we pressed onward.

What a fantastic game that was and I'm so grateful for those memories with my brothers. I don't think I've ever had such a deep connection with a game since.

For me it was Metal Gear Solid 3 and 4, as well as Devil May Cry 3.

I used to have a pretty hard time thinking about what were my favorite games and the ones that changed my tastes and probably perspectives.

I realized that every time get asked this question the first games that come to mind are always these 3.

Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery EP is the easy answer for me. It hit me at just the right time, in just the right way. It was masterfully crafted. The sound track was, at the time, perhaps the best pairing of a video game and sound track ever made.

So many people mentioning Outer Wilds, think I will have to revisit that. There are a lot of honorable mentions like HL2, SOMA and Ocarina of Time. But for me, the outstanding mention would have to be the original Elite on the Sinclair Spectrum. For such an early, technically simple game it had so much depth and gameplay, and challenge (took me weeks to master that damn docking procedure without crashing!).

Ports of Call on the Commodore 64. One of the first video games I ever played. Set up a shipping company, buy a ship, buy low and sell high and get better ships. Occasionally you have to take control of the ship (incredibly rudimentary, but it was 1986, give them a break) to dock or leave port, avoid a collision or avoid reefs, but for whatever reason I keep coming back to it.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1085260/Ports_of_Call_Classic/

Half-Life 2. I have so many playthroughs that I lost count. At the time of release, the gameplay and physics were mind-blowing. The atmosphere over time got even better when Valve released bloom lighting. The water and sky were breath taking. I still go back and visit to this day.

Fallout 3. Especially the morale dilemma's I could never bring myself to blow up Nuke town.

I think skyrim and Hitman Absolution. They were the first games that I bought by myself ob my pc, starting my real gaming era.

Mother 3 still affects me in ways no other game has, even to this day. It's truly a beautiful game.

For me, it's Mirror's Edge, particularly Mirror's Edge Catalyst. I even go running IRL to the soundtrack.

The big ones for me are the one where I made friends and very personal experiences:

Tibia, Eve Online & Warhammer Online

Which reminds me, I haven't messaged certain former guild leader in a while!

The ending of Unreal 2 (the single player game) when your team have all died and left messages for you to listen to as you fly away alone on a spaceship

Hugos House of Horrors was the first video game I played — I was probably 7 or so and my mother would perm this ladies hair every few weeks. She was a family friend and was in a wheelchair, so we would go to her house. She had a computer that had this game on it and I was just mesmerized by the whole creepy/campy vibe.

The entire Witcher trilogy, but especially the Witcher 3. Replaying after reading the books adds so much depth the world and the political decisions you are forced to make. The world is beautiful, the ambient sounds and soundtrack are so good ("winds howling") and the story is gripping.

Loom

It's been, what, 30 years? I still think about that game pretty frequently.