What are some cool games you've been playing?

superjoe on 2011/03/26 10:15
— edited on 2011/03/26 10:16

Name a few games that have influenced you as a game designer, or that just struck you as having unique or especially fun gameplay.

I'll start - recently I've been playing Minecraft. I love how infinite the world is, and how the multiplayer elements complement the sandbox gameplay.

I'm still addicted to Team Fortress 2 simply because of how well balanced the core game mechanics are. The developers have optimized for FUN rather than graphics or realism.

Also I'm a nethack player. Ascensions include a tourist and an extinctionist wizard. I love the complexity and how every game is different. Also some very subtle but cool multiplayer elements if you play on nethack.alt.org.

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Comments

hidas on 2011/03/26 13:58:

Recently I've been playing Frantic 2 on Kongregate, and that's inspired me to make my own shooter. I've also been playing Final Fantasy IV, with some Super Smash Bros. thrown in.

adrwen on 2011/03/26 16:30:

Games I wish would have influenced me:

  • The Totalwar series (don't tell Stallman)
  • FreeCol (it's really one of the best FOSS games)
  • UFO: AI (yet another very good FOSS game)
  • Tetris
  • Chess
Games that have ACTUALLY influenced me:
  • Dink

nitrofurano on 2011/03/26 17:16:

i'd start on those from Kenta Cho http://www.asahi-net.or.jp/~cs8k-cyu/index_e.html - i also loved those MSX games from Konami (Hideo Kojima were a member of this team) - 80's arcade games from Taito, Nichibutsu, etc., are also excellent as well - going back to the indie games, i also enjoy a lot games like this: http://db.tigsource.com/games/rescue-the-beagles , or this http://db.tigsource.com/games/machinarium

hidas on 2011/03/27 00:38:

@ardwen:
Heh, chess is the greatest board game ever.

gcewing on 2011/03/27 03:20:

Some games that I have fond memories of:

Zork (mainframe version)
Rogue
Leather Godesses of Phobos
Lode Runner
Wolfenstein 3D
Marathon
Prince of Persia (original 2D version)
Sim City
The Incredible Machine
Railroad Tycoon
Starcraft
Myst
RHEM

And yes, I'm also finding Minecraft to be... interesting... just a shame it's not open source... and not written in Python...

I wonder if I can squeeze a Minecraft clone into any of the themes this time? :-)

adrwen on 2011/03/27 12:55:

Seeing as you can build pretty much anything in minecraft (even "nine times"), I doubt that would be a problem!

nitrofurano on 2011/03/27 17:06:

@hidas @ardwen:
chess, always! :)

Evdude on 2011/03/27 19:26:

I got the free version of minecraft to run offline on my computer. Me and my brothers take turns building stuff around the map. the only problem is the nagging fear that my youngest brother will flood one of our caverns. :)
Other than that, SSBB, New Super Mario Bros Wii, Zelda: Wind Waker. 

taejo on 2011/03/28 20:57:

I've been playing the games on foddy.net -- simple games can be a lot of fun; controls can present a challenge (GIRP is a better example than QWOP, in my opinion); random levels can work.

cyhawk on 2011/03/28 21:41:

I fell in love with SpaceChem recently. Also if you are a fan of Nethack and Minecraft don't miss Dwarf Fortress!

richard on 2011/03/28 23:52:

Minecraft got a lot of playtime last year. Looking forward to Notch adding a bunch of stuff to make it interesting again.

I found Dwarf Fortress utterly impenetrable as a player.
 
I've been playing a lot of Civ 5 lately too. And a bunch of random PS3 games (Eat Them, PixelJunk Shooter 2, LittleBigPlanet 2, and so on).

I'm also writing my Magnum Opus game in my spare time. PyWeek is going to be an interesting break from that.

Cosmologicon on 2011/03/29 02:37:

richard: Do you have a project page for this magnum opus?

richard on 2011/03/29 03:33:

Sorry, no, it's a sekrit project until I have something releasable :-)

phoe6 on 2011/03/29 11:36:

My favorite has been "Rebel act's Blade of Darkness". I don't see much of fan following around that game in the internet. But I used to play this when it was first released.  Just to share some trivia - it used Python 1.1 in its game engine.

Recently, I have been enjoying Wii games.Wii Sports -Tennis and Wii Play - Billards. Also play FourPlay and checkers at omgpop.com. Go at Pandanet server. PyChess is interesting thing to hit the arena too. The developer has been putting in a lot of work with PyChess interface and it is really good one.

My wife seems to enjoy playing "Angry Birds" and I like that game too.  

gcewing on 2011/03/30 21:39:

Been checking out SpaceChem. Awesome! Multi-threaded Befunge!

Hugoagogo on 2011/04/03 09:22:

SpaceChem is awsome, so is Dwarf fortress, losing is fun, that why mine-craft is annoying and nowhere near as satisfying, in minecraft you don't have any serious penalty for getting wiped out

gcewing on 2011/04/03 11:03:

Now I've got to somehow stop playing SpaceChem for long enough to come up with a PyWeek game...

richard on 2011/04/03 11:12:

Hugo has clearly never been really done-over by a creeper, or an accidental lava-pool related fall :-)

"That's a nice everything you have there..."

superjoe on 2011/04/03 15:20:

or a friendly neighborhood troll!

Hugoagogo on 2011/04/04 09:41:

Not an intentional troll but reading back a bit it does come off that way doesn't it, i more just meant i prefer a game with more of a penalty on screwing up.

superjoe on 2011/04/04 10:22:

No, no, I was only adding to what richard said - that you hadn't come across a griefer in Minecraft ruining all your hard work. I was not trying to call you a troll.