Nostalgia City!

[C..]

What's your most favourite games from when you were younger in the awesome era of gaming, bar Shenmue?

[shengoro86]

This fucking thing right here:


I feel like I could play that everyday and I wouldn't get sick of it.

[MiTT3NZ]

Sonic (MS version)
SpyHunter
Into the Eagle's Nest
War Games
Duke Nukem 3D
Doom II (The Simpsons mod)
Championship Manager 99/00
Sonic 3D
Double Dragon
Super Kick Off
Sonic R
Zool
Alex Kidd: Hi-Tech World
Alex Kidd in Shinobi World
Clockwork Knight
Spider-Man (MS version)
Countless C64 games I don't remember the names of...

But yeah, me n my brother constantly take a trip down memory lane about all those awesome games we played in the 90s that no one else ever did (coz everyone was on the N64/PlayStation tip while we were a couple of generations behind)

That's why I love my iPhone. So many simplistic games to choose from that I can pick up n put down without having to invest too much time in them. Seriously, gaming nowadays is a young man's game. And a rich man's. And an "I'd prefer to chill inside tonight than go out" man's. You get what I mean...

[mrslig100]

Where do I start!?

[OL]

Still my absolute favorite 2D point & click.
I think.
Unless I'm forgetting something.
I do that sometimes.

phpBB [video]

I believe the video is of the demo, which I played about a hundred times back in the day before finally getting my hands on the full game.
Most of the licensed rock music in the game is by a band called The Gone Jackals, and I bought the cd years ago. I still put that stuff on sometimes when I'm driving. Makes me feel badass every time. And it's all thanks to Full Throttle.

[shengoro86]

Earthbound is probably the most nostalgic game for me. My big brother got an SNES for Christmas or something and it came with Home Alone 2. He and I played that for a while, had fun with it, but ultimately didn't like it all that much. My mom, in her ultimate wisdom, realized that we might like more than one game and took us out to Game Peddler and picked up Earthbound. I think we bought it simply because the box was big and we were shallow. Well good thing because it turned out to be my brother's favorite game of all time.

I used to watch him play all the time and never really played much myself -- I was (and still am :P) six years younger than him. Eventually, when he wasn't around I'd play the game myself because I loved the environments (I'm really strange in the sense that I'll turn on games such as Majora's Mask or Mystical Ninja or Shenmue simply because I want to hang out in Clock Town or Zazen Town or Yokosuka). I remember working sooooo hard and being so proud of myself when I finally left Onett and got to Twoson and heard this music:

phpBB [video]

Walking down towards Twoson, with the in-game sunset like appearance is one of the most vivid memories I have of my childhood (age 6 or so). I know this is a really shallow and hipster thing to say but... I really wish that Earthbound wasn't as popular as it's become today. It's weird and stupid but it's such a treasured thing from my childhood (back when my family was all together) that when I see all these people obsessing over it now it somehow bothers me.

So many people cheapen the worth of nostalgia but I think it's a great thing. There's nothing wrong with thinking fondly of the things you've loved.

[C..]

This fucking thing right here:


I feel like I could play that everyday and I wouldn't get sick of it.

Lots of interesting choices.
I live in the uk and there is a cart just like that excluding golden axe fucking epic cartridge!

Sonic 06 anyone?

[Crimson Ryan]

The box art alone sold me on it.

[C..]

The box art alone sold me on it.

I never heard of this game till It came with a pc my parents bought, a SEGA mega collection.

Its awesome.

Toy commander for dreamcast?

[OL]

So many people cheapen the worth of nostalgia but I think it's a great thing. There's nothing wrong with thinking fondly of the things you've loved.

I don't think anyone thinks it's a bad thing. I certainly don't. Nostalgia is awesome. It's responsible for about half of the greatest feelings I've ever felt.
But it does sometimes get in the way of being impartial and level-headed about things. That's the one drawback.

I know this is a really shallow and hipster thing to say but... I really wish that Earthbound wasn't as popular as it's become today. It's weird and stupid but it's such a treasured thing from my childhood (back when my family was all together) that when I see all these people obsessing over it now it somehow bothers me.

No, I completely get that. There's a certain feeling when you love something and seemingly not many other people do, where it feels a little more personal. It feels more like you own it. And that's multiplied even further when you have outside memories attached to it.

Semi-related to that, I remember back when Mega Man Legends first came out, and people shit all over it.
They'll tell you otherwise now, because it's cool to like it now, but back then most people thought it was crap.
And I was very proud to say, in all my thirteen-year-old glory, that those people could suck it.
MML was fucking awesome, and I didn't care if anyone disagreed; they were clearly wrong.
Yes, this is what I'm saying: I liked Mega Man Legends before it was cool to like Mega Man Legends.
Whatever. It's the truth.
Most people who clamored for MML3 a couple years back didn't even have a nostalgic history with the game.
For me, MML was sort of like my own personal Shenmue before Shenmue came along. The way people talk about just hanging out in Shenmue's world, taking in the sights, partaking in whatever activities were available, talking to the people and just drinking in the atmosphere of it all... that was MML for me.
Kattleox Island was the shit. I loved finally getting the jump upgrade, launching up onto rooftops, then leaping over on top of the bus as it drove around town. I'd just hang out on there, and I enjoyed every second of it. I actually figured out the "black armor" secret before reading about it anywhere else, just because I'd play the game and experiment with it so much.
And that's not even mentioning The Misadventures of Tron Bonne, which I think is one of the greatest videogame spinoffs I've played. Such a brilliant continuation of the personality and spirit of the original, and it went practically unnoticed when it first came out.
It should be said, I don't think I've expressed just how much I love the series in the past on here. I've said I like it, but I don't think I've ever given the full story. All this love might sound a little left-field because of that, but I just never went on about it partly because of what Thief is saying; as much as I'm into it, other people kind of killed it a bit by making the series sort of the "it" thing at one point, and it all felt so hollow and fake coming from a lot of them. So in general, I just kind of kept it to myself. Truthfully, the apparent cancellation of MML3 probably stabbed me in the heart harder than it did for most others.
And the nuttiest thing?
I still haven't beaten MML2.
Maybe I should get to that.

[Henry Spencer]

^Same for me, I played Mega Man Legends after renting it out from my local Blockbuster Video. Another little secret of mine is that Mega Man Legends is still the only Mega Man game I've ever played to completion. The only other Mega Man games I've played were the Game Boy MM games and those were hard. One day I'll give Tron Bonne and MML2 a try, but they are so damned expensive now.

Anyway this shit right here:



...was my jam back in the 90s. I played it so goddamned much that I unlocked Mania mode (which you unlock after beating the game twice!) and completed it in one sitting! I memorized every enemy pattern in the game. As if the game on normal wasn't challenging enough, it's a mode where you get hit even once, it's game over and I think there's only like 1 continue or something crazy like that. Anyway, it remains one of my favourite 16-bit games ever.

And yeah this:



...remains my favourite Sonic Team game, ever. Yup, I prefer it to every Sonic and Phantasy Star game. Another gem that remains one of my favourite 16-bit games. Absolutely beautiful and nostalgic game.

And for something a bit different, an arcade gem I used to play LOADS that has sadly been completely forgotten and actually one of my favourite arcade brawlers of all time:





...Konami's final arcade brawler that parodies loads of random things from Akira to TMNT to Final Fight to Konami's other games, the game is just completely wacky and incredibly fun. Violent Storm is a sort of love letter and a goodbye to the genre from Konami to the fans.

[OL]

Another little secret of mine is that Mega Man Legends is still the only Mega Man game I've ever played to completion.

Y'know, that might actually be why I was able to enjoy MML so much back in the day; I wasn't really much of a Mega Man fan prior to that. I'd played a couple on NES, but was never exactly crazy about them, so I wasn't as biased as some others about what a Mega Man game should be.
By now, the number of games in the entire franchise that I've beaten is still pretty low; I beat Maverick Hunter X, all four Mega Man Zero games (still some of my favorites on GBA)... and that's actually just about it, aside from MML and Tron Bonne. I like the series a lot, but I only love a select few. I might want to play through the X games one of these days, being that I've got the PS2 collection and all.

Anyway this shit right here:



...was my jam back in the 90s. I played it so goddamned much that I unlocked Mania mode (which you unlock after beating the game twice!) and completed it in one sitting! I memorized every enemy pattern in the game. As if the game on normal wasn't challenging enough, it's a mode where you get hit even once, it's game over and I think there's only like 1 continue or something crazy like that. Anyway, it remains one of my favourite 16-bit games ever.

YES.
I can't say I was ever as good at it as you apparently were, but I played that constantly when I first got it. And I kept playing it into the PS1 era. I believe the furthest I ever got way back then was to the flying stage over the city. I finally went back to it in recent years and beat it in its entirety. Can't imagine finishing that Mania mode though. That sounds insane.
But yes, ditto ad infinitum. That was one of the defining games of the 16-bit era for me. Shocking that it was never more popular.

[KRaZiGLiTcH]

I have alot lol but here is my number one fave its
Metal Arms Glitch in The System

[shengoro86]

For me its Mortal Kombat 1 - U3 on the Genesis.

Awesome awesome awesome.

I'm now still very involved with that community!

[OL]

I have alot lol but here is my number one fave its
Metal Arms Glitch in The System

Niiiiice. Such an underappreciated title. Just as much personality as a Ratchet & Clank game, except hard as nails. Felt like a real accomplishment beating that one. Shame there was never a sequel. Had so much potential to become a series.


I think my PS1 experience was a little different than a lot of people's. Apparently, from what I hear, there was a lot of promotion for Final Fantasy VII before it came out in the US. Or at least it was a lot for the time. Supposedly it was all over the place to the point that if you liked videogames, there was practically no chance you wouldn't know about it.
I, on the other hand, wasn't living in the US at the time. Nor was I living in Europe or the UK. Nor was I living in Asia. Nope, not even Australia.
No, I was in good ol' Israel. It's not a third-world country or anything, but it's removed enough from the rest of the world that if I wanted to know about something that was popular elsewhere, I really had to actively seek that knowledge out.
So while it may have been a big-shit trendy kind of thing everywhere else, my discovery of FFVII -- and by extension, Squaresoft -- was a much more personal thing than I think it was for many other people. It wasn't based on advertising or widespread chatter from a bunch of kids at school.
A friend mentioned FFVII while he was looking through a magazine. He probably showed me pictures, but I didn't remember them or anything. Didn't even know what kind of game it was. I just remembered how excited he was for this game I knew nothing about, so I asked my dad to pick it up while he was on an official trip to the US for a couple weeks. I only wanted it so that, in all my dickheaded childishness, I could brag to my friend and say "look what I got before you."
It turned out to be my first real JRPG (of the purer menu-based variety), and it absolutely shocked the shit out of me just how immersive, cinematic, and eye-opening it ended up being. I knew nothing about it beforehand, and of course that just made everything even more surprising . This wasn't some commercially-viable trend I was buying into; it was this fantastic, beautiful story I'd discovered that most people I knew hadn't a clue about. And like I was talking about earlier, that made it feel even more personal.