OT:Favourite computer games

[hans]

One of my favourite 'modern classics' is Factorio. It also wins my "just 5 more minutes"-award. And for others the "oh shit, I've work tomorrow and it's 4AM".

The story is you crashed on a foreign planet and the mission is to need to send a rocket into space. In free mode the game doesn't end there though. It's a complete sandbox which opens people creativity for e.g. smart contraptions, novel idea's or just plain overkill production facilities.

The point in this game is: if you were to completely ignore the machines and automation you can set up, it will take over 390 hours to craft 1 rocket. That's not my idea of fun. Some people have built bases that can craft and launch 3 rockets per minute. You can literally automate everything in this game.

You may first start out with a row of smelters that you need to babysit and refuel yourself. Soon you'll automate that.
In the late game, you can become as lazy as setting up train stations that automatically fill them with the required materials to set up remote outposts. You can create blueprints of structures and copy&paste them.

Oh.. and there are these things called "combinators" which you can "program". So you can set up smart factories that do some computations/logic before they become active.

The graphics are bit dark and dull; but it's not meant to be a "huray it's spring on this planet"-type game. Quite the contrary. The original inhabitants aren't so happy with the industrialization and pollution it brings. But "/care" -> just get of rid of them, after all their nests are siting on some beautiful oil wells we need for producing more circuits!

And best of all; Factorio won the "award" for least worst tree chopping experience! . I.e. you can burn complete forests down if you need that space for moar production.

Despite being early access/beta or whatever, it's extremely polished and after my (literally) hundreds of hours I put in, I hardly ever saw any bug.

[NivagSwerdna]

After I've finished portal I'll be going onto Portal 2

Portal 2 is awesome.
Spent many hours playing Minecraft, but an old fav is XCOM, and then further back in time Jane's simulations (including Longbow 2, F-15, 688(I)) with a Thrustmaster HOTAS setup (which I must convert to connect to my modern PC one day) and then in the far far back days Battlezone vector arcade game and Roc 'n' Rope on the pub arcade table. 
And sometimes you will find us underground as a family exploring the ruins of the Great Underground Empire, rusty lantern in hand.

[james_s]

Oh man, I forgot about The Incredible Machine games, those were awesome. Another one I easily get sucked into is Lemmings.

A lot of these old games you can play for free now, some are online, others you can grab from abandonware sites. There is a program called Dosbox that you can use to run them on modern computers.

[Fortran]

TIM and Lemmings where great

But nothing beats a good MUD.
Surely I can't be the only one who enjoys them.

70K online hours might warrant an addiction disorder though.

[JPortici]

I've Just started playing computer games for the first time in my life. I'm 53 and I've not really had any interest up to now

a slippering slope it can be.
some of my lifelong favourites, in no order:
from valve:
portal 2 (obviously, if you thought a sequel couldn't get better.. you are wrong.)
half life 2 and episodes, too.
from firefly:
stronghold and stronghold crusader
from bethesda:
fallout series
oblivion

caution: addictive time wasters ahead.
civilization IV + DLCs
rollercoaster tycoon 1 and 2

others:
max payne series
metroid series (the best series of all times, to me. metroid prime is the best fps i've ever played. I'd get a gamecube wii wii u just to play the whole metroid series in virtual console)

[james_s]

These days I tend to mostly play games I can fire up and play for a few minutes then go do something else, rather than having to invest many hours in it. I still have my collection of classic arcade cabinets I started collecting back in the late 90s when they were still cheap, I play those now and then.

[nidlaX]

- Total anhiliation thru free spring RTS engine http://springrts.com.

Wow, SpringRTSBADSD16v16 player?

Mass Effect series and The Witcher series are fantastic, check them out if you have time and a computer that can run them well.

[eugenenine]

Bards Tale, Defender of the Crown, Lemmings.

I play minecraft at my son's request.
Simutrans was another he liked.

[djos]

My all time favorite game series would have to be Space Quest by Sierra (particularly 1 to 4) - SQIII would be my absolute fav out of the series:



I'm also a big fan of the Monkey Island series:



I still love simple classics like Bombjack, Lemmings, Loderunner, Galaga and Space invaders too. 

[aargee]

Asteroids - the first game I had. Loaded from tape into a Dick Smith System 80 (TRS80 clone)

Time Pilot - fond memories of playing this in the late PM / early AM hours at a local roadhouse (gas station), often in freezing temperatures, with friends clocking over the high scores. That's when playing video games with friends meant face-to-face.

Halo (most versions) I have enjoyed of late when I can sit down long enough.

[BrianHG]

Since most of the modern popular games listed I already like, I'll mention 1 from the 80s on my Atari 800 I liked, 'M.U.L.E.'
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M.U.L.E.

The first supply & demand commerce type game which was actually multi-player enjoyable.

[helius]

Brogue, Capsule, Phoenotopia, Cave Story.

[alexanderbrevig]

I actually got my degree as a game developer, with AI major. This is a topic kind of close to my heart!
I rarely play games these days as I find other outlets for recreation (such as making them, music and electronics) but if I play these days it's either:

League of Legends - just recreational, and a slight hint of strategy and mechanics - of course competitive
or
Counter Strike: Global Offensive - reaction time, strategy, competitive

I've had countless hours in Microsoft Flight Sim (pretty much all of them) - got a few of the virtual certificates in X :p
Other influential titles over the years as a casual gamer: Zelda, Mario, Metal Gear Solid, Silent Hill, The Last of Us and Firewatch to mention a few.

[BU508A]

Here is my list:

- The Incredible machine
- Day of the Tentacle
- Space Quest (all)
- Kings Quest (all)
- Leisure Suit Larry (all)
- Darkseed
- Lots of Infocom games (Leather godesses of Phobos)
- Defense Grid
- Defense Grid 2
- The room (1 + 2 + 3)
- Deponia (1 + 2 + 3)
- Edna bricht aus
- Harveys neue Augen
- Daedalus encounter
- Jet set Willy
- Commander Keen
- Dots
- Lost Vikings (1 + 2)
- Sokoban

[tatus1969]

Asteroids - the first game I had. Loaded from tape into a Dick Smith System 80 (TRS80 clone)

definitely +1. Just had the opportunity to play it on the original arcades console last weekend, on an exibition 

[james_s]

Asteroids - the first game I had. Loaded from tape into a Dick Smith System 80 (TRS80 clone)

definitely +1. Just had the opportunity to play it on the original arcades console last weekend, on an exibition 

The original arcade cabinet is the *only* way to properly play Asteroids. It made the best use of the unique capabilities of a CRT vector display of any game I've ever seen. No other display technology has the dynamic range to produce those blinding bright shots. I have an original Asteroids cabinet in my basement, it's one of my favorites.

[Berni]

For Portal 2 like puzzling but with more engineering i recommend Infinifactory by Zatchtronics.

http://store.steampowered.com/app/300570/

Its a game about building assembly lines for making products. You get  raw materials coming in and your job is to build a contraption out of simple building blocks to create the required output product. The interesting part is that there is no single correct way to solve the levels. Much like in real life the solution can be dirty inefficient and thrown together or optimized to be eater fast or cheap. Once you complete a level the game compares your solution to the solutions of others on a histogram so that you can see how well you did.

[shteii01]

Geez.  Nobody plays Diablo 2?  Diablo 2 LoD?

[R005T3r]

Well, I spend most of my gaming time, studying nowadays... My favorite game so far was Halo3. With 4 and 5 they just downgraded it...

[TiN]

Dune and C&C before crappy Red Alert First game was Digger though, that's when I learnt about hex-editors and how levels are created, 

[brucehoult]

I've Just started playing computer games for the first time in my life. I'm 53 and I've not really had any interest up to now and I've always considered games as a waste of time. Spent my time messing with electronics as a teenager and computers where in their infancy so no games around.That is until I gave Portal a chance 2 weeks ago.

In my yoof I played Apple Panic, Lode Runner, Tetris, Dark Castle but I pretty much stopped playing traditional computer games 25 years ago.

I gave Portal a go when it became available free. It seemed rather easy compared to the problems I solve in programming at work :-)

The only thing I play recently is Condor Soaring



You're flying a simulated aircraft with no engine, and can take part in races of 100 - 500 km against other people on the internet in real time. It's quite realistic and useful for learning or practising the decision making skills and techniques of real glider racing (which I also do).

We use the same program at our club with a PC hooked up to the real controls in an old glider cockpit and a big projection TV in front.

The graphics are a bit basic by today's standard -- the program recommends "1+ GHz CPU, 256 MB RAM, DX7+ card with 64 MB". But in fact it's perfectly adequate for the purpose.

[JPortici]

The graphics are a bit basic by today's standard -- the program recommends "1+ GHz CPU, 256 MB RAM, DX7+ card with 64 MB". But in fact it's perfectly adequate for the purpose.

if only more developers realized this.

[GreyWoolfe]

been a long time sine i played it but id's Doom (PC) is right up there on my list along with Elite (Spectrum or Atari ST). Doom lead to Quake where i spent too many hours playing QuakeWorld online with my 28.8 modem!

 

[james_s]

been a long time sine i played it but id's Doom (PC) is right up there on my list along with Elite (Spectrum or Atari ST). Doom lead to Quake where i spent too many hours playing QuakeWorld online with my 28.8 modem!

 

I remember staying late at work to play Quake with my coworkers over the network. This was back when networks were still expensive and I was broke. Good times.

[gnavigator1007]

Planescape: Torment, System Shock, and the original Deus Ex. Several mods for Deus Ex also rank very high on my list of all-time favorite games. More recent stuff: Axiom Verge, Love, Tyranny, and Stardew Valley (I like fishing and farming  )