Best game you ever played (no multiples)

[Deadyawn]

Thief 2. The KING of immersive design.

 

[Gregz]

Wasteland (1988)

There was an era where you played cRPGs in your imagination, a kind of crossover between fiction novels and computer games. Wasteland is a great example of that era.

Wasteland was the original turn-based post-apocalyptic RPG. Very much inspired by the Mad Max films of the early 80s, this predecessor of Fallout crawls from the ruins and establishes a mix of post-apocalyptic despair, old-west mythology, and lost top-secret military technology. A rich blend of challenging combat, humorous storytelling and difficult puzzles gives Wasteland depth and room for your imagination.

https://rpgcodex.net/content.php?id=9453

 

[Silvanus]

Deus Ex. It feels like I discovered new secrets in playthrough after playthrough, and from my very first completion of Liberty Island I was constantly surprised at the world's reactivity and the foresight of the developers. Very few games have had me replaying as frequently and trying to pull off as many different things, just to see what kind of consequence they'd have down the line.

I also bought my original physical copy for about 5 dollars, and wasn't expecting to have nearly as much fun as I did.

 

[DemonKing]

Hard choice. There's a few "lightning in a bottle" games out there I could nominate. Maybe the original Company of Heroes?

I'm a sucker for WW2 stuff and this had gameplay, atmosphere, graphics and sound design in spades. It added innovative stuff like cover, pinning, retreating and damage to particular parts of vehicles. Also tons of hilarious dialog and great multiplayer in addition to a fun and varied campaign.

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

UFO: Enemy Unknown.
Only thing better than X-Com is modded X-com.

 

[Eirinjas]

Thief: The Dark Project.
It's difficult to decide between Thief 1 and Thief 2, especially when fan missions are considered (and nowadays with the NewDark patch they essentially run on the same version of the engine anyway), but when it comes to just the vanilla campaign, the original game wins out for having far more memorable levels.
Thief 2 has a more consistent quality, while Thief 1 has higher highs and lower lows, but even the lows are memorable at least, while when I think back to Thief 2 some of the levels blend together in my memory.

Why is Thief so good? Simple: great atmosphere, great exploration, and stealth gameplay that actually functions and isn't just a frustrating exercise in hiding behind objects and hoping you're not in someone's line of sight. I used to hate stealth in games before, but Thief made me fall in love with it. And to this day there's no better stealth system out there. Sure, the AI is exploitable and I've become so familiar with the engine's quirks that I can exploit it as hard as I want, but the raw systems are superior to anything we got today. The lighting, the sound propagation, and how both interact with AI awareness of the player. Simply excellent.

The amazing atmosphere and wealth of top-tier fan missions are just a cherry on top.

Thief: The Dark Project (TDP) or *GOLD*

In my opinion, TDP excels at everything it does. It has the best overall design of any FPS game. Period. The maps are clever, the missions are varied, the weapons and items are novel, the art is fantastic, the sound design is stellar, the mythology of the world is familiar but fresh, and the gameplay is top-notch. A quarter of a century later (holy fucking shit!), it still does stealth better than any other game on the market. TDP mixes stealth missions with Tombraider-style adventures and horror to make a cocktail that is inebriating to the senses. If you go into the game with no prior knowledge and don't look anything up, like I did back in 1998, you're in for a trip.

TDP's story is hands down my favorite of any video game. Garrett is the quintessential everyman. He's just trying his best to survive in a harsh and unforgiving world. He steals because that is how he eats. It's his job. Unlike that piece of shit nu-Thief from 2014 that recasts Garrett as some emo faggot who steals because of feelings. The OG Garrett is just trying to get by. He's an anti-hero, in the vein of Clint Eastwood in A Fistful of Dollars. He doesn't let anyone get between him and his money, but he is willing to sacrifice himself for the greater good (or possibly revenge). His is the hero's journey, beginning as a pathetic street urchin who grows up to rebel against the common order and goes on an adventure that ultimately saves and revitalizes the world. Joseph Campbell would surely be satisfied. And best of all, his character's portrayal is given complexity and nuance by the inimitable Stephen Russell (absolute GOAT).

TDP is from the olden times, before games became cutscenes interrupted by moments of gameplay. The majority of the storytelling is cleverly given in mission briefings and within the missions themselves. You have full control over Garrett during the missions - control is never taken away. There are very few cutscenes in TDP, but what is there is presented between the missions and in a unique animated style that is dream-like and timeless. The only thing that has aged about those cutscenes are the resolution. You could easily use TDP's narrative as a blueprint for a Hollywood film. THAT cutscene reveal that occurs is absolutely brilliant. It was a gut-punch the first time I saw it, and I felt the game crescendo as I went through the successive missions. When Roger Ebert said video games were not art, it was because he had not played Thief. It is a treasure of a game that should be in the Library of Congress and the Louvre.

TL;DR - best game ever!

 

[bionicman]

I've wasted most of my time on digital versions of blood bowl, so I guess it's blood bowl...

 

[Squidhead]

Super Mario Brothers 3

The opus magnum of Mario. Mario games after 3 would just ape the design but never really outdo it. Everything leading up to it was like the second cumming (!) of Christ.

Mario! Mario! Mario!

To be a gamer at that time...

 

[Fedora Master]

W O B B L E D O G S
O
B
B
L
E
D
O
G
S

 

[Morenatsu.]

漏れなつ。

 

[JarlFrank]

THAT cutscene reveal that occurs is absolutely brilliant.

"It's a rock. It's what you asked for. Am I gonna get paid or not?"
"Of course. Viktoria, are you prepared to give Mr Garrett his... compensation?"

 

[MadMaxHellfire]

x-com. with the goddamn fucking dash.
it had graphics, it had tech, atmosphere, lore, strategy, tactic, depth and depth, replayability, didn't cheat, didn't handhold, didn't treat you like a retard, its uneven difficulty curve was just perfect, and that brief moment between a bullet connecting and taking effect is still peak thrill.

 

[Elttharion]

Heroes of Might and Magic III. Played this so much that my father randomly asked me what I was doing, I gifted him a copy and he liked it so much that he started playing other video games too, much to my mothers annoyance.

 

[Hell Swarm]

Super Mario Brothers 3

The opus magnum of Mario. Mario games after 3 would just ape the design but never really outdo it. Everything leading up to it was like the second cumming (!) of Christ.

Mario! Mario! Mario!

To be a gamer at that time...

Mario world does everything 3 does but better.

W O B B L E D O G S
O
B
B
L
E
D
O
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S

Unironically have played this and it's pretty fun.

 

[gurugeorge]

System Shock 1, without a doubt, it was absolutely stunning at the time.

But I also had 2 years of pure multiplayer fun with the MMO City of Heroes.

 

[spookyheart]

the world ends with you easy answer.

 

[Ahnx]

Red Dead Redemption 2

 

[Wirdschowerdn]

Thief 2.

No explanation required.

 

[mindx2]

I tried, I really, really tried to pick just one but kept thinking...

They created my favorite games ever!

 

[Desman]

Thief.

You are Bulgarian right ?

 

[Gargaune]

I tend to agonise over "Top X" rankings but never regarding the top spot itself...

Deus Ex.

 

[dbx]

Kerbal space program

 

[Desman]

Anyway it's Deus Ex.

 

[Gostak]

Tough one but ruling out all games that only really shine in (or are exclusively) multiplayer my decision up until now has to be
Star Dynasties.

It's a slow (but not too hard) tug-of-war affair attempting to acquire more systems and holding them all, most later indirectly via vassals that keep
allegiance.
Political and story (events)/ people centered.
Your decisions matter and make a difference that you can feel profoundly.
The way that opinions and moods of characters are modeled is outstanding and well done (empathy plays a meaningful role here as well).
Most of the design of the game is elegant and just working splendidly for it.

Dev logs from its early days: https://forums.tigsource.com/index.php?topic=60919.0

What it's basically about:

 

[jam]

Resident Evil (2002)

I think my answer becomes less emphatic as time goes on, and I hope that I'll eventually play something that usurps it, but it is still my favorite game. The sound design will always give me chills and the pre-rendered environments are beautiful even by today's standards. I've included one of my favorites from the soundtrack below. Unlike modern horror games, Resident Evil does an excellent job of keeping the player stressed by placing him in fight or flight situations. Most others like to make the choice for the player by either forcing him to run and hide or forcing him to fight, and I think the removal of that key decision helps him relax.
The game also keeps the ante high by introducing unexpected circumstances and new enemies from time to time. The arrival of the crimson heads, the immediate realization that the mansion is far more dangerous than it originally seemed, and the dread that follows is a special set that can't be replicated. At the time, it was also surprising that the game was programmed to let enemies wander through loading zones, although its implementation was rudimentary.
Controversially, I enjoy the messy tank controls because they prevent the player from gaining confidence in his ability to avoid enemies. I suppose raising the mobility of both the player character and the enemies could give a similar result, but in general, giving a player a sense of mastery over his own movement seems to make a game less intimidating.
I acknowledge that the game has plenty of issues. A lot of the notes scattered around the mansion are clumsy and implausible, dialogue is similarly awkward, the discrete puzzles are braindead in comparison to the larger problems of navigation and inventory management, first-time players can be made to backtrack unreasonably often, some jump scares are lazy and ineffectual, and the swath of difficulty options prevented the developers from smartly controlling the player's access to resources past the first few hours, but Resident Evil has made most subsequent horror games seem obsolete to me for over 20 years. I just hope I'm not being blinded by nostalgia.