Influencial post-2000 games

[curds]

Man, I hated Ico.

 

[Btan0]

It's a real shame they butchered the animation in the SOTC remaster.

 

[DJOGamer PT]

I feel like DUSK, that fps, was pretty influential. Seemed to be the first of the unfortunately named "boomer shooter" games which are all the rage right now.

I think DOOM 2016 is the one to take that credit
As it came out before any of the other "boomer shooters" and it was very well received and popular

Shadow of the Colossus (2005) and its predecessor Ico (2001) for immersive atmosphere and minimalist story-telling

Yeah forgot about those
Those games are pretty much the reason for the whole "artsy game" trend
But I would've put only ICO, as SotC didn't do anything ICO hadn't already done (it was just more popular)

 

[pizza_microwave]

For me it was Primordia, first Point n' Click Adventure game that had intuitive and logical puzzles and item combinations.

 

[v1rus]

For better or worse, Warcraft III is probably one of the, if not the, most influential games of post 2000.

 

[PrettyDeadman]

Pathfinder: Kingamaker, Encased, ATOM Rpg, Trudograd, Brigade E5, Silent Storm, Evil Islands

 

[Verylittlefishes]

Darku Souru

 

[PrettyDeadman]

Dark Sasi

 

[forumvisitor#451]

Arma series - PlayerUnknown's Battle Royale started as Arma mod, DayZ started as Arma 2 mod and most probably many more.

 

[oddech_wymarlych_swiatow]

there's easily more "influential" titles released post-2000 than pre-2000, if you disagree you have some serious nostalgia goggles on

Even if quantity wins (which I doubt) there's no revolution similar to the one caused by Street Fighter 2, Dune 2/C&C or Doom/Duke/Quake.

 

[dacencora]

there's easily more "influential" titles released post-2000 than pre-2000, if you disagree you have some serious nostalgia goggles on

Even if quantity wins (which I doubt) there's no revolution similar to the one caused by Street Fighter 2, Dune 2/C&C or Doom/Duke/Quake.

World of Warcraft, Minecraft, Dark Souls?

All of which spawned countless copycats, and which were genre-defining games?

 

[curds]

I think DOOM 2016 is the one to take that credit
As it came out before any of the other "boomer shooters" and it was very well received and popular

it lacks the faux-90s look, but aside from that you're probably right.

Anyone mention DayZ yet? Seems to have had a great influence on both the survival sandbox and battle royale genres.

Also CoD Modern Warfare.

Unfortunately most of the really influential games were shit, lol.

 

[Bad Sector]

I feel like DUSK, that fps, was pretty influential. Seemed to be the first of the unfortunately named "boomer shooter" games which are all the rage right now.

The first would be Wrack, but it wasn't nearly as popular as Dusk. However for all intents and purposes it was the first "boomer shooter" this side of the 2010s.

 

[Nifft Batuff]

I can think of many influential games, but only in a negative way.

 

[DJOGamer PT]

Oh shit I forgot:

Half-Life 2 & Crysis | Well the reason I am putting these two together is because IMO both were essential to the shift of graphical priorities in the 7th gen. While Crysis is the reason why the pursuit of "photorealism" become big in the 7th gen. I think Half-Life 2 (i.e. Source Engine tech demo) is the reason so many studios began corcerning themselves over tech. I mean HL2 came out when the first 7th gen consoles were beggining to be introduced, but the game had already been announced and presented a couples years before that, and like Halo 2 and MGS2, HL2 was hyped as fuck. And after seeing some of those markteking materials for HL2, honestly most of them just seemed to focus on the Source Engine rather than the game.

 

[Bad Sector]

I think Half-Life 2 (i.e. Source Engine tech demo) is the reason so many studios began corcerning themselves over tech.

Half-Life 2 wasn't really that advanced tech-wise, if there was a tech powerhouse at the time it would be Doom 3. Half-Life 2 was always Quake with shaders and physics - in its original version it couldn't even do shadows properly (even Episode 1 which improved the engine somewhat had overlapping shadow glitches). Later they added "HDR" lighting but it was kinda hacky and only in Episode 2 / Portal they got it nice (though they never fixed the base game's lighting, to this day HDR looks washed out in some areas).

Half-Life 2 had good textures and materials which made the game look great even on low end hardware though, but that was largely due to their artists not their tech.

 

[Ash]

Halo - Ok, it's a shit geam but I like minor one feature - grenades as quick use item. This would fit Quake 2 where grenades were terrible unless you gain dedicated gun.

Present in at least a handful of shooters before Halo.

Anyhow, thread is very lame.

 

[Valestein]

Kill Switch(2003), which pioneered third person cover shooting, which was later further popularized by Gears of War(2006), another influential game.

 

[Morenatsu.]

I think Half-Life 2 (i.e. Source Engine tech demo) is the reason so many studios began corcerning themselves over tech.

Half-Life 2 wasn't really that advanced tech-wise, if there was a tech powerhouse at the time it would be Doom 3. Half-Life 2 was always Quake with shaders and physics - in its original version it couldn't even do shadows properly (even Episode 1 which improved the engine somewhat had overlapping shadow glitches). Later they added "HDR" lighting but it was kinda hacky and only in Episode 2 / Portal they got it nice (though they never fixed the base game's lighting, to this day HDR looks washed out in some areas).

Half-Life 2 had good textures and materials which made the game look great even on low end hardware though, but that was largely due to their artists not their tech.

No, what happened was that Valve understood that they didn't need to put in graphics just for the sake of it. ‘Doing shadows properly’ is pointless when lightmaps are visually superior most of the time. Instead, all the effort went into things like physics.

...but of course, that aspect isn't really that influential seeing how everyone instead kept doing Doom 3's lazy background-special-effect-made-of-rubber physics.

 

[agentorange]

Cave Story 2004

Pretty much the game which started the modern indie game scene, I remember being utterly perplexed 15 years ago by the fact that this big and good could be made by one guy.

I'd put Braid (2008) up there with games that popularized the indie scene, especially the market for indie games on consoles. I think it also had a part in popularizing the "artsy" looking indie games, and the deconstruction of a genre type stuff.

 

[Assisted Living Godzilla]

Street Fighter 4: Here's a weird one. You know the presentation of your multiplayer tag or badge or whatever the fuck they call it in Call of Duty that other games do too? That's from Street Fighter 4. I'd say that was probably SF4's biggest influence. Other than that, I think a little too much is made of SF4 bring fighting games back, specifically this would mean fighting games on a 2D plane since the 3D ones were still doing alright. Like there were still 2D games at the time, (I'd even say BlazBlue and KoF12 were much better fighting game that SF4, especially that first version with the wonky feeling jump) and Capcom and Marvel were already talking about MvC3 before Street Fighter 4 even came out. I can't remember his name, but the new at the time head of Marvel's gaming devision accidently let it slip at one of the trade shows showing SF4 before release that they were doing a new Marvel game; although because of the timetable this retroactively got chalked up to being a leak about the 2009 MvC2 rerelease. It does however seem the success Capcom had, the the criticism of Mortal Kombat vs DC Universe lead to Mortal Kombat returning to being a 2D fighting game.

Grand Theft Auto 3: I mean, this is an easy one. You can also point to the other game they made why still called DMA design: Body Harvest. But GTA3 is the reason we've got all these other openworld sandbox games.

Saints Row 2 - 4: The presentational wackiness of characters in Fortnite always felt like an extention of the wackiness of Saints Row and what people did with that games create a character and how you could dress your character.

Splinter Cell and Resident Evil 4: The over the shoulder third person camera. Splinter Cell did it first, but RE4 seems to be the reason you see it in everything. Why it took RE4 for this particular aspect of Splinter Cell to catch on I've no...maybe because RE4 was an action game and Splinter Cell (despite having action) was mostly seen as a stealth game. Funnily Splinter Cell also has something like this happen with it's cover system. WinBack was the first game to do cover like Splinter Cell does, but it wasn't until Splinter Cell that you started seeing it.

Kill.Switch: Kill Switch is specifically noted as a influence for Gears of War's blind fire.

Def Jam: Fight for NY: This game, although probably more specifically AKI's wrestling engine in general seems to have been an influence on a wave of similar 3D beat 'em ups and fighting game that followed it for a few years. Of these games, only Yakuza went on to be an ongoing series; although apparently the Shadow of Rome sequel ended up morphing into Dead Rising.

Devil May Cry: The influence of DMC is somewhat odd, because is highly influential, clearly games like God of War and Heavenly Sword are pulling from this. At the same time, those games feel very different, and the only other game to really feel like Devil May Cry is Bayonetta...which was made by the creator of DMC. I will see Devil May Cry attacks in other games from time to time too.

Anarchy Reigns: Overwatch completely ripped off this game's cast of characters for their original lineup of characters in that game.

Geometry Wars: This game kicks off Xbox Live Arcade being this force for smaller games from companies and eventually indie games. For a long time Xbox Live was the home of this, then Steam around like 2012 with Hotline Miami and Steam Workshop, and now it seems to be the Switch. Probably also why you started seeing more retro looking games, although the initial retro looking (like Geometry Wars) games visually had a modern spin with stuff like Pac-Man Championship Edition, Galaga Legions, Space Giraffe, Space Invaders Extreme, and Braid.

Cave Story: More it's self publishing model than the game itself. Although I'd guess it's also why you see so many indie games that are some kind of take on Metroid and Castlevania.

Spelunky: The reason there's all these god damn Rogue-lite games now. It is kind of interesting to think about how long it's taken for elements of Rogue to drift into western games given its popularity in Japan with the Mystery Dungeon games. Until this post Spelunky period of games like FTL, Binding of Isaac, and Rogue Legacy the most influence Rogue seemed to have was random level generation in Diablo.

 

[Assisted Living Godzilla]

Nah I organised the list by year of release
I was having a hard time figuring out a influential game post 2011
Witcher 3 was the best I came up with given the fact that since it's release, its "influence" in pretty much any open world story-driven AAA game seems to be almost inescapable




Yes the praise continued well after its release
In fact it seemed that Witcher 3 release was the only RPG to finally shut it up
But despite this popularity, I find it weird that barely any one even tried to do a TES clone




I have no trouble thinking that BotW indeed took inspiration from Skyrim
Specially given the fact that the previous big 3D Zelda - Skyward Sword - released a few days after Skyrim's 11.11.11 date, and was as even more overshadowed by it than Horizon Zero Dawn was by BotW
Although I don't remember Nintendo ever outrigth stating their "inspiration" in Skyrim

But I do have doubts regarding DD, given the fact that not only did that game started development in late 2008 or early 2009, but also the fact Itsuno was already working on its concepts way back in 2002 by DMC2 development

With the Elder Scrolls games it sounds like at most Itsuno was able to use it better pitch the idea to Capcom. But yeah, Dragon's Dogma was something he'd been pitching since before he started working on Devil May Cry 2.

The big influence on Dragon's Dogma seems to be Capcom's own D&D beat 'em ups, and that in general Itsuno likes RPGs. The other influence seems to be he thought western developers were shit at doing action combat, and he knew good action combat was something they could bring to the table. Also message boards.


With Breath of the Wild I actually wouldn't be surprised if something like Far Cry 2 wasn't more an inspiration than Skyrim. All the systematic stuff in the game, that's nothing like Skyrim. Then again BotW seems like a pretty natural extention of things they'd been doing since the N64. Even shit like how the open world is set up with these clear landmarks is something they've been doing since the N64.

Dragon's Dogma was influential?

I'd argue it kind of was. Breath of the Wild seems to have been influenced by Dragon's Dogma. It's not in the final game, but it does come up in the GDC talk that at one point there was going to be a hang glider. There's also the stamina based climbing, which while only on monster in Dragon's Dogma, I think also ended up getting extended to environments at some point in Dragon's Dogma Online.

I also wouldn't be surprised if Dragon's Dogma was an influence on some games like Black Desert Online, Wildstar, and that Lost Ark game. When it comes to Lost Ark I see a lot of Devil May Cry influence when it comes to specific attacks too.

 

[Humanophage]

Europa Universalis III. One of my least favourite Paradox games, but it made the grand strategy mainstream (Victoria 2, EU2, and even HoI2 were all relatively niche). One of the few positive developments.
Hearthstone. Made online CCGs a thing. Attempts to make MTG into an online game were definitely not especially popular until later.
Dwarf Fortress. Or maybe Prison Architect? Anyway, inspired a bunch of inventive and complex base-building games like Rimworld.
Minecraft. Inexplicably popular, but appears harmless. Never played it though.
World of Warcraft. MMORPGs seemed so promising with Ultima Online, Star Wars Galaxies, and the like. WoW destroyed it by taking the worst elements from Everquest. Probably the single most damaging game of all.
KOTOR. It seemed so innocuous and fun initially, but it was the first manifestation of the insidious console poison that eroded the AAA North American RPG. It was very clear by the time of Mass Effect.
Warcraft 3. Spawned MOBAs. That said, RTS esports was bad enough, so no biggie. It's probably preferable to shooters.
Don't Starve. Taught regular players who moved from consoles in the mid-2000s that it's OK to die. Normalised the hipster "roguelike" (as in a game where you die permanently rather than in the traditional ADOM/Nethack sense).
Travian. This sort of browser based strategy was very popular until the mid-2010s and is probably still big on mobile by the looks of it.
GTA3. Has been named a few times. Open world games are huge now. We should be grateful because the devs seem politically incorrect.

Some awful console and mobile games that are even worse than Mass Effect and MOBAs. Clash of Clans, Call of Duty, etc.

 

[gaussgunner]

Dragon's Dogma was influential?

Maybe not yet, but it will be... it's a late bloomer. Came out on consoles first, PC version 5 years later. First I ever heard of it was on GOG for $10, so I took a chance. Now people talk about it all the time, it's out on Switch, and the PC version is $30.

It'll be influential as an action RPG with an emphasis on the actual action, leading the way from interactive movies "games" back to what games used to be all about.

I'd put Braid (2008) up there with games that popularized the indie scene, especially the market for indie games on consoles. I think it also had a part in popularizing the "artsy" looking indie games, and the deconstruction of a genre type stuff.

Oh yeah, and Fez, Limbo, Super Meat Boy, Terraria, Dwarf Fortress, those are the big ones I remember, and of course Minecraft.


Bioshock and Fallout 3 also come to mind, not in a good way, but because so many devs copied ideas (mostly the decline) from them.

 

[agentorange]

Oh yeah, and Fez, Limbo,

I think these two were themselves part of the Braid influenced bunch of games, with Fez being kind of a bookend to that era of indie games. There was that period from when Braid came out in 2008 to around 2012 when Fez came out that the 2D platformer with a gimmick and an unexpectedly "emotional" story was all the rage.

Super Meat Boy sort of did it's own thing with focusing on a more retro style, and having that extremely difficult, fast paced style where the player is expected to die over and over again, which Hotline Miami used as well and that became it's own sub-genre (1001 Spikes, VVVVV, Super Hexagon, etc.). Which I guess technically had its origins in games like I Wanna Be The Guy, but Super Meat Boy was the first one to really hone the idea into a proper game.

That period of indie game development was very interesting. It seems like you don't have those big name indie developers like Jonathan Blow now or those seminal indie games that absolutely everyone played and influenced many games for years.