Your Top 5 1990s PC games? With a description of why you picked them

[CGQuarterly]

OK, this list is not what I feel are *THE* best games of the 90's, but rather *MY* top games of the 90's (if that makes sense). I'm sure that there are better games than these, but these are the games that I spent the most time playing instead of doing my homework in high school. My first big obsession with PC gaming came in about 1990 and lasted until about 1993/94, so these games are all from that period.

 

Star Control 2 (1992) And shame on all of you. It shouldn't have taken this long for someone to mention it. From a writing and art direction standpoint, one of the best games of all time. Best played with a gamepad such as the Gravis PC Gamepad.

 

 

 

X-Wing (1993) Most people feel that Tie-Fighter was the better game, but this was the original, and I burned countless hours playing it. Best played with a flightstick.

 

 

Epic Pinball (1993) I had a Gravis Ultrasound back in my DOS days, so any game that specifically supported the GUS was extra-cool for me. I still play this game regularly on my 486. You could buy extra "packs" of tables, but the original 4 are the best in my opinion. Actually only two of them. Android and Pot of Gold. Notable because it was written in x86 assembly language instead of something more common like C. Really awesome music, especially if you have a GUS or Soundblaster Pro. Plays like crap in DOSBox in my opinion.

 

 

 

Syndicate (1993) This game still holds up well in my opinion. I burned a lot of free time on this game, and have actually been playing through it again lately on my 486. Designed by Peter Molyneux.

 

Any LucasArts Adventure Game (199x) Yup, that's kind of a cop-out, but how can you ask someone to choose between Monkey Island 2, DOTT, Sam and Max Hit the Road, Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis, etc.?

 

 

 

Honorable Mentions:

Scorched Earth (1991) My friend and I spent so much time fighting eachother in this game. We even replaced the text files containing the tanks' "speech" with new ones so that we could digitally talk smack.

 

 

Sim City (1989)

Dune 2 (1992)

Wolfenstein 3D (1992)

 

Chris

[Cybergoth]

1. Ufo / X-COM

 

I remember playing this one 24/7 until I fell asleep over the keyboard

 

2. Tie Fighter

 

Best of the series. Best of the genre. Die Rebel Scum!

 

3. Ultima Underworld 2

 

Perfecting an already almost perfect game. The first was brilliant, the second not of this earth

 

4. Magic Carpet 2

 

IMO the best Bullfrog title. I loved the full terraforming abilities you got later and it really felt like being a powerful wizard.

 

5. Bio Forge

 

Killer. First time I played it, I needed a minute to realize that the intro movie won't continue, but the game has already started!

 

Others I loved include Westwoods Bladerunner, Duke Nukem 3D, MDK, Panzer General, Wing Commander 2, Day of the Tentacle, ...

[Goochman]

Doom - 'nuf said

 

Magic Carpet - Wish I could still play this today

 

Dungeon Master (well, on the ST )

 

Populous - doesnt get any more fun destroying your friends village over a modem!

 

Quake - the start of the next wave of fun

[PressureCooker2600]

Magic Carpet - Wish I could still play this today

 

I do, too.

 

More honorable mentions:

Forgot about Scorched Earth.........loved it. Couldn't get enough of that artillery sim. The different bombs were awesome!!!

 

Quake 2 for it's music.

[Gemini]

My Top 5... the games I've played the most and actually still play frequently:

 

1st: Stunts (aka 4D Sports Driving)

I play this DOS game more than any other and have been playing it since I was 11 years old. It makes a good coffee-break style driving game, it has an editor which I love making tracks in, and the replays are a neat addition. It's too bad they lost the source code for the game, otherwise we'd likely see all kinds of ports and updates to it.

 

2nd: One Must Fall 2097

My favourite fighting game, thus I still play it a lot too. This is actually the only fighting game I can beat on its highest skill settings and unless I intentionally go easy on someone I rarely lose a match versus people too. My robot of choice is usually the Jaguar with a medium-blue body, red joints and yellow markings.

 

3rd: Duke Nukem 3D

I can't even begin to count the number of hours I spent playing this game... let alone the number of hours I spent in the Build Editor... even though I never publically released any levels I made. This is also the only DOS game I've experienced a four-player match with... I got second place during that match.

 

4th: Magic Carpet, both 1 and 2

I really, really wish the source code for these games will be released someday. Public updates to them to bring them to windows, add internet multiplayer, and plug the memory leaks would be a dream come true. If they didn't crash all the time they would be much higher in my top 5. Either way, I still play them often... usually 2 more than 1 since it crashes less often.

 

5th: Tyrian 2000 (Despite the title, it was released in 1999)

Although this game is horribly unbalanced, and I don't like the twiddles, it is my favourite 2D scrolling shooter of all time, closely followed by the Gradius and Raiden series.

 

Oh, and Goochman, I can run both Magic Carpet games fine in DOSBox, though the crash bugs are still present and the last time I tried the second one the CD Audio vocals weren't playing unless the game was paused. You should go grab DOSBox and give it a try.

Edited March 17, 2008 by Gemini

[TwinChargers]

1. Blake Stone: Aliens of Gold- In my personal opinion a better 1st person shooter than Doom since there is a slight plot to the game.

 

2. Tony LaRussa's Baseball II- The Minnesota Twins may have been poor that year in the real standings, but I could make them good!!

 

3. One Must Fall- As stated above, a great fighting game for those people who don't exactly love them.

 

4. Wacky Wheels- A better Mario Kart in my opinion.

 

5. Any of the Hugo Adventure games- Typing in commands, watching your character do what you say has never been so fun.

[tyranthraxus]

Ahh Star Control 2, you are so right! The shame of forgetting that one! Scorched Earth is another great choice, really simple game but a lot of fun to play with friends. While not in my top 5, I think Warlords 1 & 2 were great, light strategy games.

[aftermac]

Here are my 5 favorite PC games from the 1990's:

 

1. Marathon - Bungie's forerunner to Halo was the best plot-driven FPS of the 1990's.

 

2. Unreal Tournament - No plots needed here. Just pure, unadulterated killing!

 

3. Doom - Do I need to explain this?

 

4. Sim City 2000 - Still the best "Sim" game IMHO.

 

5. Marathon 2 - Sequel to Marathon was just as good.

[Rik]

I-Blood,and all add-ons.Great gameplay.Lots of horror movie references,from movies like Phantasm

2-Quake,and all mission packs.Love the Quake 2 Rob Zombie written Soundtracks,NIN in Quake.

3.All Sierra titles,especially the Quest titles.Love the fantasy elements of King's Quest.Police Quest,LOTS OF FUN!!!

4-Halflife.The BEST gameplay bar none,IMO.

5-Bloodnet,A Cyberpunk Gothic.A really huge RPG style game.The ONLY RPG style game i like!

 

There are many others,but these are the main games that kept me interested to finish to the end.

Edited March 19, 2008 by Rik

[thomasholzer]

Here's another good game:

Contraption Zack (Mindscape 1992)

 

Anyway, why only a Top 5, we should have done a Top 10 minimum.

[BydoEmpire]

I kind of stopped playing PC games once 3D cards became required, so my list is all early 90s, but I think they still hold up.

 

1. Civilization - unbelievably addicting, and a pretty entertaining and original concept. I skipped civ2, though.

2. Ultima: Underworld - totally immersive, incredible engine and great puzzles.

3. Monkey Island 2 - really funny and well-written. One of the pinnacles of the adventure genre.

4. Doom - instant classic, and super fun. Best played with lights off and speakers loud (regardless what college roommates think)

5. X-Com - really fun strategic combat in a unique setting.

Edited March 21, 2008 by BydoEmpire

[gdement]

I'm having trouble picking the loser out of these, so I have 6:

 

Star Control 2 - Awesome game, lots to do and explore. Probably my #1. It's funny that the original readme implies that resource collection was an afterthought. Exploring the galaxy and bringing home resources is the bulk of what motivates you in the early-mid game. There's a way to cheat resources, but don't do it - you'll ruin the whole game for yourself.

 

Ultima 7 - The most immersive RPG I ever played. I just enjoyed being in that game, it was the peak of Origin's "we create worlds" philosophy. It really creates the impression that Britannia is alive. It took me 3 computers to get through this - my 386 was too slow, my 486 couldn't run it without crashing (thanks PCChips), and my Cyrix was borderline too fast even with moslo.

 

NASCAR Racing - I got really into this game. I painted a black Pepsi/Pizza Hut #74 Chevy, and used a fan-created car set that restores some missing drivers (Earnhardt) and all the alcohol advertising that was removed from the official game graphics. I didn't like the engine sound in the game, so I hacked in some engine noise from a race on TV. I bought the additional tracks add-on when it came out, and I also imported Laguna Seca from Papyrus' IndyCar game using a converter tool that was on the internet. Laguna Seca was included with the IndyCar demo, so it was free. I eventually ran a season with full length races, I enjoyed taking the time to play them like that. I had some emotional finishes too, like the time I spun out my worn, cold tires on the last corner of Sears Point at the end of the race, and ended up finishing something like 5th instead of 1st.

Before each race I'd practice the track and tweak the car setups. Most of the defaults were too tight and had bad gearing IMO. My proudest moment was beating the real-life record for Sears Point during a test session. So yeah, I really got into this game back in the day. It became something of an obsession, and I wasn't even a NASCAR fan at the time I bought it. The physics were very realistic which made the game much more fun than the typical arcade racer. Graphically speaking the cars never lift off the ground, but the downforce physics are still there.

I was fortunate enough to have a Flightstick, which was originally purchased for X-Wing. The precision of that joystick is perfect for this game, otherwise it's impossible to corner very well. (It's also great for X-Wing, allowing you to aim accurately at long distances)

The framerate optimizer was a great feature - you can set it up to automatically add/remove details to maintain a target FPS range.

 

Ultima Underworld - Another awesome RPG. I had been curious about it, and was irritated that my 3.5" version of Ultima7 didn't include a demo like the 5.25" version did.

First person dungeon game, but unlike other games this one has smooth movement and interaction with anything you see laying around. It's not one of those grid-based rectangular hallway type games. Very cool graphics, and the stat system is excellent. I also like the fact that the items wear out with usage. You start out looking like a street bum scavenging for weapons and old, worn out armor pieces, but gradually gain better equipment and more ability to maintain it. The "lore" stat is pretty cool - many items in the game are magical, but you may not be capable of realizing this when you see them. As your lore stat increases, there's a higher probability that you'll realize you're holding a unique item.

Unfortunately, my version of UW seems to be broken. Every time I load a saved game, I get the dreaded "internal object error" which supposedly causes items in the dungeon to randomly disappear. I never could find the talisman for level 2, and I fear it simply disappeared. I installed the patch which was supposed to fix this problem, but I still get the same error even on a new install of the game. I largely finished the first 5 levels and stopped at level 6 I think.

 

DOOM - The original shareware was fun to play, but I bought DOOM2 so I could play with the editors. DOOM editing was fun, but I mostly downloaded other people's levels rather than making my own. My brother ended up better at it than me, he made some incredible Star Trek themed levels that strained the limits of the game. Unfortunately all his stuff got deleted, and the world will never see it. It's especially disappointing because I never saw anything on the internet that was as good as the stuff he made. His hallway templates alone were a work of art.

 

Civilization - This game never gets old. I think I prefer the original over Civ2, and I've never played 3-4.

[Blackjack]

1) Might and Magic VI: The Mandate of Heaven

 

2) Diablo

 

3) Dungeon Keeper 2

 

4) Unreal Tournament

 

5) Sim City 2k and then 3k

 

6) Half Life - Especially the "They Hunger" mod. To bad Valve ruined everything with the source engine. I'll never play another valve product again.

[Emehr]

I'm going to cop out and list similar games for each entry. It's just too hard to pick one. So in no particular order...

 

Alone In The Dark Trilogy - The third installment is probably my favorite due to the setting (old west) and music. The first one has great atmosphere but plays a little slow and has sometimes frustrating hit detection. The second one is the only one I beat without some sort of cheat guide, IIRC. All three are atmospheric and chilling.

 

X-Wing Collection and TIE Fighter Collection - I'm still waiting for a console Star Wars flight game that plays as good as the X-Wing/TIE Fighter games for the Mac and PC. Juggling your engine, shield, and laser energy added some nice strategy. Having the option to match speed with your target was invaluable. TIE Fighter especially had me completely absorbed until I played every mission to the end. And playing the bad guys was a lot of fun!

 

Day of the Tentacle, Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis, and Full Throttle - My top three of the LucasArts point'n'click adventures. All three featured fantastic artwork, music, animation, voices, and (where applicable) humor. The puzzles were difficult but not so obscure as to be ridiculous (I'm looking at you Sam & Max!). Honorable mention: The Dig

 

Warcraft II - Probably my first foray into real-time strategy games. In addition to great gameplay, I'm a sucker for nice animation, excellent voicework, and clean graphics.

 

A-10 Attack! (incl. Cuba missions) - Flight simulation at its finest. While dogfighting wasn't it's greatest strength, making bombing runs in an A-10 was pure pleasure. With this game you could really tell your plane was carrying a crapload of bombs just by the way it handled. The physics were top-notch as was the damage system. If you land too hard, for example, your gears showed it. I spent a lot of hours with this one!

 

All of these games are the number one reason why I keep my old PowerPC Mac and my Gravis Mousestick II around.