What was your one, perfect gaming moment like?

[valcik]

Boulder Dash for Czechoslovakian PMD 85 programmed by L. Gavar; beating the game for the first time made me incredibly proud. The best BD clone I've ever played btw, with huge maze full of complicated levels.

 

[Orobis]

One of the earliest i can remember is playing Kings Quest VI and getting tricked by that damn sorcerer with the twinkling eye to jump into the ocean, i thought there was some trick to doing it properly and after about 20+ attempts i realised that it wasn't going to fucking work. Come join me he says, the water is wonderful he says, i can show you to the other islands he says....prick.

 

[Wayward Son]

Forgot one! Showing my younger sister OG Fallout after my brother spent a whole weekend showing her FO4 and having her like it a lot more. (For reference, she's 6 and terrible at it, but still)

 

[mitochondritom]

That song and the dragon fight song in Baldur's Gate 2 give me the shivers.

Absolutely, that track is amazing. In fact the one thing BG II has over the first game is the soundtrack. Its stellar.

 

[Trojan_generic]

My first and only successful emergency landing ever with an Apache on C-64 Gunship. "What, I did not die?"
I got the game for Christmas and played like there was no new year coming. I would have been 15 years old or so at the time. Great times.

 

[Neki]

Capturing mewtwo in my first try was just

 

[tred]

Probably the best gaming experience of my life.
A whole playthrough of Icewind Dale hearing this as the soundtrack:

 

[aweigh]

in a few days when i finally beat the post-game boss of elminage: gothic

 

[ERYFKRAD]

BaK

 

[octavius]

If we're talking about external, instead of in-game reasons for great gaming moments, it was probably when my old gaming buddy and me were playing Doom co-op. He opened a door, and was so surprised at finding a pinky right behind it that he jumped half a meter right up from his chair. Never thought he could be that athletic, and 20 years later it still makes me chuckle thinking about it.

 

[flabbyjack]

Playing Delta Force FPS with my dad on the same team (team deathmatch). We fight our way to the enemy base, killing all the while, until we run out of ammo. Then we run around with knives killing them as they respawn until the end of the match. People were screaming that we were cheating but that just made us laugh harder.

 

[Sykar]

Beating Planescape:Torment the diplomatic way.

 

[himmy]

Gonna go with the general Morrowind trend of the thread.

Since I didn't have Internet back then, but computer game magazines would come with DLH cheat archive update, I would use the walkthroughs I found there to find out about games. The thing is, I played that Pirates of the Caribbean game that was initially supposed to be Sea Dogs 2 and its walkthrough mentioned Morrowind. I checked out the category and found dozens of guides, all mentioning stuff like a Thieves Guild and a Temple and towns with weird names and dungeons with even weirder names. I knew there was a sunken statue somewhere off the coast that gave you a quest and I knew there was something called "glass armour", which was apparently quite valuable, in a place called Ghostgate, as well as in a vault of a house named Hlaalu. I also knew that something called Golden Saints were pretty important because of some reason to do with their souls and that there were several towns that you couldn't explore without learning to levitate. There were trainers and each skill had a master trainer and one of them was sort of hidden on a boat. There were artefacts that were mentioned in a book and you could actually find them all and there was a whole thing about becoming a vampire, which sounded like both a blessing and a curse. I also knew that whatever cliff-racers were were trouble.

Now, Morrowind is a weird and alien game in itself, but reading bits and pieces about it in some game guide without actually even knowing how the game looks like was one of the most bizarrely exciting experiences that I ever had. I became obsessed with the game and a few months later, when I finally managed to get my hands on a (horribly ripped) version I didn't even understand what was happening to me. I genuinely can't remember another time in my life when I was happier, and I'm including all the sex, drugs and professional satisfactions that came later here. It seemed like every little bit of it was blowing my mind. The adjustable menus, the travel system, the map that appeared positively enormous. And then I reached Vivec. And nothing, not even the guides prepared me for the wonder that was the Foreign Quarter, where you could easily get lost. Long story short, I spent probably a couple of thousands of hours playing it and for most of my high-school years, the only two icons on my desktop were Morrowind and Winamp.

It probably seems like a stupid idea for most people, but reading a guide to a game you don't know is the sort of unique experience that feels like discovering a long-buried book that gives patchy details about a lost civilisation. And having those expectations met, even exceeded was a beautiful, beautiful thing.

 

[Stainless Veteran]

Gonna go with the general Morrowind trend of the thread.

Since I didn't have Internet back then, but computer game magazines would come with DLH cheat archive update, I would use the walkthroughs I found there to find out about games. The thing is, I played that Pirates of the Caribbean game that was initially supposed to be Sea Dogs 2 and its walkthrough mentioned Morrowind. I checked out the category and found dozens of guides, all mentioning stuff like a Thieves Guild and a Temple and towns with weird names and dungeons with even weirder names. I knew there was a sunken statue somewhere off the coast that gave you a quest and I knew there was something called "glass armour", which was apparently quite valuable, in a place called Ghostgate, as well as in a vault of a house named Hlaalu. I also knew that something called Golden Saints were pretty important because of some reason to do with their souls and that there were several towns that you couldn't explore without learning to levitate. There were trainers and each skill had a master trainer and one of them was sort of hidden on a boat. There were artefacts that were mentioned in a book and you could actually find them all and there was a whole thing about becoming a vampire, which sounded like both a blessing and a curse. I also knew that whatever cliff-racers were were trouble.

Now, Morrowind is a weird and alien game in itself, but reading bits and pieces about it in some game guide without actually even knowing how the game looks like was one of the most bizarrely exciting experiences that I ever had. I became obsessed with the game and a few months later, when I finally managed to get my hands on a (horribly ripped) version I didn't even understand what was happening to me. I genuinely can't remember another time in my life when I was happier, and I'm including all the sex, drugs and professional satisfactions that came later here. It seemed like every little bit of it was blowing my mind. The adjustable menus, the travel system, the map that appeared positively enormous. And then I reached Vivec. And nothing, not even the guides prepared me for the wonder that was the Foreign Quarter, where you could easily get lost. Long story short, I spent probably a couple of thousands of hours playing it and for most of my high-school years, the only two icons on my desktop were Morrowind and Winamp.

It probably seems like a stupid idea for most people, but reading a guide to a game you don't know is the sort of unique experience that feels like discovering a long-buried book that gives patchy details about a lost civilisation. And having those expectations met, even exceeded was a beautiful, beautiful thing.

Yeah, it's the same for me, when I was in school I really liked reading both game guides and magazines, often they ended up more interesting than the game itself. One such article in gaming mag, written in naive RPing style, got me into CRPG gaming. It was an article about Dark Sun: The Wake of Ravager. When I look at it now, it's written enthusiastically, but amateurishly, it has kerning problems, author was LARPing as fuck in it - but shit, back than it was awesome. A dying wold, templars, cannibal halflings, gypsy elves, pyramids - all was mentioned in it, and I've become somewhat obsessed with Dark Sun and RPGs as a result. Although I never finished the game itself back than, it was buggy as fuck. Still, many fond memories - but still not as perfect gaming experience as Daggerfall and PST for me.

 

[aweigh]

Comte

i'm currently in floor 17th of Ibag's Tower. what continually keeps me from making faster progress when i sit down and play is that someone will eventually fail their resurrection check and turn to ashes forcing me to Honey Restorer my ass back to town. Other than that i'm finally at a point where Stargazers don't represent a party-wipe only the probable usage of Honey Restorer because someone ashed up.

 

[Fenris 2.0]

I remember one situation in Dark Sun 1. In the final Battle you 3 Champions from your allied Villages would join you as NPCs, two of them you met before in the Game. One was a Wizard Girl, wich died really, really fast in the Waves of Enemies - she would go into melee with her Dagger when she was out of Spells. I replayed the Battle countless times until I was able to make her survive. After the final Fight you could still roam the Areas and a lot of NPCs got different dialogues. The Wizard Girl was back in her Village and was helping her Sister (the Village Healer) to treat the Wounded there. It was nice that the Game catered to my autistic "I-want-a-perfect-Happy-End-for-my-virtual-Friends" Playstile (otherwise you would only met the Sister, who had a Dialogue where she mourned the Death of the Wizard Girl).

 

[Lomer2]

I will list just a selection of my feel-good moments. Perhaps some of them had stronger emotional impact but from the distance of time it is difficult to prioritize them.

• Fallout 1:
  • Receiving Overseer's gratitude at the end and then, upon replay, finding the cool animation with his demise, if you betray him to the mutants;
  • Wearing your first power armor;
  • Completing the game without meeting the Master during the first playthrough.
• Fallout 2:
  • Converting the fat trader Vic into a sniper machine;
  • Witnessing how Marcus wipes whole battalions of enemies (and your own party) with his machine gun. Ian on steroids.
• Planescape: Torment:
  • Entering the Nameless One's tomb and reading the inscriptions;
  • Finding a way to enter the Siege Tower;
  • Making peace with Deionarra in the Fortress of Regrets;
  • Finding that one of the zombies in the Mortuary is the blind archer (one of the practical incarnation's followers;
  • The final conversation with your followers after you have defeated the Transcendent One.
• Arcanum:
  • Finding Saint Mannox's hiding place.
  • Finding Gudmund Ore Bender deep into the Black Mountain Mines in Arcanum (at the end of a long, narrow and heavily trapped passage);
  • Finding the true king of Dernholm;
  • Realizing that Magnus's delusions of grandeur are actually well founded.
• IWD2:
  • Winning the battle for the Holy Avenger after much suffering.
• Baldur's Gate:
  • Remembering where I left Imoen when I realized that I cannot pass the trapped passages leading to Sarevok without a thief in the group (I prefer to fill my groups with warriors).
• Baldur's Gate 2 (including ToB):
  • Killing Firkraag and looting Carsomyr from his dead body;
  • Killing the demilich in Warden's Keep after I have already used my 2 scrolls with protection against magic on Kangaxx (which is the only direct defense against imprisonment spell).
  • Witnessing how Irenicus is posing as a guide in Spellhold.
• NWN 2: Mask of the Betrayer:
  • Gathering of the armies in front of the City of Judgement;
  • The conversation with Gann's mother;
  • Meeting the dead god;
• Pillars of Eternity:
  • Durance's realization that
    Spoiler

    he was betrayed by his goddess
• Age of Decadence:
  • Killing Agathoth;
  • Reaching the bottom of the Abyss;
  • Reaching the tower through the portal in Inferiae;
  • Bring the flying fortress to Ganezzar.
• Temple of Elemental Evil:
  • Killing Iuz and seeing the corresponding end slide.
• Bloodlines:
  • Killing the werewolf (after almost suffering several heart attacks);
  • Exploring the lower floors of the creepy doctor's house and realizing that your PC is actually much more terrifying creature than him;
  • A lot of atmospheric and frighting places: Andrei's hideout, Ocean House Hotel, Giovanni mansion's lower levels, the hospital, etc.
  • The whole Malkavian walkthrough (from the dialogue to the attire);
• KOTOR 1:
  • Almost everything related to Jolee Bindo. This companion is David Gaider's best (but often forgotten work).
• KOTOR 2:
  • Returning to the Jedi temple at Dantooine and having final conversation with the surviving Jedi masters;
  • Teaching Atris some manners;
  • Landing in Onderon's capital with a basilisk war droid;
• Knights of the Chalice:
  • Completing the bonus end fight. Pure luck.
• Evil Islands:
  • Killing several regenerating bosses (each fight lasting at least 1/2 hour) with aimed shots and sustained magic from the companions;
• Jade Empire:
  • The final words of
    Spoiler

    Master Li
  • Seeing the desecrated body of the water dragon;
  • Winning all arena fights on hardest difficulty.

 

[Sranchammer]

How is fucking the goat in Tarant not the most popular choice?

 

[shihonage]

The most mind-blowing moment for me was when in Fallout 1 I reached the point where you have to return to Vault 13, and I discovered that the Vault Door is not just a prop with Overseer's dialogue attached to it, but an actual fucking entrance to an actual fucking Vault 13, with fucking people in it, and the Overseer is not just a talking portrait either, but is actually in the game.

It was already a world to me back then, but when I made that discovery I just sunk hopelessly into it.

 

[Saduj]

• Dad bringing home Atari 2600 soon after it came out and being able to play Space Invaders - in my house! This was unprecedented.
• Playing Galactic Empire (early 80's multi player strategy game, not the 1990 one) on the Vic-20 with my dad and brothers. Dad almost always won but it was always funny to see who would attack my four year old brother first and then suffer his wrath for the rest of the game. He knew he wasn't winning but his unforgiving code of honor made him a dangerous enemy.
• Ultima III on the Commodore 64. Everything that came in the box, especially the cloth map. Having an open world and being able to steal stuff, piss off the guards and often get away with it thanks to that time stopping powder. IV and V were better games but III was like nothing else I had played before it. Youngest bro (now 5 or 6) creating the Anti-Avatar in Ultima IV and then getting berated by the seer was also great.
• Beating and getting the high score on a hotel Donkey Kong machine
• Saving up money and buying original Nintendo. Later, playing Techmo Bowl for the first time at a friend's house and making it my life's goal to get it for myself.
• Drunken Sega Genesis NHL Hockey ('93-'95 editions) tournaments in college

Edit - I also forgot all the hours wasted trying to kill Lord British in Ultimate III.

 

[DemonKing]

Probably the first time I saw Wizardry in action on an Apple II. I'd played D&D before a few times but to see a computer simulation like that was incredible. I remember even befriending a kid I didn't like just so I could go over to his place because he had it.

1998 was a good year - StarCraft, Thief, Baldur's Gate and Half Life. Up until Half-Life shooters were pretty much hordes of enemies and searching for keys. Suddenly the Black mesa complex appeared and almost seemed to live and breath. Scripting is par for the course now but back then the immersion levels were incredible.

 

[Ivan]

this isn't even a "big" moment but I fondly remember stumbling into an underground hideout in a marketplace and finding human corpses on tables and innards in a refrigerator.

Fist me if you know what I'm talkin' 'bout

 

[MasPingon]

Gonna go with the general Morrowind trend of the thread.



It probably seems like a stupid idea for most people, but reading a guide to a game you don't know is the sort of unique experience that feels like discovering a long-buried book that gives patchy details about a lost civilisation. And having those expectations met, even exceeded was a beautiful, beautiful thing.

Feel you bro, I got the same feeling while reading solutions in 90's gaming magazines. I also got a very similar experience with Morrowind as you, funny.

In 1999 I played a demo of Outcast. I was blast off immediatly by beautiful graphics, Moscow symphonic orchestra music and strangeness of the world. I always liked the goofiness of 50's sci-fi movies and it was full of it. It also reminded me of my experience with Another World in 1992. I didn't have PC back then, so the only oppotunity I had to play it, was the family reunion at my uncle house, 2 times a year. So back then, more often I played this game while I was dreaming then, well, actually played it. Demo of Outcast was 10 minutes long, so I tried to play the shit out of it every time I started it again. And every time I discovered something new about this game. After 5th time it turned out for me, that you actually could open Daoka portal and travel through it to Shamazaar. It was huuge, completely different then snowy Ranzaar and populated with dozens of unique NPCs. And you got about 5 god damn minutes left to play it. I was so curious of how the world look like and what lies behind the other Daoka portals that I have became obsessed with it, but the barrier of 10 minutes in game was unrelenting. I remember asking myself - do they even know they have given so much content in a freaking demo?! Am I even suppose to be here? Is it possible there is another Daoka portal in Shamazaar, leading to another region? I wasn't able to find out that, 10 minutes was not enough time. Funny thing is, Outcast was never published in my country so I bought it 10 years later in UK. That was something special, discovering the secrets of the game, hidden from you for a decade. Forgotten by God game that nobody even knows exists.

 

[Filthy Sauce]

Having sex with a prostitute while playing Icewind dale. It was missionary position, with my laptop sitting on her face. It worked out well because she was ugly.

 

[Nagling]

Game moment:
When I Finally beat Bruce Jenner's record playing this awesome game:

http://www.mobygames.com/game/olympic-decathlon