Best games 95-2003

[Ash]

You're wrong, enabler. There is literally NOT something for everyone, not even close.

FPS or TPS? Get out. Or are you one of those that think The New Order and Doom 2016 are a return to form?
Looking Glass tier underworld-likes? Well there's all the modern imitators, but they're not even close to Looking Glass quality.
RPGs? No, no and no.
Action or action-adventure games? I've been slightly more satisfied with action games of late, but they're still compromised, and the majority are still brainless popamole. Not actually fun like they used to be over a decade ago.
Platformers? Pfft, unless we're talking indie 2D platformers, which is just one form of platformer.
Hack and slash? I looked. All I saw was Dad of War.
Racing games, especially ones I enjoy(arcade style). lol no. Even the "every game must have an overpowered regenerating slo-mo mechanic!" design trend infests these games, as does microtransactions.
Open world mayhem types? No again. Not that I am aware of. Unless you think Just Cause 3 and GTAV are good games. I guess Dying Light goes here, which I like, but it's still compromised.
Survival horror? Give me examples.
Stealth? Stealth genre ded. It only lives on in the form of hybrids.

Name drop the incline.

i'll be honest, as of this year I've stopped paying as much attention to modern games, and stopped giving them chances with my time and money. This is because I got absolutely fed up with the constant disappointment, and just seek out old classics I missed that actually deserve my time. So, show me how things have changed and how there are now good singeplayer pureblood shooters, as one genre example, on the market.

Anyway, when rightfully trashing modern games, I am almost always careful to state that there are exceptions (e.g Dark Souls, New Vegas...).

 

[Valky]

Thief, HoMM3, ToEE are the biggest ones to stick out for me
If you make an exception once to fast forward to 2007 you have the single greatest real time strategy game of all time until the end of time that has never and will never be dethroned, Supreme Commander Forged Alliance.

 

[laclongquan]

My good man, RPGCODEX has your answer.
http://rpgcodex.net/forums/index.php?threads/rpg-codexs-top-50-crpgs-results-and-reviews.89680/
Truly, the section of Something For The Ages is the very thing you search for.
Feast yourself, seeker! Feast!

Lazy version, top 13 games that in that period

1 Planescape: Torment
2 Fallout 1
3 Fallout 2
4 Baldur's Gate 2: Shadows of Amn
5 Arcanum: Of Steamworks and Magick Obscura
7 The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind
9 Gothic 2
10 Wizardry 8
11 Deus Ex
13 Jagged Alliance 2
17 Baldur's Gate
21 The Temple of Elemental Evil
22 Icewind Dale

 

[Wunderbar]

FPS or TPS? Get out. Or are you one of those that think The New Order and Doom 2016 are a return to form?

The New Order is pretty good, although it's good mostly because of Starbreeze's writers. The Old Blood was great.
Polish Shadow Warrior 2013 reboot was good (it was retooled into arena shooter, but still).

Looking Glass tier underworld-likes? Well there's all the modern imitators, but they're not even close to Looking Glass quality.

that's a pretty high bar to achieve. Arkane games aren't as good as Thief 1-2 or SS2, but still pretty good.

RPGs? No, no and no.

New Vegas

Action or action-adventure games? I've been slightly more satisfied with action games of late, but they're still compromised, and the majority are still brainless popamole. Not actually fun like they used to be over a decade ago.

Define action-adventure? If you mean something like Tomb Raider, Legacy of Kain or Rune, then there are Tomb Raider 2013 (it was popamole, but it was also better than older TR games), Batman Arkam Asylum, BotW.

Platformers? Pfft, unless we're talking indie 2D platformers, which is just one form of platformer.

There is a crap-ton of good 2d platformers. 3d platformers? A Hat in Time, some Mario games, Snake Pass, new Psychonauts (I hope), etc.

Hack and slash? I looked. All I saw was Dad of War.

Souls series Nioh, Dragon's Dogma. Dunno if "hack-n-slash" means rpg-slashers or just slashers.

Open world mayhem types? No again. Not that I am aware of. Unless you think Just Cause 3 and GTAV are good games. I guess Dying Light goes here, which I like, but it's still compromised.

Genre was garbage from the start.

Survival horror? Give me examples.

RE7, RERev2, Alien Isolation? The Evil within series isn't particularly great, but good imo.

Stealth? Stealth genre ded. It only lives on in the form of hybrids.

Styx 1-2, Sniper Elite 4.

 

[laclongquan]

95-2003, dawg!

 

[Wunderbar]

95-2003, dawg!

Also not all games today are shit, you're just not looking hard enough.

You're wrong, enabler.

 

[wyes gull]

then there are Tomb Raider 2013 (it was popamole, but it was also better than older TR games)

You're wrong, enabler.

 

[DalekFlay]

Thinking the original Tomb Raider games were good is probably the ultimate nostalgia goggles.

 

[Ash]

Nostalgia goggles, the ultimate retard mole-popper argument.

Also please embarrass yourself and explain how the original Tomb Raider games were bad, or not good. What shall it be, "muh tank controls"? First that would be overlooking how well everything was crafted around the tank controls and how that was a standard control scheme for the time, and it just works if you're not a handicapped tard and can adapt to the reasonable demands of a game, and second it would mean you hate...an absolute crapton of games pre-1996 or even after as it was very common, in which case you should be burned at the stake.

Define action-adventure? If you mean something like Tomb Raider, Legacy of Kain or Rune, then there are Tomb Raider 2013 (it was popamole, but it was also better than older TR games),

Batman Arkam Asylum.

Arkane game

The New Order is pretty good,

These four games are really not up to scratch when it comes to gameplay. Batman automates much of your actions well beyond reason, removing any semblance of skill and engagement. That fucking game infuriated me and anyone who likes it I strongly suspect have never played a good action game in their life. "but...but it makes you feeeel like batman". <- the most retarded thing I've ever heard. You'll feel MORE like batman if it was actually YOU pulling off the moves with skill. I assume those that say it normally have no skill in games. The New Order is a cinematic hitscan shooting gallery through linear levels mixed in with other typical whack-a-mole elements (e.g the mech segment n the concentration camp). TR 2013's platforming, level design and more is nothing on the originals design, and even its combat is not necessarily an improvement due to popamole mechanics (regen health and more). Modern Arkane games are the best suggestions of these four, but I wouldn't recommend them. Maybe Prey.
Low standards detected.

 

[wyes gull]

Thinking the original Tomb Raider games were good is probably the ultimate nostalgia goggles.

Thinking that that was what was being argued, in the other hand, is failing at basic English.

 

[Jacob]

Batman Arkham is storyfag game tbh. A much more respectable storyfaggotry than The Last of God of War crap (Nothing pretentious, just a faithful superhero adaptation) but still storyfaggotry.

 

[Tehdagah]

Also please embarrass yourself and explain how the original Tomb Raider games were bad, or not good. What shall it be, "muh tank controls"? First that would be overlooking how well everything was crafted around the tank controls and how that was a standard control scheme for the time, and it just works if you're not a handicapped tard and can adapt to the reasonable demands of a game, and second it would mean you hate...an absolute crapton of games pre-1996 or even after as it was very common, in which case you should be burned at the stake

Except when the player have to deal with terrible hitscan enemies. It's not a problem in the first TR but the sequels really fucked by shoving humans everywhere. Even some animal/monster foes can be annoying and the combat can turn into a random jumpfest where the player needs to pray to not be hit.

 

[:Flash:]

Just in addition, a lot of great stuff has already been mentioned, so this is mostly genres not so well represented on the Codex:

X-Wing Alliance
Tachyon: The Fringe

The Need For Speed
Screamer
Supreme Snowboarding
Powerslide
(These are IMO the absolute must play racing games from the era)

Pro Pinball: Timeshock!

 

[DeepOcean]

Also not all games today are shit, you're just not looking hard enough. There's literally something for everyone out there right now.

This is too much of a general statement, some genres like 4X, city building, management, sandbox, platformers are having a really big revival on steam and are selling like hot cakes but if you notice something in common to all those games is that they are really cheap to make.

A game like Frostpunk or They are Billions cost a fraction of a Pillars of Eternity, to sell the same amount of copies.

We are on a trap right now, some genres have really low barriers to entry and those genres are exploding on steam but any genres with higher barriers to entry like RPGs are having a really hard time to secure funding, so you can't say we are living on a comparable state like the 90's where the costs to make an FPS, RPG and other expensive genres were much lower. On the 90's, it was big studios with resources that were making great games, they could even afford to experiment on large scale because the costs were low, right now, the big studios are focusing on massive entertainment because the return on investment on many genres for those big companies isn't attractive enough and the investors refuse to fund those games. Those companies need to generate revenue on the billions to keep working.

If the independent developers could carry the torch, we would be on a perpetual golden age but a game like Pillars of Eternity can cost 10 million dollars to make, how many studios can afford that? To sell the same or worse than a much cheaper game? Can you imagine an ambitious game like Daggerfall, an entire continent made on procedural generation with a really deep fantasy world simulation done by an AAA studio nowdays? Not a fucking chance and to make matters worse, such game is way above the pay grade of any indie company.

Take the single player FPS genre, only Bethesda still make those on a large escale, all the other publishers are migrating to online games as service. On the case of Bethesda, while they still make those, they are still console shooters and a game like NuWolfenstein doesn't pack the same punch even when compared to something like FEAR that was one of the last PC exclusives.

Right now, we are severely lacking on middle sized publisher and developer houses, the ones that would actually be interested into making larger escale single player games and this is because any game that isn't multiplayer, struggle really hard to sell on the 1 million to 5 million range on Steam to makes those companies viable. Isometric RPGs need to sell on the 1 million range minimum for a bigger investment to be justifiable.

Sure, you can claim that some genres have better representation like the single player FPS with games like Dusk, Amid Evil and Ion Maiden or RPGs with Underrail, Age of Decadence, but those games are the work of hardcore fans, it isn't reliable to expect those games on regular basis to claim the golden age never ended and companies like Obsidian and InXile are already complaining of low sales of their games.

 

[DeepOcean]

Also not all games today are shit, you're just not looking hard enough. There's literally something for everyone out there right now.

This is too much of a general statement, some genres like 4X, city building, management, sandbox, platformers are having a really big revival on steam and are selling like hot cakes but if you notice something in common to all those games is that they are really cheap to make.

A game like Frostpunk or They are Billions cost a fraction of a Pillars of Eternity, to sell the same amount of copies.

We are on a trap right now, some genres have really low barriers to entry and those genres are exploding on steam but any genres with higher barriers to entry like RPGs are having a really hard time to secure funding, so you can't say we are living on a comparable state like the 90's where the costs to make an FPS, RPG and other expensive genres were much lower. On the 90's, it was big studios with resources that were making great games, they could even afford to experiment on large scale because the costs were low, right now, the big studios are focusing on massive entertainment because the return on investment on many genres for those big companies isn't attractive enough and the investors refuse to fund those games. Those companies need to generate revenue on the billions to keep working.

If the independent developers could carry the torch, we would be on a perpetual golden age but a game like Pillars of Eternity can cost 10 million dollars to make, how many studios can afford that? To sell the same or worse than a much cheaper game? Can you imagine an ambitious game like Daggerfall, an entire continent made on procedural generation with a really deep fantasy world simulation done by an AAA studio nowdays? Not a fucking chance and to make matters worse, such game is way above the pay grade of any indie company.

Take the single player FPS genre, only Bethesda still make those on a large escale, all the other publishers are migrating to online games as service. On the case of Bethesda, while they still make those, they are still console shooters and a game like NuWolfenstein doesn't pack the same punch even when compared to something like FEAR that was one of the last PC exclusives.

Right now, we are severely lacking on middle sized publisher and developer houses, the ones that would actually be interested into making larger escale single player games and this is because any game that isn't multiplayer, struggle really hard to sell on the 1 million to 5 million range on Steam to makes those companies viable. Isometric RPGs need to sell on the 1 million range minimum for a bigger investment to be justifiable.

Sure, you can claim that some genres have better representation like the single player FPS with games like Dusk, Amid Evil and Ion Maiden or RPGs with Underrail, Age of Decadence, but those games are the work of hardcore fans, some genres are only alive because of kickstarter and indie studios of hardcore fans but neither of those are reliable in terms of keeping thing going.

 

[Wunderbar]

Batman automates much of your actions well beyond reason, removing any semblance of skill and engagement. That fucking game infuriated me and anyone who likes it I strongly suspect have never played a good action game in their life. "but...but it makes you feeeel like batman". <- the most retarded thing I've ever heard. You'll feel MORE like batman if it was actually YOU pulling off the moves with skill. I assume those that say it normally have no skill in games.

you're talking like it was me who said "it makes you feel like batman". Batman Arkham Asylum is a good action-adventure with 3D-metroidvania elements. Yeah, it's not hardcore, so what? For the most part combat in Arkham series is hard not in survival part, but in terms of making these unbroken combos.

The New Order is a cinematic hitscan shooting gallery through linear levels mixed in with other typical whack-a-mole elements (e.g the mech segment n the concentration camp).

Half-Life is a cinematic hitscan shooting gallery through linear levels, RTCW is a cinematic hitscan shooting gallery through linear levels. You expected WTNO to be like Quake 1 with projectile-based firearms and nazis fighting in melee?

TR 2013's platforming, level design and more is nothing on the originals design, and even its combat is not necessarily an improvement due to popamole mechanics (regen health and more).

older TR games badly aged. New TR games have popamole combat, easy platforming, too many cinematic stages and dumb story, but even then they are still more fun than older "i spent a day looking for an exit from this level only to realize that it was a dirty patch of texture in the dark corner" TR games.

Modern Arkane games are the best suggestions of these four, but I wouldn't recommend them. Maybe Prey.

most of Arkane games weren't just clones of Looking Glass games, they were homages. Dishonored is not thief, Arx is not Ultima Underworld, Prey is not System shock. It's hard to judge whether they are better or worse, considering difference in design approaches (Dishonored is basically combat-sandbox with stealth being just a facet of it).

The thing is, DalekFlay said "not all games today are shit". I'm not saying that all modern games are on par or better than games from the past (well, except for Tomb raider, but that's controversial), I'm saying that there are still good games out there - you just had to stop being pessimist.

 

[unfairlight]

Quack 1 & 2 & 3
Dyoos Ex
Unreal
Daggerfall
Half Life
Thief 1 & 2
Ghost Recon series
Rainbow Six series
Splinter Cell series
Gothic 1 & 2
Max Payne
Tribes series
Counter Strike
Morrowind
Operation Flashpoint
Runescape
Everquest (neither this or the above are too valid nowadays, though)
Grand Theft Auto series
Battlefield
Diablo
Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory (one of the first 'free to play' games)
Medal of Honor
Call of Duty

That's all I can think of at the moment. Primarily action games, but almost all of these games had a considerable impact on the industry and some created whole new genres.

 

[PorkBarrellGuy]

Tachyon: The Fringe

Underrated game, really pretty good, had a very fun multiplayer mode (base wars), Bruce Campbell VA. Honestly a solid 7.5/10 for a spess shootan game IMO

 

[unfairlight]

You're wrong, enabler. There is literally NOT something for everyone, not even close.

There's at least one or two good FPS games coming out every year. TPS, I guess. Everyone got burned out during 7th gen because of the Gears of War craze, but it's not like third person shooters were horribly common during 95-2003 either. There was what, Max Payne and Tomb Raider?
Action and action-adventure is such a unspecific term that you might as well say nothing. Essentially any game that has real time combat could be considered an action game.
Again, it's not like "Looking Glass tier underworld-likes" were common during that time either. They came out every 1-4 years, just as they do now. I don't give a shit if you don't like Arkane games, but that doesn't mean they don't exist.
Abu Antar has an awesome thread for role playing games, you should check it out some time.
Platformers are a console genre and always have been. There's plenty of them on console, and there's a few 3D indie platformers also coming out every year or two that are multiplat or PC.
I don't play hack and slash because it's a boring genre, but there's Devil May Cry 5 coming out soon enough, and I'm pretty certain Nier and Nioh fall under that banner as well.
There's Wreckfest and Onrush, heard good of both, and both are releases that are coming out this year. Plus there's the Forza games.
It's not like open world mayhem games were common back when either. You were lucky to get one every 2 years after Rockstar stopped making a GTA every year with San Andreas. Volition will probably make something in a year or two, Just Cause 4 is coming out soon and there will be the new Red Dead eventually.
The new Resident Evil, endless amounts of indie titles and The Evil Within. Not a genre I play either, so I'm just saying the first two that came to mind.
Hitman and Styx plus some indie titles every once in a while, and neither Hitman nor Styx are hybrids. You can get a stealth game every year or two, still. There will also probably be a new Splinter Cell game in next year's E3.

99% of your complaining is "I don't like it, which means they don't exist."
Look nigger, no one fucking CARES if you don't like something, but it doesn't mean that none of it exists.

 

[laclongquan]

I have posted about rpg, but I can only recommend 1 RTS. Not because there's few RTS in that period, but because I am not a RTS gamer. But if there's a game that make me say I did play RTS before, it is

Warzone 2100.

Customized tank builds. Air-Land-Artillery simultaneous strike. massive battle~

 

[Ash]

You're wrong, enabler. There is literally NOT something for everyone, not even close.

There's at least one or two good FPS games coming out every year. TPS, I guess. Everyone got burned out during 7th gen because of the Gears of War craze, but it's not like third person shooters were horribly common during 95-2003 either. There was what, Max Payne and Tomb Raider?
Action and action-adventure is such a unspecific term that you might as well say nothing. Essentially any game that has real time combat could be considered an action game.
Again, it's not like "Looking Glass tier underworld-likes" were common during that time either. They came out every 1-4 years, just as they do now. I don't give a shit if you don't like Arkane games, but that doesn't mean they don't exist.
Abu Antar has an awesome thread for role playing games, you should check it out some time.
Platformers are a console genre and always have been. There's plenty of them on console, and there's a few 3D indie platformers also coming out every year or two that are multiplat or PC.
I don't play hack and slash because it's a boring genre, but there's Devil May Cry 5 coming out soon enough, and I'm pretty certain Nier and Nioh fall under that banner as well.
There's Wreckfest and Onrush, heard good of both, and both are releases that are coming out this year. Plus there's the Forza games.
It's not like open world mayhem games were common back when either. You were lucky to get one every 2 years after Rockstar stopped making a GTA every year with San Andreas. Volition will probably make something in a year or two, Just Cause 4 is coming out soon and there will be the new Red Dead eventually.
The new Resident Evil, endless amounts of indie titles and The Evil Within. Not a genre I play either, so I'm just saying the first two that came to mind.
Hitman and Styx plus some indie titles every once in a while, and neither Hitman nor Styx are hybrids. You can get a stealth game every year or two, still. There will also probably be a new Splinter Cell game in next year's E3.

99% of your complaining is "I don't like it, which means they don't exist."
Look nigger, no one fucking CARES if you don't like something, but it doesn't mean that none of it exists.

You're such a little faggot. Stop quoting me in your stupid posts. What you're doing is the equivalent of saying "There ARE RPGs: Fallout 4, Dragon Age: Inquisition, The Elder Scrolls: Skyrim and Final Fantasy 15. SEE! Something for everyone including old school RPG fans.". That's exactly my point. If a game is shite it doesn't count, of course not. Nobody here wants to subject themselves to shit. Furthermore the whole basis of this argument was a game's quality or lacktherof, see:

"there are lots of good modern games. There's something for everyone".

"You're wrong, enabler. Shit shit shit".

Throw yourself in a ditch you dumb cunt, or learn to read. And of course you have a stupid opinion when you don't even play half of those genres.

There's at least one or two good FPS games coming out every year. TPS, I guess. Everyone got burned out during 7th gen because of the Gears of War craze, but it's not like third person shooters were horribly common during 95-2003 either. There was what, Max Payne and Tomb Raider?

Lol. Do you even game, bro? Obviously not enough to have any valuable opinion on a genre when you don't even know it has a sizable history.

The thing is, DalekFlay said "not all games today are shit". I'm not saying that all modern games are on par or better than games from the past (well, except for Tomb raider, but that's controversial), I'm saying that there are still good games out there - you just had to stop being pessimist.

Except I've not once said "There are no good modern games". I am almost always careful to state there are exceptions to avoid attracting the ire of ardent molepoppers, which sadly infest even the codex though in much smaller numbers. I come here to get away from their arrogant delusions and complete ignorance of gaming history.

"It aged poorly". No, it aged like fucking fine wine if you actually give a shit about gameplay. I didn't expect, nor want to care about some old clunky blocky game from 1996 in 2018, but the fact of the matter is it puts modern iterations to shame in regards to what actually matters: being a fking game.

 

[Ash]

Half-Life is a cinematic hitscan shooting gallery through linear levels, RTCW is a cinematic hitscan shooting gallery through linear levels. You expected WTNO to be like Quake 1 with projectile-based firearms and nazis fighting in melee?

Lol, considering Half-Life and RTCW level design equivalent to The New Order's. Reveals your understanding of such matters.

most of Arkane games weren't just clones of Looking Glass games, they were homages. Dishonored is not thief, Arx is not Ultima Underworld, Prey is not System shock. It's hard to judge whether they are better or worse

You disappoint.

you're talking like it was me who said "it makes you feel like batman".

It was in reference to game journos at the time, as well as their idiotic readerbases that parrot their dumb shit. See https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lG2dXobAXLI#t=03m18s

for an example.

timestamp 3:18.

Somehow these people don't understand that you'd feel significantly more like batman if it were you actually controlling half of the actions going on onscreen, and it really doesn't make you feel like batman at all without. But of course that takes skill, patience, paying attention and learning how to play
It's not about being "hardcore", it's about being a good game that involves the player properly, and not ignoring gaming history...critics, game devs and gamers alike. What other games like batman AA have you played, where you traverse levels with superhuman agility (in this case gliding, hookshot, high jumps) and beat doods up? If they were from before the mid-late 2000s, then you may notice they actually involved the player in the action and you can't play the game with your fucking chin like that guy did with Shadow of Mordor.

 

[Wunderbar]

half-Life is a cinematic hitscan shooting gallery through linear levels, RTCW is a cinematic hitscan shooting gallery through linear levels. You expected WTNO to be like Quake 1 with projectile-based firearms and nazis fighting in melee?

Lol, considering Half-Life and RTCW level design equivalent to The New Order's.

it's not. It's just you described WTNO in a very loose way.
"cinematic hitscan shooting gallery through linear levels" can be said about like a half of the shooters ever made.

 

[Ash]

Fair enough.

 

[Master]

Modern games all suck yes, but from 2007 onward, after Crysis and Dead Space. Yeah i like RTCW as anyone and while it does some things better, as far as actual FPSing goes, Crysis just stomps it like a T-Rex stepping on a little butterfly.