My "Forever" Games
So I've seen a lot of content creators make some variation of their "TOP TEN VIDYA" lists lately and while I don't think I could narrow down my all time favorites quite like that, I do think I could make a list of what I could call my “Top Ten Forever Games”. By this I mean games I could likely play quite contentedly for the rest of my life and not want to claw my eyes out. To be fair I'm kind of already at the point where playing games isn't very easy for me due to a lack of free time so I stick with a lot of ones I already know well and enjoy. However narrowing those down to just ten has proven a tad difficult so I'm likely to do my trademark rambling in this post, but maybe I can provide you the reader a bit of entertainment as I do so. So without further ado and in no particular order:#10. Mechwarrior 2
Ah MW2 my beloved. While I had played some of this back when it came out, the majority of my playthroughs of this venerable stompy robutt game was between the years of 2007 and 2009 on a rebuilt Windows 98 I had received from one of RadDad's girlfriends as a gift. Almost every single day I would fire up the old war machine to commit heinous violence upon my enemies from the cockpit of a Timberwolf.
I got to the point where I would play solo against an entire Star on the highest skill set because of how good I had gotten at the game. The slow and methodical combat added a taste of anxiety that has yet to be recaptured in modern gaming. Can I twist my torso in time to hit this Mech before it takes out one of my weapons? Will I be able to do so without exposing my back? If not can I rotate my legs so that I can strafe him and his buddies? Would it be better to snipe from behind terrain? Do they have something better than I do at this range? Will my heat stay low enough to Alpha Strike the big boss and allow me to sprint back to cover? All this in agonizing real time made it truly feel like a mech jockey sim and not a watered down run and gun shooter but with robots. This isn't to say the other MW games aren't good this one just seemed to hit a sweet spot for me, and if I had the space and cash I'd build my own old school mech cockpit with a zillion toggles and buttons to sink even more time into this thing that stole nearly 2 years of free time from me.
I wish I'd gotten the chance to use one of these back when they were around.
Funnily enough, I never beat the campaigns. All of the time I spent on this black hole of time and energy was in free play mode. I'm not sure if that sounds as silly to you as it does me, but looking back you'd think I would've at least tried Clan Wolf's campaign due to my unabashed and somewhat disturbing love of the Timberwolf (which I maintain as the best mech in the entire franchise and will war crime anyone who dares besmirch her).
Side note, the existence of the DC means that somewhere out there, there is a merc with a waifu pinup on his mech.
#9. Counter Strike 1.6 (Source even?)
I have a weird fixation for this game. It is one of the few series I ever learned map making software for and obsessively spent an inordinate amount of time modding and hosting servers nobody played on. I didn't like AWP only maps, or Zombies, and I ran almost exclusively vanilla games, it's one of maybe two games I ever LAN'd with friends and I was constantly making ridiculous tags for (both 1.6 and Source) while shitposting almost as much as I spent actually playing.
Exhibit A
I remember [REDACTED] the game using a local library's internet as I was a broke kid who thought Steam was a total meme at the time and installed it on my FrankenPC (a story for a later date) and downloaded so many things off FPSBanana to make it mine. It came with a mod for bots that I had to add in via console then wait like ten minutes for them to learn the map before playing. This of course is probably strange to younger players but it was an absolute god send for someone like myself still stuck using a rotating stock of free dial up CDs and Floppies on a fucking 28.8kbps fax modem I cannibalized from literal trash.
May you never know the struggle
I am to be quite frank, pretty trash at the game but love it to this day. And while I know liking Source is a cardinal sin among the purists I mostly played it for the novelty and ease of converting pictures into custom tags (yet another great failing of GO and it's equally shit sequel). You would not imagine the hoops I jumped through to get Source to run on my FrankenPC build but it was back when Vista was new and you could find oh so many XP iso's with an Aero paint job and various retarded ransomware attacks built in.
I only use memes for my tags
I loved this game so much I even downloaded a top down 2D version titled CS2D (link in media tab) and spent almost as much time playing it as I did CS 1.6. It had a built in map maker, TDM, CTF, Zombies and Construction mode. As far as I know it is still being actively maintained today and is even on Steam and have on multiple occasions brought it to places I shouldn't on USB to get a taste of my beloved Counter Strike. Cringe perhaps? Maybe but I'd be hard pressed to find a game I've spent so many hours on even if I suck and only play in jumps and starts regardless of which version I'm using.
#8. TES Oblivion
Yes I know “(insert any TES title here) was better!” but this was my very first TES title. I didn't have any real exposure to the series before this, and while the Daggerfall Unity mod is near fucking perfection for me (more on that later) I come back to Oblivion more than any other title in the series. I once stayed awake for 56 hours playing this off and on, and while I highly don not recommend anyone do the same it was some of the most fun I've ever had. Yes the monkey faces are annoying (thank god for mods) and I wish there were more than like four voice actors for NPCs it's still my go to. Of course 99% of the time I'm stealing anything not nailed down but it's the only game in the series I have zero issue in making a new character if I get bored or stuck due to poor build choices. It's one of few RPGs I don't care if I finish I just like making and playing whatever I can and do so often. I might not touch the game for years but I inevitably come back to it just to fuck around.
I mean just look at this absolute UNIT
A lot of people will justly say that the setting is very generic and Morrowind had a more exotic and fantastical flavor to the environment. I agree with that sentiment but honestly I am a basic bitch when it comes to fantasy, forests and medieval towns are my jam and I do not really care how overplayed it may be. Tolkien was best fantasy and there's a reason his setup is considered the base “vanilla” for such settings. I shall brook no argument.
Ah, a generic fantasy forest. I am truly home.
Back to my Daggerfall Unity comment though. I absolutely love what that team has done to modernize the game, and have mucked about plenty with it. Mods are small in scale and easy to run, the dungeons feel like proper dungeons, the world is absolutely humongous and the towns feel like actual towns and not just a small village. There is not a single game in the series that can match how open the game felt save perhaps Arena but it has its faults. Yeah sure you could own a house, a ship, a horse etc but the game feels rather empty despite it's size. I know it is just a consequence of it's release date (god I'm getting old) but I would absolutely adore it if someone took the idea and ran with it. Take the bones of DF:U and build upon it. I'm totally fine with the paper doll models and feel it just needs some fattening up. Larger bestiary, a more competent procedural generation of wilderness, dungeons and towns and some better use of NPCs and quest lines. If anyone ever made this a reality I would throw my wallet at them and never ever play another RPG again. Until then Oblivion holds it's place at the top of my fav TES title with DF:U at a tentative second place.
In the name of my most holy of waifus I positively LUST for it.
#7.Dai Senryaku VII: Modern Military Tactics
It is absolutely criminal this never received a PC port. I originally bought this for $5 in a bargain bin at a K-Mart and black dust was it probably the best $5 I have ever spent. I know Turn Based Strategy isn't everyone's cup of tea but it is not hyperbole when I say I've spent literal days playing this game. Once a buddy and I were playing for so long in a 2v2 match against bots (USA/Israel vs China/Russia) that when it was his turn I would fall asleep and he'd wake me when he was done so that he could sleep for a bit while I did my thing. For those unfamiliar with the series (It's been around for a long time in Japan) Dai Senryaku is a turn based tactics game usually based on an abstract modern warfare setting, and plays via hex map. I can not speak for older titles, having never played them but in VII you can select your units from a list and each has a different loadout you can decide on depending on your mission objective. You capture factories, cities, airfields and naval yards. It has ground air and sea combat and units are based on real world counterparts.
SO MANY CHOICES AAAAAAAAA
It's detailed yet just abstract enough that you don't need super tism and a manual to enjoy it (looking at you Steel Panthers: MBT). As far as I know this is the only version of the game that utilizes a fully 3D map and allows you to zoom in and out while rotating and panning in any direction you so choose. To a lot of people the graphics might seem primitive, and they kind of are, as the “pieces” are merely color coded low poly models and combat takes place via small, two window 2D sprite animations but if you don't mind such things it's truly astounding how much fun it can be.
You might think this is boring but rarely have I been so on the edge of my seat while gaming.
The sound and music is fairly limited as well but to me I don't mind. If I get bored of the music I just put it on silent and run something on the side. Also some of the factions are fairly limited and there are definitely what I'd call S tier factions (USA and Russia being the main ones) compared to others and playing as certain factions can be a handicap (Israel being the one that sticks out of memory) due to their limited unit choices. Logistics is fairly simplified using a basic supply vehicle and only two resources (money and oil) but this isn't a super deep Operations level game but by no means do I think this detracts from the game in the slightest. There is a modern PC release title Dai Senryaku Perfect 4.0 but having played it I think it's rather a step backward as it has had some translation issues and is strictly a 2D style map. It might still be something you enjoy but I suggest getting it on sale.
It's on Steam last I checked
#6. King of Fighters Ultimate Match 2002
This game, this FUCKING game. Never have I loved and loathed a fighting game so much (fuck you Bao mains). While I usually play the OG arcade version on Fightcade, the Ultimate Match release on Steam is probably the most polished variant of the game ever released and in my opinion is the best King of Fighters game in the series followed VERY closely by KoF 98 UM. I have fond memories of playing KoF 98 on NeoGeo at the local Pizza Hut and the horrendous KoF 95 port on Gameboy as a kid, but this is by far my favorite. The Mexican's are absolutely right picking this over Street Fighter and I will die on that hill.
Terry is best boy, Kyo fanboys get fukt
Now I am by no means a fighting game autist. I have neither the time nor patience to perfect combos and Desperation Moves. Most of the time I'm using characters I mained back in the day because their specials are mostly muscle memory for me at this point and yet my combos are usually from panicked button mashing and coincidence. I get BTFO'd by most people online but don't mind it as long as it isn't a total cheese blow out (FUCKING BAO). However this is the game that convinced me to spend a lot of time shopping around and building my own custom fightstick and while I am far worse at the game with it over a fightpad I adore it and even paid extra for my own print to add to it.
Are you beginning to sense a trend in my tastes yet?
The transition to 3D for me feels like a mistake and almost like an attempt to chase the success of the newer Street Fighter titles. I would love a return to the timeless feel of 2D hand drawn sprites of yesteryear and find such attempts to be a detriment to the series I love so much. This isn't an attack on Capcom whatsoever, as I have sank an inordinate amount of time into 3rd Strike and other such titles (at least for a fighting games casual), but I do feel the more limited budget of KoF would be better spent doing what works then trying to play catch up to a rival. This might just be me getting old however so don't take it as gospel.
#5. Unreal Tournament (1999)
There are lots of great shooters from this time period and while I enjoy most of them, UT99 is where it's at for me. Be it on PS2 or PC, I have poured so many hours into this beast of an arena shooter be it offline with bots (mostly this), or online with others. While I was never the best player I have always had an absolute blast with this game. When my copy was stolen I spent years trying to find a replacement as I couldn't really justify spending money on a game quite so old and trying to finagle it to run on a modern system. I ended up settling on a free clone called “Xonotic” (link for the game in the Media tab), and while it is a great game I still missed the OG until a friend of mine bought me UT99 on Steam.
I admit to being a tad embarrassed that I didn't know that it was on Steam but man was I grateful for the gift. The best part is it runs even on my Craptop and I've been fragging my way through the maps ever since. Be it TDM or running low grav mutators on CTF to just farm sniper kills for the LOLs, it remains one of my favorite shooters of all time. Don't get me wrong, Quake III and Tribes are phenomenal games in their own right but to me UT99 will forever be king of the Arena Shooters.
I swear I hear "HEADSHOT" in my sleep.
#4. Age of Empires II
Now I want to be perfectly clear, I do not mean the HD rerelease or Definitive peepee poopoo edition, I mean the original release with The Conquerors expansion pack. I do own the HD release but rarely if ever play it because why the hell would I? AoE II needs no introduction and is without a doubt one of the best RTS game series ever made and stands shoulder to shoulder with it's brethren (StarCraft Brood War, Warcraft, Rise of Nations, Command & Conquer, etc). The Genie Engine is phenomenal at what it does and it is quite easy to spend hours, if not the whole day in game.
Fucking beautiful
Now this was a hard decision for me believe it or not. To be quite honest I played Star Wars Galactic Battlegrounds before AoE II and actually prefer the vibe of AoE Rise of Rome. However air units in SWGB were rather wonky, and AoE RR AI cheats like a Vegas stripper wife so my decision ultimately fell to this variant. Age of Empires spawned some fantastic off shoots such as the Star Wars one mentioned above and the amazingly fun Age of Mythology3915054-age-of-empires-ii-the-age-of-kings-windows-front-cover (which I know I have in a box somewhere) but AoE II is the peak of the series and in my humble opinion will never be topped. I mean honestly I didn't even know there was fourth installment until like two weeks ago, and who even played the third one?
Just... terrible.
#3. Sid Meier's Civilization II: Test of Time
This game is like literal crack to me. Probably the first game I ever bought with my own money, I brought it with me anywhere someone had a computer willing to let me install it. For $8 I got a big book sized box with only a paper sleeve to hold the CD inside, I still kick myself for tossing the box away as the thing has a tendency to disappear on me for a few years before I find it again despite having a designated tote with all my other PC games (which is probably for the best as I lose so much sleep to this monster).
Just... one... more... TURN!!!
Now I know how huge a hit the original Civ II was (hell it even got an open source port), and how it is literally the epitome of “Just one more turn…” and many a strategy gamer has found themselves in the wee hours of the night wondering just how the fuck they got here but here's the thing, Test of Time is just objectively better. It has updated graphics, music and sound. It has three (count em THREE) campaigns that expand from your basic Civ game into Fantasy and Sci-Fi (which was the building block for the Alpha Centauri game) with their own complete Civilopedia and game mechanics. The amount of Fantasy campaigns I ran was OBSCENE and the best part was all of the pictures and sound effects were just out in the open on the game disk so you could just go through all of it for the laughs.
Every PC I have ever owned or built or brought back from the dead has had a copy of this game on it. The only other Civ game I have even the slightest amount of mileage on is Civ VI and even that pales in comparison. Civ II: ToT is and likely always will be my favorite grand strategy game and I think it is a shame that most people missed out by hopping from the original II to III without getting to try this variant. I still find myself listening to the old OST and even run VMs on certain machines just to play another turn.
#2. Fallout 1 & 2
Oh I know, BIG fucking surprise. It was difficult to decide between FO1 and FO2, but I went with FO2 since whenever I play through FO1 again it's usually with the mod that replaces the first game's engine with FO2's as it can be a bit of a buggy mess. It was also the first Fallout game I ever played, and while I prefer the first game's storyline over the second by an irradiated country mile, the sequel just has a more polished feel and depth. This to me was the last canon game (even though I adore Tactics) and while that might not be a very popular viewpoint, I am very much a purist when it comes to Fallout. I enjoyed FO3 and New Vegas don't get me wrong, but I disagree with the direction the games took when Black Isle was bought out by Bethesda.
It's trash! TRASH I SAY!!!
But without getting into a shit slinging fest over my personal feelings, the original duology is just an absolute masterpiece in post apocalyptic role playing. I have had so many fun builds and playthroughs of these two games that I have more than gotten my money's worth. I don't think Bethesda (and at the time of writing this article Microsoft) could possibly recapture the magic of the series unless they brought back the original team and gave them full control of the release. Calling back to my comments on FO3, while it was a fun game, it breaks my heart that we never got Van Buren as a full game. I could go on for literal days on how back assward the series has become compared to what it was and I have definitely become the meme of the embittered boomer clasping on to the ancient days of yore who lashes out at every new game and views anything through a lens of nostalgia and paranoia. Judge me as you will for it but nothing can ever really live up to my beloved CRPG series and I can not forgive Bethesda for what they've done to my beloved series.
Fuckin muties.
Runner ups:
Here are a few runner ups for what I'd call “Forever Games”. These are games I like or want to like but haven't had the time invested to add to this list officially.
Star Wars Battlefront II
Man if they had an hours clocked setup back when this was released on PS2 I'd probably have a few years logged. It got to the point where I had to do everything I could to handicap myself due to how good I had gotten against the AI and I'd inevitably start a new profile just so I didn't get the boosted weapons on spawn because it was too easy. I still have my original Playstation save to this day. The only reason I don't have it in my list is that I have quite literally played it so much that it's boring to me, and the only real magic I can get out of it is via couch co-op which is nonexistent on the PC version. We really took that split screen for granted, and I miss having IRL friends over to play it with me.
Wasteland 2
Another Post-Apocalyptic CRPG with a phenomenal pedigree. Obviously the first was a pretty direct inspiration for our beloved Fallout. It's just I haven't gotten much time with the game as life consistently gets in the way of it for me. Great game for sure and I absolutely love it but who knows if I will ever get around to beating it.
ATOM RPG
Fallout in Russia. Seems like a wonderful spiritual successor to Fallout, but much like Wasteland I just can't seem to find time to finish it.
Zork: Grand Inquisitor
Wonderful first person adventure game that got me into the old Infocom text adventures. If you've played Myst it is very similar. I obtained it at a yard sale many years ago and loved it so much that I included it in the background of my high school senior pictures (I am not joking). The only reason I didn't include it in the list is that I have literally beaten it so many times that it holds zero secrets for me. It's still wonderful and is one of my comfort games that I fall back on when the mood strikes, it's just that all the puzzles have lost their intrigue and are only difficult because my memory will fail me when I replay it again after a few years. It is still wonderful and I suggest it to anyone who is a fan of first person adventure games.
Stellaris
I know this could easily be a forever game for me, but between the time needed to get into it, the inordinate amount of DLC and the few playthroughs I have of it (last game I played through half of the available DLC didn't even exist) I just can't add it on and consider myself to be honest. Wonderful game, just wish Paradox wasn't so dedicated to nickel and diming their player base.
Barony
Great first person Roguelike with wonderful online play. Just don't have the hours logged to really call it a forever game. You should absolutely try it if you can. Just be prepared to die a lot.
#1. Nethack
This is my be all end all. Surprising to some I'm sure that it's above Fallout, but it has ports for EVERYTHING and I have played it more than any other game on this list. I wouldn't be surprised if someone has it running on a literal toaster somewhere. One of the “Big 4” of the roguelike community, a running gag is “The dev team thinks of everything” and when someone said “except the kitchen sink” they added in sinks. I originally mistook it as a literal hacking game due to the terminal ASCII graphics but woe betide my uninformed brain. An eclectic mix of Tolkien, Pratchett, Zork and other popular fantasy series, it is a brutal permadeth dungeon crawl that after eleven years of off and on playing I have yet to actually beat and yet I keep coming back for more (to be fair I suck). It's underlying ruleset is akin to a mix of AD&D 1e and B/X, and there are loads of fun and hidden tidbits to discover if you avoid spoilers. Every playthrough is randomized and if playing via Telnet or SSH you might discover the grave of other players (and their vengeful ghosts). This is the only game that I have ever raged at like you see in those old youtube videos. I once destroyed an office chair a friend bought from a yard sale after an especially grueling run that ended via a very stupid play that got my Barbarian killed. I literally threw double the money he paid for the chair at him and stormed out of the room I was so angry (not my proudest moment).
But sometimes the deaths are so hilarious you can't help but laugh and keep playing. I once was killed by the ghost of one of my previous playthoughs and to this day I can't figure out if it was suicide or homicide. I have wielded a dead cockatrice corpse and turned an entire orc war party to stone, only to trip down some stairs and become petrified. I once ate a pet out of desperation, which angered my patron god so much they smited me from existence. I have been polymorphed into a ghoul and forced to drop all of my gear just to run away. I have developed a deep hatred for gnomes and an aversion to random items I find on the floor. The deaths in this game aren't always this funny but I have never gotten bored with this game due to it's quirky nature and depth. Truly a “forever” game if there ever was one.
Well that about covers it, I know this was pretty long and rambly even for me but it was a fun topic and the cold beer in my fridge got me feeling chatty. Regardless, thanks for reading and hope to see you again soon.