We’re coming down the home stretch. I hope that I’ve at least given your Trivia Blaster enough ammunition to amuse/impress your friends over these last 5 weeks.
On to the final installment:
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Savage |
| Savage is a cross between an RTS and an FPS. It’s a game that fused two genres to create a third. The game wasn’t as successful as it could have (or should have) been.
More information (and a demo) is available at the official site. |
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Tamagotchi |
| Tamagotchi was the original virtual pet of the late 90’s. I realized very quickly (yes, after I bought one…) that they weren’t really fun to play with, they were just annoying. Inexplicably, they seem to be trying to make some kind of comeback.
More information can be found at Tamagotchi Planet. |
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Tetris |
| Tetris is one of those games that is simple enough to be played by anyone, and difficult enough to keep even hardcore players entertained. It’s an incredibly simple idea that just exploded onto the scene and has been cloned to every platform imaginable. Confusion over who owned the rights to te game sparked a lawsuit between Tengen and Nintendo.
Spinoff games from the series weren’t nearly as popular as the original, but include Hatris, Wordtris, and Tetrisphere. |
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Nightshade Part 1: The Claws of Sutekh |
| I couldn’t do a list like this and not put Nightshade in it. Nightshade is one of the best, most overlooked games for the NES. It amazes me that more people haven’t heard of it. Nightshade even managed to make the cover of Nintendo Power, and then managed to fade into almost complete obscurity. It’s a point and click adventure game that manages to be extremely fun without taking itself too seriously. Easily one of the best games for the NES.
More information is available in this review. |
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Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego? |
| What the…? A game that doesn’t involve killing things, or questing for magic stuff to kill off some kind of dragon? Nope, Carmen Sandiego was all about the player becoming a detective and trying to track down criminals by following clues left all over the world. The only game I know of that came with an encyclopedia.
More information is available the official site. |
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World Class Track Meet |
| One of the first of very few games that used the Power Pad as a controller. Attempted to get the NES game playing generation up off the couch to play some games. | |
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XBAND Video Game Modem |
| Not technically a game, the XBAND was a peer-to-peer gaming service for the Super Nintendo and Sega Genesis. Ahead of it’s time, the XBAND didn’t last very long before it’s company (Catapult) was acquired by Mplayer, and subsequently shut down. | |
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Final Fantasy VII |
| This is the first Final Fantasy game to appear on a non-Nintendo system, and was also the first to use pre-rendered movies to further the story line. This game is still considered by many people to be not only the best game in the series, but the best game made to date.
exitzer0 adds: “My introduction to Final Fantasy and it blew my mind. It is still one of my favorite games and I’m still not sure I have a complete grasp of the storyline.” |
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Gyromite |
| The game that came with the Robotic Operating Buddy, and one of only two games that is compatible with it. The other being Stack-Up.
More information is available here. |
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River Raid |
| River Raid was programmed by Carol Shaw, who is considered to be the first female video game programmer. |
And that’s The List: fifty oddball, goofy, groundbreaking, or otherwise noteworthy titles. Thanks to exitzer0 and SSB_Master for all their help in making this list a reality!