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If there was a "Windows PC Mini Console" released...

Arnox

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What games would we see on it? Kind of a dumb topic, but it did make me curious. From the DOS days to now, what were the most popular and influential games for the PC? In keeping with mini console tradition, let's say we only have 25 slots on our console. Note though that this is not a "Your 25 Favorite PC Games List". We're looking at what was the most popular and influential. I do wanna apologize in advance for all the damn first person shooters though. I'm not trying to show any bias here. It's not my fault that they were constantly at the forefront of innovation. Also, I should say, a LOT of classic games are gonna be left out here, pretty much entirely because this list has some insanely stiff competition. Just expect it, everyone.

So right off the bat, we need some id games here. Doom 95 and Quake 1 should suffice for that as we only have 25 slots and we can't just list all the id games. With that said, Doom and Quake are pretty damn non-negotiable. Doom 95 had the biggest cultural impact, but Quake had the biggest technological impact of the id roster. If you study 3D engines at all, you'll still see the waves that Quake made.

After that, I think it's safe to say that we need an Elder Scrolls game here. For this one, I was torn between Daggerfall and Morrowind. Daggerfall is when the ES series really started coming into its own, but then Morrowind established the open-world formula that is still being used to this day. I'll probably have to give this one to Morrowind. Daggerfall WAS very important, but I think it's safe to say that with Morrowind, the ES series really blew up in popularity if it didn't before and it was also a pioneer in many regards, not even talking about its incredible moddability as well.

After this I'll put two more shooters in here before giving it a rest for a bit, and I think you guys all know what one of 'em is. Unreal Tournament. Yeah. No escaping it. Now while Unreal was very important in establishing the engine, and for its time, it was very immersive, it was kind of a one-trick pony, and it didn't really reach enough people for it to really explode, but UT99 changed that in a HUGE way. I could go on and on and ON as to why UT99 deserves this spot, but I'll just say this. UT99 almost completely dethroned one of the most popular development studios of all time in one swoop, and if that doesn't tell you how popular and influential it was, I don't know what would.

The next is Crysis. The year was 2007 and Windows Vista had just come out. We were moving on from the crusty days of yore with old ass 90s interfaces into a shiny new HD world, and Crysis was the herald for all of this. The graphics engine it used was such a massive technological leap that even to this very day, the game looks incredible. Everything else about it was very decent to passable as well although it's on this list purely due to its sheer graphical prowess.

Now this one is an interesting one. At the time, no one really knew how to do stealth well in a 3D world. There was Metal Gear Solid, but it was very linear, had a focus on action, was top-down, and it seemed more like an obstacle course than an actual world you could sneak around in. Thief changed all that forever. It showed how to do stealth right, and it's basic formula has been used in games like Splinter Cell ever since.

Next one is a real oldie, but an incredibly important one for the Strategy genre. There had definitely been strategy and simulation games before it including SimCity, but Sid Meier and co. were wanting to do something new and in-depth. They talked about an old favorite of theirs called Empire and discussed things they would change about it if they could. The result of this was Civilization. It took the depth that these developers were known for and took full advantage of it, weaving systems into systems, creating probably the most complex Strategy series ever made.

Coming into the racing genre, I actually can't think of a lot to put here at all. The consoles have mostly been the home of racers for a long time, and for good reason. It's not till now that we're actually seeing racers coming to PC. That is NOT to say however that there haven't been any good ones. The Need For Speed is a great example. It is the only entry in the series actually that was a serious attempt at vehicle simulation. They had experts from the then popular Road & Track magazine come in to tune the cars so that they would match their real-world counterparts. Actually, TNFS may very well be the first true racing sim for the PC. I say that very tentatively though.

For this next entry, I was gonna put in Neverwinter Nights, but then I thought about it and then thought better of it. NWN may have improved upon BG in many different ways, but Baldur's Gate really deserves to be put on the list because I feel it had the bigger cultural impact and it also single-handedly saved cRPGs. I may not like the party system at all, but even I can realize BG's impressive writing and innovation of gameplay systems.

Next is Diablo. And once again, I have personal beef with this game, but for this list, it's pretty irrelevant. Diablo still absolutely pioneered the ARPG genre and also pioneered systems that are... *shudder* still in use today. It also popularized the gothic fantasy setting for games when the only version of it we had was Castlevania. (I think.) So for that, I'm willing to forgive it somewhat.

And while we're on the topic of Blizzard, we might as well add World of Warcraft. I don't think this game needs any introduction. Now, WoW may not have done EVERYTHING as good as other MMOs, but it did enough well to where it set itself apart from the others and presented itself really well. No longer were MMOs purely the domain of nerds. WoW popularized the genre to an absolutely insane extent where even your great aunt was playing it.

Going back to the strategy genre again, we have Homeworld which successfully took Strategy from the 2D plane to 3D. Besides that, it was just generally an impressive game. Great story, visuals, AI, and just general immersion. One of the games that kind of speaks for itself.

And finally, rounding the genre out, we have StarCraft. So popular, it spawned a major league in South Korea. It was responsible for pioneering 3 playable factions and was also lauded as having some of the absolute best multiplayer of the time. The game's development was smooth but long as Blizzard took the time to polish the game to an absolute shine.

Next up is Deus Ex, rather fittingly released at the beginning of the third millennium. While nothing it did was "first" per se, it combined so many different elements from RPGs and shooters and succesfully combined them all, giving players a dizzying amount of choices in terms of how they wanted to tackle objectives. Even further, it's story and world was somewhat prophetic as well. Now there's a way to make an impact long after your game's been released.

Coming to the adventure genre here, we have the one and only Riven. It was a big toss-up between this and Myst, but I couldn't resist putting Riven on here. It pretty much made Myst almost entirely redundant in every way and solidified the "walking simulator" genre. To this day, it's seen as the apex of Cyan World's career and it's not hard to see why. I have seen few games succeed where Riven did as well, even among Cyan World's own catalog.

You know, there's a quote that perfectly sums up the greatness of this next game on the list, and it's by Gabe Newell. "Our hope was that building worlds and characters would be more compelling than building shooting galleries." Yep, you guessed it. It's the OG Half-Life. Pioneering (mostly) seamless level loading and an immersive story in a shooter, which was not heard of. Half-Life also has this style to it that is so unique and does such a good job of sucking you in. While not a flawless game, it definitely did enough to make it onto the list.

For the next one, I can't believe I didn't think of this sooner, but it's Minecraft: Java Edition. The game that single-handedly showed that indie games were nothing to scoff at anymore. What's even more funny is how it just steadily grew and grew since first release and never stopped. A small note by the way. The game's 1.0 release was officially 2011, but that's debatable as to whether that was really the game's "1.0" version since an argument could be made for some of the other just as popular versions such as the Infgen update.

After thinking about this one for a bit, I think it's fair to add it in. And that is Guild Wars. Coming out just a year after Blizzard's juggernaut, WoW, perhaps the best argument that can be made in terms of its staying power and influence amongst a sea of other competing MMOs is simply that it actually survived WoW's onslaught where so many other MMOs just crumpled before it. Even NOW it's still being played. Besides that, the game pioneered Guild vs. Guild and an incredible skill system plus no sub fee.

Love or hate it, but Call of Duty has made its mark on gaming culture. And the one that started it all is of course the eponymous Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare. While the single-player gameplay was lacking, it made up for it with a much more relevant story instead of the then-usual setup of killing Nazi's for the 50th time. It also was one of the most popular shooters to play online. It is because CoD4 that the term "quickscoping" exists and is still used to today to an extent. It did start a lot of negative trends in gaming, but I don't think that's CoD4's fault really. Just the gaming industry beginning to show how clueless and greedy investors could and can be.

In that vein, there's also Battlefield 1942. Pioneered massive scale FPS combat. Battlefield 1942 was one of the first mainstream games to represent a dramatic shift in FPS gameplay mentality not only favoring individualism, but simultaneously encouraging teamwork and coordination. This was battle royale pretty much before battle royale was cool. One could even make an argument that BF1942 did large scale combat better than most modern examples of it, even within the Battlefield series. Battlefield 2 was also contending for this spot, but it just didn't innovate enough for me to really put it above the game that really started it all.

Next up is Portal. This one is a little debatable but its unique combination very witty and tight writing coupled with somewhat innovative puzzle mechanics and some good old tongue-in-cheek humor really made this take off. In any case, it also had a massive cultural impact.

Now it's time for the last four games. Number one is ARMA 2. Now there have been multiple military sims before this one, but I feel like ARMA II is where it all really came together. Ask anyone into the genre and they'll tell you ARMA is one of if not the best military sim you can buy. It even simulates the boring things such as logistics and traveling all the way to your destination. And finally, it spawned the popular DayZ mod.

Number two is BioShock. Steampunk has been a thing long before BioShock, but in terms of gaming, BioShock really made it take off. But the game did more than that. I took the Shock series and went through what did and didn't work with those past games. And then it took the idea of the player mindlessly following objectives and turned it around on its head. Plus, considering BioShock was running on the Unreal Engine 2, it had some very nice water effects.

For number three, I wanted so badly to put OneShot here, but as much as I dearly loved it, I can't deny that Undertale made a much bigger cultural impact. Putting that aside, the game is solid for sure, experimenting with common turn-based RPG cliches and breaking the fourth wall very heavily but also stylishly, which is quite important. All this and a good soundtrack round out this game.

And finally, number four is Counter-Strike (1.6) First starting as a mod to the already very influential Half-Life, it gained enough popularity to capture Valve's attention, and pretty soon, it got official support. Its success derives from its innovative combination of objective-based squad play and arcade movement and shooting. This proved to be quite an addicting combination and allowed for games to be endlessly varied in their outcome.

The final list in chronological order:
1. Civilization (1991)
2. The Need For Speed (1994)
3. Ultimate Doom/Doom II (1995)
4. Quake (1996)
5. Diablo (1997)
6. Riven (1997)
7. Baldur's Gate (1998)
8. Half-Life (1998)
9. Thief (1998)
10. Homeworld (1999)
11. StarCraft (1999)
12. Unreal Tournament (1999)
13. Counter-Strike (2000)
14. Deus Ex (2000)
15. Battlefield 1942 (2002)
16. The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind (2002)
17. World of Warcraft (2004)
18. Guild Wars (2005)
19. BioShock (2007)
20. Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (2007)
21. Crysis (2007)
22. Portal (2007)
23. ARMA 2 (2009)
24. Minecraft: Java Edition (2011)
25. Undertale (2015)
 

Battousai

Brother Sharp
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Cookmaster supreme
If we are going to try to make it 1 or 2 per genre at most (although with FPS its just not really possible) and with just 25 for influential and popular, then in no particular order.

The Secret of Monkey Island
Monkey Island 2: Le Chuck's Revenge
Doom (1995)
Duke Nukem 3D
Starcraft
Warcraft 3
Thief
Deus EX
Half-Life
Counter-Strike
Quake 3: Arena
Unreal Tournament 99
The Elder Scrolls 3: Morrowind
Ultima Online
World of Warcraft
Battlefield 2
Diablo 2 (the complete edition with Lord of Destruction included)
Team Fortress 2
Age of Empires 2: The Age of Kings (although preferably the gold version which also includes the Conquerors expansion)
Command & Conquer: Tiberian Dawn
Fallout (the original one)
Cave Story
Portal
Mass Effect 2
Left 4 Dead
 
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