LGC07: German journalists, experts pick all-time most influential games

They're missing a fighting game, the dominant genre through the early to mid 90s. I'd have put Virtua Fighter or SFII over Ultima, Elite, or SimCity. And having both SimCity and Civilization seems superfluous.

Well they did pick Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games as the best in show...

i thought the list was pretty well written, i consider myself hardcore but i guessed i missed Elite. a game i would have put on that list would be pole position.

It's CUSTER's revenge, the doomed American general, not the pie filling (scrumptious though it be)

Doom made the list, that's all I care about. Korea probably wants Starcraft on there...pretty damn influential right there.

Needs a bigger list. I don't see several genres, like real-time strategy games (you can't lump those in with turn-based strategy games, I'm sure everyone here knows how differently they play). For me, it's a toss-up between Command & Conquer and Starcraft for RTS's. As good as C&C is, Starcraft might be slightly more important since it has the whole televised tournament thing going on in Korea.

And "Jump'n'Run"? I think I'll read that as "Platformer" and throw Sonic the Hedgehog in side-by-side with Mario, because Sonic and Mario did for platforming what Pac-Man and Space Invaders did for the Arcade.

I'd also lump the Sims and SimCity together as Sandbox Simulations. And I'd call Wolfenstein 3D more important than Doom. After all, it pretty much defined first person shooters. I'd also add Diablo 2 to the list, due to the fact that it seems like every hack'n'slash game these days gets compared to it.

No Mario?

NO MARIO?!?

I take protest with this list! Especially since Mario's STILL influencing the industry.

Oh well. It's their list. I'll let them have it (albeit bitterly). :P

Wizardry spawned the RPG genre (yes, even the Japanese RPG's), and Infocom created the first great adventure games.

So, I have a problem with Ultima and Maniac Mansion being on the list representing their genres.

For the most part, a pretty good list.

Back in March, I actually made a list of my own for those games, like Custer's Revenge, that were important in a rather negative light:

http://www.netjak.com/review.php/1305

Interesting to note that Doom makes both a positive and negative importance list.

As for that list... I think it's a fairly solid one. Though I think Tomb Raider should be dropped in favor of Street Fighter II - I really don't think an explanation should be required.

Nice to see they chose doom over wolfenstein.

By "experts" I bet they meant the guy from the local games store. While I agree with most on this list (it's hard not to), there are many lesser known titles that came up with the ideas first, then picked up by others. Most of them apper on home computers because simply some guy with an idea doesn't need a dev kit to get his idea working if he (or she... well let's face it, he) has the know how.

The problem is, that these ground breakers are usually far too ahead of their time and nobody buys them. Take the "first" real stealth games released in the same year: Thief The Dark Project and Metal Gear Solid. Real first person hiding against guards that don't give up for ages after they see you, vs half blind f**k-wits that can be fooled by you hiding in a box. MGS sold, but the ideas from Thief where stolen.

But that doesn't compare to the game the influenced the most games I know: System Shock 2. The ammout of stuff stolen from that game is staggering, and that didn't sell ether. It's nice to see the new Shock game has found its market now. But it made me cringe when I read some idiot stating that the tape recordings idea was stolen from Doom3! Gah!

World of Warcraft? That hasn't been around long enough to influence anything. Maybe LOTR Online and Vanguard.

Everquest had a hell of a lot more of an impact on the MMORPG genre than WoW has.

I would nominate Zork (or even Colosal Cave Adventure) as most influential adventure game. The daddy of Super Mario is Manic Miner but for mass appeal Mario is the right choice.

they should do a list of most influential and then what games saved or rekindled a genre. Stuff like Baldur's Gate and BattleField 1942 come to mind and you could almost throw Geomentry Wars up there too