Best Indie game ever made?

[Mark_Tempe]

Best Indie game ever made, and I do not mean best selling. Just the best in your personal opinion.

My pick : Weird Worlds, Return to Infinite Space

Your pick?
________________________________________
Hunique Games (http://www.huniquegames.com/)
Huge and Unique Science Fiction and Fantasy Games

[soniCron]

Without question: Out of This World (http://www.mobygames.com/game/out-of-this-world)

[Anlino]

Bejeweled.






Nah, just kidding. My personal favourite must be Titan Attacks. No game has ever made me come back again and again like that, and the graphics are unbeatable.

[princec]

!!

Strange, it's my least favourite. Odd that it sells 10x better than all my others combined.

My new favouritest bestest game everest is... Cletus Clay, now I've finally got my mitts on an alpha. Prepare to be depressed when you see it.

Cas :)

[cliffski]

Lux Space Station Manager or Cute Knight

[AnthemAudio]

Without question: Out of This World (http://www.mobygames.com/game/out-of-this-world)

Hot damn! I didn't realize that's considered "indie" I mean, I know it was all done by Eric Chahi but even so... Wow.

I played that game over and over and over (SNES version) and I think I can trace my love for game audio through playing that game. Amazing score, implemented well...I could gush even more.

I guess that's my vote for OotW...how is it considered indie though? Great game regardless of classification!

**EDIT**

Apparently there's a version of Out of This World (Another World) available for GBA but hasn't made it to cartridge yet.

http://www.foxysofts.com/index.php?l=content/gba/anworld.inc

Just watch out for the pop-ups...and the French...and the French pop-ups.

And more info on Chahi I found a small wiki entry:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eric_Chahi

Now back to your regularly scheduled, ultimately inconclusive poll!;)

[soniCron]

I guess that's my vote for OotW...how is it considered indie though? I'm not quite sure how to respond to that. (Mostly fearing the wrath of the "what's indie?" argument.) However, I heard Chahi made it to the GDC last year. Perhaps he's there this year? (If anyone sees (http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/c/cf/EricChahi.jpg) him, tell him I'm a huge fan! ;))

[Pyabo]

This is a tough question... like asking what's your all time favorite movie or book... just too hard to narrow it down that far.

But if I must... I'd have to say Deadly Rooms of Death, for its unique style and extremely deep gameplay.

[whisperstorm]

I'd have to say that the game that really captured my imagination and made me realize just how great indie gaming is would be Eternal Daughter.

[PoV]

Tennis for Two.

[svero]

I guess Doom is a big one. Cletus Clay is great, I agree with cas there. Out of this World is a great game.. was created by Eric C. before going to any publishers all by his lonesome I understand (word on the street says there may be a sequel in the works). Dr. Lunatic and Looney Land from Hamumu also stick out in terms of play time spent. Bah.. there are too many good games...

- S

[Aymes]

Professor Fizzwizzle! Loved that - bought that...

Starship Tycoon! Loved that - bought that...

apart from that I quite liked "thomas and the magic words" but didnt feel like buying that one.

[soniCron]

Tennis for Two. Do academics count? ;)

[Gilzu]

Loved that - bought that...

I wish i heard more and more of that sentence. People putting their money where their mouth is.

[ChilledOut]

I gotta go with Out of This World too - truly a classic!

[Savant]

Doom.

(doom doom doom doom doom doom doom doom doom too few words)

[princec]

I vote for Doom too. By far and away one of the singular most vivid gaming experiences I've ever had. Shame they never followed it up.

Cas :)

[Artinum]

I vote for Doom too. By far and away one of the singular most vivid gaming experiences I've ever had. Shame they never followed it up.


Really? I could have sworn there was a Doom II at some point. And then there was this thing called Quake.

Or has my humourometer broken again?

I have experienced far too many great games through Bytten to narrow them down to just one. Professor Fizzwizzle IS a fantastic game, and I'd also have to mention Starscape and one of the oddest games I've encountered since my 8-bit days, "Cactus Bruce and the Corporate Monkeys".

[princec]

There was a Doom 2 but it was really just more Doom 1. Then they did Quake, which was beautiful but unfortunately only 1% of the fun of Doom. The fear and atmosphere was nice but nowhere near as fun as gatling-gunning a room of imps. Then came Quake 2 which actually came closer to being fun again, then Quake 3 which doesn't really count as a single player experience, then Doom 3 which is just awfully scary and not at all fun, then there's Quake 4, which I've not seen yet :)

Wish they'd just do Doom 4, with hundreds of easy to kill gidrahs all over the place that I can mow to pieces and chainsaw the bits.

Cas :)

[Larry Hastings]

Wish they'd just do Doom 4, with hundreds of easy to kill gidrahs all over the place that I can mow to pieces and chainsaw the bits.They did, it's called Serious Sam.

[Savant]

They did, it's called Serious Sam.
It would be nice to have more than 100 polygons per scene though. That's why sprites worked so well in the original. Pile 'em on, who cares?!

[Christian]

Did someone mention mount&blade ( http://www.taleworlds.com/ )?that game is really nice and fun, im going to buy it when i have money (and i NEVER buy games).

Edit: Bought it!! waiting for the key :D.
This is a great great game, i recommend it to everyone! support indie development!!!

[Anlino]

...not to mention Serious Sam 2...

Edit:

...not to mention that wasn't an indie game... But it was still great fun:)

[Cartman]

I was a big fan of the Kingdom of Kroz and the Kroz series.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingdom_of_Kroz

Talk about "old school".

[soniCron]

I was a big fan of the Kingdom of Kroz and the Kroz series... Talk about "old school". Anyone else find the parallels between Apogee and Epic (Megagames) a little more than coincidental? ;) Those were the days... (Anyone remember Kiloblaster? Or Megatron? Neopaint? Ken's Labyrinth? Electroman? :D)

[Coyote]

Epic Pinball. I bought all three packs at once, making it one of the first shareware products I ever purchased (Even before I bought Doom!) That game just RAWKED. Still does - since discovering DOSBOX, I find myself playing it again, and those old pinball games have stood the test of time.

Second Choice: Galactic Civilizations.

[steve bisson]

i wont tell , i dont want it to get cloned before i clone it ;) haha

[PoV]

Do academics count? ;)
I was refering to the *other* Tennis for Two (http://www.pong-story.com/1958.htm), AKA, Pong.

[soniCron]

I was refering to the *other* Tennis for Two (http://www.pong-story.com/1958.htm), AKA, Pong. Which was an academic project... ;)

Incidentally, I made this neat little iron-on (http://www.solaristudios.com/noyourroots.jpg) a while back as a response to those retardo NES "Know Your Roots" shirts. Enjoy! :)

[Grey Alien]

Doom gets my vote too. It blew my head off when I first saw it and I played it for months getting new levels from mags, BBS etc.

oh yeah, Serious Sam is basically updated Doom and was one of the craziest gaming experiences I've ever had, great game.

I have bought Heavy Weapon (get's too hard), one of those multitudinous Reflexive bat'n'ball games (good fun) and Wik and the Fable of Souls (it's OK).

[Sharpfish]

New "updated graphics" version of Another World/Out Of this world:

http://www.anotherworld.fr/anotherworld_uk/index.htm

Shareware.


sorry if posted already/elsewhere but there was a lot of talk recently about this game. A "new" windows version must be a good thing. :)

[DrWilloughby]

How bout XCom, that was made by a guy in his garage, right? OOTW was awesome too.

Of the modern indie crowd, though, I love my DROD!

[Ricardo C]

Wolfenstein 3D.

Technologically eclipsed a million times over, but absolutely nothing beats that feeling I got the first time I realized I was indeed playing a real-time 3D game.

[electronicStar]

New "updated graphics" version of Another World/Out Of this world:

http://www.anotherworld.fr/anotherworld_uk/index.htm

Shareware.


sorry if posted already/elsewhere but there was a lot of talk recently about this game. A "new" windows version must be a good thing. :)
So, whoever said that each game had to be the clone of a previous game ?:p
One would be hard pressed to find an clone in the case of OOTW...

This game is simply a work of art. It belongs to a lost golden age.
An age when you could improve not only on the background and the graphics but also on the gameplay (and at this time almost all of the computer games had new gameplay, clones were actually the exception until the japanese consoles become preeminent).
An age when games where emulating the experience of the cinema, but it wasn't a problem because cinema was not yet a debilitating CGI crapfest.
The games weren't always fun but they always made you think.

For another, less innovative, indie masterpiece I'd have to go with Cave Story.

[berserker]

Isn't Another World is just a clone of Flashback? I always thought so.

[Sharpfish]

Isn't Another World is just a clone of Flashback? I always thought so.

Flashback was after another world on the Amiga at least.

"Flashback is an arcade adventure from the team that brought you Another World, but this is far more basic, going more for the traditional platform adventure. Unfortunately, this means puzzles where you have to find an object and give it to someone else. Yawn. On the upside, loads and loads of action! Yes, Flashback is rich with the stuff Arnie's films are made of, with more scraps than Street Fighter 2!"

Also, When I first witnessed Another World (Amiga format cover disc 91/92?) I was blown away by the lack of typical levels made from tiles, it looked more like a graphic adventure. Flashback was by far more a standard platformer but with similar character animation and was more popular possibly because of that.

[svero]

Actually Flashback was not made by the same people. Flashback is an unaffiliated game but considered by many, mistakenly, to be a sequel. There is a true sequel to Another World that was released only for a sega console system. (also not really involving the original author) Eric's other game is Heart of Darkness, which is great.

[jankoM]

Flashback ?!? when I saw this name and saw that Another world graphics I got a deeply covered -flashback- of a game that totally consumed me and my cousin when we were kids (before I was even remotelly interested in computer programing) and I totally forgot about it . Wikipedia screenshot told that yes this was the game I was playing like mad. I can just feel ants crawling behind my back when I played it by looking at the screenshot.... ok... I know I told nothing usefull.

downloading them both...Time for some nostalgia...

[Grey Alien]

yeah wiki says flashback is not a sequal, but it did have a sequal which I played too: Fade to Black.

Cave Sstory is a great game.

btw: re: XCOM, which is one of the best games I've ever played, surely it was the same authors (Julian Gollop etc) that made Laser Squad. I never knew they were independent, guess it's possible,

[Sharpfish]

Actually Flashback was not made by the same people. Flashback is an unaffiliated game but considered by many, mistakenly, to be a sequel. There is a true sequel to Another World that was released only for a sega console system. (also not really involving the original author) Eric's other game is Heart of Darkness, which is great.

Hey I just post the blurb, I certainly don't think of it as a sequel to AW, point was to highlight FB was after AW and AW wasn't a "rip off" of FB ;)

If it wasn't a delphine/interplay thing then many sites have their info wrong (inc mobygames).

"Heart of the Alien" is I assume the sequel you refer to: http://www.mobygames.com/game/heart-of-the-alien-out-of-this-world-parts-i-and-ii

And Heart Of Darkness I remember from being "bigged up" in Edge many years ago. Never played it though.

[spellcaster]

Doom.
But I must admit that I had a hard time to decide between Doom and Ultima.

[jankoM]

ugh... that demo of AW is short...

To the subject...Really hard to say which is the best indie game for me... to many ways of "best" exist. If I go by most "fun/intriguing" to play:
- If I say for kids(by looking at my older nieces playing): - Bud redhead and Charlie 2
- for youngest kids: Ladybugs and LuaLua
- action ones: GISH - I know what some of you think... "good tech-demo blabla" and don't agree with you
- shmups: Kai-jin
- puzzle: DROD
- casual: BKR, Dwice
...

[berserker]

And Heart Of Darkness I remember from being "bigged up" in Edge many years ago. Never played it though.

Never played Heart of Darkness, but this name reminded me of another cool game called Shadow of Darkness if I recall right. Quest for Glory IV : Shadow of Darkness. IMO the best Sierra quest - mysterious and tragic :o

[Sharpfish]

All this talk of older games is making me want to dig some out and go play.. maybe a break from development is in order ;)

[Glen Pawley]

I'll vote Doom. There's a reason it's been redone to death.

[Grey Alien]

what's DROD? I just can't work it out.

[Savant]

http://www.google.com/search?q=DROD

[Anthony Flack]

XCOM, which is one of the best games I've ever played, surely it was the same authors (Julian Gollop etc) that made Laser Squad. I never knew they were independent, guess it's possible

In fact, Julian Gollop is a member of this forum.

Another World was published by Delphine, but it was created entirely by Eric Chahi on his own. He didn't do the publishing deal until the game was finished. Flashback was also published by Delphine but made by different people. Obviously the tech used for the cut-scenes was inspired by Another World, but the game itself seems to be much more influenced by Prince of Persia.

Heart of Darkness is great, but the story and particularly the cut-scenes are awful. Apparently they hired a whole bunch of people who had never done any 3d modelling and animation before, and they learned how to do it on the job. At the time, 3d animation wasn't really something game studios were geared up to do, so making a whole lot of it was considered an impressive feat. But the animation, storyline and voice acting all come across as really horrible now. Skip it and go straight to the game itself, which has really jaw-droppingly stunning 2d animation; some of the nicest I've ever seen.

[Mike Boeh]

AW or OOTW (as it was called in the states) was a wonderful game. Until right now, I always thought flashback was a sequel! I was so excited when fb came out, but I never played it like i did AW...

In terms of firing a game up and blowing my mind, Shadow of the Beast was the only game that really did it. I was just amazed by the visuals. Of course, it had terrible gameplay, but nobody cared!

Not sure how independent it was, but my personal favorite game from that era was Speedball 2.... I also loved Pinball Dreams/Fantasies...

[electronicStar]

My favorite part in AW (OOW) was how you would arrive in a room with a window, and if you looked through the window you'd have a cutscene with a panoramic view of the alien city. That was completely useless, but man was that atmospheric. It was the crystallizing moment for me.

[Sharpfish]

A
In terms of firing a game up and blowing my mind, Shadow of the Beast was the only game that really did it...

...I also loved Pinball Dreams/Fantasies...

Ah, Shadow of the beast was the game that made me BUY an AMIGA and Pinball Dreams was the game that made me glad I had one! ;)

Anyone else get Shadow Of The Beast 2 (or was it 3?) with the free T-shirt in a box big enough to put your Amiga in (almost). I never have worn it and it got thrown out many years ago. I miss those big boxes, like I miss the microprose golf/gunship manuals that you could take on holiday with you and read all week instead of going out in the sun ;)

[Batley]

FlashBack was great but i found the controls too fidely. There were like a million, jump, run jump, small steps, duck, role, pull out your gun and put it away, hang onto ledge. I'd be facing a guy you had to shoot and end up accendentily putting my gun away and doing a jump or barrel role towards him and die only to have to start the level again at the beginning. So fustrating.

[spellcaster]

Hm.. came "prince of persia" before or after "Another world"? Because they feel pretty similar gameplay wise, with AW being PoP in a space setting.

[Grey Alien]

In fact, Julian Gollop is a member of this forum. OMG, this is an "I'm not worthy" moment if ever I've had one. Laser Squad (on Spec and C64) and later XCom ruled my life for a while.

I remember the old Shadow of the Beast games, looked great, played like poop and thus you could never really be bothered to see the later levels. Plus they had loads of disk loading and were way too difficult.

I completed Flashback on the Megadrive (saw it on the Amiga origially) and it was a great game actually, bit tough, but hey, I once had hours to kill.

[Bachus]

Cave Story (http://www.gameflaws.com/cavestory/) > *

[terin]

You guys are so clueless.

(The now named) Mountain-King Studios and Raptor: Call of the Shadows

Too bad they never made a game even nearly as good :( Demonstar 1 and 2 were nothing compared to the majesty of Raptor.

-Joe

[illume]

Doom 2, or quake 1.

Although doom 2 was heaps easier to make maps with. However today I like playing quake 1 still.

So quake 1 it is.

[pixies]

Two words:

vga miner

That game rocked.

Raptor: Call of the Shadow was the first shareware game I bought. Best shooter ever, though now I have jets'n'guns which is a whole other totally cool beast. Doom was impressive and got played to death. Quake w/ quakeworld is the most fun I have ever had playing video games especially zoids ctf & the headhunters mod. Quakeworld had the most amazing network performance (no lag on a 28.8 modem and 16 players!). Everything after Q1 has been downhill for id.

Moria got quite a bit of play time too. So much fun going to the shop geering up and fighting @ signs. I don't think I ever got past level six though. I had a whole lucas arts addiction back in the day. Day of the Tentacle and Sam & Max had me in tears.

[Anthony Flack]

Hm.. came "prince of persia" before or after "Another world"? Because they feel pretty similar gameplay wise, with AW being PoP in a space setting.
Prince of Persia: 1989. Another World: 1991. Although Another World took two years to make, so I'm not sure if PoP could be considered an influence.

But I don't think they really feel that similar, apart from both having very smooth animation for the time. Another World is much more of a puzzle/adventure games, and it was apparently mostly influenced by the Amiga port of Dragon's Lair. Flashback is a lot more like Prince of Persia, with all its leaping and climbing and platformery.

[Momor]

Ah, Shadow of the beast was the game that made me BUY an AMIGA and Pinball Dreams was the game that made me glad I had one! ;)

Anyone else get Shadow Of The Beast 2 (or was it 3?) with the free T-shirt in a box big enough to put your Amiga in (almost). I never have worn it and it got thrown out many years ago. I miss those big boxes, like I miss the microprose golf/gunship manuals that you could take on holiday with you and read all week instead of going out in the sun ;)

Hey here in France I got a tee-shirt with Shadow of the Beast 1,2 and even Obitus and Leander. SOTB3 came in a much smaller box with no tee-shirt.
I still have these in my attic, good memories !

[Sharpfish]

But I don't think they really feel that similar, apart from both having very smooth animation for the time. Another World is much more of a puzzle/adventure games, and it was apparently mostly influenced by the Amiga port of Dragon's Lair. Flashback is a lot more like Prince of Persia, with all its leaping and climbing and platformery.


Agreed! POP was the first game where I saw really good character animation (not including fake laserdisc games) but AW took the whole environment to another level not just the characters. Very cinematic (when being cinematic seemed like a good thing to strive for). POP is certainly more like FB because it has a more rigid level design with obvious platforms.

@Momor. Yeah It was SOBII I was thinking of (long time and lot's of games ago). There is actually a feature in the latest Edge magazine on Pysgnosis showing all the boxes and what not. Brings back the memories. The Killing Game Show kept me entertained (and frustrated iirc) for a while. Wonder why no one has cloned that? or is it itself a half clone of the classic Nebulus? ;)

Those days are gone. I got hyped up for microcosm on CD32 (disaster!) and ended up forgetting about both and sticking with the SNES and Amiga. Then came the orginal Playstation and for a while gaming felt good, looking back, maybe we have a lot to blame 1995 for after all.

/breaks out of nostalgic daze, realises shit is being talked that could be construed as off topic... quietly leaves forum in shame.

[janwinnicki]

besides (interesting) thread about Another World...

My votes going to Deluxe Galaga and Elastomania, time devours... Maybe I recall something more later...

[electronicStar]

besides (interesting) thread about Another World...

My votes going to Deluxe Galaga and Elastomania, time devours... Maybe I recall something more later...
you mean "All time devours"? the interactive fiction?
Damn that game was great!
I couldn't finsih it but that was one of the greatest gaming experience I ever had:cool:
Unfortunately the-underdogs site is down now so I can put a link to it:(

[Mike Boeh]

Wonder why no one has cloned that? or is it itself a half clone of the classic Nebulus? ;)

I have never seen a true Nebulus clone. It would be so easy to do too.... To this day, if I fire up an Amiga, that's one of the games I play...

Day of the Tentacle, now that was a great game! i actually bought it on ebay a year or two ago, and got it running in that SCUMM emulator... Fun!

[Greg Squire]

I have never seen a true Nebulus clone. It would be so easy to do too.... To this day, if I fire up an Amiga, that's one of the games I play...

Day of the Tentacle, now that was a great game! i actually bought it on ebay a year or two ago, and got it running in that SCUMM emulator... Fun!

It appears somebody did a Nebulus clone here (http://toppler.sourceforge.net/).

Those old LucasArt's adventures were great fun! My favorites were, "Day of the Tentacle", "Monkey Island", and "Sam & Max Hit the Road". Too bad you don't see more of that genre anymore.

[dmikesell]

IMO, Doom was the most revolutionary game ever. It hooked me relatively late in life on games. Never like them much as a kid. Complete immersion.

[janwinnicki]

you mean "All time devours"? (...)(

no, I even don't know what it is :)

[electronicStar]

no, I even don't know what it is :) Oops sorry I thought it was another game title.
I was refering to All things devour (http://www.ifarchive.org/if-archive/games/zcode/devours.z5)a very nice interactive fiction game (text adventure) .
The link above is made to be used with a text adventure interpreter like FROTZ. (http://www.ifarchive.org/indexes/if-archiveXinfocomXinterpretersXfrotz.html)
(since it's text adventure, it might not appeal to everybody and it requires a good share of patience)

[Sharpfish]

I have never seen a true Nebulus clone. It would be so easy to do too.... To this day, if I fire up an Amiga, that's one of the games I play...


I used to have the full page Advert ripped from "Crash" magazine on my wall as a "poster" back in the 80's, I played the spectrum version which had hell of a time trying to emulate that glossy blue airbrushed advert ;).

It is a classic game though. I found some freeware offerings but didn't check em out.

As for DOOM. I love(d) FPSs, I didn't play doom till much later than everyone else (because I stuck with my Amiga through the mid nineties while everyone else was moving onto Pentium 33mhz! ;)) A lot of games owe their existence to it. Maybe Doom owes something to "Driller" or "Space Hulk" / "Corporation" etc but that is another topic.

The only bad thing about DOOM is it ushered in the era of predominantly "shoot people/beings" gameplay that is still the easy option to take these days. Ok so shoot-em-ups had us blasting aliens and ships for years, and certain platformers (exolon for example) had us running and gunning sideways. Once it moved to 3D (or almost 3D) it was a whole new ballgame. Over ten years later, better techniques are being used and the 3D is vastly improved but it's still shoot and run. Hell bring on Crysis and UT2k7.. can't wait ;)

[Batley]

Unfortunately the-underdogs site is down now so I can put a link to it


FYI the-underdogs site is still up, just some problem with the domain.

You can get to it here. http://209.120.136.195/

[d000hg]

DoomII or Quake3 - Q3 is really polished and I prefer fighting bots to searching for keys and then having to take them back somewhere I already went!

[spellcaster]

Also I second the vote for "Day of the Tentacle" and add to that "Monkey Island" and "Sam & Max Hit the Road".
DoomII or Quake3
Why are the Lucas Arts adventures or Doom2/Q3A considered indy games?

[mahlzeit]

Any game with Indiana Jones in it is an indy game. ;)

[Savant]

Doom2/Q3A considered indy games?
Because id started out as a shareware company. People find it clever to refer to them as indie and then others disagree and we get to have the "what does indie mean?" discussion for the 125,981st time.

[spellcaster]

Well, I'd agree that wolfenstein / doom were made in the indy phase of id - but, well, you're right. No deed to start that discussion.

Well, in that case, I'd say WoW is the best indy game out there.

[Artinum]

Then I'll quickly divert attention back towards the topic by mentioning an old, old game I particularly liked on my Atari 65XE (see, I said it was old). Rescue on Fractalus was a big thing back then - flying a spaceship amongst mountain peaks (fractally generated) and blasting alien gun turrets and saucers, whilst looking for shot down pilots and rescuing them.

I stayed up late playing that one many times. Then there was the near heart attack I suffered when, on a later level, with those nine-minute days and nights cycling round and enemies everywhere, I stopped to pick up a pilot. The footsteps sounded as he jogged through the corrosive atmosphere. A moment of silence before the knocking on the airlock door - but this time there was no knock. Instead an alien with eyes on stalks leapt up at my cockpit window with the electronic equivalent of "bleargghhh!!!" coming from the speaker.

That was NOT mentioned in the manual!

[Greg Squire]

Why are the Lucas Arts adventures or Doom2/Q3A considered indy games?

Oops. I lost track of the original purpose of the thread. I was just thinking of some great games I've played in the past, and didn't give much thought about the "Indie" part of it. I suppose you can consider LucasArts and ID software as "Independent" Developers (as they don't need finacial backing from a publisher), but many may not consider them "Indie" (especially now). ID software was a lot more "Indie" back in the days of "DOOM" and "Castle Wolfenstein 3D", when they used the shareware model almost exclusively. Please, I don't want to start another "what is Indie?" discussion, but that's why games like "Doom" have been mentioned.

I also liked the orginal "Duke Nukem" from Apogee, back when they were using shareware exclusively as well.

[Viridian]

In fact, Julian Gollop is a member of this forum.
Holy Toledo, you are kidding me. The creator of XCOM is a member of this forum. That is supercool.

[Viridian]

Without question: Out of This World (http://www.mobygames.com/game/out-of-this-world)

I am about to commit blasphemy, apparently.

I HATED Another World/Out of This World.

Yes, the polygonal animation was groundbreaking.

Yes, it was supercool that it was made by one guy.

But the game was so damn hard. It was just impossible to get through. There was only one way to complete any particular segment, and pressing the wrong button or getting your timing wrong meant starting that segment again.

And again.

And again.

And again and again and again and...

Not to mention the disturbingly realistic animations when the main character would die.

I never finished Out of This World or Heart of The Alien, but I did finish Heart of Darkness, which was also designed by Chahi.

Same damn thing. VERY hard, damn hard, and very graphic death animations when you messed up. This time involving a ten-year-old boy.

My least favorite? You're climbing on a wall. There are giant snakes living in holes on the wall and you must time your climbs to get past them. And you mess up. The snake grabs the boy and pulls him halfway into the hole. You see the boy's legs kicking. Then you hear a CRUNCH. The boy's legs stop kicking. Then the boy is pulled completely into the hole.

As a parent, I found that animation very, very disturbing. Who the hell would put an animation like that into a game?

And why did I do this? Why did I play all the way to the end? Because my daughter (who was probably seven years old at the time) got suckered in by the cutesy intro movie and wanted to find out what happens.

At least in this game, the boy actually gets to go home if you manage to do everything perfectly. Unlike the sequel to Out of This World, where Lester gets killed halfway through.

[Sysiphus]

Laser Squad!

Woah. I *really* liked that game. And I am not usually that passionate with a game.

lol, now I work as pixel/3d artist...So much I would love to make something like that..

But seems the retro wave is "retreating", again...sniff...

I think I played xcom too, not sure.

[Mark_Tempe]

Original Laser Squad ( on Comodore 64 ) now there was a time stealer:o

[Davaris]

I like CosmoBots and the Grow games for their unusual game play.

[Anthony Flack]

As a parent, I found that animation very, very disturbing. Who the hell would put an animation like that into a game?

And why did I do this? Why did I play all the way to the end? Because my daughter (who was probably seven years old at the time) got suckered in by the cutesy intro movie and wanted to find out what happens.

I was just playing it earlier. Funnily, I felt the exact opposite response. I hated the ugly, cutesy cutscenes. But I loved the animation in the actual game. And having sat through those awful cutscenes, and hating that stupid boy, it felt okay to watch him die horribly like that.

I just wish they'd skipped the cutscenes altogether. It must have been a huge expense at the time, and they don't match the game graphics at all. Not to mention the jarring inconsistency, as you say, between the syruppy cutscenes, and the gruesome game.