52 replies to this topic

[Nukey Shay]

I was thinking about this the other day. What are the names of games that opened up new styles of gameplay? For example:
Wolfenstein3d is credited for being the original 1st-person shooter, for example (though this is argued to a point with Star Raiders...but that one is already credited for being the original 1st-person space sim).
Pitfall! is argued to be the first side-scrolling platformer (even though fluid scrolling wouldn't happen for a platformer until Super Mario Bros).
Eastern Front 1941 is said to have started war strategy sims (well, ones less abstract than chess anyway).
Adventure for the first role-playing game (as much as there is).

Others?

[CPUWIZ]

Space Invaders - Shooter

[chrisbid]

Karate Champ - 1 on 1 fighters

[Lost Monkey]

Skeet Shoot - "take the money and run" genre, later perfected by Acclaim.

[Nukey Shay]

Ultima Ascension or Final Fantasy VIII...the "let's wreck a RPG series" genre
The Sims Unleashed...the "don't even think about adding this expansion to your old ghetto computer" genre

[compacho]

Super Mario Bros. - Platformer

Yeah, I know. It wasn't the 1st but its the one that popularized the genre.

[Nukey Shay]

Space Panic...1st platformer
(though I enjoyed it as the better-known "Apple Panic")

[ubersaurus]

CPUWIZ said:

Space Invaders - Shooter

I dunno...depends whether or not one would consider a 2 player shooter like Spacewar was as the genesis of the genre.

Of course, Computer Space was the first man on machine shooter that I'm aware of

[sku_u]

Pac-man 2D maze games

[liquid_sky]

Le'mans - Racing game (afaik)

[Nukey Shay]

I dunno...I think that even Head On could be considered a maze as much as PacMan's

[sku_u]

Nukey Shay said:

I dunno...I think that even Head On could be considered a maze as much as PacMan's

True, but Pac-Man is definitely the game that popularized that genre. Donkey Kong is not the first platform game, but it certainly popularized that genre.

When most people think of 2-D maze games, Pac-Man comes to mind before Head On.

[NovaXpress]

Aren't we going for ground-breakingness, not populatity?

Space War was the first space and/or shooting game.

I believe that Atari's Gotcha would be the first maze game.

Space Panic was the first climbing game (which definitely led to Pitfall).

Pong was the first game period (going back to the oscilloscope).

Skeet Shoot was the first game that made me want to burn my Atari.

Tempest was the first game that made me wonder what drugs were like.

Space Wars was the first vector game, tempest was first vector in color.

What was the first color raster game?

[Happy_Dude]

Dune II - RTS

[Happy_Dude]

just a thought, What was the first "light-gun" game ?

[NovaXpress]

The first light-gunner was probably the one on the original Odyssey. Shoot that big white square! Or a lightbulb or whatever glows.

[Clock]

I had a pong type console in the 70s with a light gun.... so I guess that was the first time.

Back on topic.... 3D ANT ATTACK! on the Spectrum.... not just the first isometric perspective 3D game but also the first to be politically correct (you could play as a girl or boy and save the other.)

[liveinabin]

Star Fire was the first game to hold initials by the high score (a small point but one worth mentioning)

Galaxians was the first color bitmap game (okay, not a genre but a mighty popular way of making video games:) )

First trackball game - NFL football

Oh and taking the crown for first RTS game (beating Dune II by 3 years) is Herzog Zwei for the Genesis / Megadrive

Collossal Cave Adventure was the first text adventure game

[liveinabin]

Clock said:

Back on topic.... 3D ANT ATTACK! on the Spectrum.... not just the first isometric perspective 3D game but also the first to be politically correct (you could play as a girl or boy and save the other.)

Bless you sir for mentioning Ant Attack. For anyone who doesn't know it, here's Sandy White's (the authors) personal homepage
Ant Attack homepage

[Ze_ro]

Bosconian was the first game to offer a "continue" feature.

Berzerk was the first game to use digitized speech, which cost about $1000 per word at the time.

Doom was the first game to introduce "Deathmatch", and popularized the concepts of network multiplayer, and amateur level creation. Quake later extended this greatly, and made huge contributions to today's FPS. Incidentally, Wolfenstein 3D was NOT the first 3D shooter... 3D Catacomb Abyss gets that honor with it's old EGA graphics. There were probably some primitive 3D shooter games available on the 8-bit systems that might even predate these, though. It was definitely Wolfenstein 3D that made the genre popular though.

I, Robot was the first game to use filled polygons for it's graphics... although it wouldn't be until Hard Drivin' (the first 3D driving game) that the concept became popularized.

Mortal Kombat introduced the concept of the fatality of course, and Street Fighter 2 heralded a huge flood of one-on-one fighters. Virtua Fighter was, of course, the first 3D polygon fighter.

--Zero

[MegaManFan]

So what do we consider "first" - the first EXAMPLE of a genre, or the first game that made that genre POPULAR? Because I know there were a lot of RPG's before Final Fantasy, but it seems to me that from the hype and press coverage at the time that Final Fantasy for NES became +the+ definitive RPG, the one that put everybody on the path.

[Nukey Shay]

The first...whether anyone took notice of it or not.

[Clock]

I wonder what the first text adventure game was and what year did that appear on mainframes of yesteryear?

[Ze_ro]

MegaManFan said:

I know there were a lot of RPG's before Final Fantasy, but it seems to me that from the hype and press coverage at the time that Final Fantasy for NES became +the+ definitive RPG, the one that put everybody on the path.

Actually, a lot of places credit Ultima III: Exodus with inspiring most modern RPG's. I believe it was the first to use a party system. There was a NES version, but I don't know if it was as popular as the C64/Apple II/etc versions.

I'm glad no one has mentioned Myst. This game was insanely popular and original, but saying it invented a genre is a little grandiose, since the only major games to follow it were actual sequels (and it could even be argued that Myst is the natural evolution of the old Unix games Advent and Zork). Myst is one of the most overrated games in history in my opinion. It was very well done, had nice graphics, and well thought-out puzzles... but i still think people give it too much credit.

SimCity was one of the first games where your objective wasn't well defined, leading to very open-ended gameplay. I'm not sure you could claim that it started a genre really, but it was somewhat of an epiphany in the gaming world. Of course, there were prior games like Utopia for the INTV...

Rogue definitely started a genre... the genre is even known as "roguelike" games. Sadly, many people haven't played these games (If you're amung these people, you really owe it to yourself to try out Nethack, Angband, Dungeon Crawl, or ADOM), and many newcomers are scared away by the lack of flashy graphics... but without Rogue, there would be no Diablo.

On the newer side of things, Super Mario Kart invented the kart-racing sub-genre, and Gran Turismo started the "sim-racing" sub-genre

--Zero

[Ze_ro]

Clock said:

I wonder what the first text adventure game was and what year did that appear on mainframes of yesteryear?

From the Jargon File:

Quote

ADVENT /ad'vent/ n. The prototypical computer adventure game, first implemented on the PDP-10 by Will Crowther as an attempt at computer-refereed fantasy gaming, and expanded into a puzzle-oriented game by Don Woods. Now better known as Adventure, but the TOPS-10 operating system permitted only six-letter filenames. See also vadding.

This game defined the terse, dryly humorous style now expected in text adventure games, and popularized several tag lines that have become fixtures of hacker-speak: "A huge green fierce snake bars the way!" "I see no X here" (for some noun X). "You are in a maze of twisty little passages, all alike." "You are in a little maze of twisty passages, all different." The `magic words' xyzzy and plugh also derive from this game.

Crowther, by the way, participated in the exploration of the Mammoth & Flint Ridge cave system; it actually *has* a `Colossal Cave' and a `Bedquilt' as in the game, and the `Y2' that also turns up is cavers' jargon for a map reference to a secondary entrance.

I'm not sure exactly when Advent was programmed, but it was definitely sometime in the early-to-mid 70's. The source code is actually still available, and you can compile it on modern systems (I don't know if the original was actually written in C, or whether it's a re-write or what).

Many places incorrectly credit Zork with inventing the text-adventure, but Advent definitely predates it. Zork did have a lot to offer though, and definitely deserves it's place in history. The dry humor of Advent survives to this day... just look at games like the Space Quest, Monkey Island, and Day of the Tentacle/Maniac Mansion series.

--Zero