Retro Gaming: Fond memories...

[Xeio]

Xeio, I find the lack of Mechwarrior in that list disturbing (Not that the others aren't also entirely awesome).

I've never been a fan of the series, but I've only played one of them on the Xbox (not 360), and I didn't find it all that great. I was never sure why the series got so much acclaim, I must have been playing a bad (or mediocre, anyway) one. I played Heavy Gear and Starsiege online so much though, especially modded maps for the latter.

[bigstrat2003]

That's MechAssault, not MechWarrior. MechAssault was... ok, but not great. MechWarrior, on the other hand, is fucking awesome (and only on the PC). They need to make a fifth one one day.

[Xeio]

That's MechAssault, not MechWarrior. MechAssault was... ok, but not great. MechWarrior, on the other hand, is fucking awesome (and only on the PC). They need to make a fifth one one day.

This explains much...

To not continue off topic any further:
-When your only form of tutorial was the manual, and you were DAMN HAPPY to have it.
-When difficulty came in one flavor; impossible
-When each and every level was a crawl through quicksand, in a field being shelled by artillery, with mines, and snakes
-You actually used the 'notes' part of the manual, filling it with dozens/hundreds of codes for each level in the game
-"It's dangerous to go alone. Take this." Were the only words of comfort in a harsh, unforgiving world.

Is it bad that I actually miss some of those?

[InstinctSage]

That's strange... You played Heavy Gear, you even played Earthsiege, but you missed all the Mechwarriors till they crapped the series down the toilet with the console titles?

I miss the big thick manuals. Especially on the 4x games. You'd start a new game 5 or 6 times, spending hours each time, before you finally got to a point where you knew what you were doing, and then you really started to learn a thing or two.

[Pizzashark]

-Speaking of cheats: "it's a good day to die" and "glittering prizes"

IDKFA.

EDIT: Speaking of mech games. Anyone remember StarSiege? It was released about the same time as Tribes (hey, more retro), but focused on mechs and tanks and other stuff like that instead of infantry. It was a lot of fun. I was running it on a 333 MHz AMD of some kind (I don't even remember what kind of proc it was, other than AMD) with a little pissant ATi Rage II Pro 16MB on-board video, and I swear it was running at like... 340x280 or something ridiculously low. Back then, I thought 800x600 was GREAT, and 640x480 was good. Hah.

[Plasma Man]

Atari 2600, playing Breakout with the paddle controllers. Joysticks that had only one button. Pitfall, with the excellent sound effect when you swung on a vine.
Spectrum +2, with the Bond game The Living Daylights. It came with a primitive lightgun, but you still needed to use the keyboard to move. Epic 8-player games of Chaos. Games of Rebelstar that went on for hours. Loading times that seemed to go on for hours. Being able to sing along with the noises my favourite games made as they were loaded from the tape. Copying game code from magazines into Basic to run games. Your Sinclair magazine. Free cover tapes of games. Text adventures. Passwords for levels that you had to keep written down. Side-scrolling shooters (Silkworm - awesome, but impossible). Isometric 3d being state of the art. Monochromatic games. Dizzy games (you control an egg? WTF?). Choice of Sinclair or Kempston joysticks. Some games not accepting the space bar as a fire button and crashing.

[fyrenwater]

Super Mario Kart

That game is easily in my top 10. Battle mode was awesome. Stage 2 (Koopa Beach) was fun, especially if you used cape feathers to hop inside the water squares, hiding until you got a red shell. Back then, it wasn't called camping, it was called, "Quit hiding in the squares, poophead!" XD

Speaking of oldschool Mario, I dug out Super Mario World. Did a speed run and beat the game in about 20 minutes. When I was a kid, it took me like 20 months to beat it. It's nice to see that it's aged well. Still a hardcore fan and occasionally play to look for more secrets and new trickses. <3

[headprogrammingczar]

Speaking of oldschool Mario, I dug out Super Mario World. Did a speed run and beat the game in about 20 minutes. When I was a kid, it took me like 20 months to beat it. It's nice to see that it's aged well. Still a hardcore fan and occasionally play to look for more secrets and new trickses. <3

Did you get to the secret area inside the star area? The easter egg at the end of it is hilarious, not to mention the level names themselves.

[Plasma Man]

Tubular was always the nightmare one. It caused endless frustration for months, if not years. Of course, now I know the easy way to do it, but I still feel proud when I remember doing it the "proper" way.

[bigstrat2003]

There's an easy way to do Tubular!?!?

[SecondTalon]

TALON DEMANDS YOU REVEAL THIS EASY WAY because he's too lazy to look on Gamefaqs.

[Osha]

NiGHTS into Dreams people! if you've never played this game I feel immensely sorry for you. I was devastated when Dad got rid of the Sega Saturn just because of this game. It was amazing! Seriously, when I have money to spare someday I am going to mod a playstation 2 just so I can play the Japanese version of this game. Yes it is that amazing. You should do it too, you'll thank me. This is not just nostalgia talking.

Also: Gaurdian's Crusade. I cannot help crying whenever I see the intro FMV.

Also: Something weird. I used to be pretty darn lousy at video games, as I was just a little kid. But then one day playing Sonic the Hedgehog 2, something just clicked and I easily got twice as far as I ever had before (and then I had to pause for a bit and someone turned it off). Ever since that day I've pretty good at video games.

[Xanthir]

Shit, I'm gonna have to go buy SMW on WiiWare now. I think I saw it last time I browsed the catalog...

[Plasma Man]

Easy / easier way to get through Tubular

Spoiler:

Get a blue Yoshi, then it is possible to get a Koopa in your mouth, giving your Yoshi wings and allowing you to Yoshi fly over the stage. I can't remember if you need to spit it out part way through and get another one or if you can do the whole stage in one. Either way, it's a lot easier than inflating yourself.

[teamcorndog]

I just remembered that I used to own a SegaCD. Did anyone else? Mine came with a game called "Sewer Shark", which involved flying some sort of aircraft thingy through sewers and killing mutant rats. It had REAL VIDEO FOOTAGE of REAL PEOPLE ACTORS, which pretty muchly blew my mind. zomg teh tecknologie!

[Izawwlgood]

I remember that game being like those Tri-Vision^TM things where you had to put the right button sequence in or you died.

Sewer Shark was basically like a Panzer Dragoon without the awesome. But whoa, those actors were GREAT! Remember seeing Kane for the first time? Or the STUPENDOUS acting done in Warhawk for PS1's opening sequence?

It seems... He... Has taken a supply of... Red MERCURY (dundundun), and it's your job.... to save the day. Get out there boys!

[Felstaff]

I'm trying to recall all the pieces of music from this game. The game over music was I Vow to Thee, My Country from Holst's Jupiter, and there is also a bit of Ride of the Valkyries. What is the other piece called?

doo do-do doooo! do-do-do-do-DOO do-be-do-be dooooooo.

Ach, it's running around my head, and it's a really famous piece of music.

[Izawwlgood]

Not being able to finish Tropico because Blockbuster didn't include the manual.
Thinking Bill Lambeer was a fucking God
Hating the music puzzle in Myst

[philsov]

The passcode to Metal Gear (NES): 25 characters long. In hex.

After the first time of screwing up, I'd triple check to make sure I wrote it down correctly for the next time.

[The Moomin]

I remember spending many happy hours at my friend's trying to best Doomdark in the Lords of Midnight on the Spectrum.

His dad had amazingly copied the game map from the manual to an A2-A1 size sheet attached to a corkboard. Each lord in the game had their own pin with the flag drawn on so they could be moved around the map to represent where they are.

Xajorkith was demolished by all the pinholes, and we never did manage to defeat Doomdark by force, only ever by sneaking Morkin in to steal the icecrown.

Then they ruined it all by making a pants 3d version with real time movement.