The first inductees into the World Video Game Hall of Fame

Discussion in 'Gaming' started by Aragorn, Jun 5, 2015.

  1. Aragorn

    Aragorn Fleet Admiral Admiral

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    World Video Game Hall of Fame

    Pong, Pac-Man, Super Mario Bros., Tetris, Doom, World of Warcraft.

    You can nominate games for next year on their website.
     
  2. Kelthaz

    Kelthaz Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    That's a pretty good list. I'm trying to think of other games that were just as influential, but I'm coming up blank. Maybe Donkey Kong?
     
  3. Steven

    Steven Admiral Admiral

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    No surprises there, it's a good list.

    For reference, these were the rest of the nominees (again, not a lot of surprises in this list - pretty much guaranteed that most of them will be back next year):
    Angry Birds
    FIFA
    The Legend of Zelda
    Minecraft
    The Oregon Trail
    Pokémon
    The Sims
    Sonic the Hedgehog
    Space Invaders

    Though I wonder how they're going to treat long-running series. Like the Legend of Zelda for example. Do you just take the series as a whole, or would they consider inducting multiple games from the same series (the original, Link to the Past, and Ocarina of Time probably being the top ones to consider)?
     
  4. Reverend

    Reverend Admiral Admiral

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    Thinking just in terms of influence, historical significance and longevity rather than subjective quality is pretty tough since we all have out favourites we'd like to see validated.

    With that in mind I think Rogue should probably be in there. One of the great granddaddies of both procedurally generated levels and dungeon crawling in general. Plus of course the origin of the term "rogue-like" and "rogue-lite" which have become extremely common, particularly among indie games.

    On a similar note, the games for which the "Metroidvania" trope is named probably deserve to at least be considered. Aside from their influence, they're both classic games in their own right. Same goes for the original Zelda.

    Half-Life completely redefined the FPS genre and took immersive storytelling to a whole new level. It was also later modded into several games (most notably Counter-Strike & Team Fortress) that have themselves become classics in their own right.

    Goldeneye might also be worthy just for it's influence on the multiplayer splitscreen side.

    That's all I can think of for now.
    In the case of Zelda I'd say it should be the original as in terms of game mechanics, most Zelda games are basically the same and have just iterated on and refined what the original did. That said I can see a very strong and valid case for Ocarina being made.
     
    Last edited: Jun 5, 2015
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  5. Mick

    Mick Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    Surprised EQ was not on the list.

    And how is Donkey Kong not on the list?!?!
     
  6. Lonemagpie

    Lonemagpie Writer Admiral

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    Space Invaders, Goldeneye, Elite, and X Wing should be on next year's list, IMO
     
  7. Rincewiend

    Rincewiend Admiral Admiral

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    Dune 2 and GTA 3 created whole new genres...
     
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  8. USS Triumphant

    USS Triumphant Vice Admiral Admiral

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    I feel like Dungeon (the game that was broken down to be Zork I - III for retail release) should have been inducted, but then that might trigger an argument about what a "video game" IS, since Dungeon started the adventure genre of games, but might technically be regarded as "interactive fiction"?

    I also think they should release a statement that says that Tennis for Two and certain other similar games will never need to be inducted because they are considered as having been In At Founding for the museum.
     
  9. SPCTRE

    SPCTRE Badass Admiral

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    Oh, another list. Yay.
     
  10. Disco

    Disco Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    Pinaciphobia?
     
  11. Magellan

    Magellan Commander Red Shirt

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    Halls of Fame are rather silly, but I'm surprised no one mentioned Street Fighter II.
     
  12. MacLeod

    MacLeod Admiral Admiral

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    What about Civillisation.
     
  13. USS Triumphant

    USS Triumphant Vice Admiral Admiral

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    Civilization definitely belongs, I'm just not sure it would be one of the first six I would choose. But then, Doom and WoW wouldn't have made *my* first six, either.
     
  14. MacLeod

    MacLeod Admiral Admiral

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    About the only one I think that doesn't belong (at least amongest the inagural inductees) is WoW.
     
  15. Reverend

    Reverend Admiral Admiral

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    Yeah, WoW seemed to stick out a bit to me too. I'm not a WoW player, never have been but even still I have to respect that it is probably the most popular *and* most profitable PC game in history, bar none. Though I gather it's now way past it's peak, for better or worse it pretty much solidified what the MMORPG genre would become and spawned at least as many copy-cats as the likes of Doom, Mario and Zelda, if not more. None of which have apparently even been able to equal WoW, much less surpass it.

    So while it wouldn't have been my pick, I can see why it's there.
     
  16. SPCTRE

    SPCTRE Badass Admiral

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    It's the same discussion everytime, with every single one of these lists.

    influence VS (some arbitrary, perceived) level of "quality"

    (Oh, and there are those who basically want to copy-paste sales charts, trying to account for inflation etc.)
     
  17. B.J.

    B.J. Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    One that I think should be inducted, not because it was a great game, but because of how different it was at the time, is Dragon's Lair. It's also only one of three games (along with Pong and Pac Man) to be put into storage at the Smithsonian.
     
  18. The Lensman

    The Lensman Commodore Commodore

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    Zork 1 was the first computer game a lot of people played. Yeah, it had no graphics, but it's still a game. The Infocom games were the first story based games when everything else was just button mashing reflex games. Most games now follow that more cinematic story based mode. People could enter a world with it's own history when playing a Zork / Quendor game. There was nothing else like that when they came out.
     
  19. USS Triumphant

    USS Triumphant Vice Admiral Admiral

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    I'll second that, for certain. Fairly crappy gameplay, actually, but I kept putting quarters in even so just to *look* at it. :bolian:

    Along those lines, here's something I probably *won't* expect to go into the museum, but you might find it interesting, anyway:
    [yt]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jbl_23GwjJ8[/yt]
     
  20. B.J.

    B.J. Rear Admiral Rear Admiral

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    ^ Yeesh. I remember playing that thing a few times in the arcade. :rolleyes: