Thursday, October 1, 2009

Thallian's Favorites: Old PC Games you should try out sometime! (Most are free now)

So, I've been around the block a few times on the PC and I can think of some of the best gems, they don't come around that often really, and I wanted to share a little about some old games you may or may not be able to find anymore. Now please don't think these are the best games I've EVER played. I'm following two rules here: must have come out a long time ago, and must not be an MMO. Out of that set of games, these are the best I've ever played. Enjoy:

Today is DOS REALM day! Tomorrow is Atari day!

1. DOS Realm: Castle: I played this on our old IBM pc clone which was our first computer ever!

There's a great article about it here on gamespy but I will provide my own synopsis. Castle is a role playing game where you explore an old castle and start with next to nothing. You have to do a bit of exploring, a bit of puzzle solving, and a bit of choosing to run or fight. And monsters stay where they were when you left the room. Take that Zelda... :P

2. DOS Realm: PAC-MAN! I played this on a arcade machine before even had a computer.

This game was a quarter sucker of death. But I loved it. How those ghosts get your adrenaline rushing and you can sometimes get away but never forever.

3. DOS Realm: Janitor Joe! Evil robots have taken over your work and you are the janitor late at night. Can you escape or will you get vaporized? Yes you can jump on their heads and ride them but then what will you do? Fun for all ages! Great music too.

4. The Gold Box D&D first edition games! Pool of Radiance! Curse of the Azure Bonds! Secret of the Silver Blades! Pools of Darkness! Collect them all! :) These games let you create your whole party, rest wherever you want, fight whoever you want, and die hardcore anytime. You could even die permanently in certain ways and have to reload. You want hardcore, we got it. No map for you! If you want a map you gotta make it on paper as you explore.

5. Fantasy Empires! I tried to find a screen shot of you running your little hero around but alas! You can build half-ling stonethrowers, elven archers, dwarven barbarians, or human infantry/pikemen, and orcs and goblins too I think. Then run your armies around and become the individual guy until he dies, then instantly switch to another! Tons of fun against friends.

6. Last but not least, the last of my top six which are in no particular order, is Stronghold! Gotta Love it! Build all day, or focus on armies and conquest, or take a balanced approach. Choose dwarves, elves, hobbits or humans? Choose thieves, warriors, sorcerers, or whatever! All your units gain levels! And yes it does get old after a while but only after you've had a ball with it.

2 comments:

Oakstout said...

I didn't have a computer when Curse of Azurebonds came out, but a friend, who was in the computer field did. We would go over to his place of work and we'd sit around the computer taking turns playing our characters.

Then, one day, he decided to hack the game and when he did, it caused all the characters to become cursed instead. lol I'm not sure how much further they got in the game, but eventually I think they had to start over.

Thallian said...

lol I didn't think you could survive for long after being cursed, it was usually saved for some desperate plot situations before the bonds were activated. Sounds like a case of "should have made a back up save" :) I loved those old gold box games though. Great story and turn based strategy in battle.