Hazily Remembered Games With Only the Vaguest Notion of What They Were

Gravey wrote:

Should we prepend "imbiginjapan Identifies Your" to the thread title?

There aren't a lot of things I'm good at but dredging up info on archaic games is one of them.

This game D * Generation, or something like that - a DOS game, was awesome. A couple of friends had it when I was a kid, and I loved it. I think it was a dystopian thing, isometric controls, weird color scheme. I kind of wish there was a remake. I couldn't tell you much about the mechanics or puzzles in it though.

Damnable Bear wrote:

This game D * Generation, or something like that - a DOS game, was awesome. A couple of friends had it when I was a kid, and I loved it. I think it was a dystopian thing, isometric controls, weird color scheme. I kind of wish there was a remake. I couldn't tell you much about the mechanics or puzzles in it though.

http://store.steampowered.com/app/38...

***Not vouching for quality.

Jeez thanks for the Shadow of the Ninja help!

I also thought of this recently:

KaterinLHC wrote:
imbiginjapan wrote:
ccesarano wrote:

All I remember is you could pick up bread for health, and when you ate it the music stopped and there was a deep 8-bit gulping sound. That sound effect is the only reason the game has stuck with me.

Maybe Faxanadu?

Another vote for Faxandu. God, the hours I wiled away with that one. Do you remember the NPCs blinking very, very rapidly?

There was this NES sidescroller set in Ancient Greece, in which you fought monsters like the Minotaur and Medusa. I also remember very tall trees, and winged shoes that let you fly. Sadly, that's all I remember. I don't even remember if it was a good game or not, but not knowing which game this was has bugged me for years.

The thing I remember most about Faxandu is grinding and grinding and grinding so I could buy the Uber-Weapon early in the game. I lost quite a lot of money once by not, "Remembering my Mantra" so after that I saved and saved often until I got enough money to buy the Uber-Weapon and then I went through the rest of the game like the living embodiment of war.

I remember all the games I've played, I even started listing them a few years ago, I'm that cuckoo. But I just love reading other people's memories, it's pretty awesome.
Will try to help with the identifying, although I'm no help with anything that wasn't on a PC.
Jrralls' game the first post sounded like Time Riders until he mentioned Nessie.

Looked up footage of Faxanadu and... maybe? It doesn't have the "gulping" sound effect I remember, and the protagonist isn't the right color, but we're talking something we rented once approximately 25 years ago, so who knows how reliable my memory really is.

Looks like the sort of game we'd have played, though.

I've been thinking about this for days (without posting, because real life is hogging my, er, life) and finally vaguely recalled this gem:

IMAGE(http://gamesdbase.com/Media/SYSTEM/Commodore_Amiga/Box/big/Rules_of_Engagement_2_-_1993_-_Impressions_Games.jpg)

There was an early wargame on one of the consoles that I've been trying to remember for years and years. I'm pretty sure it was hex-based, and I think it might have been on either the Turbo Grafx 16 (maybe with the CD option??) or the Neo Geo (less likely), but I haven't been able to find anything that looks right for either of those systems.

I remember hexes, factories to make units, at least air and ground units, something about airlifts, and maybe a rift down the middle of some maps. (I have a vague memory of airlifting over gorges.) I'm remembering it as being rather like Advance Wars, but haven't been able to pin anything down.

Any ideas? I believe the consoles I had available at the time would have been the Turbo Grafx 16, the Neo Geo, and the SNES. It *might* have been on the 3DO, but for some reason I don't think so. I think it predated that console. (My roommate was really into games and made a lot of money, so he had everything. )

I can't remember if it was NES or arcade, but something about ninjas and tall tree trunks come to mind.

Also another ninja game where one boss had a huge cheeks and blew you around. Might be the same games.

jrralls wrote:

I remember going to computer lab in the early 1980's and playing a game where . . . you time travel? I think? It was kind of sort a text game, but not solely text (probably) . . . Look, the only thing I can remember about it is that you meet the Loch Ness Monster. That is burned into my memory vividly. Nessie roars out of the deep and confronts you. But other than that, I can't recall a thing.

Pinging this to see if anyone has any suggestions cause now it's just bugging me. I distinctly remember that Nessie didn't appear right away. There was a puzzle you had to solve to her to appear. My friend could always solve it and I couldn't.

imbiginjapan wrote:

For the longest time

Cobble wrote:

Way back when I remember playing a game on some obscure console. It might have been colecovision but something makes me think it wasn't. It was a flying game but it was more about shooting and dropping bombs. I think you only had a view looking down from the belly of the plane. The biggest standout though is the word "flak". The game said it all the time.

I guess that makes it not coleco as there wasn't any voice in those games. Maybe intellivision?

Fighters. 3....O'Clock!....Watch'em...

Man I LOVED B17 Bomber back in the day!

Also, I'm old.

Oh man do I need your help.
I have been troubled by one old half-remembered game for many years.

It was a PC role playing game, probably from the late 1980s or very early 1990s but certainly before 1996.

It made a big impression on me because of the complexity. I believe it was party based, with isometric turn based combat. But combat was on pretty small maps I think. And there was no wandering around an over-world (though there was a world map). I believe the setting was medieval Germany, and the basic game loop was that you would get a quest, for example there might be a group of heretics that needed to be taken out. If you took the quest you would travel to their hideout (can't remember if you might have encounters along the way, but travel across the map was not really part of the game). And then you would enter their lair (which might be one room) and would have a fight on an isometric tile based map.

Story was pretty thin. I think it might have been as simple as "you are a mercenary captain", but ambiance was quite good, with menus on parchment and stuff like that. And there were LOTS of systems. Definitely potion brewing of some kind and maybe armor crafting as well. lots of fiddly bits equipping your party with gear and supplies. I don't think there was magic exactly, but you were sort of in a version of medieval Germany just at the edge of reality, with a little alchemy and witches and stuff like that.

I believe the box for the PC game was sort of brown with armor of some sort on the front. I have this vision of a set of gothic plate armor on the box, or maybe just the helmet.

The game has stuck with me because I feel like I see aspects of its DNA baked into more recent RPGs. The early elder scrolls games really remind me of this old game, and the witcher games seem descended from it as well.

I have searched for the game occasionally over the years, but have never had enough to go on. If any of you have any ideas I would be very grateful!

Darklands!

IMAGE(http://www.scientificgamer.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/crypt.jpg)
IMAGE(http://www.scientificgamer.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/options.jpg)

A game so good it's worth posting twice!

Holy smokes you are fast.
Yes. Yes that is the game.
Interesting to see how my hazy fever dream memory compares to the real thing.
And glad to see some on the internet agree it was a great RPG in its own way. Always wondered if it was a touchstone for other people as well.

Fraterpotens wrote:

Holy smokes you are fast.
Yes. Yes that is the game.
Interesting to see how my hazy fever dream memory compares to the real thing.
And glad to see some on the internet agree it was a great RPG in its own way. Always wondered if it was a touchstone for other people as well.

It was one of the most ambitious RPGs of its time, great at a whole lot of things, and also one of the buggiest games I've ever played

PoderOmega wrote:

I can't remember if it was NES or arcade, but something about ninjas and tall tree trunks come to mind.

Demon Sword?

jrralls wrote:
jrralls wrote:

I remember going to computer lab in the early 1980's and playing a game where . . . you time travel? I think? It was kind of sort a text game, but not solely text (probably) . . . Look, the only thing I can remember about it is that you meet the Loch Ness Monster. That is burned into my memory vividly. Nessie roars out of the deep and confronts you. But other than that, I can't recall a thing.

Pinging this to see if anyone has any suggestions cause now it's just bugging me. I distinctly remember that Nessie didn't appear right away. There was a puzzle you had to solve to her to appear. My friend could always solve it and I couldn't.

Do you remember what kind of machine you were using?

PurEvil wrote:
jrralls wrote:
jrralls wrote:

I remember going to computer lab in the early 1980's and playing a game where . . . you time travel? I think? It was kind of sort a text game, but not solely text (probably) . . . Look, the only thing I can remember about it is that you meet the Loch Ness Monster. That is burned into my memory vividly. Nessie roars out of the deep and confronts you. But other than that, I can't recall a thing.

Pinging this to see if anyone has any suggestions cause now it's just bugging me. I distinctly remember that Nessie didn't appear right away. There was a puzzle you had to solve to her to appear. My friend could always solve it and I couldn't.

Do you remember what kind of machine you were using?

Pretty sure it was an Apple II or Commodore 64.

Ok there's one that I think of often,loved it in the day but can't remember it! Was I think mid to late 90s PC game. I think it was along the lines of Heroes of Might and Magic or maybe even more like Civ where you have a party across a world map, medieval fantasy setting. I think there may have been an angel on the cover but might be wrong. It had the most beautiful choir soundtrack and I remember just loving that game but just can't remember details! Would love to track down the soundtrack.

Anyone?

jrralls wrote:
PurEvil wrote:
jrralls wrote:
jrralls wrote:

I remember going to computer lab in the early 1980's and playing a game where . . . you time travel? I think? It was kind of sort a text game, but not solely text (probably) . . . Look, the only thing I can remember about it is that you meet the Loch Ness Monster. That is burned into my memory vividly. Nessie roars out of the deep and confronts you. But other than that, I can't recall a thing.

Pinging this to see if anyone has any suggestions cause now it's just bugging me. I distinctly remember that Nessie didn't appear right away. There was a puzzle you had to solve to her to appear. My friend could always solve it and I couldn't.

Do you remember what kind of machine you were using?

Pretty sure it was an Apple II or Commodore 64.

Cave of Time? It was on both systems.

Docjoe wrote:

Ok there's one that I think of often,loved it in the day but can't remember it! Was I think mid to late 90s PC game. I think it was along the lines of Heroes of Might and Magic or maybe even more like Civ where you have a party across a world map, medieval fantasy setting. I think there may have been an angel on the cover but might be wrong. It had the most beautiful choir soundtrack and I remember just loving that game but just can't remember details! Would love to track down the soundtrack.

Anyone?

Heroes of Might and Magic III came out about that time, and had an angel on the cover. It had a symphonic soundtrack though.

Malor wrote:

There was an early wargame on one of the consoles that I've been trying to remember for years and years. I'm pretty sure it was hex-based, and I think it might have been on either the Turbo Grafx 16 (maybe with the CD option??) or the Neo Geo (less likely), but I haven't been able to find anything that looks right for either of those systems.

The game your describing sounds a lot like Conflict, but I only remember that being on the NES. It's possible the NES version was a port though. Turbo Grafix 16 and Neo Geo are some pretty big holes in my gaming knowledge.

Malor wrote:

There was an early wargame on one of the consoles that I've been trying to remember for years and years. I'm pretty sure it was hex-based, and I think it might have been on either the Turbo Grafx 16...

... I'm remembering it as being rather like Advance Wars, but haven't been able to pin anything down.

Military Madness - (just happened to watch a Turbografx system retrospective last night where this was featured.

PoderOmega wrote:

I can't remember if it was NES or arcade, but something about ninjas and tall tree trunks come to mind.

Legend of Kage?

I bet no one knows about this, but a little game that's about 17 years old called Spooky Castle. If I recall, it was like dungeon-crawling for kids. Surprisingly fun for what it was.

Was there a game, possibly on the Genesis, in which you were a ninja and, based on which weapon you had picked up, you could change into different beasts or monsters?

It wasn't Altered Beast, was it?

Grenn wrote:

Was there a game, possibly on the Genesis, in which you were a ninja

You just described like every game from that era!