I played all of these and am not even sure how I got them as a kid. The only one that had a box and disks that I remember was Flight Sim… I think they may have literally come already installed on the PC my parents got second-hand.
Still have these.
I loved most of the games on that list. The entire 90s decade had so many incredible games. 98 was particularly a good year to be a gamer.
Dark Forces!
My favorite achievement was beating the whole game with the starter pistol. The final boss took so much ammo! Just kept running and gunning. I think the melee Dark Trooper Mark 1 was the hardest though, thing would just bum rush you the whole fight.
That was probably my first shooter, such a great game.
I realized, the moment I fell into the fissure, that the book would not be destroyed as I had planned. It continued falling into that starry expanse of which I had only a fleeting glimpse.
Doom Shareware was among the top-selling games?
Some of us had to buy shareware disks back then. The full game cost to much.
Also remember buying shareware disks for Jazz Jackrabbit, Gods, Raptor, one I can’t remember the name but the games was like exploring a castle in isometric view…
It might mean people converting from the shareware version to full
That Westwood Monopoly game was baller. I loved it as a kid. The animations going across the board were fun.
How does the shareware version of Doom have any sales numbers at all?
The shareware version was available multiple ways.
Most probably got a floppy at a local store for $9 or less that had the 1st 9 levels of Doom (basically paying for the disk/shipping, for a fee demo that was still a great game). Then you were supposed to pay full price for the rest of the disks/levels if you wanted the full game ($30-40 I think).
However, you could (though. Most didn’t have the ability to) download the shareware for free on a BBS at dial up speed. Then up grade with the full game with the floppy disks/CD (or a copy… Yo ho).
I was just starting college in 95, had purchased my 1st real PC, and had access to university Internet. So I was one of the lucky ones that made copies for my friends, so we could play on LAN.
Also, Eventually the shareware version was released on those CDs with a ton of free software demos and such that came with gamer/PC magazines back then.
For the majority of people who didn’t yet have a BBS or internet connection (or a friend who would copy the shareware onto a floppy), they also sold a boxed version of the shareware version in stores for a low price, like 5 or 10 bucks I think.
Crazy to think they made millions selling a demo of Doom. It sure was a phenomenon at the time.
It also puts Myst’s performance into perspective, a puzzle game beating out Doom by that much is incredible.
That demo had the entire first episode in it though.
Huh. I only every encountered shareware through an intermediary and those unofficial compilation dis[ck]s they’d sell at computer stores and book stores, so I figured that’s how most people would get them. I guess it makes sense that the shareware would have to be seeded through the market somehow, just never really thought about it.
When I was a kid there was a discount store in a strip mall by my house that would sell these shareware floppys for like $2 a pop. So i’d pick up Doom, Wolfenstien, etc for cheap. I imagine many peple did the same.
Also keep in mind that the Doom Shareware floppy had like the entire first episode on it and eventually if you managed to get on a decent internet connection or knew someone who had the rest of the game you could copy that to your shareware version.
Also id games were notoriously easy to pirate. I mean hell Quake 3 Arena for example all you needed was to find pak0 and you were pretty much off to the races. Today it’s one of the easiest games to “pirate” on linux. I have the damn pak files on a codeberg repo.
You had to pay for the disk it came on; the internet wasn’t publicly available until the year this article was published. Demos for games were typically $5 at retail. You’d also find compilations of demos on a single disk being labeled as “50 games in 1!” even tho they weren’t even full games.
Or certain magazines would include a free disk/cd
Like the one this article came from. Man I loved CGW. I was subscribed right up until they ended publication. Unfortunately, my shit-ass family threw my collection out when I was gone 6 months on a cruise ship job. 😡
I’ve watched too much Futurama because I first read that as “circuits gone wild”… But it sucks that your family threw away your collection.
I played 7 of those games and only bought one. Thank goodness for my buddy’s brother running a warez FTP. I had no money and a barely capable of but got them working most of the time. Except Myst which I could never get the sound to work so the only way I could play it was with a guide to tell me how the puzzles worked with no sound cues to help.
Guess which game was the only one that was purchased. Myst.
I think the image failed to federate for me or something.
- Myst
- Microsoft Flight Simulator
- Doom II
- Doom Shareware
- Riven: The Sequel to Myst
- WarCraft II
- SimCity 2000
- The 7th Guest (hell yea! representing !stauf_mansion@lemmy.mods4ever.com )
- Star Wars: Dark Forces
- Monopoly
Cendent software!? I’m certain they were called blizzard back then.
The companies listed are the publishers, not developers.
It’s a little messy, but Cendant later became Vivendi, and then merged into Activision.
It was Blizzard since forever, I have never heard of Cendent or seen their logo anywhere.
Blizzard started as Silicon and Synapse, The Lost Vikings were published under that name.
Cendent must be the publisher though.
Which Monopoly is that at no 10?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopoly_video_games?wprov=sfla1
There’s no Hasbro Interactive PC game between 1993 and 1998 except ‘Monopoly World Cup France 98 Edition’. There is a Monopoly by Westwood Studios, maybe it’s that one.
The ‘Company’ in the list is apparently the publisher, not the developer. The Westwood Monopoly is indeed the one in the list, as it was published by Hasbro according to the wiki entry.
7th guest, so intriguing but pretty difficult. Never finished it.
Yeah, I had no idea what I was doing, got frustrated and never tried it again.
I remember it taking forever to get it to run properly on my computer
Yeah it was pretty ahead of its time back then graphics wise.
I think it was the first video game that had full motion video cut scenes and 3D rendered scenes transitions. If I remember correctly, I had to upgrade my video card and my Cd-ROM to handle it.
try the “remake” that came out this year (IMO it’s more like a “reboot” not a remake)
if you want to play the original…
There even is/was a VR remake!
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2456960/The_7th_Guest_VR/
Although for some reason it is “unlisted” on Steam.
It’s unlisted because it’s now a combo purchase with the regular remake, you get both versions together
Ohhh that’s cool! Thanks for letting me know! I might not wait for the Steam Frame to purchase it then after all haha
People actually bought Myst?
As I recall everyone with that game got it for free(like included with a PC) and had no idea wtf to do in the game and it often was used as a coaster.
My Dad bought it like nearly 10 times cause it kept giving it away to his friends like a book so he’d end up rebuying it over and over to replay and eventually give away. if it were floppy based I imagine he would just copy it and hand out but since it was like the first major CD release he just bought it over and over.
And we also got the game a few more times as freebies from like buying a new PC or graphics/sound card/whatever. Christ we had so many damn copies of that game.
Gather 'round, young ones, while I relate the tales of the dark times when we had computers before myst…
(AOL CDs were coasters, though).
The CDs were coasters for sure, but the floppies were free extra storage once you formatted them. Was a handy service AOL provided for a while, distributing free storage.
I didn’t see too many of the floppies, but I grew up in a very rural area. I think I have a 1.x AOL floppy still in storage back in the US.
I liked exploring it as a kid, but going back to it as an adult it kinda lost me with how gamey some of the puzzles were despite it trying to sell you on the idea that this is a lived in world. Like, who is going to design a door lock to correspond to some nearby whistling holes in the ground?
From what I’ve read, the sequel Rivan did a better job of making the puzzles feel more integrated into the world, but I only played that briefly as a kid and haven’t gotten around to trying it again.
Sorry for barging in through the door like a Jehovah’s Witness, but if you like these kinds of games you must try The Drifter. I finished it yesterday and it’s the best point-and-click I’ve ever played, may well have ruined the genre for me. It’s an adventure game that actually doesn’t use moon logic. A couple puzzles were a bit convoluted, but even those I felt like actually were based on some logic and made sense.
Plus it’s a great pulp story with phenomenal voice acting. Can’t recommend it enough. Well anyway, sorry for the interruption, I’ll move on to the next house. Thanks for your time.
I actually recently blasted through the first 3 chapters of The Telwynium by the same creator, and absolutely loved it (I’d say it was one of the best point’n’clicks I’d ever played, up there with Robin Hood from Sierra, which is the sole departure from them where the puzzles all make sense), so I’ll definitely be picking up the drifter at some point (and the steam release of the Telwynium which will have the 4th chapter).
Ah, good to hear. I checked out his other games on Steam and wishlisted Telwynium immediately after finishing The Drifter, but it will probably be some time before I play it. I like to switch things up genre-wise game to game. But I’m glad to hear it’s also quality, I’ll definitely pick it up at some point during some future sale.
Yes, Riven really improved on that aspect, by a lot. The puzzles feel incredibly natural and purposeful. Everything in Riven serves as world-building. Everything has a reason to exist. And the puzzles flow naturally together. It’s a game of discovery that rewards exploration. I’d absolutely recommend the recent remake.
Give it a try, Riven has a very special place in my heart. It got a remake with VR option couple of years ago
I only got around to playing Myst when the VR version came out. Haven’t made the time to play through Riven too, but I heard it had a VR version too. It’s somewhere on The Pile.
Copies were in stores everywhere and based on the box art it seemed like a casual game with an interesting aesthetic.
I think that counts as a sale still. PCs would buy bulk licenses or report back sale #s and pay some $ for the games they bundled and tossed in “for free” with the different computer bundles. They still kinda do that too, sometimes graphics cards or individual components even have “free” games or software.
So it still counted as a sale from their side. You just got it “free” as a bonus.
My PCs came with some phenomenal free disks over the years.
Wing Commander 2, Strike Commander (F-16 combat), Syndicate Plus, Ultima VII on a single CD was a really good one. I think that same PC also had Magic Carpet on CD as well. I treasure all those games.
I still have my OG Doom on like a stack of 4? 3.5 Floppy Disks from our 386 Windows 3.1 PC.
Wouldn’t sales through pack-in games also count?
I bought the entire series and played most of them through happily. (Except for Myst V, mostly because of the darn tablet mechanics.)
it’s tough! I think you were just expected to spend a long time with the game, like months…
I owned 8 of these games, and dearly loved them
