Any kind of game
EDIT: changed from suggested to mentioned and made the title more clear
No One Lives Forever
To this day I have no idea why I bought it. And I bought it close to its release date. I would only do that if I had been absolutely obsessed for months with previews and stuff. But I remember none of that.
And still it ended up becoming one of my all time favourites.
Game of the year! Is it just you or is it hot in here?
Either way I think you need a cold shower!
This is a hard one because I generally try to play good games these days, and good games either get popularized through word of mouth or Youtubers make video essays about how they were misunderstood at the time. For me, this question is really asking “Hey what weird trash did you find back when you were 10 years old digging through the bargain bin for whatever you could trade two games you finished for.”
I think my big picks from the weird trash are The Urbz, which comes from back when they made Sims spinoff games instead of endless DLC, and Ty the Tasmanian Devil, which was a 3D platformer metroidvania that revolved around collecting increasingly elaborate boom-a-rangs. I definitely sunk the most hours into the Urbz, because nothing was more fun to a 10 year old than going around a virtual town flipping people off.
nooo I was gonna say Urbz!
Two very niche board games from the 70s: “Snit’s Revenge” “Lie, Cheat, and Steal”
And an old Avalon Hill wargame: “Wooden Ships and Iron Men”
Lie, Cheat, and Steal!!! We used to play that as kids! Excellent call.
Did you play the Mad magazine game where the objective was to lose all your money?
No… Tell me more.
Idk, I remember hide-and-go-seek being pretty sick as a kid. I don’t often see it mentioned.
Hero’s Quest by Sierra (Later renamed to Quest for Glory)
So, you want to be a hero?
Probably my most replayed game, along with Betrayal at Krondor.
Have you checked out the excellent remake of QfG2?
There was this officially licensed Star Trek tabletop starship battle game that I got to play a couple times in the eighties and no one seems to remember it but me. Wish I could find a copy. I remember it being a blast.
I could rattle off a whole list of TRS-80 Model I/III or Apple ][ games that no one has ever heard of, but I’ll spare you.
Commander Keen might be one of the few old enough not to have been mentioned to me since the internet became well-known.
Also, Squarez.
Commander Keen
Only if you never watch CV-11.
Shallow Thought Of The Day: Any game mentioned in this thread twice is automatically someone who didn’t read all the comments before posting.
Or they did read all the comments, but someone posted their game during the time they were reading, so they never actually saw it. Then they posted their game and looked a stinky non-reader even though they weren’t.
Sid Meiers’ Pirets of the Carribean
Lode Runner
Loved Lode Runner! Broderbund Software, right? I think they also made Choplifter.
Board game: Sheriff of Nottingham, i just love social deception games.
Video game: BETON BRUTAL, 3D platformer with similar parkour like Minecraft, but more polished. Overall pretty chill to sink some time into.
Super dodgeball for the NES.
Deceptively simple, but much deeper than it seems on first glance. Each character has 2 different special abilities that change the way you throw. Especially if you can get a few buddies to huddle around the tv with you, will keep you all entertained for hours.
Descent
Descent 2 earthshaker multiplayer was my jam. Went through so many joystick hats!
All time biggest time sinks are probably Civilization 2 and Factorio.
Biggest time sink you’ve never heard of is Ancient Dungeons of Mystery, a one-man Roguelike dungeon delving passion project.
Civ II was peak of the series imho… Immersive gameplay trumps graphics
You have never seen Factorio being mentioned on the internet?
You never read comments you reply to till the end?
Do you play ADOM?
I really like backgammon but no one ever wants to play with me
Bounty Bob on the C64 was goood.