The FPS that changed a genre.
This game is not overrated a bit. I hear people ragging on this game, but to me, that's just a clear sign that they started gaming only recently. Anyone who was around when these came out, and played them seriously knows that this is what REALLY started the new wave of FPS games.
This game was bold, no other way to put it. It is massive, maybe the longest FPS I have ever played, and the word Hard doesn't quite cover it. Yes, I too have seen the video of this being beaten in 30 minutes or so, but I have also seen a time attack of Morrowind being beaten in about 15 minutes, so on this issue I'm really of the opinion that using glitches and tricks to fly through a game that should otherwise take some real commitment to beat doesn't really prove anything substandard about it.
The guns were cool, and the most intuitive ever seen at the time. The upgrades skins in OF were even better. The player felt very immersed in what was going on, and emotions were correctly tapped: Fear was felt when giant snakes popped out of the ground, adrenaline pumped when six soldiers rushed out of a room.
the game was overly hard in my opinion, but that had some to do with the limits of programming at the time. They definitely forgot to tell some of the enemies to miss occasionally, so that didn't make things easy on the player. The platforming/puzzle solving parts of the game were often VERY hard.
The storyline was classic, interesting, and moved forward. You really felt like you were being systematically cut-off, like a rat in a maze, and moved towards your final encounter. Only Barney really escaped unscathed.
This game was flawless. I use the word "was" because it was the perfect FPS by standards of its creation in the timeline of games. It may not look pretty any more, but it was jaw-dropping when it came out, and if you think you're a pretty good FPS player, then you should really give this a download, crank up the difficulty, and see what kind of a gamer you really are.