I wanted to compile a list of games that influenced me and set me of a life of videogame addiction. There isn't going to be any order from best to worst, but instead an explanation on why that particular game made a mark on my life. I felt inspired to compile this list of games after tediously reading a recent "Top 100 games of all time." I thought that a lot of the games were good, but I wanted to explore why particular games had impact on me, rather than how they rank as personal favorites. I'm sure most people could compile a list of their ten favorite games, but that list may change over time. The games that I will name will forever be intertwined in my memory and helped set me down a road of loving to be a gamer, even now that I'm married and have a kid I still find time to devote to my favorite hobby. That is why this list seems a little more important to me than a top 10 or top 100 list. I would encourage everyone to go back and remember the first game they played and pontificate on why it impacted their lives.

I started playing video games in 1985 when some college students that lived below my family gave me some of their computer games to play. They had loads of old floppy disks that gave me hours of enjoyment and frustration, and ultimately changed my life until I got my hands on an NES. Some of the games that I obtained for free from those college kids were such gems as: Sopwith (a strange and possibly unbeatable game), Digger (a Dig Dugknock-off, but better gameplay in my humble opinion), Loadrunner (need I say more), Castle (a game that set me down the path of loving games that made you type commands in; King's Quest, Quest for Glory etc), Spy Hunter (with terrible three color graphics, but still addictive), Defender, Robotron (this game used to give me blisters from using the joystick), and a few other odd balls like J-Bird a weird knock-off of Q-bert. I actually found j-bird a bit more charming than Q-bert but maybe that was my weird six-year old mind at work. The point being, I had a whole new world at my fingertips to explore, I just had to learn how to use the damn computer, which my dad was kind enough to walk me through. He may still regret that to this day.

The first videogame I ever played was Loadrunner. I remember loading it up on the old computer not knowing what to expect because I just had a copied floppy of the game. I thought the name sounded cool soit was the first game I chose. After a couple weeks of playing it I found out that there was a level editor included where I could create levels and save them on my own floppy disks and play them. That became my life for many months. I have no idea what happened to those disks, but I'd love to go back and try and play through my creations I came up with when I was that age. The game was simple, challenging, and fun. It didn't have a lot of frills and gimmicks, but it always kept me coming back for more even years after the initial sit-down with it. If it wasn't for Loadrunner I don't think I would have found a love for games. That marks it as very important. I recall trying to get into other incarnations of Loadrunner that came later, but none of them ever held that same mysticism that the original experience held for me.

It wasn't until years later in 1988 that I got a Nintendo for my birthday. It of course came with Super Mario Bros./Duck Hunt and the zapper, but it was the game Kid Icarus that really got a hold of me. I had already seen and played Super Mario Bros. in the grocery store and thought it was great, but it was Kid Icarus that really sucked me in and made me love my Nintendo. If it wasn't for that game I might not be any good at platformers to this day. I played that game so much and played through it so many times that I had no choice but to become really good at platformers, and to this day I still credit Kid Icarus for that. It also made me learn a lot about Greek Mythology, even though the mythology in the game was fantastically skewed. This game also set the bar for my expectations from Nintendo games from there on out and it wasn't until another birthday that I was blown away again.

Mega Man 2 was the bomb that dropped into my life and made me a life long fan of the series. I admit I've been a wayward fan of recent years because there are just so many damn games in the series it is too hard to keep up. Yet, out of them all it was Mega Man 2 that set the bar for my Mega Man expectations. The characters in the game are still unforgetable, and the music is amazing--even today I still think it is some of the best music in a videogame. I think there have even been a couple of bands out of Olympia, WA that covered old NES songs, and at least one Mega Man 2 song. I never even owned the original one until I got it on a compilation years later. I owned 2 through 5 and loved them all in their own quirky ways. Mega Man 2 is also credited with having the first ending to a game that I actually enjoyed watching. There was something about the slow montageat the end, followed by him removing hishelmet that really solidified the whole experience of the game for me.It created a monster in me that wanted to beat all games from there on out. Before that I was just playing games my mom rented for me and not always beating them. Once I beat Mega Man 2 I became obsessed with seeing a game through to the end, even if that game was horrible, and as long as a game actually possessed an ending.

The years went by and I shelved my NES for the SNES and I played many good games but it was two games that will forever stand out in the SNES catelog for me. The first is Final Fantasy 3. I had played the other Final Fantasy games before it and I had loved them to death, but it was Final Fantasy 3 that really captured my imagination and pulled me in with the storyline. At the time I was reading a lot of Terry Brooks, and Robert Jordan (RIP), and Final Fantasy 3 fit right in to that scheme for me. It helped that the game played well and had tons of characters to choose from, I think I've played through FF3 more than any other of the series. Don't get me wrong I love the seventh installment, and that is probably the best of all the Final Fantasy titles. FF3 came out at the right time for me, and without that I might not have continued following the series. I even recently purchased it again for the Nintendo DS andplaying through it was still as magical as it was the original time I sat down and played it. The game has so many different moods, and some of my favorite Final Fantasy characters were in that game. I loved how every character in the game had some back story that unraveled as the game played out. It is an epic tale.

The other game around the same time that I'll never forget is Gemfire. I don't think the game got a lot of attention or sold a lot of copies, but my friend and I used to spend hours playing against one another plotting and trying to eliminate one another from the world. It wasn't the best strategy game I had ever played, and many more would come along in later years to surpass it, but it was fun. Gemfire had this weird way of sucking us in with its odd-ball characters and funny cut-scenes of the battles when you have your units attack each other. I remember we used to devise make-shift rules that we would abide by to make the game more challenging. Gemfire in all of its charm and terrible graphics will always hold a special place in my heart for actually making me love a game that I didn't control the action. And that is saying a lot considering that most games were all about the action in those days. I actually wish I still owned this game. Maybe it will show up one day in the Wii virtual library. (hint hint Nintendo.) Now I just need to convince my wife to let us buy a Wii...one thing at a time.

I went wayward from Nintendo after that, reclaiming my ties to computer gaming after my parents bought a nice new computer with a pentium processor (when the pentium processor was the holy grail of processors). I let a new life breathe into my gaming habits and began picking up all sorts of new games and eventually having to (secretly) upgrade the computer with better hardware so I wouldn't piss my dad off for messing with his PC. I Owned an N64 along the way, but nothing ever stuck with me from that system. There were good games left and right, but most of them had that recycled idea feeling to them (even in 3d). The first game that really hooked me at the time was Duke Nukem 3d. The game was crass, it revolted my parents and I loved it dearly for everything it stood for. It was the first game I ever played via modem with someone else, and I would spend hours after school creating devious levels with the level editor. The crowning achievement of mine was when a buddy and I recreated the bar from the movie From Dusk till Dawn. It even included the temple behind the bar. We thought we were the most amazing level designers. In fact I've seen some amazing ones over the years from other fans of the game. Duke Nukem will remain the game the sold me on first person shooters, even if none since have got me addicted in quite the same way. There's just something special about a guys who wants to kick ass and chew bubble gum, but happens to be all out of gum.

It was in late 1996 or early 1997 that I picked up a game because the boxart caught my eye. (I did that a lot, and most of the time I regretted it.) This time was different. I didn't know what to expect when I popped Fallout into the PC for the first time. I just sat down and gave it a go. To date, Fallout and Fallout 2 are my favorite games of all-time, and when Fallout 3 comes out next year sometime, it will automatically have a special (ha ha, some people might get it) place in my heart; even if the game loses some of its charm because of the change in guard for developers. Fallout was all the best things I loved about RPG's and then it was something altogether new and exciting because it was funny, witty, graphic, and compelling. I remember playing for a few weeks and then getting the itch to start a new game because I didn't want to beat the game. I wanted to keep experiencing the barren wasteland in different ways. Even after I beat it, I would replay it again. The possibilities seemed endless. Then Fallout 2 came out and expanded on many things from the first game. Fallout still holds the prestige of coming first but Fallout 2 had more freedom and better interface. Sure the game was unplayable without a patch, but that didn't keep the game from being great. Those two game set the bar so high for expectations for all future games that it would be a miracle if I ever thought another game was as good as those.

The next game that really sucked the hours out of the day for me was Deus Ex. I remember thinking the box art looked stupid, but the description on the back seemed intriguing and there wasn't anything else calling out to me so I bought it. I was never engrossed in conspiracy theories or the like going into the game, but now I wear a tinfoil hat everyday and I haven't left my nuclear bunker in six years. Well, that isn't true, but I did see a whole new world of possibilities open up to the FPS genre with its ability to incorporate some light RPG elements into the game. It wasn't an amazing FPS on its own, but it had a compelling story, interesting plot twists and more replayability than most every other game, save a few. Most FPS games I would play through and then use the disks for skeet shooting, but I still own the Deus Ex disk, and I still play through it every few years. I was excited by the sequel, but the game didn't live up to my expectations and they stripped away some of the best elements from the original. Oh well. At least the game was created and I got to play it.

The recent years have been barren with games that have really had an impact on me, but there is one that stands out above all the other titles in the last decade for me and that is Shadow of the Colossus. In a time where I own a lot of games and then sell them back for store credit later, I can safely say that this game has found a permanent home on my bookshelf. It isn't an amazing game, it in some ways almost isn't even a game. Really it is just an experience. You can try to treat it like a game, but then you would be missing out on the true beauty of the game. And that's what Shadow of the Colossus is. Beautiful. I think it is the first game that really struck me with it's stark beauty and ethereal world in which it is set. Never before has a game done so much with so little and may never again. Shadow of the Colossus will be a game that I play one day on my death bed when I just want to experience a story that lets my own imagination fill in all the blanks and leaves me with shattered hope that the ending could be happy. I still think it could be, but the happiness is so bittersweet.

Thanks for reading. Twenty-two years never went by so fast as it did today.

Keep on playing.

-J.