Hello fellow people! Sorta kinda continuing with the theme of gaming memories from last week, I have some PC-centric ones that I'd thought I would share with you! I was reminded of a bunch of these games recently, courtesy of the totally awesome YouTube channel Lazy Game Reviews, so go check him out!
My earliest memories of console gaming were absolutely similar to the ones I mentioned last week, but my earliest memories of gaming in general were actually found on the computer! I remember seeing the most basic of nonsensical bits as early as I can remember, and I definitely have a few memories of some totally unique and awesome games that were found there. My history doesn't stretch as far back as say the Amiga or Commodore 64, but hey, DOS and Windows man!
When my Dad bought a family computer for the first time around when I was born, it came with a version of the then revolutionary Wolfenstein 3D. It's a first-person shooter, one of the granddad's of the genre, to be precise, and had you take the role of B.J. Blazkowicz (yeah...), as you infiltrate the many lairs and dungeons of the Nazi regime. Your goal is simple: Kill Hitler. End the Nazis. Okay! Sounds good to me! You move around simple enough, opening doors and finding various guards to shoot and relics to gather for points, which when a certain amount is acquired, you are given an extra life. You have a simple knife, a Luger pistol, an MP40, and a chain-gun to find and use against the Nazi soldiers. Different soldiers can take different amounts of hits before they're downed, and this is most realized in the area bosses, one of which is indeed Hitler, albeit in a huge Mech-suit, and featuring some strange sorcerer powers to boot. The game was incredible for it's time, and I think, still a blast to play! It's incredibly simple and almost rudimentary, but the secrets and progression found in the gameplay are still trying to be matched today.
According to my parents, when I was still crawling around on the floor, my Dad would actually hoist me up onto his lap and let me control around the game. I'm sure I had no idea what I was even doing, but I was still technically playing the game. And indeed, this makes Wolfenstein 3D the very first game I ever played. Pretty cool, huh?
So yes, as it happens, I was indeed killing Nazi's before I could walk.
DOOM.
Oh yeah. I have a little more of a memory playing this one, to be sure. Once again courtesy of my Father, I'd get the chance to participate in the slaughtering of demonic hordes every so often when I'd go to his office and watch him play. I can never really forget the sound of those hell-spawn as they prowl around looking for you, and I'll also never forget the audible grunts that occurred if you were hit, and the picture of your face on the HUD that would slowly deteriorate with each hit. Ah, good times.
Doom is definitely a big name in the first-person shooter genre, and even in gaming itself. While in no way the original FPS, it is undoubtedly the one with the most influence at the time, surpassing even it's predecessor Wolfenstein 3D. As an unnamed space marine, referred to in popular culture as "Doom Guy," is tasked with eradicating the creatures that spawned from the pits of Hell on Mars, and putting a stop to their hellish invasion. You have a bunch of weapons at your disposal, with many memorable ones including the shotgun, chain-gun, chainsaw, and the BFG 9000 (Big Freaking Gun, if you were wondering). With these weapons you must maneuver the maze-like labyrinths and corridors, defeating enemies along the way, finding secrets, and making your way to the exit, sometimes collecting those naughty Key Cards while you're at it. It's no big secret: Doom freaking rocks! Even years after it's original release, the game is still just as awesome, with a passionate modding community, and it's own sequels and re-releases. Doom set the gold standard for FPS's at the time, and in my mind, is still at the top of the pedestal.
Now by this time I think my parents were starting to notice the fascination I had with annihilating the hordes of Evil, so my Dad probably had that in mind when he started showing me some of id Software's older games, and the most noteworthy of them all, Commander Keen. Released before both Wolfenstein 3D and Doom, Commander Keen was a series of platforming games divided into various "episodes," like "Aliens Ate My Babysitter" and "Goodbye Galaxy!" And holy crap. Talk about being drawn into a game. As Keen, you land on various worlds and progress through a 2D level, with plenty of bizarre creatures and environments to see, as well as some collectibles to find. You can jump, shoot, and hop on a pogo stick. I think the environments most of all are what got me. They were so unique and cool, and very "alien." It was the equivalent of reading a sci-fi novel and describing the colours and textures of the surroundings. I became fixated on Commander Keen after I was shown it, and I remember learning from my dad the use of cheat codes to mess around with. I got stuck a lot so, for me, using a pogo stick to out-jump the screen and practically fly around the screen and map was necessary, but also totally rad. So, yes, while I guess you could argue that I wasn't playing the game properly, I was playing it nonetheless. I don't know how much more I can about Keen, but the entire game with all the episodes is available on Steam, and for the price that it is, I DEFINITELY recommend a buy.
Along with Keen though, my Dad showed me what was kind of an oddity in retrospect: Cosmo's Cosmic Adventure. Now THIS game was weird! But just like Commander Keen, it's use of the environment and aliens to develop a sense of uniqueness and variety, not to mention being straight up cool, was something that definitely had a profound and positive impact on me. The game's story though was something I always had trouble wrapping my head around. Get this: you play as Cosmo, a little green alien boy, trying to find and rescue your parents after you find them missing while exploring a planet en route to, of all places, Disneyland. Yes, Disneyland. Anyways, like Keen, the story is split into several episodes, each with different locations and enemies. Cosmo himself can jump and use bombs on enemies, while also being able to climb and stick to walls via his suction-like hands. Once again, it is a 2D side-scroller platformer, with the objective of reaching the end, and, you know, not dying along the way. This game was loads of fun for me, but was also deceptively hard in certain parts. Of course, this could be both my nostalgia and childish mind at work here. I never actually remember beating this game, come to think of it, and that's probably because we were playing a shareware version, if I do recall. Shareware was a release method for older computer games that gave the consumer/player a morsel of the game, say, an episode or level, and leaving the rest up to purchase if you liked the game. For the time, I think that was a great model!
Which brings me a sad notion, however: I haven't beaten either Keen or Cosmo. The shareware model I mentioned above was likely the reason why I don't specifically remember completing either game, and that was mainly because I never got the chance to! Well, it is time to change that. My childhood demands it! I mentioned before how Keen is on Steam, which is a great way to pick it up, but Cosmo's Cosmic Adventure is a little more complex. It's practically abandonware at this point, meaning that if there's any download service that has it or the shareware version, a full version shouldn't (in theory) be hard to find. Granted, I actually am still searching, so if I find a way to obtain a copy, without having to locate a floppy disk, I will update this piece.
Now before I go, I have just one last game to mention... A few odd years after I played these games, my Dad (notice a pattern here? Thanks Dad, you're awesome!) found a particular FPS around the time of Quake. But I'm not talking about Quake, oh no, I'm talking about freaking Duke Nukem 3D.
Oh yeah. Balls of Steel. It's freaking DUKE NUKEM. A relic of the 90's if there ever was one. I'm probably not going to talk about this series any where else, at least not right away, so consider this your Duke Nukem fix. 3D is, shall we say, a crazy game. It is chalk-full of parodies, aliens, babes, weapons, and an ego the size of Uranus. The art alone should clue you in; notice the likeliness to Doom? Yeah, Duke Nukem man. He's got freeze guns, rocket launchers, a shrink-ray, and a jet-pack to boot. Much of what I said about Doom can actually be applied to 3D, so I won't repeat myself, but suffice to say that when I watched and played Duke Nukem 3D, and witnessed an alien soldier using a toilet, first-person shooters haven't really been the same. Mostly good level design, a kick'n soundtrack, and fast paced action make Duke Nukem 3D fantastic! So yeah, even though some of the pop-culture references are outdated, and the whole premise is just really weird and kind of misogynistic, it's a product of it's time, and I still think it can be appreciated as such.
Okay. That's it for now! Thank you for reading! I hope you enjoyed another trip down memory lane with me, and I wonder if you remember any of these old games? What old PC games do you remember as a kid?
See y'all Monday!
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