Most industry defining & influential game of all time ?

Most industry defining & influential game of all time?

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Parazels said:
Sega Model 1 is the correct answer.
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Get Out Theatre GIF by Tony Awards
 
Mario is pretty valid, but I'd go with DOOM:

It was enough of a sensation for Bill Gates to get in a trench-coat for a cringe ad because it would move more copies of Windows itself.

It established such basic conventions in its genre in both design + tech that others after for the next decade were called Doom-clones.

It built core aspects of online multiplayer, establishing netcode conventions and game modes like deathmatch.

Mostly though, it was the first game to create robust tools to make modded content that lives on to this day, whole new games were made out of those tools, and it created more NEW game designers than any other single game can possibly influence now.
 
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It's got to be Super Mario Bros. Without that massive mainstream appeal, the industry wouldn't be what it is today.

Granted, home video games are such a natural result of human ingenuity and desire for entertainment that if it weren't Mario, something else would've been the zeitgeist harbinger.
 
The answer is Fortnite

In all the worst ways. It has influenced games from COD to even impacting Sony and MS at a executive level. Fortnite's success has literally been the downfall of so many developers as publishers continue to chase them
 
It's dependent on genre obviously.

But the very first Legend of Zelda on the NES was that genre defining open world adventure game, which still shapes games like current Zelda's, Assassin's Creed, Ghost of Whatever, and many others.
 
You can really make an arguement for most of these. Very good list.

If I were to rank them in terms of influence:
  1. DOOM
  2. Tetris
  3. Ocarina of Time
  4. Super Mario 64
  5. Pong
  6. Metal Gear Solid
  7. Super Mario Bros.
  8. *Pokemon R/G/B/Y
  9. Final Fantasy VII
  10. The Legend of Zelda
  11. Grand Theft Auto III
  12. World of Warcraft
  13. Half Life
  14. Morrowind
  15. Halo
  16. Modern Warfare 4
  17. Street Fighter II
* Added because it's important.
 
Metal Gear Solid

Heavy emphasis on presentation with visuals, sound, story often being the main talking point.

Gameplay is fun but ultimately very shallow and easy unless the difficulty is arbitrarily inflated.

It's almost 30 years later and this is the template for almost all mainstream games.
 
Porcile said:
Metal Gear Solid

Heavy emphasis on presentation with visuals, sound, story often being the main talking point.

Gameplay is fun but ultimately very shallow and easy unless the difficulty is arbitrarily inflated.

It's almost 30 years later and this is the template for almost all mainstream games.
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it absolutely isn't
MGS 1: doesn't hold your hand. 2: has no forced slow walking. 3: is entirely mechanics driven and has barely anything context sensitive.

also, for a PS1 game it was really damn complex when it comes to the gameplay. it was "shallow" (it wasn't btw) because it's a PS1 game, required to work on a D-Pad + 8 buttons.
 
kevboard said:
it absolutely isn't
MGS 1: doesn't hold your hand. 2: has no forced slow walking. 3: is entirely mechanics driven and has barely anything context sensitive.

also, for a PS1 game it was really damn complex when it comes to the gameplay. it was "shallow" (it wasn't btw) because it's a PS1 game, required to work on a D-Pad + 8 buttons.
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On normal difficulty you can literally run to the next room/checkpoint without even engaging in the stealth aspect of the game. It's a shallow game, doesn't mean it's bad.
 
Super Mario Bros established Nintendo, which established basically all other building blocks.

The only other choice would be WoW which was true catalyst for everyone to start chasing reoccurring monetization.
 
Porcile said:
On normal difficulty you can literally run to the next room/checkpoint without even engaging in the stealth aspect of the game. It's a shallow game, doesn't mean it's bad.
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sure, but if you measure a game's depth by playing on normal, then no modern game has any depth... like zero modern games.
I think MGS1 was as easy on normal because the devs feared the concept of a stealth game is not yet understood well.
 
kevboard said:
sure, but if you measure a game's depth by playing on normal, then no modern game has any depth... like zero modern games.
I think MGS1 was as easy on normal because the devs feared the concept of a stealth game is not yet understood well
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Yes, that's what I am saying. Almost zero modern games have any depth.
 
GamesDontSuck said:
Super Mario Bros, NES. Hands down.

That's not to say others on that list didnt help define.... Metal Gear Solid comes to mind for its cinematic and production values. Even a shoutout to Shenmue for it's in-depth open world gameplay. But Mario on nes was the one who helped bring the games industry out of the gutter in north america, practically invented the sidescroller (there were others before it sure) but it brought gaming into a new age.

Super Mario Bros is king here.
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As much as I was the SEGA kid back in the day, and worshipped MGS1 practically to this day, this is the correct answer. Original SMB still did the most for the industry than any other game in history.
 
Porcile said:
Yes, that's what I am saying. Almost zero modern games have any depth.
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they usually don't have any depth no matter which mode you play. in fact, higher modes often expose how shallow they are. I can beat most fights in Spider-Man 2, on the highest difficulty that you unlock after finishing the game, WITH ONE HAND... and I am not kidding... I actually did a whole combat sequence with like 10 enemies with only my right hand... just for fun... and I got it done... on the highest mode.
 
Miyamoto basically wrote the bible. There's other important stuff but smb/Zelda/sm64/oot are huge. Each one showed "oh, so this is how it's done." Layed down real fundamentals. I know you said one game, but my answer is the miyamoto canon.
 
kevboard said:
they usually don't have any depth no matter which mode you play. in fact, higher modes often expose how shallow they are. I can beat most fights in Spider-Man 2, on the highest difficulty that you unlock after finishing the game, WITH ONE HAND... and I am not kidding... I actually did a whole combat sequence with like 10 enemies with only my right hand... just for fun... and I got it done... on the highest mode.
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My point proven then. MGS is only hard on harder modes because they artificially increase the difficulty, not because they change up the design of the game to increase the difficulty. Spiderman 2 would be "difficult" if they did the same thing like MGS does like just making the enemies more spongy, make them kill you in one hit etc etc

MGS is like the forerunner for this kind of design in modern 3D games. DOOM is certainly not much better on higher difficulties though I suppose.

GoldenEye handles difficulty much better by expanding the objectives you have to complete.
 
Ico inspired so many games afterwards, from Dark Souls to Journey to Fez to Brother a Tale of two Sons to The Last of us and many, many more. It was one of the first games considered art, it was one of the first games with a buddy mechanic not just like Link and Navi, but one you really had to cooperate with to solve puzzles. Just google for yourself which games (and which developers) took a lot of inspiration from it, some developers you'd never think of mention Ico as their big inspiration for their games.
 
COD4 pretty much revitalised multiplayer shooters on console. Halo was the only real alternative at the time.

Had to include it for this reason.
 
Although I agree that Doom has had a tremendous influence and legacy, I think it's quite an exaggeration for it to be ranked second. Apparently, the main criterion for the voting was its importance to what's popular today — namely FPS games and deathmatches — rather than a broader historical analysis. Doom was certainly influential, but its impact was mostly confined to the FPS genre. It can't really be compared to games whose legacy transcended their own genres, such as Super Mario Bros., Super Mario 64, Pac-Man, The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, and GTA III — titles that completely reshaped the way the entire gaming industry thinks and creates. Doom was undeniably significant in that regard, but I don't believe it had that kind of far-reaching impact.

If we're going to think along those lines, then Dragon Quest should also be mentioned, because without it there would be no Final Fantasy, Chrono Trigger, Pokémon, or Shin Megami Tensei — practically an entire genre owes its existence to it.
 
Real answer is probably Pacman.

First real character in gaming.
First franchised character in gaming.
First abstract scenario in gaming (i.e. not simulating any sort of existing game or type of action).
Insanely popular in the arcades.
Drove the sales of the ATARI VCS to its peak.
Still iconic 45 years on.

Gaming as we know it is kinda impossible to imagine without this game.
 
ZehDon said:
If I had to pick one, it would have to be DOOM. DOOM changed video games unlike anything before or since. DOOM was revolutionary on multiple fronts at once, and ushered in so many new things it's honestly difficult to list them all. I might come back and rant later because I fucking love DOOM, but off the top of my head:
  • It cemented the First Person Shooter.
  • It invented deathmatch.
  • It was used to invent online deathmatch.
  • It heralded a shift in approaches to graphical programming.
  • It was the first true indie blockbuster.
  • It popularized dev support for community modding.
  • It broke through to the mainstream and became part of the cultural cannon for an entire generation.
  • It showed that games could be edgy and gruesome, and yet still wildly successful.
And that's to say nothing of the game itself. It's been said that a "classic" is one where everything before it is obsolete, and everything after it bares it's mark. You can still see DOOM's influence alive and well today. DOOM changed the industry, the medium, and the world.
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Pfff ... Doom was just Wolfenstein 3D with a paint job ...
 
Ellis said:
Couldn't choose any more poll options. That was the limit.


Which ones do you not agree with ?
They all had a large impact, in my opinion. Obviously some more than others.
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Well… you did include Ico and Shadow of the Colussus. Both of them. Neither is remotely comparable to the other games on the list.
 
I feel it's a toss up between Super Mario Bros, Doom and Super Mario 64.

Super Mario Bros because it really kickstarted gaming as mainstream entertainment. I've heard several grannies talk about how they played Super Mario with their kids in the 80s lol. That game was nuts. At the same time I think a lot of people would have a tough time picking it out of a lineup of early Mario games.

Doom on the other hand I would consider the most iconic game of all time. Everything about it is unique and interesting: gameplay, art direction, music, development history, technical innovations. The name. It also turned the 3D-trend into a full on frenzy and put FPS games on the path they are on today.

Then SM64 sort of standardized and legitimized 3D-gaming which is a legacy that truly lives on today in many ways. It's also super iconic obviously. Had they botched that game I doubt Mario would be the top tier phenomena he is today.

Special mention to Half Life though. It was the game industry's Star Wars moment in the sense that so many developers of games that I love played it and went "hey, we really have to bring our a-game! " or "you can deliver a narrative like that in games?!"
 
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Evil Calvin said:
There were other platformers before that.
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Course there were. But they did not revolutionize an entire gaming industry, which is the point.

You don't have to be first at something, you just have to be the best.

Apple was not the first touch screen phone, but they were the best at it and revolutionized how we use phones today.

Mario did that for gaming
 
Midway-AGNC- said:
Although I agree that Doom has had a tremendous influence and legacy, I think it's quite an exaggeration for it to be ranked second. Apparently, the main criterion for the voting was its importance to what's popular today — namely FPS games and deathmatches — rather than a broader historical analysis. Doom was certainly influential, but its impact was mostly confined to the FPS genre. It can't really be compared to games whose legacy transcended their own genres, such as Super Mario Bros., Super Mario 64, Pac-Man, The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, and GTA III — titles that completely reshaped the way the entire gaming industry thinks and creates. Doom was undeniably significant in that regard, but I don't believe it had that kind of far-reaching impact.

If we're going to think along those lines, then Dragon Quest should also be mentioned, because without it there would be no Final Fantasy, Chrono Trigger, Pokémon, or Shin Megami Tensei — practically an entire genre owes its existence to it.
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Good thoughts there, though if you're going to cite Dragon Quest, then why not Wizardry or Ultima. Certainly without Wizardry there would be no Dragon Quest.

Though I think those titles are lower on the rungs of defining the industry as a whole, which as I've mentioned before, the arcade and titles like Pac-Man are truly what brought gaming from a niche to the masses and inspired others, either directly through gameplay or indirectly through making billions of dollars, to look at video games as a serious business. If there's no business and money then there's no runway to create games.
 
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falconhoof said:
Good thoughts there, though if you're going to cite Dragon Quest, then why not Wizardry or Ultima. Certainly without Wizardry there would be no Dragon Quest.

Though I think those titles are lower on the rungs of defining the industry as a whole, which as I've mentioned before, the arcade and titles like Pac-Man are truly what brought gaming from a niche to the masses and inspired others, either directly through gameplay or indirectly through making billions of dollars, to look at video games as a serious business. If there's no business and money then there's no runway to create games.
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Because Dragon Quest is what truly popularized the genre, much like Doom did for FPS games. That's also why Wolfenstein 3D — which is even available as an option — barely gets any votes: Doom was the one that took what Wolfenstein started and elevated it to new heights. The same goes for Super Mario 64 — it wasn't the first 3D platformer, but it perfected the formula and set a new standard for everything that came after.

Pioneering doesn't always equal lasting influence or legacy. Wizardry and Ultima may have laid the foundations that inspired Dragon Quest, just as Wolfenstein did for Doom. But it's often the game that refines and popularizes the concept — the one that truly captures the imagination of players and developers — that ends up defining an entire genre or generation.

And you're absolutely right about the broader picture: arcade hits like Pac-Man were the ones that transformed gaming from a niche hobby into a global industry, showing that video games could reach the masses and generate real business momentum. Without that commercial success paving the way, none of these later innovations would've had the platform to thrive.
 
Dragon Quest is a bit ironic on hindsight, because what it did to RPGs is what the gaming community usually hates and scoffs at: it popularized a genre by oversimplifying it and releasing it for the console peasants.
Computer JRPGs used to be an even more obscure and hard type of game than early western computer RPGs used to be. DQ made it stupidly simple in comparison, and by doing this it quickly obliterated all that came before it and spawned not only an IP that endures 40 years later, but a way of making RPGs that is now considered THE way Japan does them.
 
Midway-AGNC- said:
Because Dragon Quest is what truly popularized the genre, much like Doom did for FPS games. That's also why Wolfenstein 3D — which is even available as an option — barely gets any votes: Doom was the one that took what Wolfenstein started and elevated it to new heights. The same goes for Super Mario 64 — it wasn't the first 3D platformer, but it perfected the formula and set a new standard for everything that came after.

Pioneering doesn't always equal lasting influence or legacy. Wizardry and Ultima may have laid the foundations that inspired Dragon Quest, just as Wolfenstein did for Doom. But it's often the game that refines and popularizes the concept — the one that truly captures the imagination of players and developers — that ends up defining an entire genre or generation.

And you're absolutely right about the broader picture: arcade hits like Pac-Man were the ones that transformed gaming from a niche hobby into a global industry, showing that video games could reach the masses and generate real business momentum. Without that commercial success paving the way, none of these later innovations would've had the platform to thrive.
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If we're talking about popularity (though I thought this topic was about influence) then I'd point more to Final Fantasy as a global RPG popularizer. I get your point. We're not talking first here. So it's not a case of shouting 3D Monster Maze instead of Doom, but this is why I feel most answers in this thread are wrong as they're naming titles and franchises that came after the industry was already defined (See topic title).

The definition of this industry is from when it became one. When it broke out of the university mainframe tinker toys and niche home computer play things. That's why I look to the arcade as being the thing that paved the way for home consoles, for mascots, for billions of dollars of investment to culminate in the fortnite dances we see today across every phone, tablet and TV screen.
 
I get why a lot of people are picking Super Mario Bros. Its a very important game for sure, but the plain truth is that it launched years too late to claim to "define" anything in the industry.

It came out in 1985, notably on a THIRD GEN console, and wasn't even the first game to incorporate its lead character. Donkey Kong and Mario Bros predate it both in the arcades and in the home entertainment space. It wasn't even the first side-scrolling platformer and certainly didn't invent the idea of collecting tokens.

It was tremendously influential and positively iterative, but it hardly reinvented the wheel.

Sorry, but the industry was genuinely defined long before. The fundamentals were already in place as early as the late 1970's.

The ATARI 2600 was launched in 1977, so its always struck me as funny that people act like it falling in popularity by 1983 should have been any sort of surprise. It was aged tech at that point, and the reason why ET was such a catastrophic failure was largely because they expected to continue to shift similar numbers to that which PacMan shifted the previous year.

Which is of course yet another reason why that yellow pizza face is THE single most important game ever made! It was indirectly responsible for the 1983 crash that in its turn facilitated the rise of Nintendo and the Famicom.
 
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Clear said:
I get why a lot of people are picking Super Mario Bros. Its a very important game for sure, but the plain truth is that it launched years too late to claim to "define" anything in the industry.

It came out in 1985, notably on a THIRD GEN console, and wasn't even the first game to incorporate its lead character. Donkey Kong and Mario Bros predate it both in the arcades and in the home entertainment space. It wasn't even the first side-scrolling platformer and certainly didn't invent the idea of collecting tokens.

It was tremendously influential and positively iterative, but it hardly reinvented the wheel.

Sorry, but the industry was genuinely defined long before. The fundamentals were already in place as early as the late 1970's.

The ATARI 2600 was launched in 1977, so its always struck me as funny that people act like it falling in popularity by 1983 should have been any sort of surprise. It was aged tech at that point, and the reason why ET was such a catastrophic failure was largely because they expected to continue to shift similar numbers to that which PacMan shifted the previous year.

Which is of course yet another reason why that yellow pizza face is THE single most important game ever made! It was indirectly responsible for the 1983 crash that in its turn facilitated the rise of Nintendo and the Famicom.
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I think the NES and Mario brought BACK the industry to the west at the very least. It was a giant hodge podge of knock off shit before then and nobody wanted it anymore.
 
CrimsonTide said:
I think the NES and Mario brought BACK the industry to the west at the very least. It was a giant hodge podge of knock off shit before then and nobody wanted it anymore.
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Nah. The home computer boom was in full swing at the time, the arcades were still strong, and consoles - thought of toys for kids only by big business - were largely an afterthought.

The significance of the '83 crash has been grossly, grossly exaggerated by people in the enthusiast press who mostly weren't old enough to actually understand the scene of the time.
It was a big deal for American corporates, but honestly it barely registered in Europe and Asia because they were never involved with that part of the industry at any point before that!
 
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