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[Soulblighter31]

Best year in gaming history.

I mean:

One game from there created e-sports. Another created the modern stealth gameplay that every single stealth game after it took elements from. Another started the benchmark of the rpg genre and put Bioware on the map. Another created a style of multiplayer unseen before from where Halo copied copiously.

And all these came in the same day. The entirety of 1998 is unparalleled. The stars must've aligned in a unique form that year, cause the number of all time greats and influence in the industry is mind numbing

 

[Švejk]

LAWD what a year that was!! It's a toss up between Metal Gear Solid and Xenogears...

Spoiler

MGS fo life

Now im wondering how i had money to play as many games back then as i did... i literally blew my whole paycheck on games.... that was my life straight outta high school.

 

[Rathorial]

1998 was an incredible year.

Thief: The Dark Project stands above everything else to me for these reasons:

• AI in the game was noticeably more advanced than any other game at the time. Lost my mind when a guard noticed blood pools that came from another guard I cut with a sword...even though I hid the body...and then the guard got suspicious.
• Level design took far more advantage of 3d space than any other game at the time, and frankly more than most games now still.
• Not sure if it was the first game to utilize 3d sound propagation, but it was the first game where I could easily tell what direction an enemy was coming from, and made it an integral part of gameplay.
• The way it handled light/shadow changed how you approached a game space, and was taken in later stealth series like Splinter Cell.
• Eidos Thief used context-sensitive UI icons for rope arrows, while this 1998 game did it better by having only grass/wood surfaces something you could attach to. More organic for the player, yet level designers still had control.
• Game had a solid story with environmental storytelling tricks later titles like System Shock 2 and Bioshock get credited for.

 

[1morerobot]

Zelda OoT followed very closely by MGS.

Best year ever for gaming.

 

[nightmare-slain]

Pokemon Red (not blue lol) is easily my favourite.

Spyro The Dragon
Ocarina of Time

 

[Cracklox]

So much good stuff that year. I'll go with Metal Gear, RE2 and Tekken 3 in something around that order. Starcraft as well, but I didn't play that till a year or 2 later

 

[tenderbrew]

Great year but I would go with Starsiege: Tribes as far as game changers for me. My first real serious foray into online mutliplayer shooters on the PC and I was addicted as hell. Can still play it today. Sad that besides the FTP (which was pretty good), this series didn't keep up the momentum.

But man - what a game! Lots of great memories.

 

[Coxy100]

Starcraft (still my number 1 game of all time)

 

[Maogp]

Baldur's Gate (PC)
Banjo-Kazooie (N64)
Einhander (PS)
Fallout 2 (PC)
F-Zero X (N64)
Grand Prix Legends (PC)
G.Darius (PS)
Grand Theft Auto (PC)
Gran Turismo (PS)
Grim Fandango (PC)
Half-Life (PC)
Heretic II (PC)
Metal Gear Solid (PS)
Oddworld: Abe's Exoddus (PS, PC)
Parasite Eve (PS)
Resident Evil 2 (PS)
Sanitarium (PC)
SkullMonkeys (PS)
Starcraft (PC)
Tekken 3 (PS)
Tenchu: Stealth Assassins (PS)
The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time (N64)
Thief: The Dark Project (PC)
Unreal (PC)
Vigilante 8 (PS, N64)
X-COM: Interceptor (PC)
Xenogears (PS)



Wow. A lots of masterpieces (or great games) here.

Ok, it's hard to choose only one. Damn...
Unreal.

 

[Waji]

1) Xenogears
2) Shining Force III
3) Breath of Fire III

 

[Soulblighter31]

Wow. A lots of masterpieces (or great games) here.

Ok, it's hard to choose only one. Damn...
Unreal.

Cool choice. Unreal is one of the legends, the greats of the decade, but its so painfully overlooked in the gaming history as a whole. You could almost say it was the end of the classic FPS design, with Half Life releasing later that year an changing the way the entire industry was making games from there out.

It is inferior to Quake 1 and 2 in several areas, the action, weapons, combat scenarios. But it has a unique atmosphere. The levels, the architecture - they're amazing. The level design is fenomenal. The music. The skaarj AI was outstanding and they're such fun encounters to go back today, from our mellow controller designed shooters. The game is as potent and playable right now as it was then.

 

[Ivory Samoan]

Ocarina tied with MGS for me....what a year though......so epic!

 

[Philippo]

OOT (still the greatest videogame of all times) > FFT > Pkmn > MGS

 

[Rick Dangerous]

Einhander ! Gran turismo ! Metal gear solid ! Tekken 3 !Such a good year for gaming. I ll go with einhander as my top pick. One of my favorite shmp ever.

 

[Maogp]

Cool choice. Unreal is one of the legends, the greats of the decade, but its so painfully overlooked in the gaming history as a whole. You could almost say it was the end of the classic FPS design, with Half Life releasing later that year an changing the way the entire industry was making games from there out.

It is inferior to Quake 1 and 2 in several areas, the action, weapons, combat scenarios. But it has a unique atmosphere. The levels, the architecture - they're amazing. The level design is fenomenal. The music. The skaarj AI was outstanding and they're such fun encounters to go back today, from our mellow controller designed shooters. The game is as potent and playable right now as it was then.

Totally agree. Unreal is a great piece of the fps history. I mean, when i hear the intro music i have so many memories about the game. The music and also the effects are really good.
Very playable, solid gameplay and I liked the lore beyond the game, I think was one of the first fps where I read all the notes got while playing.

 

[Immortal Technique]

Baldur's Gate. I remember just being so amazed to be playing such a great rendition of AD&D. It was so far beyond its CRPG predecessors. Along with its sequel, one of my all time favorite games.

 

[Morrigan Stark]

Absolutely stacked year

My list:

1. Panzer Dragoon Saga
2. Final Fantasy Tactics
3. Shining Force III
4. Breath of Fire III
5. Alundra
6. Xenogears
7. Metal Gear Solid
8. Resident Evil 2
9. Skullmonkeys
10. Crash Bandicoot 3: Warped (man it's a good year for 3rd games in a series)

Honestly, in terms of volume of S-tier games, it might be the greatest year ever.

 

[greelay]

Pokémon.

 

[Wray]

Quake 2