On the date of August 24th, 2005, I was caught with my pants down in front of a cop car that had been set on fire, while holding a book of matches in one hand and a tank of gasoline in the other. As part of my community service, I’ve been ordered to bestow my vast knowledge upon the gaming masses.
Last month, I asked you send me letters that listed your favorite PC games, to give people who aren’t experienced in that sub genre of gaming some ideas as to where to get started. What follows is my first edition of Cheat Codes that does not contain a single made-up letter. Enjoy.
The only game I have on my PC is Creep Night, a pinball game. But if you need material, make fun of the Nancy Drew series, because I’ve written guides for over half of them. I just don’t own them because I don’t want to pay for them, so I get them from the library instead.
– Michael Gray
I’d like to make fun of them, but in terms of laughs, it’s just too difficult to top your admission of having played the Nancy Drew series extensively enough to write guides for them. I’m pretty sure that guarantees celibacy.
-Zack
Hey dude, I’ll give you some games. Let’s see….
For MMOs, there’s:
- Ragnarok Online
- Gunbound
- Final Fantasy XI
- Albatross 18
RTS:
- Dune II
- StarCraft
- Shogun: Total War
Everything else:
- SimTower
- Unreal Tournament
- Princess Maker 2
- Doukutsu Monogatari
Feel free to pick and choose whatever you want. I basically just wrote down all the games I currently have on my computer, although I haven’t played most of them in a long time. I was addicted to each of them at some point in my life, even if I know I’ll never go back to some (I’m looking at you, Gunbound. And, Ragnarok. And, FFXI.).
Anyway, I hope that helps. Use it how you like, since I can’t imagine half of those games making it into the column. Time to go play some Albatross 18.
– Alex Jedraszcak
I can’t bring myself to ever recommend any sort of addictive MMO. It’s not because I haven’t personally enjoyed any of them—it’s because I hate almost everyone else who has managed to find their way onto the Internet in the last decade. The last thing I want is to be encouraged to interact with them. This column is about my limit in that category.
-Zack
OK—you asked for it:
1) Sid Meier’s Pirates!
2) The Civilization series
3) The Baldur’s Gate series
4) Half-Life
5) The Sims
Please…be gentle…. 😉
– Steve Hamner
Idon’t think a majority of our readers will remember ever having to play a PC game off of a 5′ floppy disk. That’s how I played Pirates! Although I’m sure my standards were a bit lower back before I had hair on my nuts, I do remember liking the game. Half-Life’s good, but I’ve never been a huge fan of the Dungeons & Dragons sort of games, so I couldn’t tell you much about Baldur’s Gate. Every time I decide to put Civilization or the Sims back onto my computer, I lose about three weeks of my life.
-Zack
I don’t have a lot of experience with PC games, but my top choices are the Monkey Island series, Day of the Tentacle, Diablo 1 and 2, Civilization 2, Sam & Max Hit the Road, the new Sam & Max series (as alert GameCola readers no doubt have figured out), Extreme Warfare Revenge, Castle of the Winds 2, whatever King’s Quest games I’ve played, and…I think that’s about it.
I don’t think I’ve played a new non-Sam & Max game in several years—mostly because anything made after, like, 2002 causes my computer to sputter and cry in new and exciting ways.
– Paul Franzen
It seems like you’ve got a wide variety of Lucas Arts games, which do often tend to be rad. Hell, I’ve played Day of the Tentacle so much that lines from the game entered into my day-to-day vernacular back when I was in middle school. I haven’t played it in years, but I’m confident that I could easily beat the game within an hour.
-Zack
Hey,
Here’s my list of favorite PC games:
1. Warcraft 3
2. Minesweeper
3. Halo (PC version)
– Andrew Zintl
I’ve only played two of those games on your list. One is half-way decent, and the other is Halo, which is popular among pre-pubescent boys who sounds like this kid.
-Zack
OK, I feel like I’ve played a lot of PC games, so I’ll just give you a few of my favorites. Let’s go with the King’s Quest games, the Monkey Island games, Day of the Tentacle, Creatures, The Sims, The Longest Journey….. ummmm I can’t remember any more that need to be on the list. Hope that helps!
– Elizabeth “Lizo” Medina-Gray
Anyone who’s read Making the Adventure can safely guess that you’re a fan of the old-school style of puzzle games that Sierra used to make. Oddly, King’s Quest was the only series of that genre I didn’t get into. On the other hand, Quest for Glory, Space Quest and Leisure suit Larry are all within my range of expertise. Or if you’re a fan of Lucas Arts, you can play any of the Sam & Max, Indiana Jones, or Monkey Island games.
-Zack
As for me, I remember getting excited about Wolfenstein 3D and later about Doom and Doom 2. Then there was Heretic and Rise of the Triad. Unreal Tournament was really good at pushing some of the boundaries for the genre by introducing a variety of multiplayer modes to gamers with poor Internet connections.
I’ve always been a fan of strategy games. X-Com is a series that doesn’t get a whole lot of attention, but was ahead of its time when the series began. The game is about Earth’s military response to the alien menace.
You can learn more about any of the games by Googling or searching for them on gamefaqs.com. If any of them seem halfway interesting you can either find most of them by searching for abandonware sites.
I’m about out of time, so I’ll wrap this up with one more e-mail.
Dear Z-
Are their any good graphic sex games out there in the wide world of gaming? My honey and I were talking over Valentine’s Day about how we would occasionally like a little MATURE gameplay. Can you help us out?
Unhappily Unsatisfied
P.S. My favorite PC game is Half-Life.
Dear Unhappily Unsatisfied,
There are many graphic sex games. The problem is finding any of them that are any good. You can find a ton of awful hentai games that have been reviewed on somethingawful.com. Cobra Mission is an older game that I’ve always liked, but it’s more of an adventure game that happens to have a ton of sex in it rather than a game that relies on sexual gameplay.
The problem with looking for a graphic sex game is that most gamers are going to be satisfied with insanely unrealistic pictures of overly-submissive girls. So I’m going to have to say that you’re probably not going to have much luck finding any good graphic sex games. But don’t worry, the fact that you’re having sex at all puts you ahead of about 95% of all gamers.
-Zack
So that’s it for another month’s worth of Cheat Codes for Life. Since my call for specific types of letters worked out better than expected, let’s try sending me questions that have to do with embarrassing game moments. Send me those letters.
