Games you (probably) haven't played that inspired the games you (probably) have played
The popular games get all the attention so let us look to those that walked so the big boys could run.
Ideally, each game would have led to the subsequent creation of a more remembered game or franchise.
Will be adding games as people suggest or I remember/learn more.
Ideally, each game would have led to the subsequent creation of a more remembered game or franchise.
Will be adding games as people suggest or I remember/learn more.
32 Games
Alone in the Dark"s isometric camera and survival horror gameplay would directly inspire Shinji Mikami in the development of Capcom's Resident Evil series
Arguably the first example of the modern first-person shooter genre. The gameplay and technology on display would be expanded in further id software titles such as Wolfenstein 3D and of course, DOOM.
Taitos first single screen puzzle game and a direct predecessor to Bubble Bobble
One of the earliest examples of the ARPG, it combined arcade-style action mechanics with traditional role-playing mechanics, and played a significant role in the evolution of the JRPG
After release several developers would leave Irem to form Nazca Corporation which would later create the Metal Slug series, primarily drawing inspiration from this release.
The original maze game. A student project, Namco expressed interest in the development of the game before ultimately releasing Pac-Man a year later.
One of the first open-world JRPGs, it would go on to influence Falcom's Ys series, as well as the open-world design of titles like Metal Gear Solid V.
Though it had many sequels, King's Field is best known today as the spiritual predecessor to From Software's later Souls series
The original arcade version's director, Takashi Nishiyama, would expand on game design founded here, and would later be responsible for the creation of the Street Fighter and Fatal Fury series.
One of the earliest beat em' ups. The popularity of it's western conversion Renegade would subsequently lead to the creation of the Double Dragon series.
Written and Directed by Goichi Suda, this work would influence many of his later titles, namely The Silver Case and associated works. A spiritual sequel to the series would serve as a minigame in the Dangan Ronpa series, being referred to as Twilight Syndrome: Murder Case.
Though best known for its representation as one of the stages in Super Smash bros., Pac-Land's movement physics and gameplay loop would directly influence the development of Super Mario Bros.
Notable as one of the first games designed by Yuji Horii, who would go on to create Dragon Quest which continued the picture within a picture menu system found here. It was also responsible for inspiring now notable creators such as Hideo Kojima and Eiji Aonuma to enter the games industry. Part of the PC-6001 version of Portopia Serial Murder Case is included as a hidden secret in Metal Gear Solid V in the games code.
This game served as the inspiration for the Persona series, laying the groundwork for the Persona system and featuring a high school setting.
An early survival horror title based off a Japanese Film of the same name, Resident Evil would initially start development as a remake of this title, with the two series sharing similar design decisions.
Would go on to influence a large number of Japanese creators, and would inspire many mechanics found in series such as The Legend of Zelda. Intentionally obtuse, arcades would carry notebooks for players to share tips and secrets for the games many challenges.
As well as influencing the MMO genre as a whole, the title would directly cited as an inspiration during the development of Final Fantasy XIV 2.0 by Producer Naoki Yoshida.
introduced the use of 3D polygons to the shooter genre. Some of the popular light gun rail shooters influenced by Virtua Cop include the Time Crisis series, The House of the Dead series, and various Resident Evil spin-offs. It would be an influence on Rare's Goldeneye: 007.
Recognized as the first fully 3-D fighter, would go on to directly influence the creation of both Tekken and Dead or Alive. Shenmue was initially conceived as a spin-off with the protagonist of VF, Akira Yuki, being the games lead.
Extremly popular with Japanese creators, it would not inspire the JRPG genre as a whole, but would be directly responsible for the creation of Dragon Quest, Final Fantasy, and numerous other series.
A landmark title during its release, it pioneered and solidified the mechanics of the SHMUP genre. Despite its importance it received little attention outside of Asia during its release.
Intially developed using reverse engineered Game Boy hardware prior to its international release, Nintendo of Japan's interest in the project led to Argonaut becoming the first Western developers to work directly with Nintendo of Japan. Considered a landmark Game Boy title in Japan, Argonaut would later go to co-create the Star Fox series, utilizing similar 3D graphics.
This top-down western shooter would eventually become the subject of a early 2000s reboot which would ultimately go on to become Red Dead Revolver, the first in Rockstar's Red Dead series.
A maze-based enemy eradication game, Pengo was a modest hit on release, and would directly inspire the creation of HUDSON'S Bomberman series.
Pioneered several concepts for the open-world genre of video games, and was notable as being one of the first games to contain an "Easter Egg". Outside of Video Games, it would feature as a critical plot element in the film Ready Player One released in 2018.
Directed by Koichi Nakamura, Director of several Dragon Quest games, It would pioneer the modern Visual Novel format, later receiving a sequel in the form of a tie-in with Spike Chunsoft's Dangan Ronpa series.
A self-referential parody RPG, Moon would be a major influence on Undertale, as well as being an early example of the Isekai genre of Japanese storytelling.
Alongside King's Field, Shadow Tower: Abyss alongside the original would be a direct inspiration for the development of the Souls series.
A massively influential text-based adventure game, it inspired numerous releases such as Zork, Adventureland, Mystery House, Rogue, and Adventure.
Intelligent Systems' first strategy RPG, the development of which would ultimately lead to the creation of the Fire Emblem series, as they wished to create a strategy RPG that wasn't grounded in contemporary warfare. It successor is the Advance Wars series, which continues to this day.
The first retail release by Jordan Mechner, Karateka's unique visual presentation and controls would find their largest success in his follow-up work Prince of Persia. It would also inspire other cinematic platformers such as Another World and Flashback
Was an influential title upon it's Japanese release, and directly inspired the Spelunky series of games.
22 Comments
The Outfoxies is an arena/platform fighter that pits spies and assassins against each other. It's often said to likely be an influence on Smash Bros and Killer7, as well as a direct inspiration for the multiplayer mode of The Force Unleashed II.
I would add both of those games if I could find any evidence of them directly inspiring another well-known release. Checking online, Maze War was pretty inaccessible to be that influential despite its technical feats, and Suda says he only found out about The Outfoxies after Killer7 was already out. In any case I'll have to check them out some more, I wasn't even aware of them before now!
Played Xevious, Played Alone in the Dark, Hydlide, King's Field, Pac-Land, SMT If..., Sweet Home, Druaga, Virtua Cop, Virtua Fighter, Wizardry and Xevious enjoyed most of them
Good list
Good list
Hope to be helpful!
Btw, do you think that the first Fire Emblem of them all is influential enough? A lot of people may have have played its remakes, but not the original from Famicom. To feel the loses on battle, in a sense that you lost "someone" and not a mere unit, was the main objective of Shozou Kaga.
Btw, do you think that the first Fire Emblem of them all is influential enough? A lot of people may have have played its remakes, but not the original from Famicom. To feel the loses on battle, in a sense that you lost "someone" and not a mere unit, was the main objective of Shozou Kaga.
Add Otogirisou, Moon Remix RPG Chadventure, Shadow Tower, Colossal Cave Adventure, Karateka, Ys I, Rent A Hero, EverQuest
Funny enough fwiw i know some other popular srpgs like Shining Force weren't actually inspired by Fire Emblem
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shining_Force#Development
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shining_Force#Development
Oh add Adventure as well
Famicom Wars for Advance Wars
Gunparade March->Muv-Luv, 13 Sentinels, Persona 3 (any of those social sim games with a calendar system and s-link equivalents really) , among others.
Red Dead Revolver was meant as a spiritual successor of Gun.Smoke
@Loto & C_F: Fire Emblem was influential, but so was Tactics Ogre, so most SRPGs stem from both
Also, Shining Force was deliberately made to be the anti-Fire Emblem
Also, Shining Force was deliberately made to be the anti-Fire Emblem
As for suggestions for the list, Beneath Apple Manor was made before Rogue
@Lot0 The original Fire Emblem sits in that wierd spot like the original Dragon Quest, they're too well known for this list despite the first games being not that popular in the modern sense. I didn't really think this list would get so much attention though so I probably need to rethink it and clarify a bit lmao. I'm trying to stay away from franchises that are still relevant at least.
Sometimes there will be games that are innovators but were too obscure to be recognized as influential. Finding the middle ground is difficult but I'll do my best!
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Oh yeah I guess I should clarify some of my suggestions too. Adventure I don't believe had the first easter egg in a video game outright but it was stated by Atari it could be seen as a sort of "easter egg" for players to find and was seen as an influential game due to its popular hidden message https://www.forbes.com/sites/sethporges/2017/12/20/the-true-story-behind-the-original-video-game-easter-egg-that-inspired-ready-player-one/?sh=58f6f02d2976
Otogiriso never had a translation but in Japan it was quite an influence on VNs with retrospective reviewers saying the graphics and sound really set it apart from stuff like choose your own adventure books and such before it, it also influenced Danganronpa http://endaso.blogspot.com/2011/10/super-famicom-horror-sound-novels.html
Moon Remix RPG Adventure has been cited as an influence on several works such as Chulip and Undertale due to how it handled RPG genre conventions https://www.backloggd.com/u/vehemently/list/chulip-likes/title/grid/
Shadow Tower/Abyss has more in common with Demon's Souls than King's Field does and is even less popular than King's Field. There's the diegetic sound emphasis and some rather similar areas for one. It also has some pretty blatant Berserk homages like the enemies with the cannon hands and the torture rooms resembling Mozgus' room. Even the final boss bears resemblance and it has voice acted NPCs.
Regarding Colossal Cave Adventure, as per Wikipedia "directly inspired the creation of numerous games, including Zork (1977), Adventureland (1978), Mystery House (1980), Rogue (1980), and Adventure (1980), which went on to be the foundations of the interactive fiction, adventure, roguelike, and action-adventure genres."
Without Kareteka, the platformer genre would be quite different as cinematic platformers like Prince of Persia, Out of this World, and Flashback all took cues from from Jordan Mechner's work on it.
Otogiriso never had a translation but in Japan it was quite an influence on VNs with retrospective reviewers saying the graphics and sound really set it apart from stuff like choose your own adventure books and such before it, it also influenced Danganronpa http://endaso.blogspot.com/2011/10/super-famicom-horror-sound-novels.html
Moon Remix RPG Adventure has been cited as an influence on several works such as Chulip and Undertale due to how it handled RPG genre conventions https://www.backloggd.com/u/vehemently/list/chulip-likes/title/grid/
Shadow Tower/Abyss has more in common with Demon's Souls than King's Field does and is even less popular than King's Field. There's the diegetic sound emphasis and some rather similar areas for one. It also has some pretty blatant Berserk homages like the enemies with the cannon hands and the torture rooms resembling Mozgus' room. Even the final boss bears resemblance and it has voice acted NPCs.
Regarding Colossal Cave Adventure, as per Wikipedia "directly inspired the creation of numerous games, including Zork (1977), Adventureland (1978), Mystery House (1980), Rogue (1980), and Adventure (1980), which went on to be the foundations of the interactive fiction, adventure, roguelike, and action-adventure genres."
Without Kareteka, the platformer genre would be quite different as cinematic platformers like Prince of Persia, Out of this World, and Flashback all took cues from from Jordan Mechner's work on it.
Interesting stuff! Added!
add portopia desu
Donkey Kong was first released in 1981, before Popeye.
@SuperNinjiGalaxy You're 100% right! No clue how that slipped through. I must've got dates mixed up with the Famicom release.
Lot0
1 year ago
https://www.backloggd.com/games/maze-war