There are some movies where when you hear that someone hasn't seen them you're just like, WTF is wrong with you man? Like Star Wars for instance.

What games would bring the same reaction? To me gaming would be a bit harder to nail down, so an FPS fan might say Doom or Half-life, an RTS fan maybe Dune II or Starcraft, I dunno. RPG is my favourite genre, and it's not uncommon for favourites like PS:T to be unplayed by others, but I think many might put Baldur's Gate, Fallout, or maybe some of the older series like Wizardry, Bard's Tale etc etc. I am aware many might say System Shock 2, and no I haven't played it :P if GOG hurries up maybe I will :)

So, what other games do you put in this category?

Hey, I haven't seen all Star Wars, and I don't intent to. :p

Or Fallout, or BD, or PS:T, or Wizardry, or BT or... :P

Anyway, a guy that doesn't know WoW, SC, WC3, CS is not a gamer for me. haha :p

Well it's hard to compare movies with games - movies from 60 years ago are still shown on TV and for free. Even if you want to play the 13 year old Half Life, you still need to buy it so you won't "accidentally" get into contact with it, you need to make an active effort meaning that even the most well known games are often not played by many many gamers.

I think the standard Doom, Lemmings, etc. games would fit but it all depends on the age of the gamer and when they started gaming I guess.

It's a bit depressing to see all those wet-nosed teenagers on forums talking about Counter Strike as if it's a dinosaur of a game - heck, even games released in 2004, which I still consider relatively recent in terms of a retro gamer, get treated as if they're the music equivalent of 70s music ...

Which sucks terribly. :p

*takes a bow ;)

Let's see.. That would be "World of warcraft" (haven't played), "Starcraft" (barely played when it came out), "Wing Commander 3" (played 10min a couple of weeks ago..) and "Counter Strike" (played quite alot when it came out..).

I would think that perhaps "Super Mario" would qualify. But games, up until recently, don't generally have the same timeless appeal as movies do. At least not the games i grew up on. I tried booting up the old C=128 a couple of months ago, and I must say; most of the games are pretty rubbish. While I can sit down and be completely blown away by "Metropolis" or "Forbidden Planet" or "The Public Enemy".

Maybe slightly newer games will be considered "the gaming equivalent of Star Wars" in a few years, but as of right now i really can't think of a single game I'd be surprised if someone hasn't played.

Personally I would say Tetris, Nibbles or Minesweeper nearly everybody, even non gamers, have probably played one or the other.

Good call.. I didn't think of those. I WOULD be surprised if I ran into someone who hadn't played "Tetris". Aahh.. Ok.. All those abbreviations are difficult. I had to think long and hard about a couple of those. How exhausting is it to just write the full title?

I didn't know about his love of Blizzard-games. That certantly sheds new light on his post and makes it make alot more sense. :P

Warcraft 3 i played quite a bit.. Great game :)

None taken. I'm not really "proud" to be labeled as a "fanboy", as I don't see myself as one, I just love their games.

It is a question of time, I guess. Even though I played Super Mario on my Super Nintendo when I was 3-5 (back in 1993-1995), I don't have much love for it and other old games.

Youger people will most likely praise Half Life, Warcraft, Starcraft, Civilization, Sims, and similar series that came out near 2000, or even later, than some older games like King's Quest, Police Quest... (most text-adventures) and so on...

If we are indeed tanking about praise.. I thought this was about the "WHAT.. YOU HAVEN'T PLAYED *-----* !?!?!"

If so none of those titles qualify in my opinoin. I wouldn't be surprised if i, now OR ten years from now, ran into someone who had never even HEARD of half Life.

Movies are thursted into our homes through television, and if you have never, even by acident, watched Star Wars I would be very surprised. Games, on the other hand, we need to actively seek out. And MOST people are not gamers. However, most people have cell-phones, and most people are bored waiting for the bus, and most cell-phones have tetris..

The fact that gaming is split into thousands of mutually hostile factions based on genre, platform, era, atmosphere, etc. doesn't help. The GOG forums are not going to give the same answers as, say, the Atlus forums. Ever. (Not a member myself, just pulling a (console-centric) example out of thin air.)

That said, I agree with Gersen that Tetris would be the "Star Wars" of gaming based on its penetration into humanity's overall culture. I might put Mario second. Anything beyond that is directly determined by what fandom you're a part of.

Final Fantasy.

Mostly because of how much the series has gone to crap over the past decade. :P

I play the games that I want to play, not ones that would make me a gamer in the eyes of anyone else, Ill ask advice on games that may be good but if I dont like the look of it ill ignore it

*looks at every MMO including WOW*
*glances at the Wing Commander series*
*spits on the Sims series*

Doesn't everyone?