Video Games I've Played
This is not a complete list, but it's a list of the games I felt
a sense of accomplishment upon finishing. Many of them, especially
the puzzle ones, Kristina helped play, or at least watched. I also
like some X3 games like Master of Orion, Alpha Centauri, and the Civ series.
In addition, I played and defeated pretty much every shareware version
of the
games put out by Apogee back in the day.
In any case, this list is mostly a reminder to me which games I've played,
because I am getting old enough now I can't always remember.
Tomb Raider Series
- Tomb Raider - (defeated)
- Tomb Raider Unfinished Business - (defeated) - a bit of a waste of time
- Tomb Raider II - (defeated x2) - was OK though parts could be a bit tedious
Most recent replay took a long time and was really hard, much harder
than I remember.
- Tomb Raider III - (defeated) - graphics were much better, but the levels
were too large and non-linear
- Last Revelation - (defeated)
- Chronicles - (defeated)
- Angel of Darkness - (defeated)
Controls are a pain.
- Legend - (defeated x2) - Graphics are amazing,
especially since
we're playing on a 6-year old machine with integrated Intel GPU.
Gameplay is a bit linear though, with fairly unoriginal puzzles.
Controls awkward when playing under wine.
- Anniversary - defeated x2 - OK, though the boss battles
could be obscure
- Underworld - in progress - almost too much for our recent
machine to handle, controls akward under wine
Squaresoft Games
- Final Fantasy 1 - (Defeated, **). Thought
it was a bit too easy, and the end is annoying -- time paradox!
- Final Fantasy 2 - (Defeated, ***). Much better than 1.
Not too much grinding, but missing the blood sword makes the final battle very hard.
- Final Fantasy 5 - (Defeated, ****) Took two attempts.
- Finaly Fantasy 3/6 - (Defeated, ****) Took two attempts.
- Final Fantasy 7 (Defeatedx3 *****)
- Final Fantasy 8 (Defeated ****)
- Chrono Trigger (Defeated, ****)
Originally got to the last boss battle, was too hard because
I had unknowingly skipped a lot of optional stuff and wasn't leveled
high enough. 20 years later played again and managed to just barely
beat it, the final Lavos fight is *really* difficult.
Metroid Series
- Metroid - (Defeated ****) not fast enough for swimsuit
- Metroid II - (Defeated ***)
- Super Metroid - (Defeated *****) again, not fast enough
for swimsuit, but did save the animals
Lego Related
- Lego Starwars Wii - (Defeated ****) unlocked freeplay
- Lego Indiana Jones Wii - (Defeated ****) unlocked freeplay
- Lego Harry Potter Wii - (Defeated ***)
- Lego Batman Wii - (Defeated (**)
Indiana Jones Related
- Indiana Jones and the Last Crusage - (defeated **)
really awkward controls, hated the fight scenes
- Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis - (defeated twice ***)
weird ending (second time, puzzles more annoying than I remember)
- Indiana Jones and the Infernal Machine - (defeated twice ***)
Very tomb-raider-esque. Crashes way too often in annoying ways.
(second time: concur on the crashing and sometimes obscure puzzles)
- Indiana Jones and the Emporer's Tomb - (incomplete ***)
The Mac Version has really painful controls, spazzes
out with joystick at critical times. Have gotten
near end [had to cheat a few times]. Stuck on a really annoying
level where I always fall to my death. I do enjoy smashing furniture though.
Star Trek Related
- Star Trek 25th Anniversary (PC edition) - (Defeated ***)
Voice acting great, puzzles so-so. Has really lousy ending.
Favorite part was getting the ghost of the dead Ensign to say
"Captain, don't melt the snow!"
Monkey Island Series
- The Secret of Monkey Island - (Defeated Thrice *****)
- Monkey Island 2: LeChuck's Revenge - (Defeated Thrice ****)
Bizzarre ending. On second playing, I can't emphasize enough
how weird that ending was.
- The Curse of Monkey Island - (Defeated Thrice *****)
- Escape from Monkey Island - (Defeated Thrice ***)
Not bad, but the Monkey Combat was boring and the ending was rushed
and not very enjoyable.
- Tales from Monkey Island -- (Defeated Twice ****)
I liked it a lot, though the manatee and crossroads parts
were a bit gross. I also don't like the voodoo lady conspiracy
stuff, though at least it means there's hope for Morgan.
- Return to Monkey Island -- (***)
The game itself wasn't horrible.
Managed to beat it without any hints.
Felt like it was rehashing things a lot by spending so much time
on Melee. The family *really* didn't like the ending, but I suppose
it wasn't that much worse than the ending of 2. We also were
disappointed with Elaine, we were used the grumpy/sarcastic version
of her, she was way too nice in this version.
Sam and Max Games
- Sam and Max Hit The Road - (Defeated **)
The plot was fun, but I found the controls nearly unusable,
and was constantly stuck because I wasn't clicking on the
exact two pixels that would pick up an important item or
take us to a mostly hidden room.
- Sam and Max Save the World (Remaster) - (Defeated ***)
The kids really enjoyed this one. Some of the voice acting
was a bit grating at times.
- Sam and Max: Beyond Time and Space (Remaster) - (Deafeated **)
This one seems to have more obvious crude/adult humor and a lot
of needless cruelty even for a Sam and Max game. Just got
weirder as it went along.
Other SCUMM Games
- Loom -- (Defeated **)
Interesting game mechanism. Weird story, way too short.
The radio-drama casette got stuck in my car tape deck.
Interesting game to play if your last name is "Weaver".
- Maniac Mansion -- (In Progress)
A bit too non-linear for us, with awkward controls.
- Grim Fandango -- (Defeatedx2 ****)
Good, though the puzzles were non-obvious at times, and had trouble
telling the characters apart. Very immersive.
Second time around was mostly annoyed at how buggy the native Linux
steam version is, managed to soft-lock the game a few times.
- The Dig -- (Defeated ****)
The kids liked this one. I found the voice acting a bit annoying,
and a few of the puzzles were overly difficult, mostly for user-interface
reasons (I need to hold down the button? I need to find the 3-pixel
wide part lying on the ground?)
Myst/Cyan Games
- Myst - (defeated four times, ***)
The first playthrough in the 90s we had the
defective first version that told you the wrong way to flip
the switches at the end.
- Myst (2020) - (defeated, **)
I prefer the original. The VR-related changes take away from
the game I feel. Also we were playing right after release
and it was very buggy.
The patches helped, or at least they
helped when they weren't forcing us not to play as once steam
started an update we had to wait for the full multi-GB download
to complete which for us could take hours.
The autosave interface was unintuitive
and we lost our near-the-end save.
- Myst Apple II - (defeated, ****) Also have the
world speedrun record
- Riven - (defeated four times, ****)
I still think this might be my favorite, though maybe for
nostalgia reasons. I hate the must-close-the-door puzzle.
- Riven (2024) - (defeated once, ***)
It is a nice game. Interesting added content which I can't
have an unbiased opinion about because I really liked the original.
Did get stuck a few times, but mostly because I was short on time
and also had to unlearn things from the old one. Still hate the
close-the-door puzzle.
- Myst III: Exile - (defeated five times, ****)
Really nice graphics for the time, though hard to navigate these
days, keep trying to use WASD. This is especially trouble in the
Jungles. Runs great in SCUMMVM these days.
- Myst IV : Revelation - (defeated thrice, ****)
Beautiful graphics, but was over too quickly.
Also, freaky lion on the curtains songs.
- Myst: Uru Complete Chronicles - (defeated, ***)
Poor interface, tired of kicking things around,
more close-the-door puzzles,
and we kept missing really subtle clues that were needed to win.
- Myst 5: End of Ages - (defeated thrice, **)
Yeesha is a pain and a bit too preachy. Lots of unanswered
questions about the tablets, etc. A bit short.
- Obduction: (defeated, ***)
Played it once and got 2/3 the way through before giving up.
The excessively long loading times were a huge pain.
Tried again a few years later and did finally finish it.
Was an enjoyable game, but a completely incomprehensible plot
and a very disappointing ending. Picked the wrong ending at first
just because it was very subtle that the game even let you make
any decisions.
- Firmament: (defeated, ***)
A lot of frustration with bugs (especially with the ice crane)
but that might be because we kick-started it and actually played
it right at release. A bit frustrating as patches often would
come just as we wanted to play and due to our slow internet
meant we had to delay playing for hours. We did manage to get
through w/o any hints. The aforementioned ice crane, the harvester
steering, and the pipe maintanence were all probably more
frustrating than needed. That ending was something else and a bit
unexpected.
Sierra Online Games
- King's Quest 1 (VGA Remake) - (defeated, **)
too many ways to dead-end, lots of non-obvious puzzles.
- King's Quest 2 - (defeated, *)
more dead-ends, nonsensical story
- King's Quest 3 - (in progress, *)
Hated the first-half time limit. Ended up hacking the save
game to give us more time.
- Torrin's Passage - (defeated, **) a lot of non-obvious
puzzles
Infocomm
- Return to Zork - abandoned - Very annoying puzzles.
Darkside Detective
- Darkside Detective - (Defeated - ****)
Some of the puzzles were a bit obscure. Kids liked this one.
- Fumble in the Dark - (Defeated - ****)
Some of the puzzles were frustrating but eventually figured
them out. Much longer than previous game. Weirdly
obvious typos in the last few levels.
Nancy Drew
- Sea of Darkness - (Defeated - ****) Some of the puzzles
were a bit hard but we beat the whole thing w/o spoilers.
The kids really got into the plot.
- Treasure in the Royal Tower - (Defeated - **)
This was an early one. Controls were a bit laggy on modern hardware
and extremely inconsistent. The final puzzle was a bit non-intuitive
and had to run back and forth to the tower a million times.
- The Final Scene - (Defeated - **)
Controls still laggy. A lot of just walking around talking to
people. Last series of puzzles had too many timed puzzles.
- Curse of Blackmoor Manor - (Abandoned)
This one was a pain, the puzzles were annoying, and it just
got tedious.
Other
- Out of this World - (Defeated Twice - ****)
- Prince of Persia - (Defeated Twice - ****)
- Lemmings - (***)
- Machinarium - (***)
Puzzles/steering were a bit non-obvious at times.
- Botanicula - (***) a bit short, eventually figured out the puzzles
- Ori and the Lost Forest - in progress. Find a few of the parts
way too difficult, not a fan of the controls.
- The Witness - (Defeated -- ***)
defeated the initial part (all lasers) but not the bonus.
Puzzles surprisingly accessible and mostly fun.
Lack of actual plot was a downside.
Game kept crashing but that's mostly due to our low-end Intel graphics.
- Quern - (Defeated -- ***)
All endings. Was nice to play a new Myst-like game.
Fun to pretend the weird guy was somehow an early Atrus told
from a less flattering point of view. As with Myst, ending was
a bit disappointing. Solved almost all of it without hints.
- Rime - (Defeated -- ***)
A bit darker than the usual games we've been playing, and
surprisingly reminiscent of Tomb Raider. Not 4 stars because
the story was so, so sad.
- Talos Principle -- Part way through
- Semblance - (Defeated -- ****)
Nice puzzle game. Would have liked to have had slightly
more plot, the ending was a bit quick with no explanation.
- Broken Age - (Defeated -- ****)
Beat it entirely without hints! Though we ended up extremely
frustrated and almost gave up a few times on the second part.
Did like the characters.
- Haven Moon - (Defeated -- **)
Very pretty game, but the puzzles were extremely obscure.
We did get the good ending first try.
- Quantum Conundrum - (In Progress)
Have done it without hints so far, though it has gotten massively
harder in the third wing (generally know what to do, I'm just
bad at 3d-platforming)
Portal
- Portal - (Defeated - ****) though too short
- Portal 2 - (Defeated - ***) clever ending, but unlike a lot of
people I *really* hated Wheatley
Wii Games
- Back to the Future (Defeated - ***) -- Fun though you're a bit on
rails for much of it.
- Zak and Wiki -- (Defeated - ****) -- first time through got stuck
on last level. Played over from scratch 7 years later and
finally beat it.
- Boy and His Blob -- about 2/3 the way through
- Rythm Heaven Fever -- about 2/3 the way through
Kerbal Space Program
Videlectrix
- Roomisode Triungulate. (***).
Beat it with help of kid #3. Did the whole thing without hints,
including the elevator bonus.
Stardew Valley
- Achieved perfection. (****). Highly recommend.
See some pictures here
Broken Sword Series
- Broken Sword 1 : Shadow of Templars (original version) (Defeated -- ***)
Not a fan of the must-talk-to-everyone and
show-them-every-inventory-item gameplay while only being
able to walk around really slowly.
Also died in some seriously annoying places without a chance
to save nearby.
Got stuck on the
infamous goat puzzle (annoying as we had it figured
out we were just clicking things in the wrong order).
Not really attached to George. Nico is great though.
- Broken Sword II : The Smoking Mirror (original version) (Defeated -- ***)
Really got tired of the puzzles in this one, hit the second-worst
adventure game problem: figuring out the solution to a puzzle but
not being able to figure out the exact clicks needed
to accomplish it. This happened multiple times. Also for whatever
reason George just doesn't click as a sympathetic character.
I kept wanting Nico to be even ruder to him. The ending
was extremely abrupt as well.
- Broken Sword 3 : The Sleeping Dragon (Defeated -- ***)
Hate the on-again off-again thing with Nico, and George is
obnoxious as always. Not having permadeath is an improvement.
Wasn't always a fan of the box-pushing puzzles and the weird
control system threw me off. Ending was also a bit abrupt.
- Broken Sword 4 : The Angel of Death (Defeated -- **)
Was a bit hard getting it to work on Linux.
Not really a fan of this control scheme either.
Spent the whole first half wishing Nico was there.
George even worse than normal.
Some really annoying puzzles. Paperclip?
Too many timed stealth puzzles.
Endings are always unsatisfying rushed cutscenes.
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Last updated 6 January 2025