Gaming Nostalgia

[SephYuyX]

As the days and years pass, and the more "adult" we are all becoming, it's fleeting sadness we encounter in realization that our free time is diminishing, and the time we had to dedicate to gaming is all but totally gone.

In moments of this realization I sometimes pine for simple days past where the golden age of gaming once prevailed. Now plagued with shitty cell phone games, and only enough time to be a "casual" with the small amount of blockbuster games that come out, I tend to reminisce about my favorites that I wish I could just go back to and experience all over again.

That's not to say our current or futures selves are any worse than they once were; I'm sure most of us are much better off than we were 10+ years ago and nothing but better is on its way, but one is allowed to put on the nostalgia glasses now and then.

I doubt I am the only one who sometimes thinks of all the fun they had back then, and after taking that terrible videogames+abuse questionnaire the other week, I was struck with an inclination to ponder about what my favorites were.

So maybe this is a LJ post, but in any case, it would still be fun to read about what others have to say about their video game experiences.

What are your top five or so most played/favorite games, and what is your history with them? Why are they your most played favorites? Did they teach you any future skills that came in handy, or were they just fun time killers? Etcetc.

[SephYuyX]

1) FFXI
2) Phantasy Star Online
3) Worms 2 / Armageddon
4) Unreal Tournament 2K3
5) Ragnarok Online
Runner Up: Descent II

FFXI is kind of a given, and I think for the majority of us here that will be somewhere high on the list. Regardless of the mixed bad XI gave us, whether it was great dynamis drops one day, or weeks of king hunting with no claims, or claims with DFeet, the overall experience is something I wouldn’t trade for anything. The friends I made and some of the lessons and values (patience) learned is truly invaluable. I started playing in 2002, and I loved every minute I played, up until recent years where everyone basically stopped playing, and there was no real point in doing anything anymore. Also I’m sure the lack of time to play due being in a serious relationship and eventual marriage was kind of a hindrance of being lazy. So when XIV came out, I pulled the plug on XI. I played XIV for a month or so, beat the main scenario, capped BLM, got some of gear for the time, and with the lack of time to really do anything serious beyond that point, I wasn’t really motivated to play XIV any more either, even though it was a fun game.

PSO, another MMO, I was lucky enough to be a beta tester for the JP DC back in early 2000; fond memories of getting that damn thing to work with NetZero. Such a simple MMO, but yet so engrossing. I made a lot of JP friends here (which a lot carried over to XI), and it was so fun to run after those damn red boxes. My RL buddy and I would play nonstop every weekend. I forget when it happened, but at one point my save file got corrupted, and boy I was not happy. Needless to say, I stopped playing. PSO from the gamecube was released and I picked that up and played like I did on the DC, but I eventually lost interest and stopped. Since then, I would jump on BlueBurst server and play every now and then, but I haven’t done that in several years. I also played PSU and PSO2 briefly, but could never really get in to them since PSU was terribly localized, and PSO2 just felt like a choir due to me slipping on my JP skillz.

Worms was by far my most time consuming next to XI, I would play this religiously daily. It was my first real PC game back in 1998, little did I know it had an online function, which eventually lead me to become a super awesome roper. If I wasn’t at football or bowling practice, I was playing Worms. Eventually Armageddon came out, and for the most part improved upon everything. Being a heavy UK game I made a lot of UK friends, I learned a lot about their culture, and adopted a lot of their habits and speech, but mostly they made great m8s. Roping was a sure thing now, and I was one of the best; the discovery that mechanical PS2 keyboards were better than the now usb keyboards brought a lot of people up to par, and silkworm even more so, but there was still a level of skill most never could grasp. I always keep Worms installed on my PC, and hop on every now and then, whether it be just solo offline roping, or online with the few people who still play now and then. I’ve played every version of worms since, but nothing held a candle to Armageddon.

UT2K3, the game I believe that is one of the best shooters that ever was. It improved on past games and still hasn’t been matched. I got this right before XI came out, and when I wasn’t playing XI, I was playing UT2K3. Not only the best shooter, but BombingRun? I was allll the fuck over that. DeathMatch was for pussys, BR was where the real men were. People who could both shoot guns, and at the same time play a sort of football like game? Yeah, gtfo. “BR 1.35 IG Trans LG”, if you weren’t playing this, you weren’t shit. Fucking what a rush. The hand eye coordination worms gave me gave me an edge in this game and expanded upon it. Was with one of the best clans in the game, and we just wrecked shit, I can’t even describe how awesome a time I had with this game. Like worms, I keep this game installed and play it every blue moon or so. While other people were “pros” at Halo, I saw it as nothing more than a kids game. Slow paced and unskilled. When I was done with a round of UT2K3 (a very faced paced game) I would play a match of Halo and it was just so slow and sluggish, it was like in the movies where you can just see everything in slow motion. I played UT2K4 for a minute, but it was terrible.

Ragnarok Online.. another MMO.. did this really only come out in 2001? It felt like I played this way before XI.. but I guess not. I played the alpha iRO version where all you had to do was open up a hex editor and give yourself infinite zeny, or whatever else you needed. Eventually it ended up in a full release. A very basic MMO, but a grinder’s dream come true. Kill porings and blue wolves erryday, going agi knight and just destroying everything, so much fun. Played pretty religiously for a while, but I guess XI came about. I played on private servers every now and then, killing one thing and being max level, was fun to just goof around. Last I played they had some sort of new ascended classes which were kind of cool. I played RO2 for a minute; it was kind of fun, totally nostalgic, but nothing more.

An honorable mention would be Descent II, my very first PC game. I really wish this game would be remade in all of its glory, I think it would be an instant blockbuster. For all the people who play shooters now, this is like the same thing but in spaceships. Though I guess classics need to stay where they are. As with Worms and UT2K3, I keep this installed as well and play it once a year or so.

[Sqwunk]

I hear you man, I am at a stage in my life though where I'm able to play games pretty much all night after I get home from work. But with only a 4-5 hours to play games it almost feels like that's not much time. With having to find time to eat dinner too and if I want to do any other kind of internet browsing. I certainly feel that nostalgia of not having really any responsibility and just being able to sit down and play through an RPG for hours on end and not have to worry. Casual games on cell phones is quite the strange phenomenon to me because of how time consuming they can actually be without you realizing it.

It would be really hard for me to put a top 5 list but much like you

FFXI - I invested about 7 years of my life into the game and met tons of wonderful people from all over the country and a few from other countries whom I still keep in contact with to this day even though I haven't played XI in nearly 5 years. And eventually started using this forum too because of it, though now I just use BG for everything except for FFXI related things, as it is my main forum to visit.

Ragnarok Online - I did not play on real servers though, but I have put countless hours into private servers and occasionally will still fire it up for nostalgia purposes, music, building new characters.

Diablo 2 - Nothing really needs to be said about this one, classic and awesome.

Tie for Any of the original Half Lifes / Unreal Tournament GOTY (1999 I think) - I did play 2k3 and loved the new physics engine that they had put into and it was really awesome seeing the rag doll effects for the first time, but I grew up on GOTY. Last man standing - modded one shot kill laser rifles. Who is more accurate is the real question of this game. And I equally put as much time into the half life games, single player and multiplayer. Not so much CS except for mods, but I played a lot of DoD and DoD:Source. My main shooter to play now is the battlefield series which I have also put large amounts of time into. Though Battlefield 4 has so far not really been that addicting as the BFBC2 and BF3.

DotA 2 - Currently the game I invest the most time into now. So much fun. So much frustration.

well shit that's 5(technically 7+) online games.

My favorite single player game is probably Geometry Wars Retro Evolved on XBLA. and to narrow it down, Geometry Wars 2 has a game mode called Pacifism that is my absolute favorite mode to play and it's one of the few games where I actually have a respectable standing on the leaderboards. I'm sure I've been pushed down since I haven't played in 6 months but I think I'm at least still in the top 1000 players.

[Edit] Picture in RIT just reminded me. Chrono Cross is probably one of my favorite RPGs of all time, maybe tying with Final Fantasy 9. I have played through both of them multiple times. I haven't gotten all of the endings to Chrono Cross but I have gotten a good portion of them....I might have to download the Rom for Chrono Cross now...damn nostalgia

[BaneTheBrawler]

Top two:
XI. obviously. sank over 10,000 hours into that game. dynamis was my favorite part. i was senior enough (and a DD, which meant high turnover for my competitors) in my shell that i got most of the drops i wanted fairly quickly. so for me it was a playground in which i got to try out new builds i came up with or found, without regards to the consequences. especially as samurai. sam/rng was my favorite, especially once i got my soboro. Kirin was also a favorite, because again I didn't need to worry about the consequences of my build. once i did my damage, i fully expected to die. for a while, before i got geared, i went sam/mnk and spammed Spirits Within. Got my build up to 1200 damage before my normal gear started to eclipse that and i stopped. was great fun.

Skies of Arcadia. SOA was my first RPG ever. FLYING SHIPS. AIR PIRATES. MOONSTONE CANNON FIRE! fucking LOVE this game.

the rest in no particular order:

Homeworld 1 and 2. Love the shit out of those games. Especially 2. i still play it occasionally, and even got into modding for a while.

Diablo 2. my friends at school played too

Tiberian Sun. first online game i ever played. it was great.

Ocarina of Time/Majora's Mask/Windwaker. Especially OOT. i played the everliving fuck out of that game. i still come back to it sometimes.

Pokemon. Pretty much all of them; not Snap and that kind of stuff though.

Smash Bros Melee. i never played the original, but melee... my friend and i used to do 99 stock vs bowser and donkey kong as falco (me) and kirby (friend), sometimes FFA sometimes teams. would take us about an hour and a half. whenever we played against everyone else, it almost always came down to the two of us duking it out. we were pretty evenly matched, so it was fun as hell.

Halo. All of them (Except Halo Wars), even the new ones. I grew to loathe most of them, but played them anyway because its what my friends were playing and i wanted to hang out.

Star Wars: Battlefront II and Rogue Leader. Battlefront II was great multiplayer, and rogue leader was great single player. i still haven't gotten gold on all the missions.

edit: FUCK, forgot Warcraft 3. played that a LOT. I actually played the MOBAs before they were MOBAs! so hipster. People like to talk shit about LoL and Dota 2 communities like they're shitting up the genre; the genre has had shit communities from the start. NO NOOBS NO DL LAG=KICK

Also, this list focuses more on games that I used to play, in the spirit of the title. Current games are quite different. Mostly strategy games like Civ or Sins of a Solar Empire, with a few games like FTL and Kerbal Space Program thrown in. For the future... i have very high hopes for Star Citizen. I expect them to be at least partially dashed, but as long as I can sink a few thousand hours into it I'll be okay. But tbh, I'm not actually doing much gaming at all these days, and very little console gaming.

Edit2: oh fuck i forgot another one: Golden Eye! It was the only game I ever convinced my dad to play with me, and we used to play ALL THE TIME. In the egyptian/pyramid/whatever level I used to hide in the super dark hallway on top of the body armor and wander a few corridors nearby, then just mow down anyone who got near me, then scurry back to my body armor.

[Sqwunk]

Oh lord smash bros, how can I forget. I'll just say this. much of my whole life has had long periods of smash bros nights. There was a point in time where I would gather with 3 or 4 friends, and play smash bros brawl for 5-8 hours. Probably 3-5 days a week. It was ridiculous and has made me the type of player that plays Final Destination, All Random, No Items, definitely no fucking smash balls.

[Tekki]

XI. I look back on it from time to time, and miss it. Not a week goes by that I think about it. Pre Abyssea, before I quit the first time, I had a tremendous about of meeting new people and playing with them. I really miss leading people in a video game. Like, REALLY miss it. I miss having the free time to dedicate to that task.

Its funny how this thread pops up and you start off talking about diminishing free time. I find myself in Eve, and wanting to put in the same dedication that i had in XI but I can't. I can't even come close. And now part of me wishes I was playing Eve instead of XI. I, in no way regret it, it just makes me wonder where I would sit now if I had spent the same amount of time and dedication in a different game.

[synistar]

I can't put these in any order, and one of them is a cluster of games from a publisher but it gets the point across.

+X-Wing, Tie Fighter, Rebel Alliance for PC. This series of games are the only flight sim games I played with joystick and all way back in the day. Challenging as hell these were. Plus being a kid blasting stuff with lasers while also learning other events in the Star Wars universe was just awesome.

+Gran Turismo 4 and Initial D 3rd Stage. These two racing games I played the hell out of, the 2nd being a quarter muncher in my college days. It's hard to separate these two. If anything, it taught me not to slam on the accelerator to the floor and brakes are your friends. This isn't Rad Racer. Cars don't work that way lol.

+Starcraft: Brood War. I more or less played more UMS games because I was not Korean on ladders. But dang it, so many maps consumed so much of my life.

+Final Fantasy 6 or Super Mario RPG. These SNES era RPGs are so unforgettable in my books. They still hold so much over most other RPGs of recent memory.

+DotA/DotA 2. A game that has consumed my life so much ever since 5.3x on Warcraft 3. I still think I'm only decent after all these years, pretty much plateau on my skill but I play for fun, not to get better.

+Civ 2/4/5 and Alpha Centauri. One sentence: "Just one more turn"

+SimCity, 2k, 3000, 4. Screw mayor, I was a beastly city architect.

Honorable mentions to Warcraft 3: Frozen Throne, Diablo 1 & 2, Dungeon Siege, Pilotwings 64, 2D zelda games, Fallout 1 & 2, Super Metroid, SSX (and Tricky) and Westwood RTS games before they got eaten by EA.

[Titanss]

DW I II III IV VIII X

[Serra]

XI. I look back on it from time to time, and miss it. Not a week goes by that I think about it. Pre Abyssea, before I quit the first time, I had a tremendous about of meeting new people and playing with them. I really miss leading people in a video game. Like, REALLY miss it. I miss having the free time to dedicate to that task.

Agree with this sentiment 100%. XI came out during an ideal time for me -- my first semester of undergrad. I started with a few RL friends, none of which lasted very long, but eventually made a lot of really good friends. I definitely wish I had stayed in touch with more of them now a days. I had to quit because I started grad school, but it was thankfully around the time Abyssea came out and the level cap changed, so the game was starting to feel like a completely different entity.

I was one of those people who kept a XI LJ back in the day, and so whenever I feel nostalgic, I go back through and read some of it -- and promptly wish I had never quit. I think my favorite memories of XI are still working with my CoP group, having to come up with strategies, and then all the tinkering we'd have to do because it was early in the game and the six of us didn't exactly have the best combination of jobs (I only had Drg at 75 at that point..).

I'm really looking forward to Destiny, but I know there's no way I can devote the same amount of time I did to XI back in the day..

[Urza!]

FFVI (was III at the time to us anyway)
Suikoden II
Chrono Trigger
Xenogears
FF Tactics
Secret of Mana


In that order, I could list more SNES RPGs. To me the SNES was the pinnacle of the video game console and the games from that era, especially the RPGs were just the best. FFT and Xenogears continued the Squaresoft tradition of awesome storytelling coupled with fun and engaging gameplay. Suikoden II, and it's antecedent, was simply amazing.

I still occasionally play all of those games, and am a sucker for remakes and ports. I'll probably get FFVI on iOS as I've enjoyed other FF titles, specifically FFT. But when I get nostalgic about games, or think of the "golden era" of video games, those are the titles I think of.

Honorable mention to FFXI for being the first, and only, MMO I've played. While I certainly enjoyed it while I played, looking back there were a few years (!) that I played entirely too much. I'm glad for the experience, I loved playing FFXI, and I really liked a lot of the people I played with over the years. But I'm glad I don't play any longer.

[thetruepandagod]

FFXI is like a lost love i will never get back because she got hit by a car and is now a grotesque zombie that constantly reminds me of how much i used to love her when she was beautiful and ambulatory.

[Andalusian girls]

that's how i feel about you

[thetruepandagod]

being sober makes me a boring jerk

[The Stig]

Without dipping into FFXI ... hm

Dungeon Keeper - the sheer amount of fun I had with this game was amazing, especially in the stupidly difficult expansion pack. It had the right amount of management, micromanagement, carnage and a FPS mode allowing you to control one of your minions. Shame online play was hard to get working. I believe there's a patch floating around which would make it work today, but lack of players might make it hard to matchmake.

Age of Empires II - I spent quite a large amount of time playing this; it was also my first venture into online gaming via MSN Gaming Zone. I got hilariously wiped the first time I played, and I thought I was pro before going online to play with others. Back then games had to be 1.5 hours or less, my dial up ISP cuts me off every 2 hours, and it usually takes about 30 mins to get on and get in

Final Fantasy VII - Well this can't be escaped, but back then I couldn't afford a PS1 easily or any games, so when my mum was visiting some relatives in Hong Kong, a cool cousin over there helped me buy a PS1 that could play bootleg games, and brought a bunch back including FFVII. Knowing the popularity surrounding it, I was eager to play it, having played FF6 in a limited fashion (I never played it by myself, but played it around another cousin's and I would usually watch and have a few random battles).

Of course, having no internet at the time, and before I even got the game, I was armed with a pocket guide (walkthrough) to the game that came free with a PS magazine (which had nothing but a cover with a pic of Cloud, and a tiny screenshot of an overview of Midgar):

http://ffmux.play-hookey.com/wiki/im...gar-aerial.jpg

The imagination in my head was endless. As the pocket guide was nothing else other than text, and although in English, all of the items referred to it were direct japanese translations ... so for example, it tells you to cast "Sandaa" on the guard scorpion, and that when it raises its tail, attacking it will trigger a laser counterattack. Due to this, and how the walkthrough lists each section by area, I thought the entire game takes place in Midgar (it didn't help that towards the end of the Disk 2 section it looped back into Midgar). Of course, I have no further idea on it at the time. The intro didn't help, I felt overwhelmed when I saw the entire city of Midgar in the intro and I was eager to start playing/exploring; thinking back to snippets of the vague walkthrough (why the fuck is there an Ancient Temple inside a city? God how disappointed I was later lol)

Secret of Evermore - My cousin introduced me to Secret of Mana (Seiken Densetsu 2) and we spent hours maxing up chars in that game. Thinking I'll return the favour, I went out and brought SoE, but he wasn't interested. So I starting playing it by myself. It was such a difficult RPG in the first section (how the fuck was I meant to beat the first boss (a bug with 2 arms and its weakpoint behind a rib cage) without grinding???). Also for the first 3 worlds each "end" of the world features some sort of maze, with a mention to the forest, sewer, castle mazes in the 3rd world that I spent an incredible amount of time in. I had no walkthroughs for any at the time, so that only increased the difficulty and frustration.

http://theworldissquare.com/wp-conte.../evermore1.jpg

HOLY SHITTT FIRST BOSS, THE DUDE FROM THE BOX. WHY IS IT KICKING MY ASS????

(in-game) v

http://gamesareevil.com/wp-content/u.../evermore2.jpg

Sonic 3 -

http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_ln...tw9eo1_500.jpg

Fuck you.


There's more but these stand out in my head currently.

Oh, in a general sense, I miss reading game manuals. They had some much cool information and sometimes shows screenshots that aren't in the game; I used to spend hours especially in SoE and SoM trying to get the shit shown in the manual, only to discover on the internet that the screenshot was a beta or something similar.

[Gredival]

Only three for me. I could have put two more from my favorites in, but really these are what stuck with me and what I would consider deeply ingrained in my personal history.

FFXI

I am one of those people the rest of this forum would proclaim as a sufferer of stockholm syndrome. I always believed that as long as you were willing to put your nose to the grindstone, camp, and try your best to claim, you could succeed in FFXI Endgame despite the much reviled HNM system.

All told It took me four years to get my Hecatomb Subligar. That includes two server transfers (because NASA shells took over and the HNM shells on those servers didn't want to compete), leveling jobs I hated, and working my way through three linkshells' DKP systems only to have them disband before I got it.

And I wouldn't trade the experience for the world. I adjusted my sleep schedule around the King pop times, and I set hourly (or half-hour) alarms to wake up for ToAU Kings and Tiamat. Thetruepandagod had my phone number and was authorized to call me literally any time of the day for an HNM. To put it in perspective, by the time I finally got my treasured gear for my Thief, I was able to get an Adaberk and Defending Ring from the sheer amount of spare DKP I had wracked up from continuous camping. The only thing I wouldn't do was use FFXI-App (even though Panda bought it for me).

And to me, competitive world spawns still represents the most perfect End Game system that has existed, or ever will. And with the abomination that was Abyssea and the great "egalitarian" upheaval of converting everything good in FFXI to ??? forced spawns, I will never play an MMO again. But I've been done with FFXI for over four years, and I still miss the Pre-Abyssea era every single day.

I think FFXI taught me the meaning of sacrifice and how to be honest with myself. To get what and where I wanted in XI, I had to leave my native server, with some great friends I had made over the years. But I just couldn't get what I wanted with my friends. And to be honest, that Hecatomb Subligar that I finally got, probably represents more hours, blood, sweat, and tears than either of my $120,000 elite East Coast lambskins. You probably could have offered me $100,000 for my account and at the time, not knowing the terrors Abyssea would unleash, I would have refused. I had THAT much sentimental value in my account.

Truly I regret none of the hours, lost sleep, the fifty page paper I wrote on why FFXI should be rolled back to 75 cap, or even the calc final I bombed because I was late camping Fafnir. The only regret I have is FFXI's ignoble death after Tanaka's departure.


DotA / Dota 2

I started playing DotA in high school at a LAN cafe with my friends. We were all really terrible. Back then people didn't go online to research builds or guides. It took a few years before things like Banlist and LC hosting came about to prevent people from abandoning games early. But even then, every game was hilariously imbalanced because it was purely about the first ten people to join a lobby and there were no ratings and stats to balance around. I would stop playing when I entered college, with all my friends across the country. I picked HoN up as something to pass the time while I camped Kings religiously.

Four years later, when I finally got too sick to be able to even log into FFXI anymore, Dota 2 had just had its first million dollar International. I quickly got a beta key, and also got involved working in the back end of the eSports scene as a content producer for Evil Geniuses.

Perhaps my time playing FFXI as a job made me too serious about gaming in general, but by the time my old DotA friends joined me in Dota 2 we could not play together. I played to win; I studied skill and item builds, analyzed pro-play, and spent my spare time theorycrafting. Whereas I tryharded so much that it hurt, my friends wanted to random and play with Dagons.

While I don't have the time like I did playing XI, in the free time that I do have, I spend it pushing myself in Dota 2. I'm too old to go pro, but I dream of being at that level. I play mostly with friends I have met through the game that have like mindsets and like goals. We all know we'll probably never be sponsored and playing at TI. But when that game starts, we are sacrificing an hour of our lives we'll never get back, and we want the thrill of victory at the end of that hour.

Playing DotA seriously has taught me how to take charge and control a team. Certainly I don't do it in the nicest of ways, but my drive for victory has taught me you can't just rely on your team, you have to work together actively.


Super Mario RPG

My first RPG, and my first real non-platformer, this was the first game that I ever really sat down in front of the TV and played for hours on. It was an eye opener to me. I still think that it's one of the best Mario games ever made for the completely new way it presented the characters and world of Mario.

[Kalmado]

XI: Obvious. Don't need to get into it. Broke down and bought XIV yesterday..

FFVIII: I couldn't get enough of this game when it came out. Loved damn near every aspect of it for it's time. I remember trying to get it on a Friday after school and the only store in my small town that had it was KayBee Toys which doesn't exist anymore.

Madden 03: Sports?! What??? I know right. How could a sports title make a nostalgia list. At the time I was working 6 days and 65+ hours a week. For me a great relaxing Sunday involved a good pot of coffee, egg sandwiches(one of my favorite comfort foods), and crushing teams in Madden.

Max Payne 2: I really enjoyed the story and the noir feeling of this game. Loved the fun house level. I randomly get the music from that area in my head as well as the line, "Welcome, to the next level" from I believe a tv show that will play when you turn on a tv. While the dialogue in Max Payne games can seem corny at times, I still loved this one.

[Abandon]

FFXI - 7 years down the drain.

FFT - omg, the memories. RAMZA IS TEH BEST

Diablo 2 - oh, so fun online. Wearwolf Druid bitchslapping bosses to death, yes please.

Legend of Dragoon - Gust of Wind Dance, Final Burst.

FFIX - the story, the music, all of it. My favorite, minus Tactics.

Counter-Strike - the shit i wasted sooo many hours on. Competed Cal-M too, lol... no life.

Unreal Tourny... GOTY. HOLY SHIT

Sonic 2, and Sonic and Knuckles - played these to DEATH.

[Tokitoki]

[Edit] Picture in RIT just reminded me. Chrono Cross is probably one of my favorite RPGs of all time, maybe tying with Final Fantasy 9. I have played through both of them multiple times. I haven't gotten all of the endings to Chrono Cross but I have gotten a good portion of them....I might have to download the Rom for Chrono Cross now...damn nostalgia

You're welcome.

1. FFXI
2. Ragnarok Online
3. Megaman X
4. Super Smash Bros (N64)
5. Chrono Cross

1. FFXI - Pretty obvious. Years were invested and many friends were made. I still play XIV with a handful of them. Was also by far the most time I have ever spent on a game.

2. Ragnarok Online - Both official and private servers. A mix of being the first MMO I played and the first Guild setting I was a part of. Spent a lot of time grinding Sohees with a couple guildies. Eventually got my 1h, swoard/board knight going and got weird looks the entire time.

3. Megaman X - Countless hours. Likely more than RO, but certainly less than FFXI. I played this with my best friend every. single. day. after school. I will still find myself craving this game and have to sit down to play the ROM. Between the music, art, and the memory of sitting in my friend's basement after school, it's a big one for me.

4. Super Smash Bros. - Once this came out the same friend from above and another good friend of ours that lived a block away played this almost non-stop. We'd go over to anyone's house and spend the entire day playing. I can't remember how many 99 Stock battles we played, sometimes multiple in a row. Hours.

5. Chrono Cross - I've beaten this game so many times I know where everything is, I've gotten every character, every little easter egg, everything. I remember the first cut scene you get, on the beach with Chrono being sucked into the other world while the wave comes crashing towards the shore. I couldn't believe that it was a cut scene from the Playstation. It was beautiful.

Runner-up: Pokemon Blue - Two best friends from the Smash Bros. description got this before I did and all they would do is play it. I had to beg my parents to get me both a gameboy and the game so I could play too. I remember I was not allowed to play it until the weekend, but I would get up an hour earlier to play it before my dad came in to wake me up for school. I still remember the smell of the game manual and pulling my transparent green gameboy pocket from the box.

Legend of Dragoon - Gust of Wind... Dance

ftfy. Albert's voice was the worst.

Forgot about CS. Spent a lot of time playing that, but not quite as fond in my memory.

[Vandalhart]

These are a few of the classics I always return to, or own on multiple platforms.

Final Fantasy IV - My favourite game of all time. I'm actually making my way through the PSP Collection now. I have yet to beat the sequel and the interim game. Hopefully they live up to quality of the original. I'm not going to hold my breath though.
Legend of Zelda A Link to the Past - My second favourite game of all time. I'm surprised I never went back to play through again after A Link Between Worlds. That would be because I had the next entry ready to go.
Legend of Zelda Ocarina of Time - I just got this for christmas for my 3DS. I loved replaying it.
Super Mario 64 - This game is one that will always have a place in my heart.

Final Fantasy XI was something that was a large time sink for me. It was my first and will likely be my last MMO. XIV held my interest as an observer but I never bothered to get the game for anything. It helps that I don't have a desktop anymore. If I did, I'm sure all the Steam Sales would fill my time with games out the wazoo.

[RKenshin]

I've felt similar, in how I've lost the days of having tons of free time, little major real life responsibilities, and ability to literally marathon game time for hours and hours, days and days on end. I really enjoyed it, loved the people, had a lot of great times and made some great memories. Those days are seemingly gone now though, as I overcommitted myself to work and all that fun real life stuff. I miss it.

Online games only, in order by the best memories first:

1) FFXI
- For all its faults, I had a lot of great times, memories, and friends. Most of which I lost contact with, and miss and wish I was better at keeping it going... but I'll always remember and value it.

I started off wanting to be a WAR/DRK, which I was convinced would be the superior master race of the game... and then I unlocked RNG one day after an EXP party wanted to do it together after a session, and I tried it out fully-naked with just a cheap bow/arrow in Sarutabaruta, and one-shot a bunny... I fell in love.

Skip a few things and then PW happened, fuck dat guy yo. That tried my patience with the game a little too much, and combined with the people I cared about most being fed up and/or leaving, that was the end.

2) WoW
- Carried a lot of my friends from FF into WoW, and really enjoyed the game for what it was. I probably would've never really got sick of this game in a gameplay sense, if I had the time to keep playing it. Totally hated it the first time I tried to play it, but after the PW fun drove me and a bunch of friends away from FF for some time, trying it again made it grow on me. It is definitely a lot of fun, and there's a lot to do and challenge yourself with. Only major downside is that the stress and mechanics of the boss fights and hard modes definitely drove some wedges between friends and brought out some nasty fights/arguments (myself definitely included), and as such things were more fragmented and we all seemed to grow apart more… sad to think of it now. D:

3) Unreal Tournament
- The first game I played online. I remember being like 12, and completely fascinated/amazed with how awesome it was to play a game online with other people. I'd play the hell out of this game, though I didn't make any friends or meet anyone through it; I distanced myself from clans and such, and liked being a solo force to be reckoned with. Instagib mode was my fav.

4) America's Army
- Second game I played online, and ultimately the game that lead to me playing FFXI! I was awesomely amazing at this game, having so many ridiculous little things mastered/memorized (where to bounce a grenade to kill people hidden places, perfect timing of explosives, best strategies/paths to go on a map) and for a while was one of the higher ranked players... and *refused* to join a clan, like I did in UT. I had people harassing me about it, constantly. One day a guy finally convinced me to just hop on vent with his team and play a few normal rounds on vent… was a lot of fun, and the guy was hilarious. I never ‘officially’ joined, as I always kept my name (Ru-Kenshin), but I played with them and became part of the crue. Eventually, the same guy dragged me into playing FFXI, and while he didn't stick around I stayed. I occasionally went back to AA now and then and was surprised that I could still completely wipe the floor with people in any given match, which was still just as fun as always.

5) Starcraft I/II
- This was another game I played solo more than anything; never really made any new friends, joined any clans, or anything… and while I always had a lot of fun, I’ve grown to almost ‘need’ that to enjoy games the most. Still played it quite a lot, got pretty good, and had some good times.