The 10 Most Influential Video Games Ever Made
The games we play now were inspired by these games.
When people talk about the most important video games, there are certain names that will come up again and again. Even though there are a lot more than ten games now, it seems like people only play a few of them over and over again.
These games did a lot to not only improve gaming as a whole, but also to keep whole series and styles going strong. Because of this, you probably already can think of a few games that had a huge impact on you, no matter what decade or system they were from. The most important games are the ones that changed everything and will never be forgotten.
Ocarina Of Time
When it was time to make the leap to 3D, Ocarina of Time was one of the most important games.This amazing Nintendo 64 game is still thought of as one of the best games of all time.
The adventure set a new bar for how games and their stories could be told in 3D. It’s hard to think what would have happened to Nintendo if this game hadn’t been so groundbreaking, because if it hadn’t, we might not have gotten the great Tears of the Kingdom.
Pac-Man
Even though this could be said about many games, Pac-Man changed what it meant to be a big hit in an arcade. People have been playing this classic game since the 1980s, and it’s still pretty popular today thanks to new ways to play that are similar to the old ones.
It’s the famous arcade game that got everyone together to try and beat each other’s high scores. Without Pac-Man, arcades might not have been as popular, and games might not have become the most popular form of entertainment they are today.
Mortal Kombat
This video game was important in the same way that other games were, but it also set a new level of violence. Everyone knows that this game is a big reason why there are ratings for video games and why there are more games for adults.
Mortal Kombat showed that game designers could start to really push the limits of what a game could do while still making a great fighter. Mortal Kombat has inspired a lot of fighters over the years, and it’s one of the few game series that many people who aren’t gamers will know.
Minecraft
Whether you like it or not, Minecraft was a game that changed the world. It was important in many ways, but most importantly, it showed that developers can let you make your own stories as long as they give you all the tools you need.
As time has gone on, the game has only gotten bigger, but it’s clear that many other games have been inspired by Minecraft. One could even say that the battle royale trend started in part because of how people played Minecraft.
Doom
The Doom series is always happy to give you a little bit of extreme violence when you need it. Even though there were other first-person shooters before and after Doom, most people think of it as the game that made the genre what it is today.
It was another edgy game that mixed violence, demons, and first-person action to make something truly unique. The original Doom has inspired dozens, if not hundreds, of games, and developers are always happy to talk about it when they can.
Dark Souls
Even though a lot of people don’t like Dark Souls because of how hard it is, it was the game’s challenge that made it important. Dark Souls was able to start a whole new type of game and show that extreme difficulty could work again.
For a long time, it felt like games held people’s hands too much, but Dark Souls did the exact opposite. Dark Souls-style games are still being made, and that’s not likely to stop any time soon because of how popular the easy controls, exciting action, and hard challenges are.
Grand Theft Auto 3
Realistically, you could pick any Grand Theft Auto game and call it the most important game, but the third one came out at such a unique time. This game showed everyone that big open worlds with adult stories could work, even if the stories were sometimes silly.
This was another game that really pushed the limits of what game makers could do. Given how popular this game is, it’s not surprising that it’s been said to have inspired a lot of similar games.
World Of Warcraft
World of Warcraft is clearly the most important MMORPG of all time. There’s a reason why this is the game that TV and movies use to make fun of players. It’s such a big and well-known game that it has inspired games that aren’t even in the same genre.
World of Warcraft set the bar for MMORPGs, and the game’s personality made it good for memes. Almost everyone should remember the famous Leroy Jenkins video, and you wouldn’t have that video without World of Warcraft.
Super Mario Bros.
It’s hard to think of a time when most people didn’t play video games regularly. This was the case before the NES came out and took over the market. Everyone can thank Super Mario Bros. for the success of home computer games, which it did on the original NES.
8 Ball Pool is easily one of the most important of all time, from the music to how easy it is to play. Every platformer that came after it tried to copy its magic to varying degrees of success, but the game is still going strong.
Tetris
Because Tetris is a simple puzzle game, it’s easy to forget about it, but it’s too important to leave out of this conversation. This game was popular before handheld games were popular, but it helped to make them famous in a way that only Pokemon could hope to match.
The game and music are so easy to understand that almost anyone can still hum along to the old tunes. Tetris is another game that changed the way puzzle games are made. It showed that to really succeed, a game needs to be simple and easy to play again and again.
