Poll: the game that defined fps

[Yeslek Ssomllur]

Apart from being the one of the "first," DOOM defined a lot of the standards and game play elements that are still around in todays games. Add this to the fact that it's DAMN FUN and you have a genre definer.

Wolfenstein is the precursor to DOOM, and therefore might deserve the distinction of "defining" the genre. But one of the the things I always felt defined FPS games is their EXTREME playability, which Wolfensein lacks when compared to DOOM.

 

[Caligulove]

Wolfenstein definitely defined the basic parameters of a first-person shooter

Though, for the game that set in place the mechanics and bits we expect in a MODERN first-person shooter. I would have to say Halo.

 

[Treeinthewoods]

I agree with Wofenstein 3D because it's one of the first but I do have to admit that DOOM is probably more responsible for bringing the FPS into the mainstream gaming scene.

Wofenstein 3D was not "one of the first" it was the first.
You owe the entire FPS genre to this game.

I can't really blame you for not knowing about Maze War (1973) and Spasism (1974), but I think you really slipped up when you forgot about MIDI Maze for the Atari ST (1987).

 

[Michailov]

Quake.

 

[The_root_of_all_evil]

You misunderstand what is meant by 3D. It doesn't refer to hardware accelleration.

Ah, then it would be Elite ('84) or Hovertank 3D('91).

Even Elite gets beaten by the Vectrex Star Wars (which also gets the wireframe medal) in '83. Battlezone '80 only had two dimensional movement.

I can't really blame you for not knowing about Maze War (1973) and Spasism (1974), but I think you really slipped up when you forgot about MIDI Maze for the Atari ST (1987).

Maze War has no up/down movement, Spasim was a turn based 3D FPS.

 

[Iffat Nur]

*snip*

1st off Unreal Tournament tried, and succeded in doing what Halo is doing, and secondly if you knew the history of the original C.O.D you would realize that it was meant to be like that since the original creators of C.O.D was part of the original M.o.H team.

OT: While wolfenstein was probably the first F.P.S, the one that really hooked me in was Doom because of a simple premise and a hell of a good time (even if it was near impossible to play with friends at the time). Also System Shock since it stapled the F.P.S hybrid into peoples mind along with its partner in crime...Deus Ex

I know that Unreal Tournament is succeding.
I also knew that CoD was made by former members of Allied Assault
also, I meant Quake, not Unreal Tournament -.-

 

[Optimystic]

Goldeneye easily. The customizable multiplayer was actually fun.
Slappers only + license to kill= pants pissing laughter.

"Customizable Multiplayer" started with Rise of the Triad actually.

Quake III perfectly polished FPS.

LOL, no. Half-Life did that.

 

[Ickorus]

Doom, Quake and Unreal Tournament for me, probably Doom comes up top though.

 

[MindBullets]

Doom. Always.

I find it rather annoying that Halo is on that poll.

 

[Jark212]

DOOM
Quake
Heretic
Wolfenstein
Marathon
Halo: CE
Half Life
Call of Duty

I think that any FPS could trace it's roots back to one of these games...

 

[Tourette]

Doom, and that is a historical fact.

 

[Jumpingbean3]

Doom and Duke Nukem defined the gameplay aspect and Half Life defined the story aspect while still being very strong in terms of gameplay. Sadly Halo caught on and now most FPSs are either utterly forgettable games about space marines designed to ruin online play for anyone with any form of social skills or equally forgettable games about war designed to make patriot heads swell until they explode.

 

[diggy140892]

Halo defined the modern fps really. 2 weapons, regenerating health etc. And Call of Duty has ruined the fps.

 

[Denizen]

Counter-Life Half-GoldenDoom?

Duke Freeman is a half scientist, half badass in a world where soviets still subtly operate in a plot to destroy this world as we know it while there is a developing threat in the background. Supports 64 man servers and uses weapons from your usual modern day arsenal to a Ghostbuster-esque gun that obliterates people with 1-2 ammo.

 

[Therumancer]

Wolfenstein 3d was the first major "FPS" game, released as shareware to begin with via BBS systems. It defined the genere as we currently know it. Doom was a successor to Wolfenstein.

However, as many super-long term game nerds can tell you there *WERE* games with a similar playstyle released before that, albiet none as polished or done to quite the same standards of "3d". Mostly failed attempts to create things similar to the "gun controller" games in actual arcades where you could control the movement.

While there might be things older there was a hacked together game kicked around BBS systems called "Assault On Smurf Village" which was a spiritual sequel of sorts to the "Castle Smurfenstein" mod/recreation of the original Silas Warner "Castle Wolfenstein". "Assault On Smurf Village" being very crude as befits this kind of "basement development for lulz" project but included a playstyle (gun in the middle, free roam) similar to Wolfenstein 3d, albiet it moved more like an old "Bard's Tale" game with no real aiming or smooth gliding movement. Back on things like Fidonet there was some discussion as to whether this was the inspiration for Wolfenstein 3d, though no definitive conclusion was ever arrived at to my knowledge. It does make a degree of sense then when you look at the liscence they used and what spawned from it.

You pretty much need to have had a C-64 though to have any idea about the original pre-FPS "Wolfenstein" game though, never mind any of the other stuff.

 

[Mr.Petey]

To be honest I've never seen how genre affecting Halo ever was. Nice game sure but it's nothing to wow about really. Added the two-weapons-only system which was nice and made a change from cycling through a billion of the sods.

But I'd definitely go along with the general consensus of Doom and Wolfenstein 3d (the former having a few abattoirs worth of blood 'n gore more than the latter did) with it's selection of traditional weapons that seemed to form the basis of what you could use in an FPS from that point onwards:
Pistol
Shotgun
Machine guns (both large and small)
Rocket launcher
Overpowered exotic weapon

 

[oktalist]

snip

Although, as everyone should know, the quality of any shooter can be scientifically and objectively determined by its time-to-crate [http://www.oldmanmurray.com/features/39.html] metric, defined as the number of seconds elapsed after starting the game before the player encounters a crate, this being the moment at which the designer ran out of ideas. The definition of crate includes the cylindrical crate, also known as the barrel.

Also, sorry but the word is genre. Genera is just the plural of genus, the taxanomic rank above species and below family. Thus, as games are products of the human race, their genera could only be said to be Homo.

 

[Jumpingbean3]

Halo defined the modern fps really. 2 weapons, regenerating health etc. And Call of Duty has ruined the fps.

Both of them ruined the FPS in my opinion. True Halo influenced some modern FPSs in terms of gameplay but the ones it did influence usually sucked big time. The reason Halo and CoD ruined FPSs is because almost every FPS is trying to be Halo or CoD and it's almost impossible to find something fresh these days. Hell Darkest of Days was a game that Yahtzee disliked overall but still played and even wanted to see the series continue simply for the original premise: 2 cowboys travel through time to prevent people from messing up important events in history.

 

[Jfswift]

I want to go with Doom, although to be fair, credit should go to Wolfenstein 3D. It more or less started an era. I could be wrong but I believe it was the first game of it's kind (FPS).

 

[oktalist]

Halo defined the modern fps really. 2 weapons, regenerating health etc.

Yup. Dual-wield and regernerating health, the two most genre-defining aspects of shooters.