NOTE: For everyone taking the time to comment "this isn't obscure" or "these are well known games" - bear in mind that this video was created for a Patreon subscriber who was a console game for the 90s - and didn't have access to a PC at all. So while they were aware of bigger PC titles like Starcraft, and Doom etc - the vast majority of the titles featured in this video are unknown to people outside of PC gaming circles. If you are someone watching this video and simply just knows all these titles - good for you! You're a knowledgeable PC gamer - and this video title does not apply to you. Additionally, for younger gamers (anyone who grew up after the 90s) - most of these titles are just plain unknown. Sure back then, series like the Delta Force games were huge. However, the franchise has been dormant for two decades - and a gamer born in 2002 would never have heard of it.
@@mikhail5002 Nah. Not even close to 90%. Maybe like 15%. A hidden gem/forgotten/obscure game would be a game that was maybe overlooked during its release period but discovered later. Most of the games on this list were very popular at the time of their release.
This is amazing! I used to play so many demo's of these games on CD-ROM's that came with magazines and I've forgotten most of the titles. I'm feeling all sorts of fuzzy feelings now.
Great compilation and editing. As an old school PC gamer I have played most of these games but still found some that went under my radar. Thank you for putting this together.
The second little big adventures 2 came up I knew I have finally found the game I have been searching years for. I played the first game but for the life of me couldn't remember the name, year, much of the story or characters but I've spend dozens of hours searching databases, forums, asking everyone under the sun and youtube videos and finally this video has helped me find a childhood classic. Thank you
Wow, Gary, this video is a catalog of treasures, and a real celebration of an era of PC gaming that deserves more discussion in retro circles. I'll be coming back to watch again and again, to try a few more of these games and follow the paths they open. Thank you so much for the careful curation & hard work that went into making the video. I want to play literally 80 or 90 of these. Maybe my favorite video you've done? I was mostly a console guy in the 90's, so I've only played about 15 on this list, and only 5 of them extensively: Caesar 3, Darkstone, Hexen II, Slave Zero, and my favorite Omikron.
Thank you! I am glad you enjoyed it - and hopefully it will help you discover a few gems of your own. The 5 of the games that you mentioned are indeed gems of the time and deserved to be remembered more than just as a comment on a video - so here's hoping some other people pick them up and experience them! And Omikron was Quantic Dream's best game in my opinion. The cynical side of me thinks that it's technically Quantic Dream's ONLY game before they exclusively started making pseudo interactive movies...
@@GaryRetroGamer I agree on Quantic Dream. For me, their other games have been interesting but overrated ... but Omikron felt truly visionary to me at the time. Pretty dated now I guess, but still well worth playing!
This is a very impressive collection. It's so much fun to see the games I remember... the ones I forgot and the ones I never seen. Thanks for the upload!
More than a year ago I took a turn in my life for the better and that also meant not playing games or even have access to a computer, after more than a decade of game addiction. Now looking at all these games I feel like it's 2002 again when every game was exciting and new for me
I still have Darkstone to this day. I remember that music video that played and I've thought that was the coolest thing ever. I remember a lot of these games. 90's were truly a golden age of PC gaming.
Outcast, outlaws, raptor, rayman… I loved these games. Carmageddon I managed to get right before it was forbidden by law where I live. Got lucky… the game was awesome too Shadowman had the best vibe, so eerie… so scary back in the day
100 games and maybe 10 sound effect between them. Kidding, thanks for putting this together and including KKND! It was my favorite command and conquer clone and while it wasn’t a good game, a modern army fighting mutants riding giant scorpions for oil in the apocalypse was pretty great.
These are timeless classics! As someone who grew up with a PC at home but no game consoles, I ended up getting my hands on Super Mario and a lot of other famous console games at a much later age than most gamers in the 90s. Wacky Wheels was my Mario Cart/F-Zero. Commander Keen was my Megaman. Dangerous Dave was my Super Mario.
God, I have been wondering for more than 20 years about what the game (Expendable) was named, so I could rewatch the intro. Thank you, for finally delivering it to me!
Thank you for making this, I played populous: the beginning, when I was very little and I couldn’t for the life of me remember the name of the game. When I saw it I instantly knew. Thanks again.
Great stuff, thanks for compiling it. It's amazing how many of these games look exactly like games being released now (especially indie first person shooters).
Just noticed it in my Steam library and loaded it up last week. Ran perfectly well on modern hardware, when much later games like Dragon Age origins won't even work anymore.
three of my favourite are: 1.- Urban Chaos.- Unique story about corruption and awesome gameplay similar to the old Tomb Raider games. 2.- Terminal Velocity.- Was a great flight combat game 3.- Time Commando.- Really enjoyed going through different ages of history to complete the game... Each age with different fightings styles and weapons.
i've been looking for cannon fodder literally since the 90s when i saw it playing on a friends computer his dad chain-smoked inside with cats and it hurt my eyes just to be in there but maybe the like trauma is why i remember it so vividly :x
Army Men 1 and 2 were freaking awesome games. Never played any other game like them that wasn't turn strategy. When you think about it, it's kind of weird that in this era where so many non-AAA games rehash old formulas, no one's gone and made games like Army Men.
So many of these are still as much fun today as they were in the 90s. Definitely worth dedicating a 1TB HDD to the excellent eXoDOS collection and experiencing this magnificent era of gaming.
Thanks to you I found a game I was looking for a few years now, and all I remembered was a first location and a "weird" art style. Once I saw no.55 at your list (Normality) I knew I finally found it. Thanks.
I love that there was some sound effect of a guy going “ARGH!” that so many games in the 90s used (Postal is an example here). Hell I remember it in Mission Impossible N64! It’s like the Wilhelm Scream of video games.
Some of these games were truly ahead of their time, and in others you can see elements that would later get yoinked into what would be called better games.
so much forgotten memory and some really good games from my youth. i like to add bedlam, bioforge and down in the dumps ;) but totally missing Dark Earth loved that game and it had this easy unlimited ammo cheat :D
I remember that the market were over flooded by RTS games during the last half of 90's and died off during early 2000's. It's happening with the FPS and third-person genre now. I really wish that the RTS genre will making a comeback, but in a much smaller scale.
Voy a llorar, toda mi vida estuve buscando el expendable (n30) calculo que desde 1999, ya que habia jugafo un demo... hoy con 32 años , por fin lo encuentro gracias!!
Awesome Steamkey, Gary! It's EVOLAND: LEGENDARY EDITION which released in the mid-2010's, a loving parody of the history of action/adventure/rpg games from French devs Shiro Games. They've more recently made Northgard & Darksburg ... but Evoland is more my style. Cheers!
Damn I've been searching for Litil Divil for like 20 years. I recalled it had something do with pizza, but regardless of trying to Google it, I couldn't find it. Immediately recognized it from the thumbnail. Thank you.
Anyone remember a Cannon Fodder clone called Theatre of Death? It had a clunky UI but it was more tactical than Cannon Fodder because you could use more vehicles and call in airstrikes and stuff.
Does anyone remember a point and click 90s game that I don't remember had any fighting, but you formed spells by combining runes in a separate window? There was a ton of dialogue and two warring races, one with white hair with black tips, and the other had black hair with white tips. There was a dragon at the end of the game and there were several puzzles throughout the game.
I am glad you added Shadow Man top the list ❤ i think it is very underrated 😄 But you forgot "i have No mouth and I must Scream" the great adaption from Harlan Ellisons book 😁
В детстве у меня был том 1 Энциклопедии компьютерных игр. Ия рассматривал скриншоты, мечтая поиграть в те игры. Многие здесь засветились в ролике. Грустно становится
I remember a game similar to Alien Rampage 0:50, but I can't remember its name. Same style of gameplay, health bar represented with eyes of all things, multiple stages in whatever order you want to play, bosses at the end of the stage, main character is an alien...
Flew out of my seat at 36. Incoming because I'm been trying to remember for over a year what the name of the game was I used to play on my old man's work pc when I was a kid; difficult to know when I didn't speak a lick of English at the time.
I was born in 99, but had a taste of 90ies in early childhood with arcades and old consoles like snes, sega and ps. Its one of the charmes of living in third world countries😂 Really unique experience of living through pretty much all of gaming eras while in childhood.
Oh man, Lords of the Realm was the absolute best back in the day. I sunk countless hours into that bad boy. It must have inspired the Total War franchise. Turn based kingdom building map with real time medieval battles? Ahead of it's time.
does anyone here know? there is a pc game with the fps genre in which there is a tibet map, easter island, space and others. this game is like a mechwarrior. I want to reminisce about it but I forgot the title of the game
I was personally expecting Hardwar from Gremlin interactive/the Software Refinery on here. That is also a great game for people to check out if they never heard of it.
Great selection Gary! While watching I found myself thinking _“I wonder if he has … in there“_ and several times I was pleasantly surprised. Brought back a lot of memories and nostalgia.
Yes Blade Runner is awesome! Was as enjoyable as or even more as a original movie. Had more diffrent endings, more paths a think. And you felt like a true detective...
Do anyone remember the name a racing game from the 90's, really similar to Outrun, where you have an ACME racing car (not looney toones) and with levels under the sea competing against sea horses and things like that?
I miss a lot of titles though, like darklight conflict for example (or the infamous netwars). But my all time favorite warlords is missing too :) I guess 20 minutes is 20 minutes after all.
* Dark Reign 1. One of the greatest hidden gem RTSes of that era. I dumped probably hundreds of hours into multiplayer at the time. In particular the artillery (which had a range of _several screens_ ) and superweapons were great. Also even if you never play DR1, _at least check out the soundtrack on TH-cam._ It's Jeehun Hwang at his best (same guy who did Mechwarrior 2's music). * KKND. While mostly a pale Command & Conquer clone, I seem to remember this was _just_ over-the-top enough to be worth playing. * Populous: the Beginning. Not a particularly deep RTS, but the spherical planet that you were able to deform with god powers made it technically impressive for the time. * Raptor: Call of the Shadows. Great little shareware shmup! * Darkstone. A fairly shallow Diablo clone that I played because Diablo was filled with cheaters/hackers. Then Diablo 2 came along and made me forget all about Darkstone. * Earth 2140. This and M.A.X. were some of the blandest RTSes released during that era. * Star Control 3. Technically not a _bad_ game, but man...it fell _so far_ short of Star Control 2! *Tribes* seems a bit forgotten nowadays, which is a shame because it's one of the deepest FPSes ever released. It was quite popular (enough to spawn all those sequels), but strangely I don't see it appear in a lot of modern lists/videos. Spent hundreds of hours playing this game, and I don't think anybody ever fully mastered it. While *Mechwarrior 2* is the mech game everyone knows about (so it's not a "hidden gem"), a few titles just a step behind it were Starsiege and Heavy Gear II. They definitely belong in a list like this (which isn't about showing off the famous rockstars of the era, but instead covering the just-a-step-behind games like KKND and Populous:NB).
HELP Side scrolling PC game from the 80s-90s, 3 protagonists were used at the same time who could only walk (no jumps, no somersaults) facing enemies of various kinds, even monsters. The characters you used were normal people, one of the 3 who was also in front was elderly and with little hair can you tell me the name? one of the 3 protagonists was older, there was an enemy boss that would roll at you and he was in a catacomb.
Does anybody remember a game where you control a vehicle to bounce ball in order to destroy stuff blocky stuff and make sure it does not fall off the edge?
![[MV] A leap of faith...ความเชื่อใจครั้งสุดท้าย (From "Petrichor the series")](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/U1piZH2CNXA/mqdefault.jpg)
NOTE: For everyone taking the time to comment "this isn't obscure" or "these are well known games" - bear in mind that this video was created for a Patreon subscriber who was a console game for the 90s - and didn't have access to a PC at all. So while they were aware of bigger PC titles like Starcraft, and Doom etc - the vast majority of the titles featured in this video are unknown to people outside of PC gaming circles. If you are someone watching this video and simply just knows all these titles - good for you! You're a knowledgeable PC gamer - and this video title does not apply to you.
Additionally, for younger gamers (anyone who grew up after the 90s) - most of these titles are just plain unknown. Sure back then, series like the Delta Force games were huge. However, the franchise has been dormant for two decades - and a gamer born in 2002 would never have heard of it.
don't listen to them brother, 90% of them really were obscure, people are being dramatic, it's a good list
@@mikhail5002 Nah. Not even close to 90%. Maybe like 15%. A hidden gem/forgotten/obscure game would be a game that was maybe overlooked during its release period but discovered later. Most of the games on this list were very popular at the time of their release.
No Sanitarium? No Realms of the Haunting? :(
Anticipating negative comments?
Just own it bro and give the patreon his props
What's obscure about Rayman? It's one of the most well known platforming games ever made.
This is amazing! I used to play so many demo's of these games on CD-ROM's that came with magazines and I've forgotten most of the titles. I'm feeling all sorts of fuzzy feelings now.
Omg thank you for posting this I’ve been trying forever to find the name of that game I used to play eradicator!!!!
Great compilation and editing. As an old school PC gamer I have played most of these games but still found some that went under my radar. Thank you for putting this together.
The second little big adventures 2 came up I knew I have finally found the game I have been searching years for.
I played the first game but for the life of me couldn't remember the name, year, much of the story or characters but I've spend dozens of hours searching databases, forums, asking everyone under the sun and youtube videos and finally this video has helped me find a childhood classic.
Thank you
im having that problem and its been bothering me for 25 years.. still dont know what the game is :( glad your quest is complete tho :)
HOLY SHIT IT WAS THE SAME GAME AS YOU WERE LOOKING FOR LMAO!!!
Seems like everyone forget about that game and searched for it for decades
Same 😅
Wow, Gary, this video is a catalog of treasures, and a real celebration of an era of PC gaming that deserves more discussion in retro circles. I'll be coming back to watch again and again, to try a few more of these games and follow the paths they open. Thank you so much for the careful curation & hard work that went into making the video.
I want to play literally 80 or 90 of these. Maybe my favorite video you've done? I was mostly a console guy in the 90's, so I've only played about 15 on this list, and only 5 of them extensively: Caesar 3, Darkstone, Hexen II, Slave Zero, and my favorite Omikron.
Thank you! I am glad you enjoyed it - and hopefully it will help you discover a few gems of your own. The 5 of the games that you mentioned are indeed gems of the time and deserved to be remembered more than just as a comment on a video - so here's hoping some other people pick them up and experience them! And Omikron was Quantic Dream's best game in my opinion. The cynical side of me thinks that it's technically Quantic Dream's ONLY game before they exclusively started making pseudo interactive movies...
@@GaryRetroGamer I agree on Quantic Dream. For me, their other games have been interesting but overrated ... but Omikron felt truly visionary to me at the time. Pretty dated now I guess, but still well worth playing!
Terminal Velocity and Wacky Wheels were my childhood! Thanks for all your hard work Gary
Your videos are always a great help to find "new" old games to play! Thanks for your work
This is a very impressive collection. It's so much fun to see the games I remember... the ones I forgot and the ones I never seen. Thanks for the upload!
One of the few videos that *really* have "gems" in it;
Thank you for this list
More than a year ago I took a turn in my life for the better and that also meant not playing games or even have access to a computer, after more than a decade of game addiction.
Now looking at all these games I feel like it's 2002 again when every game was exciting and new for me
I still have Darkstone to this day. I remember that music video that played and I've thought that was the coolest thing ever. I remember a lot of these games. 90's were truly a golden age of PC gaming.
the massive graphical improvements happened between 94-96, also there were so many c&c clones
Outcast, outlaws, raptor, rayman… I loved these games.
Carmageddon I managed to get right before it was forbidden by law where I live. Got lucky… the game was awesome too
Shadowman had the best vibe, so eerie… so scary back in the day
100 games and maybe 10 sound effect between them. Kidding, thanks for putting this together and including KKND! It was my favorite command and conquer clone and while it wasn’t a good game, a modern army fighting mutants riding giant scorpions for oil in the apocalypse was pretty great.
These are timeless classics! As someone who grew up with a PC at home but no game consoles, I ended up getting my hands on Super Mario and a lot of other famous console games at a much later age than most gamers in the 90s. Wacky Wheels was my Mario Cart/F-Zero. Commander Keen was my Megaman. Dangerous Dave was my Super Mario.
God, I have been wondering for more than 20 years about what the game (Expendable) was named, so I could rewatch the intro. Thank you, for finally delivering it to me!
You bring back my happy memories. Thank you.
Nice one. You could do PC games of the 00s as well
Thank you for making this, I played populous: the beginning, when I was very little and I couldn’t for the life of me remember the name of the game. When I saw it I instantly knew. Thanks again.
Great stuff, thanks for compiling it. It's amazing how many of these games look exactly like games being released now (especially indie first person shooters).
It's funny you mention that; here's a video we posted recently you might find interesting: th-cam.com/video/O9KyylLKD3U/w-d-xo.html
1995 - 2000 very prosperous and inventive plus quirky years for video games! Thanks enjoyed to a great extend!
Gorky17 is such a good game. I have replayed it several months ago.
Just noticed it in my Steam library and loaded it up last week. Ran perfectly well on modern hardware, when much later games like Dragon Age origins won't even work anymore.
OMG Gangsters was absolutely awesome! Loved this game! And Incubation too!
10:45 One of my favourite DOS games, I love it! Its so atmospheric and unique!
three of my favourite are:
1.- Urban Chaos.- Unique story about corruption and awesome gameplay similar to the old Tomb Raider games.
2.- Terminal Velocity.- Was a great flight combat game
3.- Time Commando.- Really enjoyed going through different ages of history to complete the game... Each age with different fightings styles and weapons.
i've been looking for cannon fodder literally since the 90s when i saw it playing on a friends computer his dad chain-smoked inside with cats and it hurt my eyes just to be in there but maybe the like trauma is why i remember it so vividly :x
Army Men 1 and 2 were freaking awesome games. Never played any other game like them that wasn't turn strategy. When you think about it, it's kind of weird that in this era where so many non-AAA games rehash old formulas, no one's gone and made games like Army Men.
God I wish I could go back
So many of these are still as much fun today as they were in the 90s. Definitely worth dedicating a 1TB HDD to the excellent eXoDOS collection and experiencing this magnificent era of gaming.
So pleased Outcast is on this list.
Great hidden gems from PC era:D
Thanks for sharing:D
It must've taken a lot of work to make such vids:D
So pleased Slipstream 5000 is on this list.
Thanks to you I found a game I was looking for a few years now, and all I remembered was a first location and a "weird" art style. Once I saw no.55 at your list (Normality) I knew I finally found it. Thanks.
As a PC gamer, I like this type of videos. I'd like to know every hidden gem in PC gaming so one day I can try them. Thanks!
This video could easily be double the length, 40 min and I would watch it all. Some clips are way too short. Love it none the less
I love that there was some sound effect of a guy going “ARGH!” that so many games in the 90s used (Postal is an example here). Hell I remember it in Mission Impossible N64! It’s like the Wilhelm Scream of video games.
many many many games in the 90's used stock soundeffects, and images, even doom.
The true golden age of gaming
A spike of pure nostalgia thank you
Some of these games were truly ahead of their time, and in others you can see elements that would later get yoinked into what would be called better games.
so much forgotten memory and some really good games from my youth. i like to add bedlam, bioforge and down in the dumps ;) but totally missing Dark Earth loved that game and it had this easy unlimited ammo cheat :D
Great list, Albion and Independence War are standout games for me as I remember completing them both
I remember that the market were over flooded by RTS games during the last half of 90's and died off during early 2000's. It's happening with the FPS and third-person genre now. I really wish that the RTS genre will making a comeback, but in a much smaller scale.
fps has been on the copycat run since the first doom came out. Is why most fps games between 92-97 were called doomclones.
Voy a llorar, toda mi vida estuve buscando el expendable (n30) calculo que desde 1999, ya que habia jugafo un demo... hoy con 32 años , por fin lo encuentro gracias!!
Came here looking for Septerra Core. You delivered.
This channel is awesome, just found it, well subbed👍
Awesome Steamkey, Gary! It's EVOLAND: LEGENDARY EDITION which released in the mid-2010's, a loving parody of the history of action/adventure/rpg games from French devs Shiro Games. They've more recently made Northgard & Darksburg ... but Evoland is more my style. Cheers!
Damn I've been searching for Litil Divil for like 20 years. I recalled it had something do with pizza, but regardless of trying to Google it, I couldn't find it. Immediately recognized it from the thumbnail. Thank you.
x-com apocalypse best game ever
I didn't realize games in the 90's looked this good and I played games in the 90 on pc.
I still can't find it ... I'm starting to think it was a dream
Anyone remember a Cannon Fodder clone called Theatre of Death? It had a clunky UI but it was more tactical than Cannon Fodder because you could use more vehicles and call in airstrikes and stuff.
Used to play Seven Kingdoms all the time. Dark Colony is also a fantastic game from that era.
I played the shit out of Dark Colony as a kid. Super unbalanced though.
Does anyone remember a point and click 90s game that I don't remember had any fighting, but you formed spells by combining runes in a separate window?
There was a ton of dialogue and two warring races, one with white hair with black tips, and the other had black hair with white tips.
There was a dragon at the end of the game and there were several puzzles throughout the game.
Arx Fatalis maybe?
@@B1omaH Just checked. The game I'm thinking of was made before that one and it didn't have free movement.
I am glad you added Shadow Man top the list ❤ i think it is very underrated 😄
But you forgot "i have No mouth and I must Scream" the great adaption from Harlan Ellisons book 😁
I love these kinds of vids. Find memories of the past.
I love eating while taking a mega trip down memory lane
Battle Isle was like a precursor to Advance Wars. Fun!
В детстве у меня был том 1 Энциклопедии компьютерных игр. Ия рассматривал скриншоты, мечтая поиграть в те игры. Многие здесь засветились в ролике. Грустно становится
Da, nostalgia napadajet :)
Outlaws was a great mulitplayer shooter, like DUke Nukem with its multiplayer update
I was looking for wacky wheels ! Thank you !
I remember a game similar to Alien Rampage 0:50, but I can't remember its name. Same style of gameplay, health bar represented with eyes of all things, multiple stages in whatever order you want to play, bosses at the end of the stage, main character is an alien...
Flew out of my seat at 36. Incoming because I'm been trying to remember for over a year what the name of the game was I used to play on my old man's work pc when I was a kid; difficult to know when I didn't speak a lick of English at the time.
The golden age of PC gaming for sure. Misty watered colored memories ;)
Loved playing some of these games 😀 Good job 👍
Septerra Core!!! Wow that game got me into RPGs still have an unopened CD game!
I was born in 99, but had a taste of 90ies in early childhood with arcades and old consoles like snes, sega and ps. Its one of the charmes of living in third world countries😂 Really unique experience of living through pretty much all of gaming eras while in childhood.
Thank you for mentioning Vangers
Wacky Wheels .. a split-monitor gem. Sunk so many fun hours with my brother in it.
Gems for real, sir... Thank you so much for reminder! Absolutely awesome!
Oh man, Lords of the Realm was the absolute best back in the day. I sunk countless hours into that bad boy. It must have inspired the Total War franchise. Turn based kingdom building map with real time medieval battles? Ahead of it's time.
4:30 Death rally OH YES!
I love that game!
does anyone here know? there is a pc game with the fps genre in which there is a tibet map, easter island, space and others. this game is like a mechwarrior. I want to reminisce about it but I forgot the title of the game
I was personally expecting Hardwar from Gremlin interactive/the Software Refinery on here. That is also a great game for people to check out if they never heard of it.
@Gary Lovely and nostalgic content. 90s games in particular evoke feelings long lost :`) subscribed
Great selection Gary! While watching I found myself thinking _“I wonder if he has … in there“_ and several times I was pleasantly surprised. Brought back a lot of memories and nostalgia.
Pure nostalgy. I miss One must Fall though. I approve of X-com Apocalypse at the end. Good game to end.
I literally sat with my jaw open when I saw "Time Commando" come up. I forgot ALL about that one!
Same for me with Bad mojo😂
6:48 Hidden and Dangerous! :)
A 🇨🇿 classic :)
Yes Blade Runner is awesome! Was as enjoyable as or even more as a original movie. Had more diffrent endings, more paths a think. And you felt like a true detective...
Yea, each start had many diffrent variations of what could happen and who was a nexus.
Do anyone remember the name a racing game from the 90's, really similar to Outrun, where you have an ACME racing car (not looney toones) and with levels under the sea competing against sea horses and things like that?
I'm pleasantly surprised to see Albion on this list. But also disappointed to not see Entomorph.
How is jazz jackrabbit not on this list :p it was an all time pc great. Great list, found some games I had completely forgotten about :)
Little Divil - that's quite a blast from the past
time commando, what a time to be alive not knowing that the hell was going on as a kid
I miss a lot of titles though, like darklight conflict for example (or the infamous netwars). But my all time favorite warlords is missing too :) I guess 20 minutes is 20 minutes after all.
* Dark Reign 1. One of the greatest hidden gem RTSes of that era. I dumped probably hundreds of hours into multiplayer at the time. In particular the artillery (which had a range of _several screens_ ) and superweapons were great. Also even if you never play DR1, _at least check out the soundtrack on TH-cam._ It's Jeehun Hwang at his best (same guy who did Mechwarrior 2's music).
* KKND. While mostly a pale Command & Conquer clone, I seem to remember this was _just_ over-the-top enough to be worth playing.
* Populous: the Beginning. Not a particularly deep RTS, but the spherical planet that you were able to deform with god powers made it technically impressive for the time.
* Raptor: Call of the Shadows. Great little shareware shmup!
* Darkstone. A fairly shallow Diablo clone that I played because Diablo was filled with cheaters/hackers. Then Diablo 2 came along and made me forget all about Darkstone.
* Earth 2140. This and M.A.X. were some of the blandest RTSes released during that era.
* Star Control 3. Technically not a _bad_ game, but man...it fell _so far_ short of Star Control 2!
*Tribes* seems a bit forgotten nowadays, which is a shame because it's one of the deepest FPSes ever released. It was quite popular (enough to spawn all those sequels), but strangely I don't see it appear in a lot of modern lists/videos. Spent hundreds of hours playing this game, and I don't think anybody ever fully mastered it.
While *Mechwarrior 2* is the mech game everyone knows about (so it's not a "hidden gem"), a few titles just a step behind it were Starsiege and Heavy Gear II. They definitely belong in a list like this (which isn't about showing off the famous rockstars of the era, but instead covering the just-a-step-behind games like KKND and Populous:NB).
What a cool list! Shame about no Realms of the Haunting but otherwise is awesome every hidden gem is there.
For DACH Region: Number 7 is "Schleichfahrt"
I played 15 of these tops. And I played a shitonne in the 90s! Nice list!
The last express had a very special ambience.
Some are not hidden, some are not gems, some "oh my.... Part of the childhood". Great time it was.
You forgot Syndicate Wars!
HELP
Side scrolling PC game from the 80s-90s, 3 protagonists were used at the same time who could only walk (no jumps, no somersaults) facing enemies of various kinds, even monsters. The characters you used were normal people, one of the 3 who was also in front was elderly and with little hair can you tell me the name?
one of the 3 protagonists was older, there was an enemy boss that would roll at you and he was in a catacomb.
I had almost all these games
*hits crack pipe and watches this while crying and remembering the 90s*
Reunion, Cyclones, LED Wars, Arsenal, Rodge Rock in Retroactive
Does anybody remember a game where you control a vehicle to bounce ball in order to destroy stuff blocky stuff and make sure it does not fall off the edge?
I would have loved to see either Heavy Gear I or II on this list but great selection nonetheless
Gary, Garee, Garie. What were the chances of those three adventurers finding each other? Lol 7:28