What games define you?

I think the one game that opened my eyes to how incredible gaming could be was probably Elite on the Speccy. It's hard now to impress on young whippersnappers just what a mind-boggling achievement that game actually was, to condense an entire galaxy with a level of freedom of choice into 48 kilobytes.

Lovely OP and replies but to be honest I'm not 100% sure I understand the thread

But, I'm going to say 51 worldwide games and Tetris Effect - both so addictive and comforting; I've put hundreds of hours into them.

Also I'm a platformer guy. Some people meditate, I play platformers when I need to be lifted out of myself. Games like Inside, DKTF, Mario 3D World are my crack.

Also shout out to Night in the Woods I've played that every Autumn (and it is the perfect game to play in Autumn) since 2019.

The first one that comes to mind is Secret of Mana. Absolutely my most favourite game of all time but also one that I have enjoyed playing through with various friends too. It helps me to remember that gaming is always more fun with friends, even story-driven JRPGs.

The game that defined me as an individual is WipEout in all its various forms. It was the first difficult game I really wanted to get good at. The soundtrack put me on a path towards electronica that resulted in (via the absolutely brilliant progressive trance OST for the 3rd game by Sasha) me taking up DJing as a hobby and playing to large crowds in venues which was admittedly mostly the student bar at Uni but still. It was a love of the graphic design from the Designers Republic (who I’ve later learned from people that I know who worked with them were a bunch of arrogant, self-absorbed donks) that made me pursue that as a career and it was the little anecdotes in the manuals that got me into speculative fiction and futurism. To call that series influential on my life would be an understatement.

Roonmastor wrote:Final Fantasy VII
AOE2
Smash Bros Melee
MK64
Civ IV
F-Zero GX
XCOM
LOTR: BFME
GP4, F1 2011, 17, 2020 and 21
Motorsport Manager

Sorry, I should say that each of these games would be classed as defining of me at different points in my life to different people. Conversely, they also define certain people in my life.

Final Fantasy VII would be the "game I went on about" at school.

Age of Empires II has been in and around my life for 20years, so some kids from school, to some very new friends would be able to define me by this game.

Smash round my house was a stable at 6th form, so I'm closely linked to it. Equally, it was Mario Kart 64 at my uni pad for the same reason.

I lived on Civ IV multiplayer with guys on here when I lived in Rotterdam for a year.

F Zero GX oddly defines me the most here, as my username changed to Roonmastor as I was on a team that was TS2Master and Gamesmasta and we were to be called the Masters. But many people wouldn't know that.

XCOM is just the type of game that epitomises me. I am still annoyed I can't get the original to work without it over clocking, and the remakes are excellent.

LOTR: Battle for Middle Earth - I whiled away summers at Uni with my Melee friends trekking PCs across the country so we could LAN this game. Great times.

F1 games - my best mate and I lived together at uni and LAN GP4 on full seasons on full race distances numerous times, we continue to do this most of the time on PS4 now he lives abroad. Annoyingly, I think in 2021 co-op, he's up 1-0, whereas in 2020, I was up 4-2.

Motorsport Manager probably defines me on the forum right now, as I'm currently running a forum game around it.