Another game that I always was eager to play and never came around to... I what way has is influenced/impacted/left its mark (on) you?

Also, please tell me what prize(s) you are in for.

Oh.. Okay.
1. I'm in "under $20". 1 game under $20. I'm sure I can't win your giveaway! :))

2-A. Well... I can't explain that very well. It has some similarities to these movies: Godfather trilogy and Scarface, so it influenced and impacted me in a same way like those films. For me: I should aware of my actions. Every decision is important in my life. There is always a chance to lose everything in your life. Some decisions and mistakes will change your life forever and there is no way to go back, because those choices are/were irreversible.

2-B. If you like GTA III era, I recommend Mafia, but I should mention that except some similarities, Mafia has a different style and it's not another GTA. It used typical GTA's elements, but Mafia is Mafia. Mafia has a good story and gameplay (PC version). But it's old now and due to major improvements in the open-world/sandbox/GTA-type games, maybe you don't like an old game like Mafia.

3. toxicTom, Can you describe yours? Because I want to know that game and its influences on you.

There is not just one game - I just asked for one example. I've already dropped a few names in the thread. But I'll mention a few:

One game that really had a lasting impact on my life was Budokan - The Martial Spirit. Now it isn't one the greatest games of all time. And I wasn't very good at it. But in the game you could visit the sensei and would get one of many "wise" advices". Now these advices are really a bit like platitudes drawn from east asian/martial art/budo kitchen wisdom - but at the time (I was a teenager) they had a huge impact on me and kindled my interest in east asian philosophy and spirituality. This helped me a lot because of these influences I managed to control my anger - I was a choleric child and youth up to then. I'm thankful to this very day that this game brought all this to my attention.

Another game that had an influence on me was Doom. Now I could say it really sparked my interest in first person games - but when I think back, the real first game that had this effect was Dungeon Master. Sure, it's not 3D scrolling (and even party based) but it was the first game that had this "being there" effect that I cherish. I think back on Doom with a warm feeling for another reason:
Up to my 20s I used to have a recurring nightmare: I was running through some kind of deserted hospital or asylum - long corridors with many doors, discolored tiled wall, moudly and mossy, lots of cracked concrete staircases. I was running because some bad guy was after me. I'd never really seen him, just sometimes heard his footsteps just around the corner but I was scared, in panic...
I'd had this nightmare every once in a while ever since I was little.

One night I had that dream again - I woke up heart racing, sweating... But I had played Doom for the last several months and sometimes excessively. What I did was - I re-entered the dream - dreamt myself back to this place - but this time with the shotgun from Doom. I became the hunter. I never actually got the bad guy - he was running from me. I only caught a glimpse of his hulking shadow disappearing behind a corner. But I've never had that nightmare ever since.

Yeah, it is. I'm waiting for GOG to release the rest of LucasArts classics, hoping it will be there! Together with Indiana Jones and Monkey Island 2. I have my doubts about MI 3 and 4, but maybe someday those 2 get here.

300!

Count me in for Grim Fandango por favor, I've been waiting for this game to rerelease for ages.

As for the screenshot I'm gonna go with the first zombie from Resident Evil 1 (can't wait for the re-remake coming out in a few days). This guy turning around scared the poop out of me when I was a kid, I did not know what I was going to play and I really didn't see it coming. It left me with a long lasting appreciation for scary cinematic horror games, and did I mention I can't wait for the reremake to come out on steam...

http://www.relyonhorror.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/zombie.jpg


And I'm totally +ing the Mafia post from before me. That is another game that I really didn't expect to be that good, I was obsessed with it, the cutscenes were just as nice as the movies it was influenced by. The voice acting and cinematography and story telling in that game were just awesome, and the guns really sound and feel like they mean business, I replayed it last year I think and it still holds up pretty well.

Thanks for the sweet giveaway

I can imagine RE having a huge effect on someone who just entered gaming. I came to the series too late to really be able to enjoy them. To me they felt clumsy and sometimes a little cheap. On the other hand, when I had the chance to play Silent Hill for the first time a few years ago I was stunned. I knew I had never played a game like this before - the omnipresent fog, the radio static, the switching between worlds.
If GOG ever went to selling emulated games (like the PS games bundled with a set up ePSX, like they do with the DOSbox/ScummVM games) this would be an instabuy for me.

Oh Silent Hill was miles better than Resident Evil, often times it got so scary for me that I had to turn it off because it was giving me anxiety attacks hehe. I guess Resident Evil had the advantage of being first so that's why I mentioned it.

I agree with you about Silent Hill. Wonderful game.

Resident Evil I played on the Playstation with my youngest brother. Funniest thing kept happening to us. I am a little colorblind, but it specifically affected my ability to see the RED FLASHING bars that represented locked doors on the map screen. So, we would get stuck and check the map to look for areas we hadn't been yet, and I would say, "We've been everywhere!" He would say, "What about behind that locked door?" "What locked door?"

This happened over and over.

300!

The game I'm in for, "To the moon"

One game that impressed me and had me wasting nights and nights playing it was Europa Universalis III.I've recieved a demo of it after buying a magazine and.. it had everything I could ask for: I love geography, politics and history is my biggest passion.This game had a freaking world map with playable historical nations and you were the political leader.Every time I played a campaign, it felt different.. every nation having it's own individual flavor.Playing England, forming the UK and colonising the Americas..,playing the Ottoman Empire and expanding into western Europe or playing an Irish minor and gettin rekt the second day.

I alway was fascinated by history-simulating games. Biggest number in the game of course being Civ. And I never came around to play one of the Total War series - though I really like the premise and had the opportunity to watch a friend play TW:Rome years ago. I was intrigued although we were mocking the battle AI all that night - it really was rather dumb.
I can remember UMS (Universal Military Simulator) from back in the day. It was scoped a lot smaller - a "real" battle simulator - but as complex as it gets. I only knew from reviews - a hardcore grognard game. Nowadays I would refrain from even trying to start a game like this - I just don't have the time to learn it.

I see we share the same fascination.I loved the Civ series as well (haven't had the chance to play the last one, though), and TW:Rome is still one of my favorite strategy games.Even though I liked the gameplay in CIV series, it didn't offer me the same satisfaction and realism as EU3 or Victoria 2.

And are you more into the "history" part of those games, or do just like the complexity/realism. If the latter, have you ever tried "Imperium"? It might just be the game for you.

Doom, Blood, Duke Nukem 3D, and Quake influenced my gaming life. They made me a FPS-addict! :))

8-bit and 16-bit era video game consoles, Resident Evil 2, Fallout series (specially 1&2 in 1997 and 1998) are most important parts of my gaming life. Fallout 1 & 2 changed me forever...

Please elaborate ;-)

If you'd ever like to try out a history-simulator, ala EU, I'd suggest For the Glory (really, EU2.5). They pulled EU3 in a more sandboxy direction, and the verdict is still out on whether EU4 has returned enough the other way.

I could probably call Europa Universalis 2 my most impactful game, given how it pulled me into this then-obscure genre of strategy-simulation. I still play it and rank it above all other strategies. However, if there's one game that totally changed my ideas of computer gaming, it was The Curse of Monkey Island. I'd never played the previous games (I actually thought it was "that game where a gorilla jumps around and throws barrels"), barely bothered with Maniac Mansion and Larry, while Myst seemed entirely too far up its own... ahem. Adventures held no appeal for me, and neither did most other games. I don't remember why I even checked CMI out, but a friend lent me the discs, and I decided to give it a try.

I didn't touch anything else until it was over, and then I replayed it on harder :P It made me an adventure convert overnight, and I've always accounted the genre as my favourite. Considering how it ended up "dying" just a few years later, and its newer incarnations never quite made it for me, I consider this a most remarkable achievement! CMI also convinced me that there was surprising value to be found in computer games and I should pay them more attention. Which automatically makes it more significant than anything that came after :P

Also, Murray may or may not have forced me to write this: http://i.ytimg.com/vi/V9xLoTXC5fk/hqdefault.jpg

Oh, and happy 300!