Your Christmas Games!

[red_avatar]

Every year around christmas we hear the same songs on the radio - some love them, some hate them - but you can't escape them. I personally love this time of year, staying at home, nice and warm, while it's so cold and dark outside.

It's also the time of year which recalls many many fond memories of playing games until late at night. Somehow it just makes some games so much more fun. There's several games I catch myself playing each year - just like the recurring christmas songs, they have become part of christmas for me.

For example: Beneath A Steel Sky, a game whose demo I first played back in december 1993, included with the first PCGamer issue.

http://www.vollversion.de/bilder/430_2_full.jpg

Also Micro Machines - another demo with the first issue! So much two-player fun, unbelievable.

http://users.pandora.be/mpq/software/scree...ro_machines.gif (http://users.pandora.be/mpq/software/screenshots/micro_machines.gif)

And of course ... Halloween Harry who for some reason just feels wrong to play outside of the holliday season.

http://www.abandonware-france.org/images_jeux/Harry.gif

And let us not forget Jazz Jack Rabbit! Great platform game.

http://www.worldvillage.com/wv/gamezone/download/j95.gif

But one game that was synonymous with Christmas back in the early 90s was ... LEMMINGS!

http://www.grenier-du-mac.net/copiecran/g_...ngs-1993--1.jpg (http://www.grenier-du-mac.net/copiecran/g_k/HolidayLemmings-1993--1.jpg)
http://www.grenier-du-mac.net/copiecran/g_...ngs-1993--2.gif (http://www.grenier-du-mac.net/copiecran/g_k/HolidayLemmings-1993--2.gif)
http://www.mobygames.com/images/shots/orig...18436236-00.gif (http://www.mobygames.com/images/shots/original/1018436236-00.gif)

To be honest, looking at the games released for this winter, I find very few "christmas games" - games that really fit christmas. Hell, we're getting a wild west shooter! Hardly christmas material. I'll undoubtedly find myself saving lemmings or driving my little car over a ruler and between cereal boxes!

So what are your christmas games? Which games remind you of christmas, of winter?

[moogle]

Nightmare before Christmas " Oogie's revenge

Yay.

[JimmyJ]

LOL, moogle!

Secret of mana and Legend of mana! (hey, those 2 games have moogles in them!)

[gorkur]

I always play Monkey Island 1 or 2 during Xmas. Simply wouldn't be the same without those games ;)

[Lucullus]

Since I'm in Australia my christmas doesn't go with playing inside... too damn hot for that. But I am from Denmark originally so I do recall what I used to play every xmas...

Snow Bros on Sega Emulator... rocks...
Starcraft (netplay)
Hidden and Dangerous (too awesome with snowgraphics) :)

But spent a lot of time replaying rpgs on snes emulator too tho and FF series was one of them.

[moogle]

Oh wait, ooops, I thought we were talkin bout games with christmas themes....uhh....Half Life 2, most definitely.

[red_avatar]

Anyone remember Jack in the Dark? Free mini game that came with Alone in the Dark II and where you had to rescue Santa :D

[Data]

Interpose- Xmas greeting.

[Sebatianos]

Originally posted by red_avatar@Nov 22 2005, 11:21 PM
Anyone remember Jack in the Dark? Free mini game that came with Alone in the Dark II and where you had to rescue Santa :D
Do you mean >>>THIS<<< (http://www.abandonia.com/games/en/372/JackinDark.htm) ;)

BTW - my favorite Santa game was an adventure game for the C64, but I can't remember the title :wall:

[Taskmaster]

"There's something in the chimney, and I don't know what it is, but it's been there since last Christmas." - cute song about Santa....


Time to whip out No One Lives Forever and drive the snowmobile around from the comfort of my warm Florida abode!

:Titan:

[Timpsi]

My Christmas mood is ensured when I get to beat my brothers in table hockey (http://koti.mbnet.fi/herd/pictures/puckmaster.jpg) (sorry for the slightly dark picture). It has served us all the way from the pre-Timpsi time in the '70s, and is still the most excellent piece of any kind of gaming ever.

Besides, I haven't lost to anyone for the past 10 or so years.

EDIT: Oh, yeah. And The Fight of the Sumo-Hoppers.

[Quintopotere]

Originally posted by gorkur@Nov 22 2005, 01:48 AM
I always play Monkey Island 1 or 2 during Xmas. Simply wouldn't be the same without those games ;)
Very good tradition :ok:

I should start to make the same :D

[efthimios]

Hmm, the games that for whatever reason I usualy play near and over xmas are:

Lemmings ( I suck at it even after all these years)
Midwinter
Civilization series
BOTF
Transport Tycoon
and a good racing game.

I don't know if I will follow this "tradition" this year, I will (90%) get finaly a new pc in december (hopefully) and I might have a go at a few games that I couldn't play over the last couple of years. FEAR, Far Cry, Silent Hunter III, etc.

[Taskmaster]

I might have a go at a few games that I couldn't play over the last couple of years. FEAR...

:ot: I know I am about to step in it for these comments, but hey, it's just my opinon. I quit FEAR as soon as I encountered the first couple of soldiers as they spewed obscenities, including calling my "mother" the F-word.

I understood it was rated "M"ature, but I did not see anything around the demo, that warned of the obscenity. Again, that's just me, but I also found no way to turn it off. I want realism in the game play, but I don't need profanity shouted at me, especially when I have two young girls in the house. My computer is in the family room - due to space limitations.

Anyway, the game looked great and the soldiers reacted with incredible AI. Too bad I won't be able to play it for moral reasons.

Sorry to get off topic... We now return you to your regularly scheduled Christmas program already in progress...

(Tiny Tim:) "...God bless us every one!"

[Doubler]

This christmas I'm propably going through the twice-yearly event of playing through Mafia again.
I really don't know why... The game just plays like a good movie.

[Blood-Pigggy]

:ot:
@Taskmaster: That was your own fault for not reading the ratings on the back of the box Taskmaster.

MATURE
Blood and Gore, Intense Violence, Strong Language

That should alert you enough that there will be language in the game, by the way, you think this is bad? You haven't seen anything until you hear the language in The Suffering: Ties That Bind. :D

[Taskmaster]

:ot:

@Taskmaster: That was your own fault for not reading the ratings on the back of the box Taskmaster.

MATURE
Blood and Gore, Intense Violence, Strong Language

There was no box, I downloaded the demo directly from a link in the newsletter they send to me. They talked about the game, but never mentioned the make-a-sailor-blush language going on. I assumed - my fault for sure - that the mature rating was for the normal blood and guts stuff.

Sorry to get off topic... We now return you to your regularly scheduled Christmas program already in progress...


(Marley:) "Tonight you will be visited by three ghosts: the ghost of games past (Atari 2600), the ghost of games present (XBox 360) and the ghost of games future (Whiz500GTX)."

[A. J. Raffles]

Originally posted by Blood-Pigggy@Nov 23 2005, 09:15 PM
You haven't seen anything until you hear the language in The Suffering: Ties That Bind. :D
That sentence is a classic, Piggy.:ok:

I don't suppose I'll be playing computer games at Christmas, but if I do, I'll probably be boring and play Day of the Tentacle once again.

[Eva02Soul]

I'll probably play through the baldur's gate series again, because nothing says christmas like being the son of a god.

[moogle]

I shall be playing Eder Scrolls: Oblivion, now that every time you hit a person its a hit, I like the game, the old one (morrowind) just pissed me off because you could stand there and stab a guy for twentty time and only 2 hit. I mean, its ok, because its based on stats, but its one thing if your standing farther back and attacking with some dagger, and its anotehr oif your right in the guys face attacking with a battleasxe as tall as you are...

[DeathDude]

Hmm prob going to spend some time playing Deus Ex again, always love playing that game, maybe some old classic adventure games such as the monkey island series, Day of the Tentacle, Sam and Max we'll see what happens.

[duckpatch]

Anyone remember Jack in the Dark? Free mini game that came with Alone in the Dark II and where you had to rescue Santa :D

Yeh fun game. Bit scary at times with the jack-in-the-box!

[win98]

Ahh memories of when we got our first pc for chrismas a peninum 2 233mhz with win95 and dad got all the budget pc games from the games store he could find and they were all for ms-dos thats how I came to like the games he got 10 really cheap ones for me for chrismas but as he got more some of them i did not play in the end half of them were chucked out because we had to much mess and our house and dad finished them ahh those were the days when 32bit 9x winndows had just begun. And he said to me windows would be like this for years and it would get better but still use the same kerrnal. I only took in half of it at the time but look at today windows xp uses the windows Nt kernal so he was incorrect.