First Inductees to the World Video Game Hall of Fame

[Draco1962]

The first inductees to the World Video Game Hall of Fame are DOOM, Pac-Man, PONG, Super Mario Bros., Tetris, and World of Warcraft!

[nullPointer]

I was right on board with it up until WOW. I'm quite sure it's a case "Get Off My Lawn Syndrome," but whereas the other games in that list helped lay the foundations of gaming as we know it, WOW just seems exceedingly modern by comparison. I mean sure, it probably deserves a place, eventually. But really is it more deserving of recognition than Street Fighter II, Final Fantasy VII, Donkey Kong, Grand Theft Auto III, Legend of Zelda, Space Invaders, Pokemon, Sonic the Hedgehog, etc.? Poppycock I say!

... Don't worry I have the same reaction every year to inductions into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. Like Deep Purple still isn't in, but The Paul Butterfield Blues Band is?! (Seriously WTF is that, I have no idea)

[tthurman]

I read this yesterday, and seeing how it was Space Invaders that basically introduced me to arcade gaming, its absence blew it for me!

I stopped following the music side of things after the Jethro Tull Grammy win some years back. Not a hater, it was just wrong considering the category.

[Adultery]

Wait, Deep Purple isn't in? That is truly a fail!!! Love that band, especially the album Fireball. Great piece of rock awesomeness! I have to listen all the way through every time I put it on the turntable. Not a lot of albums meet that bar.

/Side Note: Ian Gillan as Jesus in the Superstar rock opera is absolutely untouchable. He did some things vocally on that soundtrack that still blow me away today. The man deserves the recognition.

As for WOW, they revolutionized the MMORPG genre the same way Super Mario Bros revolutionized the performer. I think it's a fair inductee. Although I don't play it. I get the 'too modern' angle, but the genre is modern on the whole. Sure there were a few lesser known ones before, but if you play one today I guarantee they look at WOW for inspiration.

/my 2c

[stigzler]

Think I'd remove Pac-man. It's neither genre nor generation defining - as per null's point - why pacman and not space invaders?

However - Zelda Ocarina of time absent!? Who are these guys getting back handers from?

and what about E.T.

[Draco1962]

I can see Pac-Man's influence since it did spawn all sorts of merchandising and cartoons, etc. But Space Invaders is an easy one to replace it in my book.

[nullPointer]

Think I'd remove Pac-man. It's neither genre nor generation defining.

C'mon now Stigz, none of those other games can lay claim to this masterpiece. Live it, love it, be it.

(side note: I had no idea the Big Lebowski was ever a recording artist)

[ClassicGMR]

I agree with almost every selection. There has to be something left out every year if they want to whittle it down to a finite amount of inductees. Having said that here's my $0.02 on the inductees:

I do not agree with WoW being the flagship inductee of MMORPG though. Ultima Online has been going since 1997 and Everquest took that banner and ran with it full speed in 1999. They didn't call it Evercrack for nothing. I understand that the success EverQuest garnered compared to Ultima Online was exceeded in spades with World of Warcraft. Yes WoW should be in maybe over the next 2-3 years but not at the forefront.

Tetris is the reason that the Gameboy sold so many systems. It introduced a genre to the public they never even knew they wanted.

Pac-Man is a given here. Aladdin's Castle had 2 machines and for the first year straight there were rows of quarters on the bezel waiting for their turn to play!

Pong brought gaming home to the general public. No problem there.

Super Mario Bros helped relaunched video games when no one wanted video games anymore ("The video game fad is dead!"). It was also one of the best platformers ever released and still has replay value.

[stigzler]

Looks like I'm outvoted on pac-man, although that anti-nostalgia-triggering video of bad 80s pap did little to change my opinion, null! *urgh* *shudders* @ the 80s

Think you highlight the difficulties with this kinda thing, Classic - it's how far back you go to define 'genre-defining' - for instance, World of Warcraft:

??

or maybe even, for doom:

But still, I persist... Really!? No Ocarina of time?

[ClassicGMR]

Skullkeep is all well and good as an RPG but it doesn't qualify as an MMO. If you want to go pure RPG there's SSI's AD&D Gold Box, Final Fantasy or, hell, let's go way back...

There's also The Oregon Trail and Colossal Cave Adventure to name a few text based games.

[stigzler]

Multiplayer, role-playing (kings, queens + knights) and online (err... well kinda - remember postal chess?).

I know, I know... it aint a video game - but was just kinda illustrating my point - how do you define a 'genre' or 'generation'? It's all a bit of a wild goose chase.

(Still think ocarina should be in though!

[Draco1962]

For the PC text adventure genre, Colossal Cave Adventure started it all, but I would have to say that one of the most influential would be Zork by Infocom. Infocom's cross platform sucesses were almost unrivaled for almost a decade.

[ClassicGMR]

@Draco - not sure how Zork didn't even enter my mind. Bad brain! Bad!

@Stigzler -