pong, and probaly other examples of early home console games
wolfenstein3d, doom, quake, quake3, doom3 because all of them were technical milestones, had lasting impact on the industry and they show the rapid advancement of pc gaming in the 90s and 2000s
the elder scrolls series, as a simmiliar showcase.
final fantasy 1, 6 and 7, as a showcase of jrpgs through various generations and the fmv of 7 and onwards were imho precursors of 3d rendered movies.
half-life, because of the impact of it's scripted set pieces and its level design
counter-strike and starcraft, as the games that probably gave us professional e-sport.
dota, because its for mobas what doom is for first person shooters.
deus ex and thief, pioneered the "immersive sim" and they are great showcases of the interactive nature of games
Pokémon, cultural impact can't be denied and the trading aspect is a great example of a non traditional multiplayer experience
various Mario Games, but definitely Mario Bros. Super Mario World and Mario 64 and probably Galaxy as a showcase of the evolution of plattformers in 2d and 3d, maybe throw a spyro or banjo kazooie in there.
Grim Fandango, Kings Quest, Monkey Island, point and click adventures are there very own beast and often feature actual memorable characters. I definitely think more often about Manny Calavera than i do about Gordon Freeman or any Morrowind NPC, even though i played half-life and Morrowind much more than Grim Fandango
Minecraft
super meat boy, fez, hollow knight... lots of interesting indie games and they show how much more accessible game development has become.
Prince of Persia and karateka, the way they were animated alone would be enough, but they also featured an actual story, they were interested in showing and featured music used simmiliar to a movies soundtrack.
probably much more
games that are a product of a very localized culture (gothic could not have been made anywhere else but the ruhrarea for example)
the whole military complex is missing (from Mil Sims like Operation Flashpoint to actual recruitment vehicles like Americas Army)
more modern games, which i just don't know or that have not been rattling around in my brain for long enough, but baldurs gate 3, the last of us, or alan wake would probably end up on my list in a couple of years.
Videogames are still a young medium, very diverse and changing so rapidly, that i feel like there is no established canon of 'classics' or 'high impact' works. We'll probably end up with dozens of lists like this in such a topic, and might end up without a single game that made it onto all of them, besides tetris.
if a simmiliar question was asked in a movies community i'd bet any list with more than 10 entries would include metropolis, nosferatu, citizen kane and star wars, just because those are widely agreed upon movies that had an impact.
To my limited knowledge, it was the first games where true orchestral music was used. It was influential enough to be remade for PS3 and PS4, there are few games to get such a treatment.
i think that honour might go to total annihilation.
i also remember the final fantasies on the psx having an orchestral pieces jn their soundtrack, but those might have not been performed by an actual orchestra originally.
Amazing list. I personally would add couple games, that defined my "gaming hobby":
XCOM/UFO: Enemy Unknown - not sure how this fits in the list, but it was ground breaking for me: perfect blend of micro- and macro management, strategical decisions, tactical battles, what a great game and so much memories of it (and I'd put honorable mention of Jagged Alliance 1&2 here, 'cause they are very similar concept)
Civilization - genius idea, one of the 4X pioneers, easy to pick up, hard to master, and so much replay value; its overall depth is quite a feat, especially given it's from 1991, no wonder the franchise is still alive and well now
Fallout - esp. 1 & 2 might not be the best gameplay-wise, but their world building, characters and atmosphere are excellent... and everyone knows the legendary intro "War, war never changes..."
Planescape: Torment - similar to above, amazing world, unbelievable story, one of a kind game
Gothic - mainly 1&2 were simply awesome, there are no barriers (ahem), the world is your to explore, but it's deadly so you have to plan your progress, nothing is streamlined for you; I can't remember different game with such a vibe (other than piranha bytes later production)
VtM: Bloodlines - kind of similar to Deus Ex, but also taking from the table top; and in my book it has THE best atmosphere of all the games I've played
Witcher - this might be just European thing, but playing especially W1 felt kind of like folklore fairy tale from childhood turned into pretty grim adult game
Disco Elysium - this is probably the only "sort of new" game that I've played and which definitely deserves a place in the list, great characters, amazing story and writing
there are plenty of others too, but my brain farts
yes, arcade stuff is lacking on my list. The few i have played where mostly on an atari 2600 and simmiliar home consoles way after the fact and the only arcade i've ever seen was in a holiday resort thingy :D
Zelda: yep, was surprised there was no mention of it after i looked over my "finished" list, original Zelda and ocarina of time should probably be there, maybe a link to the past. did not play breath of the wild, so don't have an opinion on it. But zelda -> altp -> ocarina of time is a nice showcase of 2d games transitioning to 3d, and the item based exploration and progression is found in a lot of games.
halo: i am not a console shooter guy and on pc it felt like a very good game, but atleast to me not ground breaking. through the lense of console shooters it's probably a huge milestone.
unreal tournament: if i'd be listing my favourite games it would be there. but it did not have the impact on e-sport cs or the quakes had so it would be another technical showcase. the unreal engines became very important however.
sonic: yes, at the very least to show another take on plattformers.
gta: yeah, 3 onwards as blockbuster movie equivalents. don't ask me why they are not on the list, no idea.
gran turismo: if we include simulators, we should also list a bunch of microprose work, richard burns rally, the microsoft flight simulators and so on. Definitely an interesting section of gaming, but not one iam part of so hard to tell what to include for it.
chrono trigger: yeah, my list lacks non western games and chrono trigger deserves to be there simply because of its ambitious scale and the fact that its one of the greatest games i've ever played, what was i thinking?
earthbound: never played it :(
castlevania: the early metroids and later castlevanias for what we know as "metroidvanias" today. I've played castlevania 1 and 2 and there is not much of what makes metroidvanias in them. fun games though.
I came here to say this exact same thing. Videogames are an art form, and the history of that art should be preserved, both the successes and the failures. People should be able to look back on what was a hit and what was flop, on the ideas that worked and the ones that didn't, on the well made games and the badly made games. All of it matters, all of it is part of the same story.
I could write an essay significantly larger than the game itself and it wouldn't be as powerful of an argument as just saying the name with the weight of legacy it commands.
Civ 3? Outside of introducing strategic resources, it is difficult to think of what innovation Civ3 brought to the franchise. Civ 2? Absolutely. Civ 4? I can totally see it. What makes Civ 3 stand out?
If anything, Civ1 should be the milestone for creating a genre.
Hmm... Good question... They'll have to be the kind of videogame that was the first to do something, or set the standard for something, or has had a huge, long lasting cultural impact that can still be felt today.
So in that hypothetical museum I'd nominate:
Pong.
Tetris.
Donkey Kong arcade game.
Super Mario.
Super Mario 64.
Crash Bandicoot
Metroid (the first one).
Castlevania (the original one).
Hollow Knight.
Mario Kart.
The Legend of Zelda (the first one).
TES III Morrowind.
TES V Skyrim.
Doom (the original one).
Half Life.
Counter Strike (the original one).
Ultima.
Ultima Online.
Dune (the RTS game).
Warcraft.
World of Warcraft.
Age of Empires II, perhaps alongside the Definitive Edition.
This is a pretty solid list, but I’d try to bridge the gaps between older games and more modern ones, to show how things progressed. Essentially, you want each section of the museum to tell a story about how some critical building block of gaming was taken from concept to implementation.
I would actually include both the original Castlevania and Metroid then follow it up with Symphony of the Night. Show the original Castlevania game to establish the series, then show Metroid which has the exploration and backtracking with new abilities. Then show SOTN, which shows the combination of the two (effectively cementing the entire Metroidvania genre). Then show a game like Hollow Knight or Ori and the Blind Forest, which goes on to embody the genre several decades after it has been established.
Zelda is a good one, and I’d follow it up with something like Okami, which follows the same dungeon formula in a radically different setting and art style. Again, showing the genre’s establishment, then showing how it can be adapted.
For Final Fantasy, I’d also include FFX, which follows a very similar turn-based playstyle. Maybe include a Dragon Quest game somewhere in there too, as that series tends to stick to the same basic gameplay formula. Then I’d take it in a different direction and show something like Bravely Default, which is still technically turn-based, but also has additional elements layered on top.
I’d chase Super Mario 64 with something like A Hat In Time. Again, showing the establishment of the 3D platformer, then showing the elements in use elsewhere.
You have Ultima on here, which I agree with. But I’d probably break the display for it into two different halves: For the RPG half, I would include some more tabletop-inspired games here too, as the early game devs were largely tabletop game fans who were simply adapting their favorite games into digital settings. Games like Fallout 1/2, or Baldurs Gate. Maybe even show a modern game like Baldur’s Gate 3, to show how tabletop RPG mechanics can gracefully transition to digital games. Morrowind would also fit nicely here, but Skyrim is a little too far removed from old TTRPGs to be relevant to this section. Still important to have on the list, but I’d probably have it in a section dedicated to player-made mods.
For Ultima’s one-point-perspective dungeon-crawling, following it up with something like Persona Q or SMT: Strange Journey could be impactful to show how it was adapted to more modern games.
Most of these I get, but idk about hollow knight unless it's a part of the "Metroid/Castlevania" exhibit. It's a good game but idk if it's quite "museum" status.
It would be part of the Metroidvania section, because it's probably one of the best modern takes on it, and it has and currently is spawning quite a number of copy-cats. So that would cover its cultural impact too.
On the home-gamer gameplay side, this is a solid list. On the technology side, I think there's even more that makes sense for a curated museum tour. There were big leaps made in arcade tech through the 80's and 90's that were pushing all manner of graphics and sound, head-and-shoulders above the previous generation.
Sega's "super scaler" boards come to mind, allowing for games like Hang-on, Outrun, and After Burner. Digitized sound samples started with Sinistar and Tempest. Dragon's Lair amazed everyone with an interactive LaserDisc experience. There were also notable forays into AR with Time Traveler, and VR with Virutality. Lastly, we have the fully-enclosed and immersive cockpit of early Battletech simulators.
Another World/Out of This World. Short game, but also a 1991 game made by one dev and one composer in two years, and artistically it still holds up fairly well even today.
Because everyone needs to remember how a company can exploit their customer base with money grab schemes like loot boxes, pay to win junk and empty unplayable shells which need loads of expensive dlc's to make it even a little playable.
There should also be an entire wing for never finished bug simulators.
The area with actual proper games would be tiny. But it should include the old age of empires 2, city skylines 1, Kerbal space program 1 and everything from Larian studios.
I've finished BG3 6 times now, had a lot of fun playing Divinity 2 and am now playing divinity 1 couch coop with a friend. Their games are actually properly built, with loads of well written storylines.
The reason why it became so over hyped is because people got angry at all the other studios because Larian actually delivered properly built games worth their money. Same with Schedule 1. The game is fun but should be average compared to other games. But it isn't average, the rest is just complete money-grab bug simulator junk.
Street Fighter II - Not the first fighting game, but the one that kicked off a massive cultural phenomenon, and defined so much of the format that every fighting game since has taken influence from.
Puyo Puyo Tsu - Although this game never got a chance to shine in the west, in Japan this game was just as influential to the puzzle game genre as Street Fighter II was to fighting games. I often describe Puyo 1 as the Street Fighter 1 of puzzle games, but I think you could make a case for whether 1 or Tsu really belongs in the museum, since 1 was plenty popular at release and did inspire other puzzlers even before Tsu hit the scene. However, Tsu is the game that really established puzzle games as a serious competitive genre, with large tournaments being held all the way back then.
Beatmania - The original vertical scrolling rhythm game. Could include either the original, one of the first editions of IIDX, or even a current cabinet.
Dance Dance Revolution - While Beatmania gets credit for being the first, and for being plenty popular in Japan, DDR is what popularized the genre in overseas markets. And for good reason, it's equally notable for not being played with typical inputs.
Rogue - The thing that a whole bunch of other games are like. Except now most of the games we say are like this, aren't really like this at all...
Like every major Nintendo game - fuck it not even gonna list them all
My then-girlfriend-now-wife and I went to a temporary video game exhibit at the Museum of the Moving Image. A lot of the mainstays you'd expect were there, particularly from the arcade era, including ground-breaking titles like Dragon's Lair (which is fascinatingly beautiful and a bad video game at the same time). At one point, one of the signs mentioned moving on from vector graphics, which my wife had no idea what that meant, so I immediately looked around for an Asteroids machine. You don't really get how one of those games looks unless you're playing on the genuine article. That's the kind of thing that probably ought to be in a museum most.
I recently went to Galloping Ghost in Illinois, which is now the world's largest arcade. It's got nearly every arcade game you can think of, and they do a good job fixing them up. They have an F-Zero AX machine. I've always wanted to play one of those. I went to Galloping Ghost two years in a row, and it was broken both times. Turns out they're having trouble sourcing the displays. As you go around the place, most machines are working, but even only a year later, more of them had display problems. I imagine even just getting regular old CRTs is going to make this kind of thing way harder as time goes on, and a good CRT does affect how these old games look, because they were designed for them. This is the kind of burden I'd expect a museum to take on.
For me, it has got to be tetris. It is still thriving, even today. Anyone can understand the base concept and play it : it's simple and enjoyable, anywhen. Plus, it runs on remotely anything.
I really like the atmosphere. They created so much with such an minimalistic graphic style.
Factorio.
I don't know where to start. Overall a great example that some people like to optimize and put way more effort into this game than their job. Zeitgeist?
This is a more complex question than just "what is your favorite video game," or "what games do you consider works of art?"
If I'm putting a game in a museum, it's because there's something about it that warrants preservation on a greater level than other games. To that end, my candidates are
Pong (1972)
The first commercially successful video game.
Tetris (1985)
Arguably the most influential game of all time
Rollercoaster Tycoon (1999)
Handcrafted in assembly, serves as a lesson both in optimization and harnessing the players' penchant for finding intrinsic value in simplistic game mechanics
Edit: I just realized this comment looks like an infernal machine wrote it. I want to make it clear that I'm a human, with skin and blood and stuff
Alright, so here's my case for Thief, the Looking Glass Studios game.
Thief, on its own, is a great game and basically shares the claim to originating a lot of ideas behind stealth in games along with MGS, which came out the same year.
What many don't know is how incredibly innovative what they were doing with their engine tech was. In another timeline, id software were mildly successful action game makers while LGS became the industry defining mega success. The Dark Engine refines a lot of ideas present in Ultima Underworld and marries them to tech that was decades ahead of its time.
Thief had, probably, the first ECS in gaming. They also had their own rendering technique using "portals" that was a bit slower than id's BSP trees but allowed for insane geometry. They also had an incredible system for events called stimulus-response that was doing things like Breath of the Wild's "chemistry engine" again, decades before it would be rediscovered.
They weren't just making games, these were really simulations of a limited world with complex interactions. If the rest of the industry had caught onto their good practices, who knows what the landscape would look like today!
So I did a class on the art of the video game and MoMA (museum of modern art) has a number of them in their collection. There is even a Wikipedia article on it. Wikipedia Article
Eve Online and The Sims are excellent additions. But they are not RPGs.
I would personally include VTMB or Deus Ex, but from a broader perspective probably one of the Ultimas (6 or 7 are considered the best I believe) would be more appropriate.
Don't play jRPGs, but from my understanding FF7 is considered the "best in genre" release.
With Deus Ex you definitely can play very different characters with a broad spectrum of personalities and narrative decisions. Although I do agree that an argument can be made it's not an RPG.
Eve is a sandbox MMO and The Sims is lifeim, don't really see how they are RPGs.
Very few RPGs execute the role playing component so well as VTMB IMO.
Terraria, a monument to indie games and the craft itself, gave tons of free content and still does, unlike the popular pay for expansion models on a half finished buggy game of their contemporaries
If only, but I did find a way to play my old cd a while back. Can't say it aged well. Game was actually quite wonky. Most of the "secret mechanics" are pretty hard to trigger
Karateka, along with everything else Jordan Meschner did following it, starting the Prince of Persia series.
It's a nice evolution of personal style.
I've more or less dropped out of mainstream gaming so have no idea how the more recent Prince of Persia games play, nor if he has any involvement... but anyone who knew the original games should understand that these games did something foundational with movement and interface, helping the player to feel involved in the action.
the last prince of persia Meschner directly worked on was Sands of Time, which is imho well worth playing.
the other 3d Prince of Persias by ubisoft upto two thrones are still good games, but they lost a bit of the 1001 nights feel. The darker parts where there in sands of time, but warrior within goes all in on dark and edgy and just loses a bit of that timeless flair and is very much a mid 2000s game.
can't talk about ubisofts prince output after two thrones, they never found their way into my collection.
I remember my little brother and I would be playing kashyyk and would wait for the wookies on the beach behind the barriers and he would always say "We have more customerrrss" shit was so damn hilarious
It depends on what your museum is trying to convey. If it's moments of gaming history and games and consoles of significance, I'd go with:
For the earliest video games, I'd show the Tennis for Two on the DuMont Lab Ocilloscope, released in 1958.
You should also include the life of Warren Robinett, because he was the first ever game programmer to receive in-game credit for a game he made, because Atari never gave their programmers credit, but he snuck one in as an easter egg. He then went on to found the Learning Company which made all those Reader Rabbit games.
For the Crash of 1983, you have to include ET for the Atari 2600 as the posterboy, but "Pitfall!" should also be included. Pitfall was a good game, but it was the breakout hit of Activision and therefore proof that third-party video games were viable, leading to the glut of video games which, in combination with ET being such a colossal failure, caused the crash.
For the resurgence after the crash, the Nintendo Entertainment System, but specifically the one that came with the little robot to help you play games. It's essential that you convey that Nintendo intended to sell it as a toy rather than a games console because the games market in the US had completely died in the crash, but the toy market was very much alive.
NFL 2K5. It would be a somber, warmly-lit memorial, a pedestal bearing a single copy of the (Xbox version of) the game, with a spotlight shining down on it from above as it rotated. An eternal flame, possibly several, burn nearby. The walls would be digital, montages of all the memories. There would be mournful orchestral music playing, heavy on the clarinets and oboes.
And a screen where it plays YouTubers comparing it to every version of Madden for a decade-plus after. Eventually finding Madden to look better, but always finding Madden lacking in features and presentation.
100% guarantee there are probably still YouTubers doing that in 2025. And you might be surprised how good it can look upscaled to 4K, if you haven't tried it.
I think the better question is what about games deserves to be in a general history museum? The advent and changes of technology and the implementation is far more important than the examples of it in use. There are very few games on their own that would qualify as "culturally impactful" to the greater world by their sheer existence. (Mario, Pokemon, and Tetris immediately come to mind).
If we are talking about a "video game museum/exhibit" then the list broadens a lot, but it's less about the "what" and more the "why" that needs focused.
Shadow of the Colossus is the first that comes to mind. I'd probably toss in Final Fantasy VII, Zelda: Ocarina of Time, and DOTA 2 because I'm addicted to it
If I had to be stuck in a timeloop, I might pick being in high-school, late night, losing untold hours to Unreal Tournament until the sun came up and/or I occasionally fell asleep at my computer. Or maybe the LAN parties from that same time.
I loved getting that damned smiley-faced flak (secondary fire mode) in the face....made me LMFAO every time, and just brought a smile to my face now ☻. Domination was awesome!
Unpopular opinion, I played Elden ring for close to 10 hours and hated it. Ugly game, saw nothing but barren wastelands, got extremely annoyed with the style of fighting and the repetitiveness. I think it’s by far one of the worst games I’ve ever played
Objects in museums don't have to be there because of the art, but also cultural/historical significance. Elden Ring and the rest of Fromsoft's Soulsborne games definitely deserve to be in a video game museum, like the MADE in Oakland, CA.
If I was reading a list of "games that should be in a museum," and the author mentioned fucking DLSS as being an important factor, I would have exited the page immediately.
Every opinion is valid and people can disagree with it. But have you considered that there are museums of torture devices, or substance abuse. In that spirit what are the games that could should be remembered as a cautionary tale? For me it would be heroes3, minecraft, rimworld. These took most of my life (rotted most of my brain).
I was actually just kidding. I don't do much gaming myself, but I don't actually believe games to be brainrot. As for games that should be forever remembered, Club Penguin gets my vote. Minecraft was kinda fun, until I suddenly started getting headaches from field of view or whatever it is (screen speen, no good for head).
tetris, because it is tetris
pong, and probaly other examples of early home console games
wolfenstein3d, doom, quake, quake3, doom3 because all of them were technical milestones, had lasting impact on the industry and they show the rapid advancement of pc gaming in the 90s and 2000s
the elder scrolls series, as a simmiliar showcase.
final fantasy 1, 6 and 7, as a showcase of jrpgs through various generations and the fmv of 7 and onwards were imho precursors of 3d rendered movies.
half-life, because of the impact of it's scripted set pieces and its level design
counter-strike and starcraft, as the games that probably gave us professional e-sport.
dota, because its for mobas what doom is for first person shooters.
deus ex and thief, pioneered the "immersive sim" and they are great showcases of the interactive nature of games
Pokémon, cultural impact can't be denied and the trading aspect is a great example of a non traditional multiplayer experience
various Mario Games, but definitely Mario Bros. Super Mario World and Mario 64 and probably Galaxy as a showcase of the evolution of plattformers in 2d and 3d, maybe throw a spyro or banjo kazooie in there.
Grim Fandango, Kings Quest, Monkey Island, point and click adventures are there very own beast and often feature actual memorable characters. I definitely think more often about Manny Calavera than i do about Gordon Freeman or any Morrowind NPC, even though i played half-life and Morrowind much more than Grim Fandango
Minecraft
super meat boy, fez, hollow knight... lots of interesting indie games and they show how much more accessible game development has become.
Prince of Persia and karateka, the way they were animated alone would be enough, but they also featured an actual story, they were interested in showing and featured music used simmiliar to a movies soundtrack.
probably much more
games that are a product of a very localized culture (gothic could not have been made anywhere else but the ruhrarea for example)
the whole military complex is missing (from Mil Sims like Operation Flashpoint to actual recruitment vehicles like Americas Army)
more modern games, which i just don't know or that have not been rattling around in my brain for long enough, but baldurs gate 3, the last of us, or alan wake would probably end up on my list in a couple of years.
Great list!
I would add KSP, Guitar Hero and/or DDR, Beat Saber, WoW, and Portal.
Kerbal Space Program is awesome :)
Videogames are still a young medium, very diverse and changing so rapidly, that i feel like there is no established canon of 'classics' or 'high impact' works. We'll probably end up with dozens of lists like this in such a topic, and might end up without a single game that made it onto all of them, besides tetris.
if a simmiliar question was asked in a movies community i'd bet any list with more than 10 entries would include metropolis, nosferatu, citizen kane and star wars, just because those are widely agreed upon movies that had an impact.
I'd add the Shawshank Redemption to that list as well, and probably the Godfather part 2.
oh, absolutely, rogue and nethack, they are the foundation of crpgs and dungeon crawlers.
i just fear we'd need increased security to break up the fight between groups with various definitions what 'roguelike' means.
Shadow of the Colossus should be in there too. It has pioneered orchestral music in video games and gad a huge impact on them as a whole.
shadow of the colossus seems like a great game, but i've never heard its music referenced as pioneer work, what did it different in that department?
To my limited knowledge, it was the first games where true orchestral music was used. It was influential enough to be remade for PS3 and PS4, there are few games to get such a treatment.
i think that honour might go to total annihilation.
i also remember the final fantasies on the psx having an orchestral pieces jn their soundtrack, but those might have not been performed by an actual orchestra originally.
Possible. Might warrant more reserch on my part. Still, there is very few games to be remade for 3 consecutive console generations.
From my quick search, looks like it would be The Lost World: Jurassic Park, in August of 1997. Total Annihilation was released in September of 1997.
I would add the OG Mortal Combat gave us the MSRP rating system.
Probably shouldadd Mike Tyson’s Punchout, Tekken 2, and Marvel vs Capcom.
Double dragon, Street Fighter, the original Simpsons arcade game.
Amazing list. I personally would add couple games, that defined my "gaming hobby":
there are plenty of others too, but my brain farts
Good list.
Vampire the masquerade bloodlines also deserves a honourable mention
Maniac Mansion was the OG in the category, at least with graphics.
Myst deserves a place for is graphics too, even if it was mostly static renderings.
Awesome effort.
Missing Space Invaders it started a coin shortage in Japan.
Others I can think of off the top of my head:
yes, arcade stuff is lacking on my list. The few i have played where mostly on an atari 2600 and simmiliar home consoles way after the fact and the only arcade i've ever seen was in a holiday resort thingy :D
Zelda: yep, was surprised there was no mention of it after i looked over my "finished" list, original Zelda and ocarina of time should probably be there, maybe a link to the past. did not play breath of the wild, so don't have an opinion on it. But zelda -> altp -> ocarina of time is a nice showcase of 2d games transitioning to 3d, and the item based exploration and progression is found in a lot of games.
halo: i am not a console shooter guy and on pc it felt like a very good game, but atleast to me not ground breaking. through the lense of console shooters it's probably a huge milestone.
unreal tournament: if i'd be listing my favourite games it would be there. but it did not have the impact on e-sport cs or the quakes had so it would be another technical showcase. the unreal engines became very important however.
sonic: yes, at the very least to show another take on plattformers.
gta: yeah, 3 onwards as blockbuster movie equivalents. don't ask me why they are not on the list, no idea.
gran turismo: if we include simulators, we should also list a bunch of microprose work, richard burns rally, the microsoft flight simulators and so on. Definitely an interesting section of gaming, but not one iam part of so hard to tell what to include for it.
chrono trigger: yeah, my list lacks non western games and chrono trigger deserves to be there simply because of its ambitious scale and the fact that its one of the greatest games i've ever played, what was i thinking?
earthbound: never played it :(
castlevania: the early metroids and later castlevanias for what we know as "metroidvanias" today. I've played castlevania 1 and 2 and there is not much of what makes metroidvanias in them. fun games though.
All of them. In the Museum of All Video Games
This. All of them needs to be preserved.
I came here to say this exact same thing. Videogames are an art form, and the history of that art should be preserved, both the successes and the failures. People should be able to look back on what was a hit and what was flop, on the ideas that worked and the ones that didn't, on the well made games and the badly made games. All of it matters, all of it is part of the same story.
Exactly. There is no selection of which deserves it.
imho, this is the most correctest answer
Doom
I could write an essay significantly larger than the game itself and it wouldn't be as powerful of an argument as just saying the name with the weight of legacy it commands.
Already a great book on Doom. Called Masters of Doom by David Kushner. Have the audiobook highly recommend.
https://fabiensanglard.net/gebbdoom/
a more tech oriented book about doom.
great read for anyone who is into programming.
Added to my wishlist. Pricey but looks worth the read.
the full book in pdf is linked on the page for free , it's very much worth the price for a paper coppy however.
the blog is also a treasure trove of techincal details for various games :)
Yeah not interested in a pdf version. I believe in reading books on paper. But I do the occasional ebook. But this will be worth having in my library.
Also my first thought. Specifically the first one.
Be sure to have a look at KeeperFX and ![email protected]
Of course, keeperFX is great!
To get the obvious out of the way: Pacman, Doom 2, Starcraft, Simcity 2000, Civ 3. All genre-defining milestones.
Total Annihilation. They're still making sequels today (Supreme Commander, Beyond all Reason).
Warzone 2100 was the first 3D rotatable zoomable RTS which was pretty mind blowing at the time.
Fuck yes Total Annihilation. BAR is already amazing and last time I played it it was still in alpha.
Civ 3? Outside of introducing strategic resources, it is difficult to think of what innovation Civ3 brought to the franchise. Civ 2? Absolutely. Civ 4? I can totally see it. What makes Civ 3 stand out?
If anything, Civ1 should be the milestone for creating a genre.
Civ 3 was the first one I played so it sticks in my mind the most, that's all. Any of the Civs would be fine.
I do feel like Civ 3 was a big step up in visual effects, though.
Civ 3 was the first game in the series that didn't feel like a big improvement (graphics aside of course). but you always love your first Civ.
So many people in this thread just listing games they like and don't know what museums are for.
Dwarf Fortress, obviously.
"It's the best game you're not playing."
Gestures broadly: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Video_Game_Hall_of_Fame
All of them.
Art is art is art.
Not every single piece of art goes into a museum
All glory to Hareraiser!
Bad art is still art
I clicked your link not expecting to watch more than thirty seconds but watched the full thing, that was a great lecture.
Hmm... Good question... They'll have to be the kind of videogame that was the first to do something, or set the standard for something, or has had a huge, long lasting cultural impact that can still be felt today.
So in that hypothetical museum I'd nominate:
This is a pretty solid list, but I’d try to bridge the gaps between older games and more modern ones, to show how things progressed. Essentially, you want each section of the museum to tell a story about how some critical building block of gaming was taken from concept to implementation.
I would actually include both the original Castlevania and Metroid then follow it up with Symphony of the Night. Show the original Castlevania game to establish the series, then show Metroid which has the exploration and backtracking with new abilities. Then show SOTN, which shows the combination of the two (effectively cementing the entire Metroidvania genre). Then show a game like Hollow Knight or Ori and the Blind Forest, which goes on to embody the genre several decades after it has been established.
Zelda is a good one, and I’d follow it up with something like Okami, which follows the same dungeon formula in a radically different setting and art style. Again, showing the genre’s establishment, then showing how it can be adapted.
For Final Fantasy, I’d also include FFX, which follows a very similar turn-based playstyle. Maybe include a Dragon Quest game somewhere in there too, as that series tends to stick to the same basic gameplay formula. Then I’d take it in a different direction and show something like Bravely Default, which is still technically turn-based, but also has additional elements layered on top.
I’d chase Super Mario 64 with something like A Hat In Time. Again, showing the establishment of the 3D platformer, then showing the elements in use elsewhere.
You have Ultima on here, which I agree with. But I’d probably break the display for it into two different halves: For the RPG half, I would include some more tabletop-inspired games here too, as the early game devs were largely tabletop game fans who were simply adapting their favorite games into digital settings. Games like Fallout 1/2, or Baldurs Gate. Maybe even show a modern game like Baldur’s Gate 3, to show how tabletop RPG mechanics can gracefully transition to digital games. Morrowind would also fit nicely here, but Skyrim is a little too far removed from old TTRPGs to be relevant to this section. Still important to have on the list, but I’d probably have it in a section dedicated to player-made mods.
For Ultima’s one-point-perspective dungeon-crawling, following it up with something like Persona Q or SMT: Strange Journey could be impactful to show how it was adapted to more modern games.
I think some representative of mobile gaming should be on this list (as much as I hate them). Probably either Candy Crush or Angry Birds.
There should also be a motion gamer entry somewhere on here like Wii Sports or something.
And maybe an indie entry...like perhaps Stardew Valley.
Also some type of sim entry...maybe SimCity?
And probably an adventure game entry of some sort (King's Quest or Monkey Island).
Relatedly, I think we're still waiting for a VR or AR game that anyone gives a real shit about.
Edit: the more I think about this the more I think we need more entries so I'll just stop it
Most of these I get, but idk about hollow knight unless it's a part of the "Metroid/Castlevania" exhibit. It's a good game but idk if it's quite "museum" status.
It would be part of the Metroidvania section, because it's probably one of the best modern takes on it, and it has and currently is spawning quite a number of copy-cats. So that would cover its cultural impact too.
On the home-gamer gameplay side, this is a solid list. On the technology side, I think there's even more that makes sense for a curated museum tour. There were big leaps made in arcade tech through the 80's and 90's that were pushing all manner of graphics and sound, head-and-shoulders above the previous generation.
Sega's "super scaler" boards come to mind, allowing for games like Hang-on, Outrun, and After Burner. Digitized sound samples started with Sinistar and Tempest. Dragon's Lair amazed everyone with an interactive LaserDisc experience. There were also notable forays into AR with Time Traveler, and VR with Virutality. Lastly, we have the fully-enclosed and immersive cockpit of early Battletech simulators.
Could make a museum for Doom alone. With all the systems it run on.
Another World/Out of This World. Short game, but also a 1991 game made by one dev and one composer in two years, and artistically it still holds up fairly well even today.
Came to put this one in. I was mindblown when I tried it on the Amiga.
All of them.
I said all of them, so yes.
The ICO trilogy
EA games deserve to be in a museum.
Because everyone needs to remember how a company can exploit their customer base with money grab schemes like loot boxes, pay to win junk and empty unplayable shells which need loads of expensive dlc's to make it even a little playable.
There should also be an entire wing for never finished bug simulators.
The area with actual proper games would be tiny. But it should include the old age of empires 2, city skylines 1, Kerbal space program 1 and everything from Larian studios.
Age 2 is actually in a museum now. Larian's games are overhyped, and even KSP went bad the moment Squad sold out to Tencent.
I've finished BG3 6 times now, had a lot of fun playing Divinity 2 and am now playing divinity 1 couch coop with a friend. Their games are actually properly built, with loads of well written storylines.
The reason why it became so over hyped is because people got angry at all the other studios because Larian actually delivered properly built games worth their money. Same with Schedule 1. The game is fun but should be average compared to other games. But it isn't average, the rest is just complete money-grab bug simulator junk.
Street Fighter II - Not the first fighting game, but the one that kicked off a massive cultural phenomenon, and defined so much of the format that every fighting game since has taken influence from.
Puyo Puyo Tsu - Although this game never got a chance to shine in the west, in Japan this game was just as influential to the puzzle game genre as Street Fighter II was to fighting games. I often describe Puyo 1 as the Street Fighter 1 of puzzle games, but I think you could make a case for whether 1 or Tsu really belongs in the museum, since 1 was plenty popular at release and did inspire other puzzlers even before Tsu hit the scene. However, Tsu is the game that really established puzzle games as a serious competitive genre, with large tournaments being held all the way back then.
Beatmania - The original vertical scrolling rhythm game. Could include either the original, one of the first editions of IIDX, or even a current cabinet.
Dance Dance Revolution - While Beatmania gets credit for being the first, and for being plenty popular in Japan, DDR is what popularized the genre in overseas markets. And for good reason, it's equally notable for not being played with typical inputs.
Rogue - The thing that a whole bunch of other games are like. Except now most of the games we say are like this, aren't really like this at all...
Like every major Nintendo game - fuck it not even gonna list them all
My then-girlfriend-now-wife and I went to a temporary video game exhibit at the Museum of the Moving Image. A lot of the mainstays you'd expect were there, particularly from the arcade era, including ground-breaking titles like Dragon's Lair (which is fascinatingly beautiful and a bad video game at the same time). At one point, one of the signs mentioned moving on from vector graphics, which my wife had no idea what that meant, so I immediately looked around for an Asteroids machine. You don't really get how one of those games looks unless you're playing on the genuine article. That's the kind of thing that probably ought to be in a museum most.
I recently went to Galloping Ghost in Illinois, which is now the world's largest arcade. It's got nearly every arcade game you can think of, and they do a good job fixing them up. They have an F-Zero AX machine. I've always wanted to play one of those. I went to Galloping Ghost two years in a row, and it was broken both times. Turns out they're having trouble sourcing the displays. As you go around the place, most machines are working, but even only a year later, more of them had display problems. I imagine even just getting regular old CRTs is going to make this kind of thing way harder as time goes on, and a good CRT does affect how these old games look, because they were designed for them. This is the kind of burden I'd expect a museum to take on.
Half-life, or any source game along with minecraft.
For me, it has got to be tetris. It is still thriving, even today. Anyone can understand the base concept and play it : it's simple and enjoyable, anywhen. Plus, it runs on remotely anything.
Bioshock
Halo: Combat Evolved
Fallout New Vegas
Also, cynical answer is also whatever current mobile game is making a bazillion dollars right now because ✨capitalism✨
Limbo.
I really like the atmosphere. They created so much with such an minimalistic graphic style.
Factorio.
I don't know where to start. Overall a great example that some people like to optimize and put way more effort into this game than their job. Zeitgeist?
Dwarf Fortress is, in fact, in a museum.
E.T. for Atari
Nah, just bury that shit into desert... /s
https://www.si.edu/object/video-game-cartridge-et-extra-terrestrial%3Anmah_1519322
It's too late, accept history
I still have my copy in my own little museum in my office with some of my favorite (or in this case most notorious) games. Does that count?
Yes, however the Smithsonian also counts, which is also where a cart is....and the Henry Ford museum...and the museum of Failure:3
One that comes to mind is The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker.
This is a more complex question than just "what is your favorite video game," or "what games do you consider works of art?"
If I'm putting a game in a museum, it's because there's something about it that warrants preservation on a greater level than other games. To that end, my candidates are
The first commercially successful video game.
Arguably the most influential game of all time
Handcrafted in assembly, serves as a lesson both in optimization and harnessing the players' penchant for finding intrinsic value in simplistic game mechanics
Edit: I just realized this comment looks like an infernal machine wrote it. I want to make it clear that I'm a human, with skin and blood and stuff
These three plus Doom and Shadow of the Colossus are what was I thinking. Maybe Minecraft too.
Ico and Shadow of the Colossus.
Also what’s the game in the screenshot?
the game in the screenshot is Elden Ring.
Tomb Raider.
Isn't the Louve pyramid already a reference to Tomb Raider ?
Isn't there an open source port of this?
Mario 3 Legend of Zelda Ocarina of Time Minecraft Portal The original DOTA that was built on Warcraft 3 World of Warcraft
I choose these games not because they are good but because they had massive impacts on video games. Except for Mario 3, that ones just the GOAT.
Alright, so here's my case for Thief, the Looking Glass Studios game.
Thief, on its own, is a great game and basically shares the claim to originating a lot of ideas behind stealth in games along with MGS, which came out the same year.
What many don't know is how incredibly innovative what they were doing with their engine tech was. In another timeline, id software were mildly successful action game makers while LGS became the industry defining mega success. The Dark Engine refines a lot of ideas present in Ultima Underworld and marries them to tech that was decades ahead of its time.
Check out the opening and closing of this long talk: https://youtu.be/wo84LFzx5nI
Thief had, probably, the first ECS in gaming. They also had their own rendering technique using "portals" that was a bit slower than id's BSP trees but allowed for insane geometry. They also had an incredible system for events called stimulus-response that was doing things like Breath of the Wild's "chemistry engine" again, decades before it would be rediscovered.
They weren't just making games, these were really simulations of a limited world with complex interactions. If the rest of the industry had caught onto their good practices, who knows what the landscape would look like today!
RDR2
There is video game museums already:
https://www.computerspielemuseum.de/en/43-Homepage.htm
There is also the National Videogame Museum in the US
https://nvmusa.org/
Dwarf fortress
Ocarina
Doom, Minecraft and Touhou
Elite dangerous. 1:1 replica of the Milky Way that is being actively colonized as we speak.
So I did a class on the art of the video game and MoMA (museum of modern art) has a number of them in their collection. There is even a Wikipedia article on it. Wikipedia Article
Pretty solid collection IMO. I am surprised they haven't included any RPGs (say one CRPG like Ultima 6 and one jRPG like say Final Fantasy 7).
Eve Online and The Sims are excellent additions. But they are not RPGs.
I would personally include VTMB or Deus Ex, but from a broader perspective probably one of the Ultimas (6 or 7 are considered the best I believe) would be more appropriate.
Don't play jRPGs, but from my understanding FF7 is considered the "best in genre" release.
With Deus Ex you definitely can play very different characters with a broad spectrum of personalities and narrative decisions. Although I do agree that an argument can be made it's not an RPG.
Eve is a sandbox MMO and The Sims is lifeim, don't really see how they are RPGs.
Very few RPGs execute the role playing component so well as VTMB IMO.
Terraria, a monument to indie games and the craft itself, gave tons of free content and still does, unlike the popular pay for expansion models on a half finished buggy game of their contemporaries
Also Journey and Flower for different reasons
Jetset Willy
Had this on the spectrum. I spent so many hours trying to map this game, think I ultimately failed. Yeah it's a classic for sure.
Resident Evil - the original.
Black and White
Oh my god I forgot about this one!! I would love to see something similar in today's market or even an HD remake of the original.
If only, but I did find a way to play my old cd a while back. Can't say it aged well. Game was actually quite wonky. Most of the "secret mechanics" are pretty hard to trigger
Redneck Rampage
"Hey mother fucker!"
The Museum of Modern Art in New York has some games in their permanent collection: Games in MoMA
Swap the () and []! 🩵
Star Raiders for the Atari 400/800.
That was the first game that scared the shit out of me.
Granted, it was a jump scare, but it got me good....
I had that game for the Atari 2600 and unlike E.T, it was a great game.
"List all notable video game characters"
Oh cmon
Might as well ask someone to list the top songs of every year since the 80's.
Edit nvm it's not even characters, just games.
Pong is from like 1972.
Anthem
(For history purpose, just like there are museums for the Holocaust or the WTC)
I still mourne over what that game could have been.
Meh, I mean the gameplay is nice but Bioware hasn't been able to write a good game for more than a decade, I don't expect anything from them anymore
Karateka, along with everything else Jordan Meschner did following it, starting the Prince of Persia series.
It's a nice evolution of personal style.
I've more or less dropped out of mainstream gaming so have no idea how the more recent Prince of Persia games play, nor if he has any involvement... but anyone who knew the original games should understand that these games did something foundational with movement and interface, helping the player to feel involved in the action.
the last prince of persia Meschner directly worked on was Sands of Time, which is imho well worth playing.
the other 3d Prince of Persias by ubisoft upto two thrones are still good games, but they lost a bit of the 1001 nights feel. The darker parts where there in sands of time, but warrior within goes all in on dark and edgy and just loses a bit of that timeless flair and is very much a mid 2000s game.
can't talk about ubisofts prince output after two thrones, they never found their way into my collection.
for a more "traditional paint" like experience, Gris is just gorgeous to look at
The original Star Wars Battlefront games. The best offline multiplayer I’ve ever had in a video game.
I remember my little brother and I would be playing kashyyk and would wait for the wookies on the beach behind the barriers and he would always say "We have more customerrrss" shit was so damn hilarious
All of them.
Indiana Jones and the Great Circle
Et for the Atari 2600
Doom OG
GTA 3
Half Life Dead Space Minecraft Terraria Stardew Valley Uhhh...how do you do line breaks in comments? This looks like trash.
Gris.
Pong, Pac-man, OXO, Mystery House, Super Mario, Battlezone, Wolfenstein, Doom.
The classic pioneers.
I'm surprised that nobody has mentioned the Strong Museum of Play which contains the video game hall of fame
Assuming a single game, Minecraft. It should be a kids museum style where you can build things. You can make each room a different biome or structure.
It depends on what your museum is trying to convey. If it's moments of gaming history and games and consoles of significance, I'd go with:
For the earliest video games, I'd show the Tennis for Two on the DuMont Lab Ocilloscope, released in 1958.
You should also include the life of Warren Robinett, because he was the first ever game programmer to receive in-game credit for a game he made, because Atari never gave their programmers credit, but he snuck one in as an easter egg. He then went on to found the Learning Company which made all those Reader Rabbit games.
For the Crash of 1983, you have to include ET for the Atari 2600 as the posterboy, but "Pitfall!" should also be included. Pitfall was a good game, but it was the breakout hit of Activision and therefore proof that third-party video games were viable, leading to the glut of video games which, in combination with ET being such a colossal failure, caused the crash.
For the resurgence after the crash, the Nintendo Entertainment System, but specifically the one that came with the little robot to help you play games. It's essential that you convey that Nintendo intended to sell it as a toy rather than a games console because the games market in the US had completely died in the crash, but the toy market was very much alive.
Sneak King
Half-life: Alyx
Probably One Must Fall 2097
I loved it and played against my little brother on one keyboard constantly, that was fun!
Too bad that the follow-up game went through developer hell, took ages and looked and played like shit :-(
NFL 2K5. It would be a somber, warmly-lit memorial, a pedestal bearing a single copy of the (Xbox version of) the game, with a spotlight shining down on it from above as it rotated. An eternal flame, possibly several, burn nearby. The walls would be digital, montages of all the memories. There would be mournful orchestral music playing, heavy on the clarinets and oboes.
And a screen where it plays YouTubers comparing it to every version of Madden for a decade-plus after. Eventually finding Madden to look better, but always finding Madden lacking in features and presentation.
100% guarantee there are probably still YouTubers doing that in 2025. And you might be surprised how good it can look upscaled to 4K, if you haven't tried it.
Didn't even know that was a thing; that's how long it's been since I looked at it. Thanks!
All y'all be honest with yourself. The answer is the prestigious league of legends.
The Binding of Issac. Hands down my favourite game and a work of pure dedication.
Do I only get to pick one?
If so, Prince of Persia.
but which? og? which release? I liked it on Atari ST then hated it on PC lol.... but only had access to a really bad pc.
Spore, even if imperfect.
Minecraft.
Pong.
Elden Ring.
Rollercoaster Tycoon.
Zoo Tycoon.
Pokémon Green.
Spore should be in there bit not for a good reason.
I think the better question is what about games deserves to be in a general history museum? The advent and changes of technology and the implementation is far more important than the examples of it in use. There are very few games on their own that would qualify as "culturally impactful" to the greater world by their sheer existence. (Mario, Pokemon, and Tetris immediately come to mind).
If we are talking about a "video game museum/exhibit" then the list broadens a lot, but it's less about the "what" and more the "why" that needs focused.
Sexy Beach 3
Shadow of the Colossus is the first that comes to mind. I'd probably toss in Final Fantasy VII, Zelda: Ocarina of Time, and DOTA 2 because I'm addicted to it
None, that's not how you enjoy the medium. You don't go to a museum to read books.
I beg to differ, sir. I've been to a pinball museum and all were playable. It was great.
Elite
Street Fighter, Mortal Combat, Sega Rally, Unreal and also Unreal Tournament
If I had to be stuck in a timeloop, I might pick being in high-school, late night, losing untold hours to Unreal Tournament until the sun came up and/or I occasionally fell asleep at my computer. Or maybe the LAN parties from that same time.
I loved getting that damned smiley-faced flak (secondary fire mode) in the face....made me LMFAO every time, and just brought a smile to my face now ☻. Domination was awesome!
Everything 1Upsmanship puts on their "Celestial Hard Drive".
Or, Minecraft.
MechCommander (1998)
Red Dead 2. The story mode is amazing.
How about ... All of them?!?
As in history, all of them
As in art?
Blasphemous.
La puta madre que belleza de juego.
Unpopular opinion, I played Elden ring for close to 10 hours and hated it. Ugly game, saw nothing but barren wastelands, got extremely annoyed with the style of fighting and the repetitiveness. I think it’s by far one of the worst games I’ve ever played
Objects in museums don't have to be there because of the art, but also cultural/historical significance. Elden Ring and the rest of Fromsoft's Soulsborne games definitely deserve to be in a video game museum, like the MADE in Oakland, CA.
Do you think "art" only means "pretty pictures"?
If I was reading a list of "games that should be in a museum," and the author mentioned fucking DLSS as being an important factor, I would have exited the page immediately.
What a bad take. Do you also think the Seven Samurai movie shouldn't be in a museum because it's not IMAX?
And there's no CGI.
You must have never went underground in elder ring. It is the most beautiful thing ive seen in a game.
Ah yes, DLSS, the option to make your game look worse for better performance.
It's not a necessity for a good looking game.
you have the worst taste maybe imaginable in games that you're 'opinion' is futile lol
None. Video games are brainrot
Every opinion is valid and people can disagree with it. But have you considered that there are museums of torture devices, or substance abuse. In that spirit what are the games that could should be remembered as a cautionary tale? For me it would be heroes3, minecraft, rimworld. These took most of my life (rotted most of my brain).
I was actually just kidding. I don't do much gaming myself, but I don't actually believe games to be brainrot. As for games that should be forever remembered, Club Penguin gets my vote. Minecraft was kinda fun, until I suddenly started getting headaches from field of view or whatever it is (screen speen, no good for head).