Your most loved (WOW!) feature in a game!

Game: Resident Evil 4 (GameCube)
Feature: Interactive cut scenes
Comments: After years of Final fantasy games, I'd trained myself to respond to a sudden shift in camera angle by putting down the controller and reading until the game comes back on. RE4 rocked my socks with the "Press A to not die" feature.

Game: Zelda: Twilight Princess (Wii)
Feature: 3rd person swordfighting with the Wiimote
Comments: Totally kickass. The perfect balance of available moves and possible situations that lets you get into and out of tight spots with a blend of finesse, grace and excitement. I'm going through the Cave of Ordeals with the beginner sword and no shield, just to enjoy the leaping, slashing, whirling, dodging thrill of the game's smooth, intuitive, exquisite combat system.

Game: Supreme Commander
Feature: Strategic Zoom + Realistic Nukes
These are the BEST inovations to RTS ever. The zoom for it's complete fluidity, and usefull ness.
The nukes, cauze it helps bring that epic size feel back to something that would seem small played from
the strategic view all zoomed out.


Game: Dawn Of War
Feature: Resourcing
Ok, so this was origionally done by Total Anilation(redone in SupremeCommander), but it is a great
departure from the resourcer's + resource patches that you deal with in ever other RTS


Game: Homeworld 1
Feature: Fuel
Most people hated this one, but I loved the fact that you had to manage you units for fear that they would
run out of fuel and be usless. You needed to run supply ships to the front lines and cycle your fighers to be
most effective. Effectivly turning what would be throw-away units into a valuable, I-should-save-these
resource.


Game: Imperium Galactica 1 + 2
Feature: battle sequences
They turned strategic 4x battles (more like chess pieces) into something where the pieces zoomed in and
you actually got to manage the fleets.
(this was before the total war series also did something similar in their 4x games)


Game: F.E.A.R
Feature: The AI.
I think this has been discused plenty, but it was a "WOW!" moment in my FPS gaming.

[Edited by - KulSeran on April 25, 2007 2:07:17 AM]

Game: NFS most wanted
Feature: I really liked when real actors talked to you with rendered stuff in the background. Especially when the cop scratches your RENDERED car with his REAL keys. It was just hyper-awesome.

Game: within a deep forest
Feature: ability to switch between windowed and fullscreen mode at any time

Quote:

Original post by KulSeran Game: F.E.A.R Feature: The AI. I think this has been discused plenty, but it was a "WOW!" moment in my FPS gaming.

F.E.A.R.'s AI Demystified

Quote:

F.E.A.R. was widely lauded for the ability of its soldiers (both singly and in squads) to flank the player. In reality, the AI wasn't flanking at all -- it was moving from one cover area to another cover area. Because of the skill exhibited by the level designers, that next cover area was to the side of the player's location (or where the designers assumed the player would be), so when the AI moved to that location, it created a seamless illusion of the enemy flanking you. Adding a final layer to the illusion was the notion that the AI called for reinforcements. As the player slugged it out with the game's bad guys, one of them would call out for reinforcements. Then, when the player moved forward, they would come across an enemy squad rushing toward them. The squad was always there, regardless of whether or not reinforcements were actually "summoned," but because of the dialogue, the player creates a connection that really isn't there.

For me, playing through HL2 Episode One with the commentary on created more WOW moments than I could possibly share here.

Game: Gears of War
Feature: Chainsaw

Game: God of War
Feature: Entering the throut of the hyidra after killing it to get the key.
It's mouth didn't really look that big when I was fighting it @@

Another World: the entire game is one big wow. Gameplay & Graphics were unique.
Wolfenstein3d!: (illusion of) 3d. I can't believe no one mentioned this yet.

I just remember another couple!

Game: METAL GEAR SERIES
Feature: when PSYCHO MANTIS appeared I thought it was just a silly ghost... but when it read the card of my playstation and told me what games I played previously, what kind of player was I and made the joystick rumble on the floor I think I actually wet my pants a little bit. It was amazing. I said "How they did this!? OMG! WOW!".
Right after that the pictures on the wall behind PSYCHO MANTIS start laughing like little girls and that spoiled my moment, but it was actually cool what happened before that.

Game: Shadow of the Colossus
Feature: when you have to jump on the giant bird in order to kill him and he just keeps flying with you on his back. That was another "how that was made?!!!".

And another one, if you people look on those video sites (don't know if I can mention the Youtu... word here due the rules, I didn't found anything against it) you can search for a video of Half Life 2, Tower of Terror which is actually a level made (at least that was the video said) by a independent party, and it is the exact, exact exact copy of the Disney's ride "The Tower of Terror". EXCELLENT work there, really something.

keep it coming it looks good!

Game: Monkey Island 2
Feature: The graphics & sound. MI2 was the game that got me into gaming. My only experience with games beforehand were the old Kings Quest games (16 colors!), Chessmaster, Math Blaster, and Captain Comic. The graphics and sound blew me away. (BTW, I got Monkey Island 1 a week later so that I could play them in order.)

In more modern times...

Game: World of Warcraft
Feature: Fighting Ragnoros for the first time. Seeing this huge flame creature thing rise from the lava then starting an epic fight was really impressive the first time, especially since I was a rogue and right next to him when he popped up. Of course Molten Core became boring on subsequent visits...

Frontier: Elite 2 and Frontier: First Encounters - Realistic solar systems with planets you can land on. Something no other game has accomplished since. Both games have very serious problems, but that single fact made them very "wow" worthy.

Freedom Fighters: probably the cleanest, simplest, most intuitive 3rd person controls I've ever used. It's also an example of how a game can look good and be fun, without using tons of advanced graphics features. And I'm always impressed when a game never crashes and doesn't need a single patch. Too bad the game's so short.

Deus Ex 1: Combine RPG elements like a decent story line and skill progression with a shooter? Nice! And the alternative modes of playing, such as stealth, were very much appreciated by those of us who don't like to go in guns blazing like in most shooters.

PS I'll second the monkey island games. They've always had a very unique charm that puts them in a class all their own. They're the only adventure games from way back that I still like to play.

edit - shoot, how can I forget xcom? That game was ground breaking and genre creating in every respect.

StarCraft: 3 _really_ different and _really_ balanced races.
Quake 3: Dead simple gameplay, but nearly endless multiplayer fun.
Half-Life: Interactive intro and the game's atmosphere in general.

Game: Ultima VI - The Black Gate
Feature: The Guardian's eerie, booming digitized voice constantly taunting you throughout the game.

Game: Aliens vs. Predator
Feature: (Space Marine quest) The game's ability to instill raw terror in complete darkness. Your only friend is your rifle and your radar!

Game: Thief (I and II)
Feature: The cynicism of Garrett contrasting with the way he (quite against his will) gets drawn into doing heroic deeds. Also the really cool stealth gameplay. And when the zombies jump you, by God, I jumped in my chair and screamed like a little girl. Those games are scary.

God Of War. The whole damn game.

Hah, so true....
God of war was great.
Good gameplay, graphics, ideas...everything.

Prince of Persia: Sands of Time
Feature: Moving back in time, anyone? When I first pressed THE button, my lower yaw hit the desk... The game only had a frustration-level that was unique on its own too :(

Quote:

Original post by skittleo For me, playing through HL2 Episode One with the commentary on created more WOW moments than I could possibly share here.

How do you do that?