Fox's top 5 games before 1999

It has been many years since I was playing 1986's Ikari warriors on my family's old Tandy1000 pc. Games like Kings Quest and out Outnumbered held a special magic for the gaming pioneers of the new generation. With over 20 years of multiple platform gaming I would like to point out my favorites. They may not all be industry game changers, but each has unique character and were extremely well made for their time. Enjoy!

Starting out at number ten.

5 - SIM CITY 1986 by Maxis

Back in 1986 Maxis was doing something special. They brought the idea of computer based simulation to a whole new level with breakout game Sim City. Users where able to make entire digital cities using advanced urban construction design concepts and watch their creations grow in a digital world. The subsequent line of 'Sim' games wound their way into an impressive market dominance still held to this day.

4 - Starcontrol 2

Starcontrol 2 was two games in one! In the adventure mode, the user could explore an impossibly vast galaxy interacting with various alien species while on a quest to discover a way to free Earth from a mysterious shield that had locked the citizens of humanity from the greater world of space. As one traveled they could make allies with new races and do battle with evil ones through a clever top down ship fighting game. This game mode could also be engaged for skirmishes apart from the adventure game. 

3 - Warcraft

The game that put RTS (real time strategy) on the map. Warcraft allowed the user to construct a village in real time and raise an army to attack the opposing commander. Gold and lumber were harvested and those resources were than funneled into the commanders war funds. This game is the first in a long series of games that today have resulted in the insanely popular 'World of Warcraft'.

2 - Daggerfall

Daggerfall was pure ambition. This was the second game in a series that is called the Elder Scrolls series. Daggerfall was one of the first few games that had no instructions. It broke off from traditional ideas of linear gaming and allowed to user to to what ever he wanted. Be a good guy, be the bad guy if you wanted; Daggerfall was a MASSIVE 3d fantasy world that lived and breathed. You could roam the game as you wished, fighting monsters or saving the princess. The open ended nature of Daggerfalls concept were astounding for it's time. This game is an early in a series that has ended today in the critically acclaimed Skyrim.

1 - Counter Strike

Counter strike was a free modification to the engine originally created for the award winning game 'Half Life'. Counter Strike was a counter terrorist simulation where the Counter Terrorists had to prevent a bomb from being set by t he opposing team of terrorists in a window of about 3 minutes. This game was played online only and was noted for being brutally fast. A single bullet could take someone down and if you died in the game, you had to wait for the whole round to be finished to start again. While many keyboards and computer monitors can claim themselves as being victims of the early days of CS, that rubble of expensive equipment just goes to show that CS was the ultimate EDGE of online competitive gaming for it's time.