Games for a first time (period) game player?

I'm not actually in this situation, but I'm curious as to what others think.

Dwarf Fortress

Angry Birds. Minesweeper. Tetris. That sort of thing.

Superman 64

edited 9th Aug '11 12:04:34 AM by Sabbo

2D games:

Pokemon (introduces them to basic rpg elements)

Ace Attorney (introduces them to moonlogic in games + has a nice linear story which won't make them too lost)

Angry Birds (it's cheap and actually kinda challenging for a casual game..introduces them to basic challenge I guess)

Little Big Planet/Easyish 2d mario game (to introduce them to basic platforming)

3D games:

Mario Kart, it's an easy to follow racing game with enough imbalanced items to make people win no matter how bad they are. It isn't fair but it's a fun way to start.

tbh I can't think of any other 3D games. I want to say Portal but a frustrating experience with getting my sis to play has taught me that non gamers will utterly struggle with a first person game and getting their head around the concept of portals (she couldn't even get past the second level and the first level was just a fluke)

edited 9th Aug '11 12:14:39 AM by ShadowScythe

Less than you'd think. Having just been playing it with some friends, placing isn't nearly as random as the internet likes to act like is. It can, be quite fun and spectacle filled, but it can also be rather frustrating. A good choice for someone that doesn't mind placing poorly, but not for someone that isn't sure about this whole videogame thing

x4. Idk about you but I didn't figure out how Minesweeper worked until high school, when I'd been gaming for 10 years or so.

Wow...

I'd go for one of the Super Mario platformers (2D or 3D...even Sunshine) as they are fun and simple to play. Besides, the first game introduced several to gaming in 1985.

edited 9th Aug '11 2:13:47 AM by JustaUsername

I never really figured out Minesweeper. I kind of understand it, but the massive failure, that I experience every time I try it, tells me that I still don't really know how it works.

Minesweeper hold a special place in my heart for being the first game I exploited. Big grid with <10 mines and one click will win the game in 1 second.

Really, games fall into lots of different categories that apply to different interests in different poeple. It's like asking what kind of movie someone who has never seen movies before should watch. Gotta know what their other interests are, first.

Kirby would probably be a good way to introduce yourself to Platform Games.

LA Noire isn't a bad place to start, particularly if they're the intelligent sort and like puzzles/investigations. Heck if they ever get stuck they can even skip the action scenes, and the game will start to dumb down the AI for them!

Ocarina Of Time. Or Super Mario Galaxy. Why not start with the best? . First-party Nintendo games are always great ways to introduce new players because they have very gentle learning curves and hit you over the head with how the controls work.

edited 9th Aug '11 7:48:55 AM by MrShine

A Wii would be a pretty good starting console, even if all the non-gamers who bought it didn't know it, because of the VC.

I would pick a game with the simplest controls that requires the least "video game knowledge" to play.

As much as I hate them, I'd probably show someone an FPS because it's intuitive. Press R to shoot, move with this, aim with that.

Perhaps it's just my bias against FP Ses, but I would think they would be the least enjoyable genre to play if you aren't good at video games. They don't really tend to reward just blundering around learning the controls, and the communities suffer newbies poorly. Also the "Great, i just died to an enemy I never saw" factor is incredibly frustrating.

edited 9th Aug '11 8:13:48 AM by MrShine

Mario Party might be a pretty good one. Minigames of all varieties and more importantly, it requires there to be other players around for hand holding and quick learning.

There have been two games I've gotten my mother to like: Tetris and Portal.

My mother got into video games with Lego Indiana Jones, the DS Zelda games, and Dragon Quest IX. She is now more of a gamer than I am.

I'll agree that you should start them off on a game with the least amount of buttons. and Wii has a vast amount of options for that.

For portable games, start them off with either a GBA, or a DS.

Ninja Gaiden 2............

Nah just kidding, My first few were "Pokemon" and "Jak and Daxter", so i'd recommend those.

Pong.

Also, I'll have to add myself to the list of people who didn't "get" Minesweeper until years later.

Actually games like Halo and Call of Duty are pretty damn newb-friendly, as long as it's on the lowest difficulty and they avoid the online multiplayer. Enemies at the lowest difficulty can't shoot for squat and spawn less often, you have quite a bit of health, every ammo drop pretty much refills all of your ammo, and sometimes your allies may even be able to clear out a whole area on their own.

I would advise against anything requiring two control sticks to play, which of course covers most FPSs. In fact, I'd even advise against anything where you can directly control the camera angle, if purely due to the unintuitiveness of reverse controls (push up to look down, etc.)

How about a Sonic game?

1 or 2. NOT the third one becasue... well, THAT. GODDAMN. BARREL.

You can reverse those controls, you know. Almost every FPS these days allows to set up what you like at the very beginning often by doing a "head bobbing" test.