The History of FPS Games Vol 1 1974-1988

[mripetscan]

arctic fox which system?

[AereVoS]

Great video!!! Accurate and informative! Thanks mate!

[cadmus98]

Wow, someone knows about Cholo on the BBC Micro? I spent hours on that one as a kid.

[cacaroG]

christ, I remember playing "3D Monster Maze" when I was a kid, it scared me shitless every time..

[P5BDeluxeWiFi]

Star Wars 1983 (arcade/conversions) is missing?

[iLikeTheUDK]

Is it just me or the song from 7:39-9:13 is from Unreal Tournament 99 (a game released over a decade after the last one in this vid was)?

[TheAdam159]

THANKYOU for acknowledging that there were games with you running around a maze in first person, shooting things, long before Wolfenstein or Doom. Those ones just popularised it.

[N73B60]

@TheAdam159 Sorry, Doom and Wolfenstein not only popularized FPS, they pioneered in using the mouse for FPS games. They inaugurated the "fast shooting" sub-genre of FPS games, thanks to the use of mouse in conjunction with the keyboard.

I'm talking about "gameplay" here, not just graphics. If you play games like Counter-Strike and Quake, you will see the difference (strategic vs fast shooting).

[PeterRoeder31]

This is amazing. Great work!!

[Sentinal6]

really good series! i am just going to asume that all the research is correct haha byw the colony looked really fun.

[SAMBOUDYY]

yes but will it blend?

[STATiSofVITALETHICS]

is that music at the start from an old game? i could swear thats pantera -mouth for war

[Didac1111]

These are the best video series on Youtube. It goes further until vol. 40...

[1N73RC3P7OR]

They really seemed to love mazes back then :D

[dnzota]

7:44 unreal tournament tempest ftw!

[startrek1992]

I love retro games!

[Namekn]

Amazing compilation

[CincinnatusSPQR]

looks like you put alot of work into this putting it together, thanks. You can imagine the response back then " Wow! these graphics are fucking awesome!!!".

[TheKyshu]

For some reason, I have a feeling, I was born too late ;( Thanks for the great video and all the effort put into it! :)

[RODILLASEXPLOSIVAS]

Oh man this is awesome!! Thanks for all the work, the videos are great! There is no complete (1974 - present) video for download anywhere right? :(

[PirataGalactico]

hey! where's my 1986 Desert Fox for C64??? This is outrageous!!!

well, it was actually more a strategy war game... or not. it had it's fps parts. i don't know, i just like it very much haha. plus it has synthesised voices! and that was amazing at the time

i really like this videos, great memories, and discoveries!

PD: and dude... TEKWAR! YES! it was weird as hell, but fun to play...

strife was awesome. thanks!

[Whiskmos]

Great video, all the volumes are great.. but Phantasy Star isn´t a FPS game ... its a RPG.. the only part that you play with your first person cam is inside of the dungeons .... how i miss this game, played some many years!!!

[uratoko]

7:10 looks epic wow :O

[smilertoo]

where's Elite?

[corpusc]

you're missing Elite

[12NiBer12]

Amazing video. Good work uploader.

You know, you can feel a big jump somewhere in 1984 onward, the games from there onward improved a lot comparing to the standard of the games before the mentioned year.

[corpusc]

if its not smooth(ish) scrolling, its pretty much pre-rendered graphics pieces. all those cell based movement maze things could be done with monospaced textgraphics.

was a waste of time showing that stuff.

[wandererlain]

I've played a few of these awesome games but there's a lot I've never seen before. Very interesting!

[BdR76]

@2:50 wow! Wayout and Capture The Flag look pretty impressive for 1983 games..

[teorock91]

This video can be a respond to who insists that Wolfestein 3D be the first FPS game.

[naughtydawgP]

i feel sorry for those guys who had to play these games...but if it wasnt for them...we would not be wer we are today

[tnartey]

o my word that first song takes me BACK lol

[MelancholyxRequiem]

Music list please ...

[slissaur]

well... I wouldn't count flight simulators as FPSs but it's a nice list

[theplock99]

None of these are FPS games...

[STATiSofVITALETHICS]

@theplock99 alot of these are in first person perspective, and you shoot things..so yes some are FPS games

[TheAdam159]

@theplock99 It's seen from a first person perspective, and you shoot things. How are these not FPS's?

[ackar18]

Doom music then quake 3

[00Miedo]

This is what i was looking for, i had the idea to make videos of FPS History (i'm a grate fan of this genre), but now that you have it, i better watch it :D - subscribing -

[gamezonic]

phantom slayer gives me headaches

[parazituxxx]

Good game from 83 to play today



[durananrananrananran]

I am the only person that thinks Colony looks amazing for its time?

[Highretrogamelord89]

Very nice video!

Quite informative and fun to watch!

Can't wait to watch the other parts. :D

[troffa]

@9:27 hallo 0

[Didac1111]

Yo Balgorg, are you still alive? Every week I hope there will be a Vol. 30 of your beautiful history of fps-shooters-collection, but there never is one. I hope you're still there and that one day you'll come back with more of these unique videos. You're the best!

[Zottyo]

Most of them owns COD

[bachterman]

i loved cholo, but it's remake roxxord my boxxorz.

[LedWilde]

Pantera!

[steve5123456789]

They are Light gun games NOT FPS like House of the dead, Area 51, and Duke hunt on NES, come on get it right this is rubbish.

[blkpntr]

sadly "I, of the Mask" (1985, ZX Spectrum) is missing!

[steve5123456789]

3d monster maze is the first FPS the other ones before that ARE NOT fps, end of.

[metabog]

Good job picking the music.

[timrocket2]

omg i remember playing battlezone it rocked 00:50

[anyotheronee]

Maze games are to FPS what Jazz is to Rock'n Roll.

[MrTaylork1]

dungeon master's inventory scheme looks a lot like world of warcraft's =D

[hagelt18]

Wow, "The Colony" looks really clean and smooth for its time. Shame I've never played it yet.

[metabog]

@hagelt18 Yeah, The Colony looks really smooth, too bad they hadn't figured out texture mapping yet, could've been like Wolfenstein.

[RickTheStickman2]

What is the name of the song at 8:44 ?

[Puppy41H]

:D I like that the FPS History video starts with 2 Doom songs

[colorado4815162342]

I loved battlezone... I always thought it was windows...

[darkpumperrr]

The Colony have nice graphics.

[criceto]

battlezone was awesome

[Jaqshit]

some of the videos are way tooooo short

[orborborb]

I consider the first realtime 3d first person shooting game to be The Colony (the video doesn't show it but you DO shoot lots of enemies in realtime as you wander the rooms and corridors, in addition to solving puzzles). The games before were either flight/tank sims or maze/dungeon games. The Colony is the first game where you are a person going through recognizable human-scaled 3d rooms shooting enemies in realtime.

[AzzATheGodlike]

way out and capture the flag were amazing for 8-bit

[fraudcakes]

One you might want to add is Star Cruiser, released in 1988 for the PC-88 in Japan. Run a youtube search on 'star cruiser megadrive' and there's a good video of the 1990 Megadrive port. Star Cruiser is an interesting hybrid of FPS, RPG and space combat sim.  Sadly, it was never fully translated but you can give it a shot - it's emulated well on both MD and PC-88. The developer, Arsys, also made another game called 'Wibarm' in '86 which has 3D maze parts (and an automap!) mixed with a 2D ARPG.

[Jagged85]

@fraudcakes

Another interesting thing about Star Cruiser is that it was possibly the first 3D polygonal FPS ever released. Prior to its release in 1988, all FPS games were either 2D or vector, but Star Cruiser featured full 3D polygonal graphics nearly a decade before Quake. In addition, Star Cruiser was also possibly the first console FPS, since its Mega Drive port was released in 1990.

[kay9ine1]

@Jagged85 battlezone was 3d...

[Jagged85]

@kay9ine1

Battlezone was vector, which is technically 2D, or pseudo-3D. The kind of 3D I'm referring to is true polygonal 3D, which is the kind used today. Star Cruiser was the first FPS to use shaded polygonal 3D graphics.

[iLikeTheUDK]

@Jagged85 But Quake was the first to do the latter combined with texture mapping, an important milestone nonetheless.

[Jagged85]

@iLikeTheUDK

Actually, the first FPS game to feature texture-mapped 3D graphics was Sega's "Metal Head" in 1994. However, Metal Head was a mecha simulation game, so you could say Quake was the first on-foot FPS to feature texture-mapped 3D graphics.

[CodyRicheson]

Way Out is very impressive, seems to be the first game on this list to feature more or less real-time exploration rather than a bunch of images that give the impression of movement.

[LennyKillLadies]

Why wolfenstein is considered as the first fps if those games existed before ? Is it because you can see your gun on the screen ?

[jakeharvey]

The 3D Monster Maze death animation is awesome.

[zakopako82]

whoah!! the "capture the flag" game surprised me!! the first time i heard about this term was in unreal tournament!! and i remember thinking that it was a great idea lol

[expertnoobFTW]

MOST of these games aren't even fps and I read the description but the title even says fps not just games as in games in general and I dont even think the first fps wasn't made until 1992 when wolfenstein 3d came out

[natevines]

Is it me or does 'The Colony' (around 8:30) look REMARKABLY smooth for its age?

I'm impressed

[skateingMetalHead25]

so full of win

[vipjerry]

Man how could u forget 1984 ELITE...

[davidson2354]

the songs were taken from doom series right?

[mgabrysSF]

Xybots from Atari Games (arcade) : 1987

[blade004]

Another nice one was the game "Corporation" for the Amiga, but it was a bitch to control ;) And nice to hear the C64 music for Driller again!! the SID chip doing some of its finest work as well as Matt Gray of course :)

[blade004]

Nice to see someone with a "true" knowledge of gaming and for putting it all into proper perspective :) 

[Xipholaris]

What was the first game to use textured polygons?

[oskulock]

There is a game called "ESCAPE!" I think its older than Akalabeth. :D

[olynxmano]

Seems someone put the C64 stuff in, just to have some C64 in there ;)

Really. The Video just accelerates from game to game, and everytime a C64 title was put in, someone seems to put the gear to reverse ;)

C64 and 3D .... two different wolds that never met ;)

[Amaranthus616]

some of the games look pretty cool. colony and dark side look neat. maze war is a cool looking game too

[forsaken108]

Wow fps games were terrible last time xD

[EpicTrilogy]

Almost half of these maze crawlers, and quest games are R-P-G's... dumbass.

[urizen123]

@EpicTrilogy

If you had taken the time to read the video description, you would have known that the purpose of this series - this section in particular - is to trace the EVOLUTION of the FPS genre, rather than just to summarize the games that fit the modern definition of the term.

Hmm, and despite your declaration that the uploader is a "dumbass", who apparently doesn't know what he's talking about, [irony] it seems you still found his video entertaining enough to add to your favourites. :D

[EpicTrilogy]

@urizen123 lol, Is the maker of this video your lover? hahahaha, jeez.

YOU, are still wrong my good sir. no justifiable explaination needed.

[urizen123]

@EpicTrilogy

Congratulations, what you just said makes absolutely no sense whatsoever. All I'm doing is basically just paraphrasing what Balgorg wrote in the video description - right or wrong doesn't enter into it. Your logic is inherently flawed here, rendering the argument unwinnable by you. Try harder next time. Or don't, and go do something productive. :)

Obviously, you would've made this series differently. If you feel that way, why not go and make your own "definitive" version, then?

[EpicTrilogy]

@urizen123 hahahaha, I will disregard everything you said except for "Try harder next time. Or don't, and go do something productive".

... and this is your idea of productive!? you sit at the computer all day and defend other peoples video's??

stop crying and suck this guys dick already. jesus

[urizen123]

@EpicTrilogy

1. I like this video. To be honest, at this point I'm defending it because I'm curious to see whether you can actually produce a coherent and legitimate criticism against it, more than anything else. In the meantime, you're entertaining me.

2. Productive? Hell, I'm getting a chuckle out of you reciting from "The Generic Troll Responses Handbook", so yeah, I guess this is productive. For me, anyway. :)

[StephanieLoveful]

The funny shit is, even today, they could probably release The Colony. The game at 8:30. Just name it a cell-shaded FPS for houseplaners or something.

[ninotimecrisisfan]

dam so many classic . The old games are better than the present day games because you always get hours and days not to mention that the present games are easy and you get 3 hours playing but the classics are the best

[SpadajSpadaj]

Sorry, but I wouldn't call games where you must type in the commands "FPS".

[Amaranthus616]

@SpadajSpadaj if it makes them shoot then they are an fps....pressing a single button is still "typing" a command...just using one button. as keyboard keys are after all, buttons as well

but still, if, you can get it to shoot, its an fps...doesnt matter how you get it to shoot as long as it does

[Vector27X]

Excuse me, but Phantasy Star is an RPG not a FPS.

-_-

[Thoreandan]

@Balgorg Actually, Mercenary was an Atari 8-bit title. (Amazingly, it fit into 48K and wasn't disk interactive, a higher resolution version would load if you had more RAM)

[nicolunacba]

Great compilation and ... Quake 3 music yay!

[unkas9]

think what these worth today?

[maikkk]

Scarabaeus?

[JokerXCIV]

MAZE RULEZ! XD

[ZombieToaster]

Some of these look so ahead of their time. Especially the ones on atari are so much better looking than atari games in general.

[szyzyg]

One glaring ommision - Catch 23 on the ZX spectrum from 1987 - you were a soldier on foot walking around an island looking for a stolen plane. Most of the scenery was 3d vectors and enemy soldiers were sprites that would pop up, you'd have a few seconds to target and shoot them before they shot you.

[spites1]

wow watching this vid has made me really look at how much the actual progression of technology is compared to these dates. for instance there was an even larger leap in 2000-2010 in games compared to 1974-1984

good shit man

[ultrawaregamestudios]

04:40 lol. That music is from System Shock 1

[quangluu96]

OLD LOLZ

[zenthex1234]

fake and gay!

[Arcadeprehacked]

3D Monster Maze is supposed to be the first 3D game?

[zyriuz2]

lol music to darkside reminds me of doom 3 theme music ^^

[gullywoots]

The Colony looks like it's purposedly retro.

And I never understood the Doom Pantera ripoff played at the beginning of the vid.

Thanks for sharing those gems!

[Jcaldrone12]

Lmao Doom music right?

[alonalon777]

2:55 quake 3 arena

[MaxRideWizardLord]

awesome doom music!

[Captain6313]

i love the atari i wish i still had mine wait must find emulators

[zver711]

Man, Battle Zone, Tau Ceti and Driller. That takes me back. To last Saturday. When I played Tau Ceti. High five!

[Derek105Huey]

the maze games don't count cuz there not shooters. but good list though.

[Balgorg]

@Derek105Huey Have to disagree with that because were dealing here with the evolution of the fps. Dont get hung up too much on the definition of the term FPS becaue for many years they were called 3D Shooters, and Doom Clones.

[Derek105Huey]

@Balgorg i read the description and missed "influential games". Sorry, I was wrong.

[Balgorg]

@Derek105Huey Yeah some people believe that John Carmack & John Romero invented the FPS but as you can see it all started back with Maze War and Spasim. Maze war was a maze game in which you could shoot, & Spasim was a space simulator. Maze war gave rise to maze games (you could shoot in some of them) and 3D rpg's, spasim to space simulators; tank sims & mech games. A combination of all these influences led to the 3D Shooter, later (about the time Doom arrived) to be called the FPS.

[gshauger]

@Balgorg They did invent the modern FPS. Comical that you think otherwise!!!

[DVman700]

@Balgorg where cani find some of these games online?

[Drakosgames]

Thanks for posting these videos on FPS's man. I love waiting to see which one I wanna try next :P

[Balgorg]

@Drakosgames Great, thats the idea, its a real chore trudging through the games I dont like. There are many I haven't played, so I can't wait to move on to the next volume.

[elSaher27]

great work Balgorg! I have a question for you: can you tell me, what is the title of one game, one of the levels in this game was in big well,with the downward spiral coming down the pavement, so if you flew down you could be a jump to a lower level of this big well

do you (or anybody) know what is it?

[Balgorg]

@elSaher27 This game is a FPS ? and do you know the year it was from (approximately).

[elSaher27]

@Balgorg yes yes, it was fps, i didn't wrote it. I don't know exactly year, but it was maybe 94-98,graphically similar to duke, maybe quake I or II (i don't remember are there were a bitmaps enemies or not)

[Balgorg]

@elSaher27 Still cant find this game, can you remember anything else about it ? Like the type of guns, were they real-world or futuristic ? were the enemy's monsters or were they human ? Was there any humour in the game, or was it kinda serious ?

[elSaher27]

@Balgorg i played this game when i was a kid. some guys told me that it looks like hexen or heretic, maybe this is sw dark forces ii,because the well was big.

I will looking for speedruns of this games. Ok thank you anyway, your list is great help for searching

[BecuzIt]

you're a legend you know that

[Balgorg]

Hate is good

[alcyon2sp]

articfox was wayyy ahead of its time, i used to really love it, it simply blew me away!!

[Balgorg]

What version did you play (Amiga ?).

[alcyon2sp]

@Balgorg no, i used to have a Apple 2 from 84.

[Balgorg]

I didn't know it was on the Apple 2.

[alcyon2sp]

@Balgorg oh yes it was, the computer itself was called CUBIC 99. it was my cousins from the 80's. he gave it to me in 1992, i played that thing till the monitor spoilt, but couldnt be fixed anymore. my favorite was arctic fox.

[z0nt21]

I'll be watching a few of the volumes, thanks. :)

P.S. Great Arma II vids.

[Popsiclethehippie]

around the end was some good old fasioned ut music

[Loletam]

Beginnings weren't easy.... I remember the very first version of this video ^^

[Balgorg]

Thanx to your help sorting a few things out ;-)

[zobidizumba]

This series are some of the best videos I've seen on YouTube. Informative and entertaining at the same time. Involves great effort. Very well done. Thank you so much :D

[silverbullet521]

this music makes me feel like if Children of Bodom was in a snes game

[Balgorg]

lol

[nbdi]

no, children of bofom aren't as angry as game dev programmers

[blacklily8]

Wow! Fantastic work, Balgorg.

[Balgorg]

;-)

[Zeratulmit]

Excellent job

[Balgorg]

Thnx

[asd616]

1:20 holy shit xD

[magic666z]

way out looks like a breakthrough

[magic666z]

2:58

quake 3 soundtrack :)

[HardWarUK]

Excellent - but no Ballblazer.....! :) Still, 5/5! Must have taken ages!

[Balgorg]

Ballblazer ? Have to look that one up. Omg....maybe i'll have to start over again !!!!

[0000Paveway0000]

hey nice FPS history thing you are doing balgorg. can u please tell me the names of all the tunes you have going on in the videos?

[Balgorg]

in this one I used the some tune's from the Doom soundtrack, some from Quake III, one i think from System Shock, one from Unreal Tournament. The remainder were from the games featured.

[vanea010]

fps=fucks per second

[explosionguy]

7:45 unreal tournament baby!!!

[NaCCuRiT]

yeah unforgetable sound haha

[kproer]

What the..! Pantera riff in the intro??

[Balgorg]

where too ???

[kohan69]

So "The Colony" was the first FPS with to have indoor corridors and seamless live gameplay? (like 'doom', not turn based like bards tale)

[Balgorg]

I am no expert on the gfx rendering, bu the Eidolon was a tunnel based FPS, but the enemy didnt move around. So not exactly 'live' then. Cholo has indoor and outdoor environments, but the fighting is outside (I think). You might therefore be right. At the moment im just trying to get all the games in the correct order, understanding them will come later. Hopefully these vids will help ;-)

[Loletam]

Corridors of Genon should be 1983.

BTW which game was first: Spasim or Maze War?

Wasn't it Maze War?

[Balgorg]

Wot, nooooo, missed that one !!

Im not sure about the order mazewar-spasim?

[Loletam]

Of Course, Phantasy Star should be 1987-88 I guess

[Balgorg]

I could only find the EU version, but it was released in 1987 in Japan, or so I have read someplace.

Thanks for the heads up on the Colony.

[Loletam]

Ye, but in the video it says '1987-1998' ^^

[Balgorg]

Will add the banner on Arctic Fox on the next release, and hopefully get a version of Midimaze working ;-) also still cant get Phantasm 1988 amiga game to work ;-(