(Saw this question asked on another popular link aggregation website and it got me thinking)
If you could play one game for the first time all over again, what would you choose? This might be because you want to do it all again, or because you don’t think you got enough out of it the first time. It could be experiencing the game exactly as you were back then, or experiencing a game with what you know now.
For me, it’s Legend of Zelda: A Link To The Past, experienced exactly as I was back in 1991.
Nothing comes close to how jaw-droppingly amazed I was by that opening sequence. The epic orchestral score, the cinematic rainstorm, creeping around in the dark… it was a generational leap above anything I’d played on 8-bit computers and consoles, and even the Megadrive. I’d love to play it again without thirty plus years of Nintendo/Zelda knowledge, or without knowing about the dark world.
I just finished Dishonored 2 for the first time. I played it like 6 years ago, got to the second-last mission, and realized that even though I’d been playing ultra stealthy and non-violent, somehow someone I knocked out had died in an earlier mission, so I wasn’t going to get the stealth achievements so I shelved it.
This time, I’d forgotten enough so I started from the beginning again, remembered to keep checking the stats page to ensure I was fully stealthy, fully non-violent, and got to the end with the achievements.
The funny thing is that the game gives you so many ways to play – lots of gun upgrades, lots of ways of disposing of bodies, lots of health boosts and strength boosts. But, I play my way, and so both runs I did ultra stealthy, no killing. I’ve played almost the entire game twice, and have no idea what most of the powers are like because they’re oriented around combat / killing, not stealth.