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[Chef Boyardee]

games that simulate mental illness and obsessive compulsive disorder by abstracting all variables into visible, manipulable numbers

OR!

RPGs - games with emphasis on strategy in combat, character customization and development, exploration, choice and consequence. Storytelling takes a backseat, I care a lot more about interesting and deep mechanics, getting lost in bOnKeRs worlds and the ability to make my own choices whenever I want. I don't like to be railroaded through games! I prefer turn-based combat over action, but games like Gothic and Dark Souls have great combat too.

I like RPGs that experiment with mechanics and I've only played one or two that brought absolutely nothing new or good to the table. They're all worth exploring if you're interested in design and seeing what they're capable of and what they've already done. I especially like Akitoshi Kawazu for his ability to consistently reinvent the RPG. Even when his games don't turn out so great, they always have a ton of new, interesting ideas. If you want to make RPGs, you could learn a lot from this guy!!

[C.A. Sinner]

yup

[Alevice]

@FrankieSmileShow

Have you tried Zeus? Its by Impression Games, the same dudes behind Pharaoh. I personally loved it much more than both Pharaoh and Caesar. I think its on gog.com

And yes, Star Control 2 is one of the best pseudo 4x, exploration and shooter arcade hybrids I have played.

[Graham.]

I love every genre that I can recognize as one.

I love games that give me a very clear sense of progress. I don't care how I progress, I just want to do it. RPGs mark transitions with leveling and plot; fighting games with skill (over opponents); strategy... with skill (over opponents); platformers with the ease that I can express my skill, even in a single level.

I want to start small, then grow, and grow, and end up somewhere definitively beyond where I started. I want the game to show me that progression, even if its just by searing it into my brain, making me remember on my own.

Movies always "end up" somewhere. Same thing with books, other linears. But they don't reflect where you went. They can signal it, but its up to you to interpret that. Games have always been in my head - the reason I put them on a pedestal - as things through the playing of that I became different than what I was when I started. Provable growth. I love it.

Most of the time I don't like a game is because I don't understand how to progress steadily, or stay aware of my progression, or stay interested in my progression (etc).

[Lynx]

Space exploration!  It's a genre that hardly gets touched.  You have lots of space 4Xs, space action, space war, but very little in the way of "You're captaining your own starship out in the deep black, you come across strange stuff and you have to figure out how to deal with it".

Star Control 2 had a lot of that space exploration vibe, and Homeworld also rang that exploration bell in that you weren't just hacking your way across a map but you were also going into forgotten corners of the galaxy, parts that were populated with mysteries and dangers.

Alien Legacy did the best take on the theme from the point of view of a 4X.  You were in charge of a generation ship that was supposed to bring colonists to a system that had been opened up by a prior probe, but when you got there, there was no sign of the first expedition...  So you needed to build up your colony while sparing resources to figure out what happened to them.

Star Fleet Command never really succeeded at making me feel like I was exploring, unfortunately.

Besides that, I generally like story-heavy RPGs that aren't just more cliche fantasy, i.e. Knights of the Old Republic, Planescape Torment, and Baldur's Gate II and Mass Effect, and stealth games like Deus Ex and Thief where you're being smart, not just tough and heavily armed-- preferably with the options not to kill anyone.  You've got a mission but you aren't a murderer.

[Graham.]

I fucking love space.

Never enough, never enough.

[J-Snake]

games that simulate mental illness and obsessive compulsive disorder by abstracting all variables into visible, manipulable numbers

Or music being your enemy as an additional concept

[Optrirominiluikus]

I love flight sims, car sims & racing games, 4X games, and fighting games. But I can't play them because I usually don't have the patience. So it's more of a theoretical love, I guess.
If you don't want to read lots of whinign, skip to the final paragraph.

There's this old flight sim called Flying Corps, and the box is just wonderful. It's got maps, manuals, a flight manual from the 1910's (either a facsimile or a very elaborate emulation of one) and it's one of the games I always show to people who show interest in my games collection.
But that's just for the nerdiness of it all, I guess. I haven't even played the game, partly because it's too old (late 90's) and partly because I can't actually be arsed to do so. It's just too much to take in, and too much hassle to get it going on Win7.

I'm also madly in love with car sims, but again, it's a genre I can't find the time or patience for. I'm not even interested in cars, with few exceptions (I like 1980's pickup trucks and vans – Dodge Ram and Chevy Silverado, mostly) and I can't for the life of me figure out why I've bought so many car sims and racing games. I played Burnout 3 for 12 hours straight once, and I've probably logged 20+ hours in Flatout 2 for the Xbox, but all the rest... they just sit on my shelf or in my Steam list, and I never play them.

4X games. Again, it's time and patience.

Fighting games, on the other hand, is a genre I have spent lots and lots of time exploring. When Street Fighter II was released for the Super Famicom in Japan, I imported a copy (I live in Sweden, on the ass end of gaming space) and since I had no idea what NTSC or PAL was, I couldn't understand why the game didn't work on my TV. I had audio, but no video.
I eventually tired, and sold it. It was a beautiful yellow box, and it had cost me a fortune. I must have been 12 at the time, so I didn't think much about how my 32 year old self would have loved to have that original vintage shit standing in his bookshelf.
Anyways, Mortal Kombat and Street Fighter II made their way to PAL territory a year or so later, and I was hooked. Sure, SFII was slower than its NTSC counterpart (damn you and your shitty PAL conversions – anyone who's played PAL Sonic the Hedgehog knows exactly what I'm talking about) but it was still the best thing since sliced bread.
Ironically, when the Dreamcast and its library of the best of the best came out, I was oblivious. I think at that time, girls and music were more important to me. When I finally bought a DC, I immediately got Soulcalibur, and didn't play much else for a while.
Street Fighter III 3rd Strike, Mark of the Wolves, Virtua Fighter 3... Man, I had lots to do then. And the PS2 with Virtua fighter 4, Soulcalibur 2 and 3, Tekken 5, Street Fighter compilations of various sorts. Great stuff.
But I lost it all. Had no one to play against, and gave it up. Still bought Street Fighter 4 and Virtua Fighter 5 for the 360, but hardly touched 'em.

Shit, I can go on forever, it seems. If you read my whining this far, thanks.

That said, I mostly play (J)RPG's and FPS games right now. Wasteland, Ultima series, the old Squaresoft SNES classics that never made it to European shores, Skyrim, Deus Ex Human Revolution, Battlefield Bad Company 2, etc.
I love metroidvanias and platformers. The La-Mulana remake is great. Cave Story is on my top five. Some puzzle games and adventure games sometimes. Loved the point n'click days. Played every Lucasarts classic. Still buy every good PnC game, the latest being Resonance.
And IF games. Currently trying to write my own.

[.]

i don't care as long as the game has nice aesthetics

megaEDIT: like REALLY nice aesthetics

[Molten_]

Platformers, and not just because I'm an amateur indie dev. I grew up playing Super Mario 64 and Super Mario World, so platformers resonate deeply with me. It's a shame a good platformer is really hard to come by nowadays.

I also really like ... oh man, I don't know what to call them. "Zelda-likes"? I mean, I know the term for a Zelda game is an action-rpg, but I'm a huge fan of games that borrow from the Zelda ... like Okami for example. Those kinds of games really interest me for some reason.

[eyeliner]

I don't have a specific genre I like, but I ALWAYS buy Ridge Racer games for the systems I own, and Civilization games make me drool for them like a savage mongrel that made me buy Civ Chronicles despite having Civ II and III. Can't understand why, though.

I also have an unrelenting love for Descent and X. And I can only play the first Command and Conquer despite owning the First Decade and C&C 3 on Eggs Box.

[Schoq]

Platformers of most types (except ones where literally all you can do is run and jump).

First person shooters that don't descend from Counter Strike (real guns are boring, being unable to both jump and aim predictably is boring, not regularly gibbing things is boring).


Both feel like natural ways to have an avatar do stuff in a virtual world I guess. And allow for mad fun with other people.

[Erinock]

1. Action Adventure Role Playing games
2. Atmospheric games
3. Sometimes FPS's
4. Mainly Roll Playing Games in general

I like Action Adventure RPG's, not specifically open world like Skyrim but games where your able to just roam, find places that are visually rewarding and just see a whole different world before your eyes. Also I don't know if Mass Effect really fits this classification but its also one of my favourite genre's.

I love atmospheric games which make you feel emotion, attachment to characters and peace.

Sometimes I like an FPS's, but ultimately their mindless products pushed out to make big bucks. And I hate that.

If its an big RPG im usually there, I want to think on, ponder, digest and consume the story line. Develop, create and customize my character and actually come out of it with something.
Unlike games like call of duty, linear storylines for the average simple-minded consumer.

[tha_Chiller]

I'm a diehard sRPG fan - Tactics Ogre series, Final Fantasy Tactics series, Front Mission 3, Advance Wars series, Disgaea, Fire Emblem series, Dragon Force, Onimusha Tactics, Romance of The Three Kingdoms. Missing some but yeh I'm waiting for the true XCom reboot by Firaxis.

[baconman]

I tend to like games you can play in shorter or longer spurts that feel nice and complete; and generally require manual dexterity and some degree of precision/rhythm to play well.

Fighters

This is about as straightforward as you can get, especially on a head-to-head competitive level. The nonparallelism between characters *usually* has fun and interesting results, and if you're ever bored you can just change characters and playstyles. It's also pretty astounding to see what they can do with this genre - from UMC3's Heroes and Heralds to SFA3's World Tour or BlazBlue CS's Legion mode.

Fighters didn't get me started on gaming, but they got me started on developing!

Music Games

Again, this is COMPLETELY BY DEFINITION about dexterity and accuracy. There's also pattern recognition that translates directly into music theory knowledge, and it's a great way of giving yourself apprecation for musical depth/complexity (or in some cases, divine simplicity).

Usually, musical games are the ones I'm most physically interactive with as well, often playing on dance pads, guitars, drum controllers, etc. It's a refreshing departure away from "controlling" the character and into BEING the character. The character on the screen didn't raise their skill level and 4-star Painkiller - YOU DID.

Platformers

Here's the start, here's the end, there's a few different ways you can go to get there, and some nifty secret stuff along the way. GO!!

Probably the best - or in many cases worst - example of elegant simplicity, depending on the level design (or generation algorhythm thereof - I'm looking at you, Spunky). There's always a degree of anticipation, in many cases a combination of fast pacing and precision, elements of risk and reward... and they're usually very pick-up-and-play.

Adventure

Yes, a lot of this comes down to the exploration factor. There's just something about a nice, open world to tear apart and find lots of nifty little secrets and shortcuts in. Be it Zeldalikes or Metroidvanias, finding stuff by poking around is just never going to get old, especially when combined with some of the other concepts discussed in this post.

Challenging Games

IWBTG and it's sequel take it to hilariously outrageous extremes, but a game that's hard to win just gives this sense of tremendous accomplishment that you don't really get from other titles. And clearing virtual adversity is both more comfortable and more fun than defeating ACTUAL adversity, although the latter is tangibly more rewarding. But face it - what kind of fool goes around looking for REAL adversity in the name of "fun" anyhow?

Oh yeah. Indie developers like us...

Strategy games?

Strategy games are kind of a mixed bag with me, but it is partly due to my personal perspective of what a "strategy game" is. I would acquaint Marvel vs. Capcom 2/3 or The Binding of Issac/Sushi Castle with being RTS, and I would acquaint Roguelikes/Mystery Dungeon games with being TBS. But then, these games are strategic in the purest sense, but games in the context of other "genrefications."

I still stand by the argument that Roguelikes are more TBS than adventure/WRPG, though. At least, they will be if you're ever gonna win one!

Then you have "raw strategy games." I've played a number of them, but they just fail to resonate with me - and considering I was a Chess Club captain here in 4th Grade; that's kinda saying something. Could just be a matter of taste too, but it feels to me like most "raw strategy games" get the strategy part down, and forget there's a "game" part to it. Don't know how to better describe that...

Advance Wars is probably the funnest "raw" strategy game I've played. And that actually DID win me over.

Shmups and Danmaku

Again, a very simple and straightforward concept. Is it limiting in concept? Sure is. Has it stopped being fun yet? Sure hasn't.

This has a lot in common with the platformers above, like the definitive structures (although hiding secrets takes a bit of... finesse?), the anticipation and precision. Although few of them are actually fast-paced... they're ironically very slow-paced and methodical most of the time - and for the precision it takes to avoid most attacks, especially in the Danmaku, it works.

To be totally honest, I kinda have a love-hate thing going on here.

I LOVE PLAYING THESE. I'm certain I always will, Galaga alone will see to that. (Mmmmmmm Danmaku Galaga... and yes, I own Legions DX!) The mathmatical/designer part of me loves the Danmaku, too. However, the designer part of me hates how hard it seems trying to create one, or making it interesting. And how hard it is finding or making good, consistently designed sprites to do so.

Driving games

Not to be confused with lap-oriented racing games, I always liked the more freeform style of driving games. Stuff like Spy Hunter, APB, Crazy Taxi, and Need For Speed games. Ones where there's more going on that just vehicular combat or pulling laps. This is the part of GTA I find fun and exciting - hop in a police cruiser and become a vigilante. Hop in a cab and become a cabby. Hop in an ambulance and go rescue people.

Even starting-line-to-finish racing games have always been more appealing to me than lap-based racers. Dunno why.

PGC games

Now, you can also attribute good level design to this, but I love the kind of game you can play tons of times over, and sometimes with DRASTICALLY different outcomes. It's not always a matter of randomizing everything, but knowing what you can randomize (or free up, like level orders) to freshen up the experience.

HOWEVER, with maybe the exception of Terraria/Minecraft, and maybe Malevolence (since it's ever-expansive), I think using persistence with PGC is kinda wasteful of the whole PGC gaming concept. Heck, I would practically PREFER a Terraria-style game that's meant to be one-shot in 40-60 minutes and not saved. AT ALL. (I *could* see how Rogue-style saving might work, but if a game takes an hour tops to lick, what are you really losing? Good runs will happen.)

Maybe I'm just weird or something...