Hi, folks…
I’ll have the last article in the series on Maxis Software for you next week. Today, I’m happy to say that the new ebook, covering the historical year 1999, is available, and on a far more timely basis than the last one at that. My thanks go to Richard Lindner, for developing the scripts that produce it, and to my hiking buddy Stefaan Rillaert, for modernizing them slightly and adapting them to run on Linux instead of Windows.
As always when we finish out another year of history, here’s a sneak preview for you of what I have planned for the coming year.
- Maxis in the 1990s and The Sims. We’re up to eyebrows in this already, so I assume that no further explanation is required.
- Driving sims, a hugely neglected topic around these parts. I can’t hope to remedy that neglect entirely, but I can tell you about how these lifestyle-adjacent games came to be, and tell you about the one driving game that I ever got seriously into. (Hint: it involves Porsches.)
- The somewhat anticlimactic later days of the Lemmings franchise, which did at least conclude with one last really good game.
- Deus Ex.
- Diablo II.
- Icewind Dale and Baldur’s Gate II.
- The Russians are coming! Most notably for our purposes, with Evil Islands, an idiosyncratic but engaging take on the CRPG.
- Impressions Games and their historical city-builders.
- Her Interactive. I’ve been promising something about the folks who found fame and fortune — on a modest scale, that is — through the unlikely vehicle of interactive Nancy Drew for years now. I’m finally going to do it this year. No, really, I am!
- The ongoing struggle for relevance of the adventure genre in general: Discworld Noir; In Cold Blood; Stupid Invaders; Escape from Monkey Island; RealMyst; Fairy Tale About Father Frost, Ivan, and Nastya. (Try saying that last one three times fast…) Not an overly heartening list, but needs must.
- The Longest Journey, because this adventure game does deserve its own bullet point.
- No One Lives Forever, a groovy, desperately needed breath of lightness and whimsy for the gamer-dark, testosterone-overloaded FPS genre (even if it does totally rip off the Austin Powers aesthetic).
- The uncanny popularity in Germany and parts of the rest of Europe of Aufbaustrategie games, as exemplified by the Settlers series and especially Anno 1602, the best-selling German game of all time at the turn of the millennium.
- Technomage: Return of Eternity. I stumbled across this obscure curiosity of a console-style action-adventure from Sunflower Interactive, the studio responsible for Anno 1602, when I was doing some preliminary research on the latter game. I found myself weirdly charmed, not least by a script which has never heard of the concept of irony. So, here we are.
- On the digital-culture front, I’m toying with the idea of an article on Napster and the disruption it caused, if I can squeeze it in.
Looking back over my last list, I see that I managed to do a reasonably good job of keeping my promises for a change. One exception is Discworld Noir, which gets pushed into the adventure article above. Another is The Longest Journey, which didn’t reach markets beyond Norway until 2000 or later, so it fits fine here instead. As far as Metal Gear Solid goes… I tried, folks. I really did. But I found it impossible to take seriously in any sort of way. If I wrote about it, I’d just spend all my time making fun of it, and that would just make those of you who enjoy this Japanese console aesthetic hate me even more. I’m sorry, Solid Snake fans. It’s not you, it’s me.
As usual, last-minute suggestions for year 2000 and pitches for things you’d like to see in future years are welcome. I can’t promise to act on all of them, but I will take them all under advisement, within the boundaries of scheduling, personal interest, expertise, and how non-boring I feel I can make any such articles.
If you’ve been enjoying my writing and like what you see above, please do thinking about becoming a Patreon patron if you haven’t already. You have free rein to choose any pledge level you’re comfortable with, from as little as $1 per article (which works out to $2 per month).
Speaking of which: it looks like I am going to be forced to switch over from per-article to monthly billing within the next months, thanks to a policy change at Patreon. I hope — and think that I have good reason to believe — that this will be a distinction without a difference, as I’ve been publishing two articles per month religiously for quite some years now. So, your new monthly rate will be either double your current per-article pledge or your monthly spending cap, whichever is smaller. If I ever can’t give you two article in a month under the new regime because real life gets in the way in some sense, I still have the option of pausing billing completely for a month. I will certainly never allow you to be charged for content which I cannot deliver.
But I’ll be talking with you patrons some more soon on this somewhat annoying topic. In the meantime, thank you for your support, in whatever way you provide it. I wish you all a great rest of the summer. Stay real, stay safe, stay outside as much as possible, and (particularly if you’re here in Europe) stay cool! See you next week with a monster of an article on The Sims…
Did you enjoy this article? If so, please think about pitching in to help me make many more like it. You can pledge any amount you like.
Jaina
July 31, 2026 at 4:29 pm
Iceland Dale? Sounds like a experimental Nordic walking simulator. Curious about this unheraleded lost treasure.
(I know it’s an autocorrect for Icewind)
Jimmy Maher
July 31, 2026 at 6:14 pm
Woops! Thanks. Not an autocorrect — I don’t use it — just muscle memory in the old fingers.
WargamingScribe
July 31, 2026 at 4:29 pm
The beginnings of mobile gaming might be a good topic, but I reckon you would derive almost no pleasure writing about it. It’s a difficult topic that is at the intersection of several technologies and “company history”.
Knurek
July 31, 2026 at 4:37 pm
The issue with covering early days of mobile gaming is that there hasn’t been a concerned effort for preservation for those platforms (barring the Japanese exclusive Java games) so most (if not all) of those games are truly gone.
The Wargaming Scribe
July 31, 2026 at 4:52 pm
As of 2 years ago, Gameloft had kept in its archives all its mobile Java games – and the emulators to run them. I know it because I use it when I worked there maybe a decade ago and have kept tabs.
Unfortunately, you are right in that it is not available to the general public.
tacitgreg
July 31, 2026 at 4:50 pm
Some random titles: “Perfect Dark”, “Shogun”, “Red Alert”
Ben R
July 31, 2026 at 6:38 pm
Gotta second Shogun, as well. It’s a good start to a big franchise!
killias2
July 31, 2026 at 10:07 pm
Another vote here for Shogun
Joe
July 31, 2026 at 4:55 pm
Have you thought of covering American Mcgee’s Alice?
Jimmy Maher
July 31, 2026 at 6:19 pm
It is interesting to me in a somewhat ironic way, as an artifact of the second era of game designers as would-be rock stars. I want to do an article on the rise and rather spectacular fall of Ion Storm, but probably next year, when I write about Anachronox. American McGee, Gathering of Developers, etc., were all part of that same too-cool-for-school scene. I think maybe I could work them all in there.
Sarah Walker
July 31, 2026 at 4:58 pm
Article on the early emulation scene maybe? The triple controversies of Virtual Game Station, Bleem! and UltraHLE were technically 1999, but not impossible to go back…
hatlock
July 31, 2026 at 5:23 pm
I like this idea as well.
Jimmy Maher
July 31, 2026 at 6:21 pm
As it happened, I started to write exactly that article at one point. I can’t quite remember why I dropped it. But it’s still a fine idea.
Aerothorn
July 31, 2026 at 5:08 pm
As usual, I think you’ve hit all the important beats (sorry to hear you couldn’t get on with MGS – it’s definitely an acquired taste, in the first game is in some ways the least interesting, but as a series it’s one of the most interesting to study!)
The only strong recommendation I have is Crimson Skies, which I think is right up your alley: this is one part flight sim, one part Interstate ’76 (in its customization system and arcadey gameplay), and a big part 1930s radio dramas. It has a few rough missions but is overally a really good time, and also a path not taken (it exists somewhere between traditional flights sims and pure-arcade games, and I haven’t seen any other game really tackle this territory outside of space sims).
Some other ones of note:
*Allegiance, an insanely ambitious Microsoft MMO space sim (???) that still has a small playerbase to this day.
* Vampire: The Masquerade – Redemption, which is an interesting attempt to have both a single-player RPG and a GMed multiplayer RPG, though not one that entirely works (and is released in a bad state).
*Sacrifice, an ambitious and strange 3rd-person action/RTS combo from Shiny.
*Shogun: Total War, which I think was often seen as one of the best Total War games – may be a good point of consideration for the series.
While there are some other games that are a good time (Mechwarrior 4, MDK2, Starlancer, Giants; Citizen Kabuto, Tachyon: The Fringe) they are probably less notable in terms of a full article.
Jimmy Maher
July 31, 2026 at 6:35 pm
Crimson Skies does look cool! I’d assumed it was just Wing Commander with 1930s airplanes, which it is, but it also looks much smarter and more sophisticated in its fiction and aesthetics.
I think I can mention this Vampire game and the many other Diablo-likes in the run-up to Diablo II. The really interesting Vampire game is the one by Troika.
I’d thought to hold off on Total War until Medieval, as I understand that to be a little more refined, in a setting I’m more comfortable with.
I did try Sacrifice when it was new and was completely baffled. I suspect my reaction would be pretty much the same today. You probably have to be far more of an RTS aficionado than I am to appreciate what it’s doing with the genre.
hatlock
July 31, 2026 at 5:19 pm
Some other titles that are likely worth mentioning from 2000:
-Giants: Citizen Kabuto – I’m personally curious and a fan of any game that has game mechanics that introduce unique perspectives of a game world or have characters interact with it in different ways. The earliest games like this I can think of are Castelvania III and Super Mario Bros. 2. It also has RTS controls so it fits in my third point below.
-I’d re-iterate Red Alert 2.
-Maybe you could generally explore the RTS games of 2000 and also include Sacrifice, which incorporates RTS gameplay centering around a player controlled avater like granddaddy of the genre Herzog Zwei. It also includes some serious voice actors and has a demented cartoon look and feel.
Chris Foster
July 31, 2026 at 5:56 pm
Impressions! I worked there from ’92-’97 as my first industry job straight out of college.
Can’t wait to read your history and analysis of the studio!
Jimmy Maher
July 31, 2026 at 6:36 pm
Cool! Can we talk sometime?
Marcel
July 31, 2026 at 6:10 pm
I did not expect Evil Islands to be covered by you. This game has a special place in my heart – it was one of the first games that the young me managed to finish on my first own PC. Although, if memory serves me correctly, I was using cheats all the way, because that game was really difficult for me, from the very beginning. I don’t remember that much about the characters and story, but the atmosphere was great. And the cutscenes looked beautiful. I’m very nostalgic about this game, I have great memories playing it on long autumn and winter evenings, very much looking forward to that article.
Jimmy Maher
July 31, 2026 at 6:41 pm
Yeah, the problem with the game is that it’s just absurdly difficult. The developers patched in an Easy mode after so many people complained about it, and even that is pretty darn hard. There’s a joke here somewhere. “In (post-)Soviet Russia, monsters grind YOU.”
Throteka
July 31, 2026 at 6:44 pm
1999 is also the beginning of the Flash gaming era. A new tool has revolutionized game creation and distribution, ushering in a new field of intense creativity.
> Impressions
Here’s a recent interview that I think covers some new ground:
https://milkandhate.wordpress.com/2025/07/19/an-interview-with-chris-beatrice-impressions-games-tilted-mill-entertainment-pharaoh-zeus-master-of-olympus-immortal-cities-children-of-the-nile-caesar-iv/
Zack
July 31, 2026 at 6:55 pm
“Impressions Games and their historical city-builders.”
Hell yeah ! Been looking forward to this for years.
Joe
July 31, 2026 at 6:58 pm
Another game that might be interesting to write about is Messiah, though you would probably hate it quite a bit ;)
John
July 31, 2026 at 7:12 pm
Ah, Metal Gear Solid. On the one hand, intriguing stealth game play mechanics. On the other hand . . . everything else. It’s a series I wish I could like. Alas, I still recall the day I watched a review of (I think) Metal Gear Solid 2, which revealed that the first two hours of the game involved less than twenty minutes of actual gameplay. That’s when I decided it probably wasn’t the series for me, and everything I’ve heard about the series since then has only served to confirm that decision.
As for the articles you are writing rather than the one that you aren’t, I’m most looking forward to the one on Deus Ex. Deus Ex is another one of those incredibly influential games from the 90s that I didn’t play at the time for various reasons but whose spiritual successors I have enjoyed tremendously. I’m simultaneously tempted to go play it and terrified that it either hasn’t aged well or that it wouldn’t live up to the hype.
Mike Russo
July 31, 2026 at 7:27 pm
No IF this year? 2000 feels to me like an inflection point as the scene shifts more fully away from big puzzlefests you highlighted in your previous IF article, and a lot of celebrated authors are either getting their start or having productive periods where they poke at what you can actually do with this stuff; Emily Short debuts with Galatea (and also Metamorphoses), Plotkin does Shade, there’s 9:05 and Shrapnel from Adam Cadre, and My Angel from Ingold, Rameses by Stephen Bond…
Jeff Sampson
July 31, 2026 at 7:44 pm
Daikatana came out in 2000… I guess that could be mentioned in the Deus Ex story, since it makes for a happier ending to point out that Ion Storm still produced one to three beloved games, thanks in part to Romero. Chrono Trigger was one of the inspirations for Daikatana(it’s why Romero’s non-magnum opus has time travel and a party of three and a sword), if you need a 2000 related rationale to give the JRPG genre one last try, by playing its most beloved and not overly long or hard title. (And one with no random encounters.) The Chrono Trigger sequel also came in 2000, but that was a divisive game.
Interestingly, Deus Ex has a part where it looks like you’re being forced to abandon your brother to a heroic last stand, but if you stay and fight he’ll live. This was inspired by the JRPG Suikoden, where it looks like a character has a JRPG plot-mandated death, but you can save him if you refuse to leave him and keep fighting. I think Cyberpunk 2077 also got this idea from Deus Ex.
I never played it, but Daikatana had some ideas that others would try later, like putting RPG mechanics and companions into a shooter. Some might say Daikatana was already redeemed by this remix of its dialog(CGW mentioned this in a “cool stuff we noticed” sidebar): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y8SC7z8W134
TW
July 31, 2026 at 8:02 pm
I’m not sure if you’re already aware of this or if it’s too late to be useful, but the website TCRF has a lot of information on the development history and unused content of The Sims: https://tcrf.net/The_Sims_(Windows)