I too had been playing Civ since 1998. Back then it was Civ II, then Civ III carried me all the way to 2016. I got a copy of Civ V, but couldn’t get past the user interface, and walked away from it.
What is your all-time favorite version?
Tripler
I wore out the CD-ROM on Civ III.
Chess, since the early 80s when I was an adolescent. I picked up some bad habits when I first learned, habits that stuck with me for decades. I only played here & there, and only started taking it seriously about three years ago. I still suck, but I’ve ditched some of those adolescent bad habits.
D&D, which mirrors my chess experience somewhat. I began as an adolescent but, unlike chess, after my early teens I basically forgot about it until about five years ago, when I met friends who played and I’ve been rolling ever since.
Pinochle, which my grandparents played religiously every Saturday night for decades with their friends. The rest of the family played, too, and all of us kids learned. Lacking Mrs. H’s interest, and lacking couple friends to play with anyway, I’ve been playing with apps.
The first “real” computer game I ever played (excluding games designed for young kids), was Heroes of Might and Magic III complete, when I was four years old. I have been playing it on and off for the last 25 years.
I played the original Wasteland when I was 13. I still occasionally replay it and I’m almost 46 now.
Wordtwist, an online version of the classic Boggle game from PuzzleBaron. Like here, you can pay for a subscription if you choose to or you can play for free. I’ve been playing for almost 10 years, keeping stats under several different user names.
PuzzleBaron offers a range of free games and puzzles - I will occasionally do a jigsaw puzzle or word search, but it is Wordtwist I keep coming back to.
You know they made a couple sequels a few years ago? I’ve only played the second, but it’s pretty good.
I liked the Stacks of Doom of earlier versions, but I’ve grown to appreciate the relative simplicity of Civ 5. I probably would like to go back to some of those earlier versions, and maybe this thread might encourage me to do so, but I’m concerned that the older user interface might throw me off.
Also: just me personally (not a design criticism), I don’t like some of the mechanics like religion, diplomacy, and spying. Civ 5 lets me pretty easily turn those off or (in the case of religion) just ignore them (though certainly there are bonuses to be had by pursuing them).
Yep. I crowdfunded both of them.
For me (and I’m surprised nobody has mentioned it yet), it’s Magic: the Gathering. Got my first Revised deck in 1994 and have played off and on since then, so approaching 30 years. Took some time off (I think most M:tG players do) for a while but have been consistently engaged in the game (reading articles and following spoilers, etc., even when I haven’t folks to play against) for about 15 years straight now.
I’ve probably played through Fallout 1 and 2 150 times each. I’ve been playing Civ II at least once a year since I first got a PC in 1996. But for some reason, I’m pretty sure my most-played game of all time is Championship Manager 3. I install it a couple of times a year and play a couple of seasons (at least). For reasons I don’t understand, I’ve never liked any of the more recent versions though I’m sure they are objectively better.
Played baseball in the mid 60s played national league full with friends owning each team! Best of times!
Archon- Inspired by a human chess match at a Renn Faire, and the “Let the wookiee win.” scene in Star Wars, Archon combines the strategy and finesse of chess with the action of Mortal Kombat. I have the Commodore 64 version, the NES version and the marvellous-cannot be praised highly enough- one of the best video games of all time- Archon Ultra for the PC. OTTOMH Archon Ultra came out about 33 years ago. It makes me deliriously happy that I can still play it with DOSBox. It makes me very sad that there is no way to use the play another human by modem function.
ETA
There was a version of Archon for the iPhone. By the time I got an iPhone, it was gone from the app store.