Classic games you never played but inspired modern hits

Summary

• Forgotten games that another world lays the foundation for beloved modern successors as inside.

• Titles like Thief: The Dark Project affected hits like Dishonored, sets Standards for Stealth Gameplay.

• Legacy game such as Planescape: Tormment Inspired Modern Gems as Disco Elysium, transformation of stories in RPG.

Many of us enjoy today's popular and successful games without realizing the deep, often overlooked the legacy behind them. In the world of video games, there are many groundbreaking titles that broke new ground in genres and mechanics but remained largely underplayed or forgotten.

This is often due to technical restrictions, poor marketing or simply ahead of their time, which prevents them from reaching a wide audience. Years later, their ideas are revived by spiritual successors – modern games that mix these core concepts with advanced technology and games, which achieves global success. This list highlights the forgotten pioneers together with the beloved successors who carry their legacy today.

8

Another world

A spiritual precursor to inside

Long before inside imprisoned players with their wordless horror and surreal world, another world was pioneers this minimalist narrative style. Developed solo by Eric Chahi follows the physicist Lester, teleported to a foreign planet after a lab accident. Without dialogue or skin, players must interpret the hostile world through images and animation alone.

This design philosophy deeply echoes, where silent story, atmospheric tension and test-and-error games dominate. Both games promote empathy through isolation and vulnerability and emphasize mood over exposure. Even Chahi himself acknowledged the spiritual relationship and stated that inside reminded him of his own work. It's not just influence – it continued the inheritance.

7

Thief: The Dark Project

A spiritual precursor to the disgraceful series

Thief: The Dark Project, first person's stealth games that we know it today started here. Developed by Looking Glass Studios, it placed players in the shadows – literally – with the help of light and sound as core mechanics. As Garrett, a lone thief in a dystopian medieval world, players were rewarded for patience, planning and silence over Brute Force.

Its heritage lives on in Dishonored, which expanded Thief's engrossing sim roots with supernatural forces and design of the vertical level. Both games emphasize freedom of freedom, player agency and stealth as a form of puzzle solution. Dishonor's creator has openly credited thief as a great inspiration and cemented it as a real spiritual successor.

6

Planescape: torment

A spiritual precursor to Disco Elysium

Planescape: Tormment redefined RPG by placing philosophy, identity and dialogue above the battle. The game is located in the bizarre multiversen of D & D's planescape and follows the unnamed – an immortal that wakes up in a stretcher, peeled memory and seeks truth over twisted planes and with equally broken companions.

Disco Elysium inherits this heritage and changes swords for internal votes and dice for introspection. Both games have amnesiac heads whose fragmented identities develop through rich dialogue and moral complexity. For ZA/UM, Planescape was a direct inspiration. Where Tormment asked “What could change a man?”, Replied Disco Elysium by: “And what happens if that man is you?”

5

System shock

A spiritual precursor to the Bioshock series

System shock was groundbreaking for the engrossing sim genre with its mix of FPS, horror and RPG mechanics. Set up on board the Citadel station in 2072, the game follows a hacker fighting against Shodan – a unhappy AI with a god complex and a legion of twisted cyborgs. Its atmospheric stories, environmental interaction and player agency lay the foundation for future story -driven games.

Bioshock (2007), designed by System Shock 2's Ken Levine, inherits this DNA. Both games pite the player against a charismatic, unpleasant antagonist who runs a failed utopia. With moral ambiguity, choice of world-forming and eerie worlds, Bioshock Reimagine's system Shock's vision with Art Deco Flair-To get its undeniable spiritual successor.

4

Syndicate

A spiritual predecessor to the XCOM series

You love the tactical depth of Xcom, but chances are you have never played syndicate. Syndicate lies in a gloomy Cyberpunk future and puts you responsible for a mega company that runs a brutal war for global dominance. As it ironically entitled Marketing Director, you lead a squad of cybernetically improved agents through murder, sabotage and abduction.

Mixing in real-time tactics with strategic monitoring, R&D management and ethical ambiguity, syndicate pioneers itself that defines modern Xcom: Elite Unit Control, Limited Resources and Globe Sankning Hot. Although thematically distinct, Syndicate lays the foundation for the squad-based, high effort that Xcom fans thrive today.

Xcom's roots are closely linked to X-Com: UFO defense, while Syndicat's spiritual influence feels wider over the strategist genre, especially in its focus on tactical squad management.

3

Wasteland

A spiritual precursor to the Fallout series

You love Fallouts post-apocalyptic environment, moral choices and dark humor-but the wilderness first went the irradiated path. This CRPG is developed by Interplay and throws you as a squad of desertrangers-decenders of US Army survivor-with to keep peace in a ruined, mutant-filled American southwest.

With deep character adaptation, branching stories and harsh consequences for each decision, Wasteland lays the foundation for Fallouts iconic style. Interplay's team could not ensure the rights to a sequel as a spiritual continuation. Nuclear waste desert, moral ambiguity and freedom of choice that define Fallout were all born in the irradiated soil in the wilderness.

2

King's field

A spiritual precursor to Dark Souls series

You love Dark Souls for his punishing battle and cryptic world -building – but have you heard of King's Field? King's Field was developed by FROMSoftware for the original Playstation and was the first move to RPG's first person. The game is located in a damned medieval kingdom and follows Alfred, a lone sword that falls into haunted catacombs in search of his missing father.

King's Field lays the foundation for what would become the Soulsborne formula: Slow, deliberate battle, environmental story and a world that punishes impatience. Although they are primitive according to today's standards, its oppressive atmosphere and emphasis on cautious exploration marks it as the real ancestors of Dark Soul's brutal elegance.

1

Ultima underworld: the naughty abyss

A spiritual precursor to Elder Scrolls series

Ultima Underworld redefined what a first person RPG can be. It was released in 1992 by Looking Glass Studios and introduced real 3D movement, dynamic lighting, complex article interaction and open exploration-all in a single, massive underground dungeon. Unlike their online -based contemporary, it offered the freedom to jump, swim and look freely and deepen players as never before.

Its influence on older rolls is undeniable. Arena, Daggerfalls and even Morrowind inherited its core design philosophy: player agency, environmental story and engrossing freedom. Todd Howard himself has quoted the underground as fundamental to their vision. Simply put, Ultima Underworld went so that the oldest rolls could run.