Sure thing, let’s dive into this whirlwind of pixelated nostalgia—yeah, video games! You probably didn’t expect me to be so jazzed about this, but here we are. So, The Strong National Museum of Play, Thursday—just like any other day, except it wasn’t—goes and says, “Hey, guess what? We’ve got some new legends entering the hallowed realm of the World Video Game Hall of Fame.” Cue drumroll or fanfare, your call. They slapped Defender from Williams Electronics, GoldenEye 007 from Rare, id Software’s Quake, and—oh wow—Bandai’s Tamagotchi into the spotlight. Yep, those little digital pets that would beep at 3 AM because, well, they didn’t want to die.
I guess they had a whole gang of contenders for the 2025 list like Age of Empires, Angry Birds (those angry little guys), Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, Frogger, and a few others. They’re out there duking it out for a coveted spot. But not this time, folks. Nope. It’s like some twisted generation gap showdown.
Apparently, these winning games—Defender, GoldenEye, Quake, and Tamagotchi—are like, the cream of the crop. Influencers, but in video games. Weird, right? The Strong’s got this checklist: icon thingy, how long they’ve stuck around, how far they’ve traveled (globally, not physically running around), and their hefty influence. Quake’s got this neat trick of being the second id Software game in the Hall after Doom got cozy in there in 2015.
And talking about these games—why they matter—or why someone decided they do. Defender with its cool spaceship vibe, GoldenEye 007 taking us back to secret spy fantasies, Quake being a pioneer in the first-person shooter saga, and Tamagotchi—teaching us digital responsibility, or something.
Since they opened the gates in 2015, 49 games have been given the nod. Just last year, the museum ushered in Asteroids, Myst, Resident Evil, Ultima, and SimCity. Yeah, all aboard the nostalgia express!
