There was a time in my life where I was able to cite from memory basically every game that made it onto the wiki; every game that had a memorable title attached to it, every game that people referenced; etc.
Sadly, the days of me being able to cite such things have long-since passed.
I can however mention certain games notable for leaving permanent influences on site culture:
Large "Normal" 92 was one of the two games which singlehandedly lead to the formation of the Normal Review Group, demonstrating why there needed to be a dedicated review group for determining what was 'Normal' and what was not--you need only look at the roles present to see plenty of examples. Limmer, Mafia Mason, even a Cult, in a game that was "Normal".
(I can't find the other game but I seem to recall that it was a "Normal" that involved a masonry being informed they were actually the mafia N1 and random VTs becoming serial killers every time the town mislimmed.)
Beyond this, ever since the Scummies introduced "Game of the Year" as a Scummie, the games nominated for that award are the closest I would say we've got to "famous" games in recent history.
(That, and games which resulted in Titles. As the Title Fairy, I have somewhat extensive knowledge about where titles come from but I am, sadly, not encyclopedic with my knowledge there. Still, most titles which come from a single game usually mean the game in question was at least somewhat famous.)
(Oh, also; we have a Records page, not updated in forever but every game on the Records page was famous back in its day for one reason or another.)
I cannot give you famous games prior to the introduction of the GotY scummie because my memory of them is no longer present, but can give you game highlights from Scummies:
Silent Mafia 3 is, I believe, where OhGodMyLife got the title "Silent But Deadly" from.
Mindscrew Mafia series of games (3 in this case), the game series behind Tarhalindur's title, is another huge lasting impact on site culture, in helping us define what is Bastard and what is not. (Vi
actually wrote a guide which can explain this more eloquently than I can about some of the effects Tar had left behind.)
I'm not sure if it's famous, per se, but
Boost Mafia and its sequel
Boost Mafia 2 are two of the best games from its era.
The War In Heaven series of games (II in this case) are also a notable part of the site's older culture; the
HURT: tags HEAL: we HURT WITH A BLADE: use are linked to that series of games, having been added because of them.
This game in the same year as
this game were two, among many, that gave Haylen the title "Life of the third party".
I'm less certain of it, but I believe
this game (on the linked page) was responsible for imaginality's title of Restricted Townie.
Medeival Mafia was one of the best games of 2009.
/in-vitational 4 was one of the best games of 2009.
Legacy of the Ancients was one of the best games of 2009.
Super Smash Brothers was considered one of the best games of 2010. (I'm least familiar with this era of site culture so I can't really be confident.)
A Clash of Kings was considered one of the best games of 2010. (I'm least familiar with this era of site culture so I can't really be confident.)
Lord of the Rings Mafia was considered one of the best games of 2010. (I'm least familiar with this era of site culture so I can't really be confident.)
Fates Mafia was considered one of the best games of 2010. (I'm least familiar with this era of site culture so I can't really be confident.)
The MtG Parallel Universe series of games was basically a gigantic Large Normal disguised as three mini themes, and in many ways has influenced multiple games since then, with its pseudo-Team-Mafia format, back before Team Mafia was actually a big thing.
The Vi pod battery has left a lasting legacy on many moderators who have adopted similar deadline rules (most notably in current moderation I believe would be Cabd).
The Stars Aligned series of games (linked second) was, while with its flaws in each iteration, a solid standard in how to run a mostly open setup with solid flavor and good mechanics and one of my strongest memories.
This was one of many games that earned SaintKerrigan their title, with them being notable for having some of the best flavorwriting skills of any mod onsite for damn good reason.
The original Pick Your Power game (At least I think this was the original version of it.) is noteworthy for being where we got...well, one of the most popular Open games of all time that shares the namesake of the original, and from which we can trace the lineage of countless other games inspired by this choice mechanic. (Most recently, Gypyx's Draft game uses a very similar mechanic, as an example of how this is still influencing site culture to this very day.)
DEFCON Mafia is one of the most iconic game series we've had, which has continued to be run multiple times since then, most recently by SirCakez. It has the perfect mixture of meme-worthy content, chaos, and yet legitimate scumhunting with mechanical talk and optimization consideration and so on and so forth.
Perpetual Mylo Mafia is an Open game that has remained one of the staples on the site, and this game was the original iteration of the now-famous Open setup that spawned from a result of it. (At least I think this was the original version of it.)
Chess Mafia is one of the most infamous mafia games of all time in that it was technically speaking a mafia game because technically speaking the town could choose to eliminate players during the day phase and thus allow mafia to nightkill players, but they never opted to use the Elimination mechanic they had access to, instead preferring to play the chess game out. This makes it one of the longest games of all time.
Kingdom Hearts was, once upon a time, one of the longest games of all time.
Phables: Death Note Mafia was also one of the longest games of all time filled with numerous mechanics.
The Game of the Year was similarly long (tho I don't know much about it).
Occarina of Time was also very long and reasonably complex.
Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Legacy was one of the longest games of all time and where mykonian got his title from, and is one of the most famous yet also most infamous games of its era.
Mafia Behind the Maiden was even longer (tho I don't have much knowledge there).
Politics Mafia had a ton of unusual voting mechanics and was multiball to boot and insanely complex but left a notable memory on a whole generation of scummers.
Overly Posh Mafia is one of the largest games onsite but has the honor of being one of the only non-theme games on the list.
It was eventually toppled by the aptly named
A Large Normal.
And then my
Maniacle Street Mafia game--another noteworthy game that left a lasting impact on an entire generation of summers. (It remains an incredibly flawed game in many ways but also probably one of the games most iconic of my moderation.)
Of course, eventually, another Large Normal would topple even my game, that being the
Epic Game of Epicness.
MafiaStuck held the honor of longest by page game of all time for a long long time.
Mobile Suit Gundam Seed was even longer although at the time wasn't the longest game, was still an iconic game though.
We Didn't Playtest This was even longer although again at the time wasn't the longest, but was basically two different games meshed together in an incredibly unique interesting way.
Tales of You is one of the most infamous games of all time where basically every player the town eliminated had the scumteam nailed basically dead to rights and every player the scum nightkilled...didn't, because the scum were eliminating the largest threats to them in the day and didn't need to nightkill the accurate players.
Fire Emblem: Awakening contained one of the most unique, interesting mechanics of all time by pairing individuals up (producing a topic between them) and the paired individuals producing offspring--introducing new players into the game after the pairs were formed.
InuYasha Mafia was one of the longest games of all time and was a game people didn't know was multiball until it was too late.
UnderTale Mafia was even longer although I don't actually know much about it.
SaGa Frontier was an even longer game and a fine example of Varsoon at the prime of his moderation (Varsoon being one of the best theme game designers we've had on site but suffering from, to some extent, the Tarhalindur problem Vi described, in many ways being a less-bastard version of Tar in his games and his legacy).
Another example even longer:
Steven Universe 2. It is one of my favorite games of all time, and one of Varsoon's best games of all time, and probably one of the games he is most well-known for, containing a bunch of legendary players from multiple eras of site history and is a game that to this day still gets referenced reasonably often.
SMITE Mafia remains one of my favorite games of all time and has the length to support that; it was a fine example of dramonic at
his
prime, and filled with legends of their era.
The longest game of all time before people stopped updating records was
the infamous Civilization Mafia, and it has left a mark (mostly in the form of scars) on an entire generation of more recent scummers, and is a game that many still carry bad blood/memories from. The game featured brilliant mechanics that were highly unique and interesting, with highly apt flavor and was wondrously designed, but the stunning setup and moderation was overshadowed by the sheer.
length
. of the game, dwarfing literally every longest game played by a landslide, and has left long-lasting memories, mostly bad but some good and lots of learning experiences from players.
(I'm getting fatigued, I've still got years of scummies and more records and more title fairy stuff to sort through, so consider this a highly incomplete, only partial, list. I can make it more complete given more time but I need to take a break before I do more.)
