What PC game demos blew you away?

[Via]

And made a certain game a must-buy for you?

I remember the Deus Ex demo on the PC Gamer disk. It included the whole first level and it had a huge "wow" factor for me with all of the different ways you could approach it. If I hadn't gotten Deus Ex for free with my soundblaster a short time later would have bought it for sure.

The Dungeon Seige demo was great; unfortunately, the rest of game was meh. The demo did it's job on me though. I bought it at full price.

The Doom 3 demo was awesome.

The Rune demo definitely made me buy the game. Using severed limbs as weapons sealed the deal for me.

The FEAR demo made me open my wallet.

I cam't think of any recent games that had demos that made me think "I HAVE to buy this game".

I'm sure I'm forgetting some great ones.

 

[SergeC]

Homeworld, the original one. Wow.

 

[Via]

Yes - Homeworld.

I knew I forgot some good ones. That demo made me run out to buy the game.

 

[spittledip]

COD and BF2142

 

[Via]

I knew this would bring back some good memories.

I never tried BF2142, but the COD demo was like being in a movie. I had never seen anything like it. I did eventually buy the game, so it worked for me.

 

[CoinOperatedBoy]

Unreal Tournament '99. Actually, I guess the demo was a little too good because I played so much Instagib CTF on the demo that it took me a year or two before I bought the full version, and then I didn't even play it much.

 

[Ganeedi]

Original System Shock demo off the PC Gamer disc. That completely blew me away. I had never seen anything like it. Still have that disc somewhere...

 

[sandorski]

Unreal and UT.

 

[Martimus]

The Alien vs. Predator 2 demo made me buy that game. The demo was better than the game, but the game was still pretty good. I just wish they made the game a little harder, like the demo where you really had your heart going when an alien showed up (since they could kill you very fast, unlike in the full game where you were closer to superman.)

 

[Martimus]

The Rune demo definitely made me buy the game. Using severed limbs as weapons sealed the deal for me.

I loved that demo. Never did buy the game though, since I was in College and had no time to play video games. I would like to try it out now though.

 

[Skurge]

Dirt 2, Half life 1, BIA, crysis (even though I played it on a 9600pro)

The level I played in th HL demo wasn't in the retail version.

 

[AyashiKaibutsu]

I cam't think of any recent games that had demos that made me think "I HAVE to buy this game".

That's because all games nowadays either are so bad they can't be made to look good even in a short burst, or are so short that any demo of practical length would basicly be the whole game.

 

[Via]

I loved that demo. Never did buy the game though, since I was in College and had no time to play video games. I would like to try it out now though.

Some people thought it was too repetitive, but I liked it a lot. I played throught the whole LONG game twice, and restarted it several other times. And the graphics were killer for the time.

Unfortunately my Rune disk barely works anymore. It hangs on install.

My guess is it was cheaply made. Oh well - it was definitely worth playing and I got a lot of fun out of it.

 

[AntiFreze]

no mention of BF1942? man, wake island kept me entertained for about 3 months. I did finally end up buying it, but I still mostly played wake island.

 

[DaveSimmons]

X-Com 1. Night mission, chrysalids rushing and infecting your squaddies . . . -( eek! )

 

[sandorski]

no mention of BF1942? man, wake island kept me entertained for about 3 months. I did finally end up buying it, but I still mostly played wake island.

I couldn't get into that Demo at all. Loved the Game, but the Control Setup was too much a PITA to bother figuring out for a Demo.

 

[KeithTalent]

UT2K4 was the best one. It was like a full game in itself and I played it for quite a while. Best demo that I ever tried by a very large margin.

KT

Edit: whoops, did not read the whole thing. I never bought UT2K4 since I had enough game in the demo.

 

[Zargon]

Dark Forces

 

[Cheeseplug]

No One Lives Forever, and Call of Duty. Both turned out to be gems.

 

[Hopeless]

There have been a few but the over all best that I can remember was the original Warcraft. Not sure which gaming mag I was reading but there was an ad for it that listed a toll free number to call. It was a recording of an "ork" that had me laughing my ass off. Afterward you left your name/address & they mailed out a demo disk completly free.

 

[M0oG0oGaiPan]

quake

 

[wirm]

I really liked the Duke Nukem 3D and MDK demos

 

[GullyFoyle]

Doom (Shareware). Nine full levels of epic awesomeness. BF2 Demo on Gulf of Oman got lots of play, too.

 

[tk149]

Warcraft (the original). I played that demo to death and then some more. I finally went out and bought the game even though I was in severe money-saving mode at the time.

 

[Wag]

Quake was cool.

The original Tomb Raider on a Voodoo card was pretty awesome as well.