Game developers rejoice. Defender, GoldenEye 007, Quake, and Tamagotchi have joined the World Video Game Hall of Fame at The Strong National Museum of Play.
These four games—which have significantly influenced popular culture and the video game industry—emerged from a field of finalists that also included Age of Empires, Angry Birds, Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, Frogger, Golden Tee, Harvest Moon, Mattel Football, and NBA 2K. Here’s last year’s winners.
The games were announced at a special ceremony that included members of the Defender development team, with team lead Eugene Jarvis; John Romero, co-creator of Quake; and Tara Badie, the head of Tamagotchi for Bandai Namco. The games are now enshrined in the Strong National Museum of Play‘s World Video Game Hall of Fame rotunda, part of the ESL Digital Worlds exhibit.
About Defender: Released by Williams Electronics in 1981, Defender proved that players would embrace more complex and challenging games in the arcade. Defender married intense gameplay and a complicated control scheme with a horizontally scrolling spacer shooter. It sold more than 55,000 units—making it a bestseller—and helped create a new market for more difficult games.
Says Jeremy Saucier, assistant vice president for interpretation and electronic games, “Defender’s punishing gameplay raised the level of competition in arcades, and it was among the first games to truly separate dedicated players from more casual ones. By challenging conventional wisdom about game mastery and the idea that players would reject more complex arcade video games, Defender paved the way for richer video game possibilities for developers and players alike.”
About GoldenEye 007: In 1997, Rare and Nintendo partnered to release GoldenEye 007 for the Nintendo 64 console, a first-person shooter based on author Ian Fleming’s iconic British superspy James Bond. Lauded for its in-depth story and immersive gameplay, GoldenEye 007 is especially known for its highly popular four-person multiplayer mode, which influenced many multiplayer games that followed. It was the third best-selling game for the Nintendo 64, only trailing Super Mario 64 and Mario Kart 64.
Says Andrew Borman, director of digital preservation, “Critics lauded GoldenEye 007 as the premier example of a first-person shooter to succeed on a console rather than a PC, and it is still considered one of the best multiplayer experiences ever produced on a Nintendo system. Its impact can be felt in nearly all console FPS games that followed, including Microsoft’s epic Halo franchise that launched in 2001.”
About Tamagotchi: Launched in 1996, Tamagotchi bridged toys and video games. The handheld, electronic game created a digital pet for its owner to nurture and raise by the press of a button—allowing owners to provide affection and attention from birth to adulthood. Tamagotchi spurred the popularity of the pet simulation genre of video games, yielding popular games such as Neopets, Nintendogs, and many other social media and app-based games.
Says Kristy Hisert, collections manager, “Beyond cultivating nostalgia, Tamagotchi offered a distinct form of play that differed from popular video game electronics of the time.
It provided players with feelings of connection, caring, and customization, a respite from competition and fighting games. The legacy of Tamagotchi can be seen in the popular pet simulation games that followed on traditional gaming platforms, the Internet, and personal devices throughout the subsequent years.”
About Quake: Id Software’s Quake shook up the gaming world when it debuted in 1996. The first-person shooter’s 3-D engine became the new standard for the industry, and its multiplayer mode helped to spawn the world of esports. The revolutionary Quake game code has been linked to dozens of other games and continues to be used in some modern games nearly 30 years after its release.
Says Lindsey Kurano, electronic games curator, “Quake’s legacy lives on in its atmospheric single player campaign, its influence in how online games are played, its active modding community, and its creation and shaping of esports. Not only this, but Quake’s code is a literal legacy. Of few games can it be said that its DNA—its code—continues to be present in modern games, decades after release.”
The World Video Game Hall of Fame at The Strong was established in 2015 to recognize individual electronic games of all types—arcade, console, computer, handheld, and mobile—that have enjoyed popularity over a sustained period and have exerted influence on the video game industry or on popularculture and society in general.
Inductees were announced at The Strong National Museum of Play in Rochester, New York, on May 8, 2025, and are on permanent view on the museum’s second floor in ESL Digital Worlds: High Score. Anyone may nominate a game to the World Video Game Hall of Fame. Final selections are made on the advice of journalists, scholars, and other individuals familiar with the history of video games and their role in society.
This year’s candidates also included Age of Empires, Angry Birds, Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, Frogger, Golden Tee, Harvest Moon, Mattel Football and NBA 2K. I’m glad some of my own votes made it to this selection, like Quake.
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