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[SantaC]

First night and day system game I ever played was Castlevania II: Simon's quest.

It was simple, but added antoher dimension to the gameplay at that time.

Then it was a big gap for me, and the next "true" night and day system game I played was Zelda OoT. It was wonderful to the see the sun rise over hyrule field. The one complaint I had with this system was that it was too short. The night and day passed too fast.

In Zelda Majors Mask, this system was much better than OoT. You could control it much better now, and it's also running alot slower. Felt like day and night really passed.

The night and day system in Zelda WW took a minimal downgrade from Zelda MM imo. night and day only passed on the sea now which was a lil annoying. Still a good system.

There are probably some games I have forgotten with a night and day system, but overall I think Zelda MM had the best system so far.

 

[cvxfreak]

Animal Crossing

 

[AniHawk]

Didn't Prince of Persia go by the time on your system's clock?

 

[Shompola]

Morrowind.

 

[fennec fox]

Hmmmmmmmmmm

Ultima had moon cycles as early as 3 but didn't actually have day and night.

Dragon Quest III is probably first on the console side.

 

[TAJ]

Shenmue/Shenmue II.

 

[Espio]

I agree, Shenmue 2.

 

[TheGreenGiant]

Ocarina of Time and Majora's Mask

In both game.. day/night actually plays into the game.

Eg: getting the arrow upgrade at Hyrule Lake in OOT. Skulltula hunt.

Majora's Mask has an active time systme. Nuff said

 

[D.Cowboys]

I like the three mentioned here already.

The Shenmue series, Morrowind and Animal crossing.

 

[TekunoRobby]

Is this day/night purely from a graphical standpoint?

Morrowind has the best day/night that I've seen in a videogame, too bad it's mostly for visuals and nothing more.

 

[Alucard]

Brave Fencer Musashi. You actually had to sleep, otherwise your character would be sluggish and ineffective. Plus, you could speed up time any time you wanted. The game was brilliant for that since you didn't have to always wait to talk to a person in town who was only home during a certain hour. Plus, the night theme in Grillin' Village was beautiful.

 

[Neutron Night]

Shenmue, easily. Ocarina of Time looked awesome back in the day, though.

 

[Semjaza Azazel]

I remember my first experience with night and day was in Dragon Warrior III and IV. I used to think it was such a big deal. There was even a color transition from dawn to sunlight to dusk to night and back again. Towns had different things going on at night, which was always interesting.

So those two games get my vote, simply because they had the biggest impact for me.

 

[DDayton]

Did all the Ultima games have day and night? I was under the impression that they did...

 

[bjork]

Toss up between Simon's Quest and BFM.

 

[SiegfriedFM]

Soul Blade. Although the days are hella short in some levels.

 

[Musashi Wins!]

Vice City!

 

[TekunoRobby]

I withdraw my entry, many of you have provided better examples. Now to play those games!

 

[Travado]

Morrowind and GTA 3!

 

[Wario64]

Metropolis Street Racer

 

[teepo]

warcraft3.

 

[Gattsu25]

Jak and Daxter :b

 

[GigaDrive]

I liked the day-night transistion in Soul Edge. Why didn't Namco keep that in SC or SC2?

 

[SantaC]

Yes Zelda MM had an active night and day system. Some sidequests required you to meet certian people exactly at the clock. (etc 7pm)

 

[golem]

Did all the Ultima games have day and night? I was under the impression that they did...

(actually dont remember if all of them did, but 7 was definitely the pinnacle of things to do at night fully scheduled npcs too.. ahh the good ole days

 

[Kiriku]

Brave Fencer Musashi. You actually had to sleep, otherwise your character would be sluggish and ineffective. Plus, you could speed up time any time you wanted. The game was brilliant for that since you didn't have to always wait to talk to a person in town who was only home during a certain hour. Plus, the night theme in Grillin' Village was beautiful.

Couldn't agree more, and now I feel like playing it again.

 

[shuri]

Morrowind

 

[Korranator]

Gothic series

 

[way more]

Fallout 2.

 

[BlackMage]

Lots of MMORPGS.

 

[belgurdo]

I liked the day-night transistion in Soul Edge. Why didn't Namco keep that in SC or SC2?

Yeah, that was fucking mesmerizing. They should have kept that for the Calibur games.

 

[Diomedeskun]

Ultima 7 did things in the early 90s that are only now showing up in many other games. It was the most immersive and fleshed out world for a single-player game that I have ever played. It is a shame that Lord British is only interested in MMORPG now.

 

[Duck of Death]

Boktai

 

[jiggle]

Dragon Quests

 

[BobbyRobby]

Dragon Warrior IV was my first experience with it.

 

[TheGreenGiant]

Boktai

Okay. Haven't played this but I believe this game wins.

 

[MightyHedgehog]

The first Faery Tale Adventure game on PC.

 

[FightyF]

Shen Mue, it did affect gameplay after all.

Sometimes I'd hate it if I've arrived too late and a store closed down for the day.

Graphically, it's amazing since the stores during the day would be purely lit by sunlight, meaning that it's somewhat dark. At night, they are glowing with their own lights. Plus, the volumetric shadows casted by buildings during the day looked really cool. Watching the shadows crawl as you are manning a Pachinko stand...it really feels like the day is passing you by.

 

[GhaleonEB]

Shenmue. Just watching all the shadows elongate and the people pack up and head home from the shops was impressive. Gorgeous lighting.

*Edit*

Heh, yeah what ^^^^he said.

 

[TheDuce22]

"Ultima 7 did things in the early 90s that are only now showing up in many other games. It was the most immersive and fleshed out world for a single-player game that I have ever played. It is a shame that Lord British is only interested in MMORPG now."

Whats funny is ultima online did things at launch that other MMORPG's are still catching up to. I cant wait to play the new one he is working on.

 

[Docpan]

I HATED the day/night system in CV2. Actually, I hate CV2.

Answer to your question:

Ocarina of Time.

 

[RiZ III]

Yea Ill definetly have to go with Shenmue 1/2 on this. Although I really hated how the game forced you to go to sleep. I suppose it made the game more realistic but it was still annoying.

 

[Scrow]

Not exactly specific to a night/day system, but Majora's Mask had the best time based gameplay I've ever seen.

 

[Sagitario]

Majora's Mask +1

 

[Keio]

Morrowind players should grab the add-on graphics mods from the Best Morrowind Mods Page ... they add brilliant light effects to the game. And some mods even add NPCs that act based on the time of the day.

The day/night cycle really adds to player immersion, although at times its annoying to wait for the evening. Then again, in Shen Mue it was a good excuse to spend time at the arcade...

 

[evilromero]

Animal Crossing was good, but the movement of the sun wasn't really dynamic. You had to enter a house or an event would occur to change the setting.

Pikmin had a very good system. Same with Doshin the Giant. Realistic sun movement that you could track all day. Majora's Mask takes the cake for the Zelda games and Pokemon Ruby/Sapp holds the crown in my opinion over all.

 

[Optimistic]

Shenmue, easily. Its day night system was amazing...I hope, if they don't make Shenmue 3, Sega at least tries its hand at another realistic rpg/adventure game, because really, I've never played a more atmospheric game than Shenmue, and no other game in the near future looks set to top it, except maybe Fable, but even then it won't have the realism factor...

 

[rawk]

When I was little I was very impressed by the day to night change in King's Quest 4.

 

[scorcho]

Beyond Good and Evil. the weather change was especially beautiful while on the ocean.

 

[DemonCleaner]

shen mue !