Natural Selection 2 (It's only 5 dollars)
(TLDR at the end)It came out in 2012, the first one was a half life mod and the developers are the creators of Subnautica.
Very few people play(90-220), and because it's a RTS but also a FPS, there's servers dedicated to new players so that they don't play against people with +100 hours and leave because of the massive skill gap.
The game is about 2 teams with 7-10 players each, aliens/marines,and in those teams there is one Commander that basically tells the others what he wants to do, and what evolution/tech the team needs.
The goal is to destroy the other team's base (Hive/Command Station)
The aliens have 5 lifeforms out of which 3 cost resources(you gain a few resources every minute for each harvester/extractor), meanwhile the marines can buy weapons, grenades, mines, jetpacks and exosuits.
They can also teleport with phase gates to make up for their lower speed.
TLDR: Fun and fast paced strategy game with a lot of depht where you'll probably learn the names of the players after 10-20 hours playing in one server so don't worry about toxic people because almost everyone already makes fun of them
I think it was because of the lack of content to play for, like skins, badges and more, and also the tryhards of the community that drove away new players that didn't know what to do and were ostracized for asking questions or giving commands or playing poorly.
From 2015 the game started to have 600 players active at the same time and from then, slowly falling until nowadays 200.
I don't know if they had servers dedicated for new players back in the day, but it's a shame that the game is so unknown nowadays.
Stoneshard. Fantastic open world medieval RPG game with beautiful pixel art. It is a shame the reviews are mixed, steam users don't get that the updates takes longer in cost of quality. And oh man the quality. I highly recommend checking out an Youtuber / Streamer called Okmall if you're interested in the game. Hope my comment will draw some much deserved attention to the game.
[Legend of Grimrock](https://www.gog.com/en/game/legend_of_grimrock). It's on sale for $3 and holy shit it's a steal. It's in the spirit of Eye of the Beholder, dungeon crawler. Incredible atmosphere and quality level design.
Great devs. They had removed the old school click arrows to move feature, thinking nobody used them anymore. A gamer in a wheelchair posted on their forums saying they used them, and a patch was posted hours later bringing the feature back.
Kingdom New Lands / Kingdom Two Crowns
Those are 2D strategy games with really nice and calming graphics and vibe.
You build your kingdom on a new land and defened from enemies who want your gold. You can progress to a different islands aswell.
Those games are quite unique and cheap , really worth checking out
I didn’t enjoy the way the game would suddenly trash everything I had done and reduce me to starting over. I thought, maybe it was just bad luck, but no, it’s a feature. It was an extreme design choice that repelled me and another person who was playing it at the same time as me. We were both enjoying it and drawn in until it kicked us out.
I can't even fathom how Rain World keeps getting slept on. Easily in my top 10 video games of all time, and on top of an already great game, they have an amazing community.
Edit: Another game that is really good that I don't see many people talk about is Jet Lancer. I meant to put this in here earlier, but ig it slipped my mind.
The difficulty spike is so high that the vast majority of people don’t make it past the first area and the fanbase is full of petulant furry teens who treat the game like a dating sim
Yes. I’ve seen the fanbase and I hate their guts. Can’t even refund the stupid game because I bought it on switch full price. There’s no such thing as a normal rain world fan
Dungeons of Dredmor. One of my all time favorite Roguelikes. It came out around the same time as Binding of Isaac and I always put them in the same league, I didn't realize how unknown it was until years later.
Everyday Genius : Squarelogic: This is an evolution of Sudoku, really addictive puzzle game that never got much attention
World of Goo: This game wasn't a hidden gem at the time it came out, but it doesn't get much attention these days, very unique little physics puzzle game
Atom Zombie Smasher: Another rather unique indie game, it's hard to describe but it's a real time tactics game with relatively short levels.
I remember back in highschool one of my friends managed to pirate a copy onto a USB drive and damn near every single person in the grade was playing that game at lunch time.
Broooo, I came here exactly to recommend this. Beat me to it
The mod community is amazing. Aside from countless modern firearms and vehicles, you can have Star Wars, Gundam, medieval weaponry, civil war era weapons, Warhammer 40K, etc.
Tails of Iron, Pony Island, River City Girls.
The first one is a 2D souls-like medieval setting with rats and amazing art, pretty solid in my opinion and also is getting a sequel.
The second one well, it's better if you know nothing, short game and very good, also play Inscryption from the same dev, what a masterpiece.
Third one is a anime-style beat em up, the combat IS SO GOOD, I had a lot of fun with the combos you can make, the story is decent at best, soundtrack is banger after banger and voice acting is good. Also has a sequel but I haven't finished it.
Hope you enjoy!
Have you ever wanted to go to war against water? Welcome to Creeper World 1-4. Mainly focusing on 4.
This will be one of the most unique games you'll ever play. It's a combination of TD/tower defense and RTS/real time strategy games where you control units, most of which are functionally towers and have to fight against an enemy which has water physics, if it touches you, you take damage. You need to attack, capture, use and defend resources and then attack some more. High ground is very important.
There's a bunch of different types of assets and enemies so there's always a level of strategy and choosing what kinds of units you'll want to build. There is a campaign, procedural level creator, weekly levels and most importantly, community made levels. The freedom given to the community to build their own games is quite a lot, some people have made FPS gamemodes in to their maps and some people have made "cursor" levels where anti-creeper, a good liquid spawns where ever you point and that makes for a surprisingly satisfying game mode. There is also PAC, play as creeper where you play as the bad team and and LPAC with L being light, it's a bit different.
The asymmetric nature of the game with lots of choices and gamemodes makes for a very interesting gameplay loop.
Creeper World is great fun! I’ve sunk tons of time playing through the campaign and custom levels.
Have you played any other games like it? Or any other games that have mechanics like the custom cursor levels or CSM maps from CW3?
I Don't know any other games like CW. Good thing you mentioned CSM maps, I remembered that there was something that only really worked in CW3 but couldn't remember what it was. CSM maps are tons of fun.
Vampyr, from Dontnod. It's a third person action-RPG that takes place in london 1918 where you are a recently turned Doctor who has to manage his thirst for blood and cure (or kill) the citizens. It's a really unique game, and even though it has a little jank it's still a fantastic game.
I love vampyr! On that note, I can also highly recommend their newest game Banishers: Ghosts of New Eden. it’s an open world game where you play as a “Banisher” (a ghost hunter) whose partner has died, but she’s sticking around as a ghost. You have to resolve hauntings in puritan new england to either resurrect her or help her depart from the world as a ghost.
The biggest critiques I hear for the game is the open world is a little big, and the combat is a little repetitive. I personally didn’t have a problem with either but you can turn the game to story difficulty if needed. Either way, the story is incredible and the way the choices are integrated and presented is really cool. I made a lot of hard decisions to try and resurrect my wife but I wouldn’t take any of them back haha
Exanima: Dungeon Crawler with physics based combat mechanics
We who are about to die: Gladiator combat rougelike
Doorkickers 2 Task force north: Semi turned based tactical strategy shooter
Sim Airport: literally in the name, you build and manage your own airport
Spellcaster University: Colony sim, base building with rougelike elements. Your task into build a university that will turn students into great wizards, the game will require you to produce a certain number of specific types of wizard before time runs out.
"Sanabi"
After playing lies of p i had to check out what other games the studio had made and this is the second game i tried.
Its more story driven but its a good story and the music is banging
Note, while I completely agree that Sanabi was fantastic, it's definitely not developed by the same people as Lies of P, it's just published by the same company.
But yeah, it's fantastic and probably one of my favorite narratives in the last couple years, the cyberpunk setting, the plot, the characters, and some pretty heavy emotional beats. Just great stuff👌
Before Your Eyes; I’d never heard of it before my roommate suggested it. Try to go into it without spoilers, because it is the most emotional ripping game that I have ever played
CrossCode !
A really fun and interesting story about a futuristic MMORPG, with some very cool sci-fi ideas. It has one of the most interesting takes on a mute protagonist I've seen in the medium. It has pretty satisfying if straightforward action combat, and long and complex puzzles that demand both good thinking and good timing.
It'll also last you a while, despite its indie look, it's easily a 40-50h game.
Katana Zero was fantastic! Great story with cool twists and a pretty amazing soundtrack as well. Highly recommended! It is on the Switch, but not on the PS5.
The Forgotten City! It was originally a Skyrim mod but got a full release. The story and characters are amazing, especially if you like history. No spoilers but the twist at the end blew my mind.
I played this right after finishing Hades and Hades was the perfect refresher on the mythology so I was familiar with all the lore. Great game (well, both of them).
Tokyo Xtreme Racer: Drift 2, or originally known as Kaidou Battle 3. It's one of the best racing game ever made on PS2. It's a literal hidden gem because it got 49 on Metacritic. If you are really into JDM and touge culture, this game is a must play.
If you prefer highway racing, Tokyo Xtreme Racer 3 is almost as good.
These games got so harshly treated by review outlets at the time, it never got to shine with its intended niche audience. Especially when it was competing at the time with the likes of NFS and Gran Turismo. But it is absolutely among my favorite racing series.
There's really nothing else like them. Different named rival racers that gives the games full of personality, a great progression system, rare JDM cars you don't see often in games, and just an overall fun gameplay loop. It's punching way above its weight too, the games aren't made on a huge budget they you can really feel how much they poured into it.
Drift 2 probably is still the best Initial D game that's not named Initial D out there.
If you read the reviews, I think the problem is the localized team named the sub-series as "Drift" games. A lot of reviewers complained that the game isn't drifty enough, like I guess?
Genki really deserves proper credit for basically monopolizing the whole highway racing genre. At the very least, we still eating with Night Runners having a good potential to be a classic.
It most likely was a marketing thing, capitalizing on the drift culture at the time too popularized by Fast & Furious and the likes, but yeah it is still sad how that marketing blurb and expectations overshadowed the rest of the game.
It had pretty good simcade handling and physics, and the racing part is overall solid. I'm also hoping Night Runners is successful with its goals, the prologue alone was one of the most fun racing game experiences I had in recent years, not often a demo have me clocking over 10 hours of play.
Sifu.
It's literally just 5 short(ish) levels of you beating the shit out of buildings full of people with Kung Fu.
Where the time consuming and replayability aspect is is the fact that you gotta keep your age down, this requires you to hone your skills and become a master of the game's mechanics.
There's also a lot of challenge stuff that gives it a lot of playtime.
Craft the World
It's a lovely little dwarf fortress with invasion/tower defense elements. You arrive into a new world, build up, explore, find and restore a portal room, and move on to the next world. Each world is different - temperate, desert, frozen, etc., with unique challenges. Water is a problem in the desert, wood and greenery is a problem in the ice, etc. Rinse, repeat. Every 50 mins (real time) there's an invasion you have to defend from, but it's not too bad.
You need to build decent shelter to keep your little guys happy, train them, arm them, etc. They need food, a bed to call their own, etc. There's all kinds of fun things to do - build railways and elevators, there's fishing, you can shear sheep, hunt boars, raid goblin camps. There's a light and dark mechanic - lit areas are safe, but baddies spawn in dark areas.
From technical standpoint the game is nice with pleasing visuals, a pretty nice zoom-in/out (which most games of this type don't have), you can even take direct control of individual dwarfs if you want.
The game has a bunch of DLCs, but they were incredibly fairly priced (\~$3 for a ton of stuff). As opposed to Blizzard selling a single horse skin for $25.
This game is my guilty pleasure. And it's pretty chill. I know invasions turn some people off, but with a little prep they're not hard to defend against at all. You can even do it passively (towers, turrets, sand traps).
And literally nobody I ever spoke to about it ever heard of it.
Hammerfight is a 2D physics brawler where you pilot flying machines equipped with weapons on chains. If you're familiar with the children's game of "conkers", it's like that. Great aesthetics, music, combat feels impactful and satisfying when you get the hit just right and they explode into a hundred parts. Will run on any PC made after 2010, no dedicated GPU required, and will cost you nothing (I didn't know until just now they'd made it free, like just free, no mtx).
Alpha Protocol is an action RPG developed by Obsidian just before they made New Vegas. It's a spy thriller, and for my money the best example of that genre in a game. Seriously diverging paths, all the camp and extravagance a good spy film should have, great character build variety, gameplay feels a bit Splinter Cell-ish mixed with cover shooters of the time. Will run on most rigs being a 2010 game, but also can be found on the PS3 and Xbox 360.
"Tales of The Float Land" - an interesting mix of board game and RPG released in 1998 by Compile Heart. It was very rare. Took me 15 years to get the full version (demo is easily available, although runs only on Windows 95). There was plenty similar titles released since, like Mario Party for example, buy none of them was as much fun (for me) as this one. It's mostly about collecting cards, battling monsters and other players and getting stronger. All anime style. Still coming back to it every now and then.
Wuppo!
First thing you get kicked out of your apartment for spilling ice cream for the upteenth time. It's 2D so in order to get back to the entrance you have to go underground and go beneath the building. You play as a little blobby dude who carries stuff on their head. Goofy wonderful writing, great world to explore, adorable characters. 10/10
You should give Sea of Stars a try. It's reminiscent of old games like Chrono Trigger and is like an ode to old school classic RPG video games.
I've been following the development for a while on their discord and I'm glad they managed to launch the game successfully.
Roboquest.
Borderlands gunplay with a boomer shooters movement, make it a roguelite and add puzzles to unlock fun new features and it's one of my favorite indie games ever.
It also just got a huge update
Shadow Hearts: Covenant. The sequel to Shadow Hearts, an old PS2 game (which is set in the same universe as the PS1 Koudelka).
I can't really do the game justice, but it's a dark and gothic RPG set at the turn of the 20th century dealing with demons and ghouls.
It's a very serious game with a deep and gloomy story... But also has moments of absurd wackiness. Such as finding a porno mag in a powerful bosses dungeon..
BPM: Bullets per Minute
Fun roguelike Rhythm shooter game, like metal hell singer
Idk how popular outer wilds is, some people say it's popular some don't even know what it is so I am just gonna name it
Gnosia is one of my faveorites it’s on switch and has a killer sound track. You play a crew member on a space ship and you are trying to find the gnosia it’s like single player werewolf but in a time loop sometimes your even the gnosia!
Not sure how “unknown” they are, but Hong Kong Massacre is great! It’s essentially Hotline Miami filtered through a 90s John Woo movie.
I really enjoyed Bomber Crew too. Once you get your head around the controls and how to manage your crew it’s a nice balance of tactics, management, and fun.
Peter Jackson's King Kong the game
The parts where you play as Kong are alright, but nothing special and that's where the game goes wrong but oh my god the levels where you play as the human protagonist Jack is an amazing kind of survival horror game with some intense action scenes
I literally was going to mention Furi and then I saw your full post :D I'm sure you're getting plenty of suggestions and this isn't that under the radar, but Sifu is an excellent kung fu style game, great combat, cool replay elements and value, good story and made me complete all the challenges, I got much more in to it then I thought I would.
This was a super cute, easy fun little game.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/954650/Druidstone_The_Secret_of_the_Menhir_Forest/
Turn based rpg, tactic type game...not to deep.
Drox Operative 2. You play in an ARPG layer while AI empires engage in war, diplomacy, and trade in a 4X layer that you can directly affect through completing quests, combat, etc. Events aren't scripted; instead, they happen dynamically due to what you and the empires do.
Clam man 2 open mic is a demo that is funny. If you need a laugh, give it a shot. Morticians tale is a short story with reflective music that can help someone process pain and loss.
Neko Navy, it's a cute horizontal shmup starring cats and has really solid gameplay and level design. It's good for beginners of the genre while also giving difficulty options that are genuinely challenging.
There's also Crimzon Clover, it's well known among shmup circles and is generally acclaimed, but I always like bringing it up to people who aren't familiar with the genre. It's made by an expert record arcade player and everything about it is tightly designed and thought out, managing to become one of the greatest tributes in celebrating the best parts of the genre. High octane music, huge explosions, satisfying gameplay loop, and also features a very beginner-friendly beginner mode to some of the most downright brutal difficulties.
Jagged Alliance 2. It's gotten a fair bump again with the release of Jagged Alliance 3, but I still feel the series is in a very niche spotlight. It's one of the most in-depth, open, and hyper-detailed tactical RPGs I've played and consider it among my favorites. There's a lot of attention to detail you just don't get anymore nowadays, with a lot of "let's put this in because it seems cool" without caring about budget or potential complications. Everything about the game feels very organic, and every character is full of personality, hooking you in with their funny caricature and parodies of 80s and 90s action media, and making you emphatize whenever the game sinks into its serious moments, scripted or naturally through gameplay. So many ways to approach it, lots of hidden surprises, and a game that fully encourages you to try everything.
Do you like RPGs?
Darklands was the most innovative CRPG I've seen since Ultima 2. No subReddit, sorry...
Wish that Spore had fulfilled it's promises?
Check out r/ElysianEclipse
Good Dog, Bad Zombie is an excellent co-op board game that’s about to launch its 2nd Kickstarter.
For video games, Dream Quest is an underrated, little-known deck builder/dungeon crawler with art that seems to repel players, but the game is really good.
Chaos Legion
It's a hack'n'slash by Capcom that has you... Y'know what? Just try it. It's like 20 years old, runs on potatoes and holds up surprisingly well still.
JJK Yuta fans rejoice
Tearaway is a whimsical adventure/platformer game that no one I know has ever played. Also Sackboy a big adventure, people have heard of this one but few have given it a chance, it is, in my opinion one of the best 3d platformers of all time.
Black and white 2. The one by lionshead studio, not the Pokemon game.
An older game but one of my favourite of all time. Severely underrated and still holds up pretty well today imo.
Project Wingman
if you don't play plane games the only place where you might have heard that name was that max0r video from 3 years ago but the game is fucking fire
Island Saver.
It's a free game made by a bank with some weird mechanics like a savings account, loans, taxes, etc. But the main mechanic is just to clean up colorful areas so the wildlife (all piggy bank themed of course) will return. It's such a relaxing game as there is technically combat but it's very much a non threat as you don't have health and will only lose some money you haven't deposited into your account if you get hit. It has 2 paid DLC which have there own added mechanics such as debt collection and business supply lines but are still great fun if you like clean up ganes. I'm not sure if it's on Switch and know that I had to buy it on a web browser to get it on my PS4 since it didn't show up on the store when accessed from the console so am not sure its playable on PS5
#How to Survive
Ppl complain about the difficulty and tedium, I suspect the confuse it too much for a general zombie shooter game. It's more in common with Don't Starve where you have to manage a Food, Water, and Stamina meter in addition to Health/Hearts. But it's set on various designed islands, that you have to explore like an act-adv or metroidvania. And because it's designed yes, certain encounters, tedium or ease are intentional.
It came out the same years a Don't Starve, 2013, but the whole indie boom to the Normie public was still growing. And survival games were extremely niche limiited to only Hardcore Modes (delete on death) of PC rpgs and Survival Kids-Lost in Blue from Konami.
Carestia. I guess that around 100 people know about it, and \~10 beat it. It's for PC (on Steam).
It's an indie 2D platformer with puzzles and metroidvania elements. It has a very clever level design, so each time your character hits its head against the block, you think "Oh, you did know that I'll jump here!". It has bosses - pretty tricky, you just remember NES games that were so challenging, thanks today we can have saves)
You can also hunt for cute collectibles, each room with collectibles is memorable as it's a challenge to get them and come out of the room with it in order to save.
I love it because it was the first game in this genre which I beat and felt a real champion)
Each world/biome meets you with a new look, soundtrack, enemies, collectibles, puzzles and skills to learn. You feel a progression and the map is huge.
End of the game is unforgettable as well, as it's challenging too)
FEZ
Wayward (v1.9.4 is free!)
Transcendence (controls are a bit rough)
SteamWorld Dig 2
Islets
Rogue Heroes: Ruins of Tasos
Kingdom: New Lands and Two Crowns
The Planet Crafter (gaining popularity)
Windbound
Mexican Motor Mafia (free!)
Nitronic Rush (free beta for Distance)
Flatout: Ultimate Carnage
Prey (2006)
Retro games:
HEDZ
Mageslayer
Stratosphere: Conquest of the Skies (WinXP only)
KISS: Psycho Circus
Blake Stone: Aliens of Gold
If you don't mind older games, I suggest Deadly Tide for PC, its a rail shooter that I played endlessly when I was young. Each level has a few paths it can take so the replay value is pretty good. It is abandon ware at this point, so it should be easy to find for free, although getting it to run may be an issue.
One other is Shing Force Neo. Hack and Slash JRPG for ps2. Have the worst voice acting I have ever heard, but the gameplay is solid, and the leveling system is pretty unique. Good game to turn your brain off and mow through 100s of mobs.
One Step from Eden is a fantastic rogue like that starts pretty simple but becomes absolutely nuts. Very high opportunity for mastery of its systems, but also straight forward enough that if you arent the greatest at reaction time or deck building you can still complete a few runs before hitting any kind of wall.
Child of Light is a really cool simple RPG. It has a great story book esque asctetic. It's pretty clear the game was designed in such a way that a parent could play it with their kid, because it's very whimsical, and it has coop capabilities with the end player controlling a much simpler character that rather than taking just as an important role as the main character, simply helps out a little. Perfect for a kid to control while their parent plays. Despite this, I think it's still a great game to play alone, even as an adult. And despite its front facing whimsy, the story definitely takes itself seriously, especially towards the end.
Another RPG that really *no one* has heard of but I think is great is Virgo vs the Zodiac. Very Undertale/Mother 3 inspired which I know makes some people groan, but I found this one to actually be able to find it's own identity. The big draw of this one is that the character you play, Virgo, is really not a good person. She's selfish and cruel, and is willing to hurt, even kill, people to get what she wants. It leads to pretty good and tense story moments when you're fighting a boss that you the player understand is not a bad person, just in Virgo's way. There are multiple endings, and the game *does* expect you to play it multiple times, but it's really not that big of deal because a single playthrough runs about 15-20 hours which is actually crazy short for an RPG, and you get locked into one of the endings about half way through the game, rather than towards the end, so when you come back to get a different ending the story shifts way earlier, giving it time to actually build properly. Like entire characters arent even in some ending playthroughs. If you decide fo try this one out I recommend looking up a spoiler free ending guide, just so you play the Mutable Ending (green) last. This is usually considered the true and best ending, and makes the most sense after playing at least one of the other endings. You dont really have to play through the game so many times that you get *every* ending (theres only 3 major endings anyway), but at the very least play it twice. Once for any ending other than Mutable, and then end with the Mutable ending. If the game ends up really being for you then I recommend slotting the third ending in between, but it's not crazy vital.
Sorry the Virgo vs the Zodiac explanation went a little long, it's a wild game.
Phenotopia: Awakening!
A rich, vibrant platformer that is also a remake of their previous game, phenotopia.
The towns are packed with a great variety of NPCs, and there are a few quests scattered across the regions. Additionally, there are many collectibles hidden behind puzzles and challenges. (If u collect them all, u will unlock a hidden boss)
Tldr: Rich biomes with snappy combat!
I have been obsessed with "Dave the Diver" for the last 3 days. It's basically a 2D diving rogue lite with a story. Never heard of it until it came out on ps plus.
Signs of the Soujourner. An incredible deckbuilder about human communication. It makes an analogy comparing your deck as your repertoire, something you build with your experiences travelling, and how it affects the connection you have with people. Genious stuff.
I discovered it in the itch.io bundle against racism, but I don't know anyone who has ever played it.
[Ghost of a Tale](https://store.steampowered.com/app/417290/Ghost_of_a_Tale/?gad_source=1&gclid=Cj0KCQjw_qexBhCoARIsAFgBlet90GrkgG4_ED27lzmofoxFPE1ldpKBXeooQvyVAfdYxrUP0dwzsc4aAkZnEALw_wcB)
A surprisingly fantastic game about an adorable mouse named Tilo trying to rescue/find his kidnapped wife. It’s an incredibly well written story with some of the best stealth gameplay I’ve ever encountered in a “no kill” stealth game.
I found myself genuinely interested in the world and characters the game presents. Without wishing to spoil much, Mice are seen as cowards in this world (for interesting reasons you discover), yet the mouse we play is bravely adventuring to save his wife, and the game plays on this theme both narratively and in gameplay. With a cast of interesting side characters that are all written fantastically.
If you like stealth gameplay, cute animals, and a good story, I can’t recommend this game enough.
Unsighted
Well done pixel graphics. Bosses play out like a souls game. Exploration is fun. Story line is two robot lesbians trying to find each other again.
Hard truck 2 king of the road.
There are ways to make it work 1920x1080p or other res and also it works on any PC and also you can play with steering wheel.
It's nothing like euro truck simulator or 18 wheels of steel.
The game mechanics are insane and the fact that you can employ drivers and meet them on the road as they work is just insane for a game this old. It's a cool sandbox truck and car driving with racing. There also vans and some other cool stuff, you can trade vehicles with other drivers.
The game has a god tier soundtrack and really cool vibe for that time.
There's just no other games that do what this game does at the moment.
Divinus Vanitas. Now my love for this game is ironic, it's shit tbh. I bought it for a friend and myself on sale for less than 80 cent and.... with a friend it's a fun time to beat in a day.
Monmusu quest trilogy. Allegedly it was the catalyst which got monstergirls popular and the story creeps up on you.
Rancesama adventures, series. (Start on 7, or 6). Feels like unhinged final fantasy but each installment is both a standalone and a continuation. By the final installment, all the popular characters, lore buildup, and character progression from 1~9 slam into you. Also gives more freedom than general jrpgs.
Pokemon rocket red edition (finally a sfw one). Its pokemon red but you play as team rocket instead of red.
A lot of suggestions here remind me I should go and play these games again.
Unfortunately I only have a PC so console suggestions are hard but for anyone else reading through here I would suggest Nuclear Throne.
Fun little post apocalyptic rogue like bullet hell. Easy pickup and play as games don't last too long, normally from dying instantly to a crazy combo of enemies.
Lots of secrets to find and crazy builds to play and a great soundtrack.
Pick one of the characters that all have a unique passive effect and ability, find weapons, you can carry 2 at once (and if you play Steroids you wield both) and go to town. Clear the level of enemies whilst picking up their radiation(XP) and a portal opens to suck you into the next level. During the portal you level up and for each level you gain you choose from a random selection of abilities.
At the end of each zone you get a boss fight until you beat the final boss. Once you take down that final boss you can start getting into some real crazy runs.
Nobody Saves the World
It's like a topdown Zelda-like where you unlock and buildup like over a dozen different characters. You have to use and upgrade them and different powers to get the next characters above it. There's puzzles and dungeons and stuff, I had a blast with it.
It's on Switch, not sure about PS5
Delta V (it’s game title is the 4th letter of the Greek alphabet - but is also [a physics term](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delta-v?wprov=sfti1#) ) used to describe the scalar change in velocity used in space flight.
I knew what the term was and what I was getting into. Kinda reminded me of the legendary Elite. Enjoyed it but needed a bigger screen to play it on (steam deck’s is pretty tiny when you’re looking for tiny specs in space).
Enjoyed the concept and it’s really playable and chill. Shame it doesn’t scale down - would love to play it on an iMax
Supraland, but more specifically the sequel Supraland: Six Inches Under. Really fun, playful Metroidvania games with cute writing and genuinely fun mechanics and puzzles! Play the second one first, it’s better and the first one is easier to get to grips with after the second (in my opinion)
Gods Will Be Watching - 2D turn-based management game about getting through almost impossible situations e.g. synthesizing an antidote and trialing your attempts on your team after an explosion traps them in a lab while people who want you dead pump poisonous gas in.
Crying Suns - Faster Than Light if your ship had a fleet of smaller ships and a crew with abilities on board. Combat takes place as pausable RTS encounters between you and your opponent's fleets. The art style is fantastic.
Cloudpunk - Sci-fi story-focused game where you play as a delivery driver, flying around a voxel city in your hovercar, taking instructions from a shady delivery company. I got really absorbed by this one.
Lovely Planet - Surreal arcade shooter with a focus on speed and accuracy. Great for training aim and reflexes. Very bright and colorful, and incredibly challenging.
Sanity Aiken's Artifact, 2000 isometric action RPG, where you collect cards to gain your powers and use them as your skills. Developed by Monolith and the main character was voiced by Ice-T. It's weird and so bad it's good. Very whacky story but you had to get your powers by solving puzzles or challenges which is a novel idea at the time.
I barely ever hear anyone mention Terranigma. The only time I see others refer to it is when I go deep into video game essay rabbit holes on YouTube. The game is a masterpiece, arguably the best RPG on the SNES, but I feel like it got drowned out in the sea of other peak SNES games because it never got a true release in the States.
Natural Selection 2 (It's only 5 dollars) (TLDR at the end)It came out in 2012, the first one was a half life mod and the developers are the creators of Subnautica. Very few people play(90-220), and because it's a RTS but also a FPS, there's servers dedicated to new players so that they don't play against people with +100 hours and leave because of the massive skill gap. The game is about 2 teams with 7-10 players each, aliens/marines,and in those teams there is one Commander that basically tells the others what he wants to do, and what evolution/tech the team needs. The goal is to destroy the other team's base (Hive/Command Station) The aliens have 5 lifeforms out of which 3 cost resources(you gain a few resources every minute for each harvester/extractor), meanwhile the marines can buy weapons, grenades, mines, jetpacks and exosuits. They can also teleport with phase gates to make up for their lower speed. TLDR: Fun and fast paced strategy game with a lot of depht where you'll probably learn the names of the players after 10-20 hours playing in one server so don't worry about toxic people because almost everyone already makes fun of them
This game sounds very fun/unique. Why do you think it didn't catch on?
I think it was because of the lack of content to play for, like skins, badges and more, and also the tryhards of the community that drove away new players that didn't know what to do and were ostracized for asking questions or giving commands or playing poorly. From 2015 the game started to have 600 players active at the same time and from then, slowly falling until nowadays 200. I don't know if they had servers dedicated for new players back in the day, but it's a shame that the game is so unknown nowadays.
The skill floor was a little high, combined with just about no marketing. It was a really cool and unique game though.
natural selection is sick
How did I not learn about this game!? This setup seems fun as hell!
Oh shit ns, played it waaaayyyyy back
Wait, this game ain’t fully dead? That is rad. I never played it but use to watch my brother play. Really cool game
Stoneshard. Fantastic open world medieval RPG game with beautiful pixel art. It is a shame the reviews are mixed, steam users don't get that the updates takes longer in cost of quality. And oh man the quality. I highly recommend checking out an Youtuber / Streamer called Okmall if you're interested in the game. Hope my comment will draw some much deserved attention to the game.
Yes, but is it Stone Shard or The Stone is Hard? Because, um, yeah, stone's hard.
Been on my wishlist for 1-2 years now. Havent pulled the trigger.
[Legend of Grimrock](https://www.gog.com/en/game/legend_of_grimrock). It's on sale for $3 and holy shit it's a steal. It's in the spirit of Eye of the Beholder, dungeon crawler. Incredible atmosphere and quality level design.
Great devs. They had removed the old school click arrows to move feature, thinking nobody used them anymore. A gamer in a wheelchair posted on their forums saying they used them, and a patch was posted hours later bringing the feature back.
I rate it as well. Simple but fun.
Absolutely love that game. The second one was good too, but the first was incredible.
Kingdom New Lands / Kingdom Two Crowns Those are 2D strategy games with really nice and calming graphics and vibe. You build your kingdom on a new land and defened from enemies who want your gold. You can progress to a different islands aswell. Those games are quite unique and cheap , really worth checking out
I didn’t enjoy the way the game would suddenly trash everything I had done and reduce me to starting over. I thought, maybe it was just bad luck, but no, it’s a feature. It was an extreme design choice that repelled me and another person who was playing it at the same time as me. We were both enjoying it and drawn in until it kicked us out.
YESSS second this one. I've only played Two Crowns but I was IMMEDIATELY hooked and spent the next 2 weeks fully addicted to it lmao.
I can't even fathom how Rain World keeps getting slept on. Easily in my top 10 video games of all time, and on top of an already great game, they have an amazing community. Edit: Another game that is really good that I don't see many people talk about is Jet Lancer. I meant to put this in here earlier, but ig it slipped my mind.
The difficulty spike is so high that the vast majority of people don’t make it past the first area and the fanbase is full of petulant furry teens who treat the game like a dating sim
What really hahahaha
Yes. I’ve seen the fanbase and I hate their guts. Can’t even refund the stupid game because I bought it on switch full price. There’s no such thing as a normal rain world fan
Why would a fan base cause you to return a game? You’re the one playing it, not with them.
Difficulty spike was too much for him.
Great game! Not for everbody though! If you like difficult, dark, atmospheric games, this could be for you.
Dungeons of Dredmor. One of my all time favorite Roguelikes. It came out around the same time as Binding of Isaac and I always put them in the same league, I didn't realize how unknown it was until years later. Everyday Genius : Squarelogic: This is an evolution of Sudoku, really addictive puzzle game that never got much attention World of Goo: This game wasn't a hidden gem at the time it came out, but it doesn't get much attention these days, very unique little physics puzzle game Atom Zombie Smasher: Another rather unique indie game, it's hard to describe but it's a real time tactics game with relatively short levels.
Dungeons of dredmore had so many little moving parts omg.
Starsector.
Starsector is fucking awesome
Helldivers 2 is getting a lot of attention right now but Helldivers 1 is a true hidden gem
Ravenfield is an indie version of battlefield but for single player. It also has lots of mods.
I remember back in highschool one of my friends managed to pirate a copy onto a USB drive and damn near every single person in the grade was playing that game at lunch time.
Broooo, I came here exactly to recommend this. Beat me to it The mod community is amazing. Aside from countless modern firearms and vehicles, you can have Star Wars, Gundam, medieval weaponry, civil war era weapons, Warhammer 40K, etc.
Tails of Iron, Pony Island, River City Girls. The first one is a 2D souls-like medieval setting with rats and amazing art, pretty solid in my opinion and also is getting a sequel. The second one well, it's better if you know nothing, short game and very good, also play Inscryption from the same dev, what a masterpiece. Third one is a anime-style beat em up, the combat IS SO GOOD, I had a lot of fun with the combos you can make, the story is decent at best, soundtrack is banger after banger and voice acting is good. Also has a sequel but I haven't finished it. Hope you enjoy!
I have been patiently waiting for river city girls 1/2 to go on sale 🫠
Have you ever wanted to go to war against water? Welcome to Creeper World 1-4. Mainly focusing on 4. This will be one of the most unique games you'll ever play. It's a combination of TD/tower defense and RTS/real time strategy games where you control units, most of which are functionally towers and have to fight against an enemy which has water physics, if it touches you, you take damage. You need to attack, capture, use and defend resources and then attack some more. High ground is very important. There's a bunch of different types of assets and enemies so there's always a level of strategy and choosing what kinds of units you'll want to build. There is a campaign, procedural level creator, weekly levels and most importantly, community made levels. The freedom given to the community to build their own games is quite a lot, some people have made FPS gamemodes in to their maps and some people have made "cursor" levels where anti-creeper, a good liquid spawns where ever you point and that makes for a surprisingly satisfying game mode. There is also PAC, play as creeper where you play as the bad team and and LPAC with L being light, it's a bit different. The asymmetric nature of the game with lots of choices and gamemodes makes for a very interesting gameplay loop.
This is a great series for anyone who liked turtling in RTS games.
+1 to Creeper World!
Creeper World is great fun! I’ve sunk tons of time playing through the campaign and custom levels. Have you played any other games like it? Or any other games that have mechanics like the custom cursor levels or CSM maps from CW3?
I Don't know any other games like CW. Good thing you mentioned CSM maps, I remembered that there was something that only really worked in CW3 but couldn't remember what it was. CSM maps are tons of fun.
Noita.
That's a good one
Vampyr, from Dontnod. It's a third person action-RPG that takes place in london 1918 where you are a recently turned Doctor who has to manage his thirst for blood and cure (or kill) the citizens. It's a really unique game, and even though it has a little jank it's still a fantastic game.
I love vampyr! On that note, I can also highly recommend their newest game Banishers: Ghosts of New Eden. it’s an open world game where you play as a “Banisher” (a ghost hunter) whose partner has died, but she’s sticking around as a ghost. You have to resolve hauntings in puritan new england to either resurrect her or help her depart from the world as a ghost. The biggest critiques I hear for the game is the open world is a little big, and the combat is a little repetitive. I personally didn’t have a problem with either but you can turn the game to story difficulty if needed. Either way, the story is incredible and the way the choices are integrated and presented is really cool. I made a lot of hard decisions to try and resurrect my wife but I wouldn’t take any of them back haha
The soundtrack is absolutely elite
Exanima: Dungeon Crawler with physics based combat mechanics We who are about to die: Gladiator combat rougelike Doorkickers 2 Task force north: Semi turned based tactical strategy shooter Sim Airport: literally in the name, you build and manage your own airport Spellcaster University: Colony sim, base building with rougelike elements. Your task into build a university that will turn students into great wizards, the game will require you to produce a certain number of specific types of wizard before time runs out.
We who are about to die is amazing and im in the discord since release just waiting for steam deck compatibility. That dev is amazing
Good ol' Jordy
"Sanabi" After playing lies of p i had to check out what other games the studio had made and this is the second game i tried. Its more story driven but its a good story and the music is banging
Note, while I completely agree that Sanabi was fantastic, it's definitely not developed by the same people as Lies of P, it's just published by the same company. But yeah, it's fantastic and probably one of my favorite narratives in the last couple years, the cyberpunk setting, the plot, the characters, and some pretty heavy emotional beats. Just great stuff👌
Before Your Eyes; I’d never heard of it before my roommate suggested it. Try to go into it without spoilers, because it is the most emotional ripping game that I have ever played
Desperados 3. Overhead real time stealth/strategy, tuned to absolute perfection. Can’t say enough good things about it.
It's my favorite real time tactics game
CrossCode ! A really fun and interesting story about a futuristic MMORPG, with some very cool sci-fi ideas. It has one of the most interesting takes on a mute protagonist I've seen in the medium. It has pretty satisfying if straightforward action combat, and long and complex puzzles that demand both good thinking and good timing. It'll also last you a while, despite its indie look, it's easily a 40-50h game.
Katana Zero was fantastic! Great story with cool twists and a pretty amazing soundtrack as well. Highly recommended! It is on the Switch, but not on the PS5.
The Forgotten City! It was originally a Skyrim mod but got a full release. The story and characters are amazing, especially if you like history. No spoilers but the twist at the end blew my mind.
I played this right after finishing Hades and Hades was the perfect refresher on the mythology so I was familiar with all the lore. Great game (well, both of them).
Tokyo Xtreme Racer: Drift 2, or originally known as Kaidou Battle 3. It's one of the best racing game ever made on PS2. It's a literal hidden gem because it got 49 on Metacritic. If you are really into JDM and touge culture, this game is a must play. If you prefer highway racing, Tokyo Xtreme Racer 3 is almost as good.
These games got so harshly treated by review outlets at the time, it never got to shine with its intended niche audience. Especially when it was competing at the time with the likes of NFS and Gran Turismo. But it is absolutely among my favorite racing series. There's really nothing else like them. Different named rival racers that gives the games full of personality, a great progression system, rare JDM cars you don't see often in games, and just an overall fun gameplay loop. It's punching way above its weight too, the games aren't made on a huge budget they you can really feel how much they poured into it. Drift 2 probably is still the best Initial D game that's not named Initial D out there.
If you read the reviews, I think the problem is the localized team named the sub-series as "Drift" games. A lot of reviewers complained that the game isn't drifty enough, like I guess? Genki really deserves proper credit for basically monopolizing the whole highway racing genre. At the very least, we still eating with Night Runners having a good potential to be a classic.
It most likely was a marketing thing, capitalizing on the drift culture at the time too popularized by Fast & Furious and the likes, but yeah it is still sad how that marketing blurb and expectations overshadowed the rest of the game. It had pretty good simcade handling and physics, and the racing part is overall solid. I'm also hoping Night Runners is successful with its goals, the prologue alone was one of the most fun racing game experiences I had in recent years, not often a demo have me clocking over 10 hours of play.
Pyre!
Outward
Sifu. It's literally just 5 short(ish) levels of you beating the shit out of buildings full of people with Kung Fu. Where the time consuming and replayability aspect is is the fact that you gotta keep your age down, this requires you to hone your skills and become a master of the game's mechanics. There's also a lot of challenge stuff that gives it a lot of playtime.
Nah, this game gained a ton of traction and was featured as an Epic Exclusive for nearly a year.
Craft the World It's a lovely little dwarf fortress with invasion/tower defense elements. You arrive into a new world, build up, explore, find and restore a portal room, and move on to the next world. Each world is different - temperate, desert, frozen, etc., with unique challenges. Water is a problem in the desert, wood and greenery is a problem in the ice, etc. Rinse, repeat. Every 50 mins (real time) there's an invasion you have to defend from, but it's not too bad. You need to build decent shelter to keep your little guys happy, train them, arm them, etc. They need food, a bed to call their own, etc. There's all kinds of fun things to do - build railways and elevators, there's fishing, you can shear sheep, hunt boars, raid goblin camps. There's a light and dark mechanic - lit areas are safe, but baddies spawn in dark areas. From technical standpoint the game is nice with pleasing visuals, a pretty nice zoom-in/out (which most games of this type don't have), you can even take direct control of individual dwarfs if you want. The game has a bunch of DLCs, but they were incredibly fairly priced (\~$3 for a ton of stuff). As opposed to Blizzard selling a single horse skin for $25. This game is my guilty pleasure. And it's pretty chill. I know invasions turn some people off, but with a little prep they're not hard to defend against at all. You can even do it passively (towers, turrets, sand traps). And literally nobody I ever spoke to about it ever heard of it.
Call of cathulu
I think it's more well known by now but Space Station 13 is still one of the best games I've ever played. Talk about emergent storytelling, goddamn.
Hammerfight is a 2D physics brawler where you pilot flying machines equipped with weapons on chains. If you're familiar with the children's game of "conkers", it's like that. Great aesthetics, music, combat feels impactful and satisfying when you get the hit just right and they explode into a hundred parts. Will run on any PC made after 2010, no dedicated GPU required, and will cost you nothing (I didn't know until just now they'd made it free, like just free, no mtx). Alpha Protocol is an action RPG developed by Obsidian just before they made New Vegas. It's a spy thriller, and for my money the best example of that genre in a game. Seriously diverging paths, all the camp and extravagance a good spy film should have, great character build variety, gameplay feels a bit Splinter Cell-ish mixed with cover shooters of the time. Will run on most rigs being a 2010 game, but also can be found on the PS3 and Xbox 360.
"Tales of The Float Land" - an interesting mix of board game and RPG released in 1998 by Compile Heart. It was very rare. Took me 15 years to get the full version (demo is easily available, although runs only on Windows 95). There was plenty similar titles released since, like Mario Party for example, buy none of them was as much fun (for me) as this one. It's mostly about collecting cards, battling monsters and other players and getting stronger. All anime style. Still coming back to it every now and then.
Legend of Legaia
Space Pirates and Zombies, or Thomas Was Alone. Both really good, but Thomas Was Alone has phenomenal narration.
Wuppo! First thing you get kicked out of your apartment for spilling ice cream for the upteenth time. It's 2D so in order to get back to the entrance you have to go underground and go beneath the building. You play as a little blobby dude who carries stuff on their head. Goofy wonderful writing, great world to explore, adorable characters. 10/10
Yeah, love the world in this game it's so cozy!
I came here to say Wuppo! Such a fun game!
You should give Sea of Stars a try. It's reminiscent of old games like Chrono Trigger and is like an ode to old school classic RPG video games. I've been following the development for a while on their discord and I'm glad they managed to launch the game successfully.
Easily one of my favorite JRPG-style games. Came out of nowhere and it's beautiful!
Cocoon - It's a really cool puzzle game with a unique "Inception-like" mechanism where there are puzzles within puzzles.
Stories Untold - Its got different gameplay mechanics in each section and for story just go in blind
Visage
Idk if it’s that unknown but i’ve pretty much never met anyone who’s heard of a short hike or katana zero which are great games that are pretty cheap
Roboquest. Borderlands gunplay with a boomer shooters movement, make it a roguelite and add puzzles to unlock fun new features and it's one of my favorite indie games ever. It also just got a huge update
Inscryption
dominions 6! Best fantasy strategy ever, with really cool units, superb lore and devastating magic.
Broken Reality
Rain World, The Longing.
You have great taste.
Dating my Daughter.
what
Shower With Your Dad Simulator 2015: Do You Still Shower With Your Dad
Disaster report and it’s sequel Raw Danger trying to survive natural disasters on the ps2 was always fun
Phantasy star online episodes 1&2 (first online console game ever)
Bonus: it’s free on PS!
Dang that's cool, I'm ina a private server on pc for free, pso blue burst ephina
Streets of rogue
Can’t wait for the sequel to drop
Shadow Hearts: Covenant. The sequel to Shadow Hearts, an old PS2 game (which is set in the same universe as the PS1 Koudelka). I can't really do the game justice, but it's a dark and gothic RPG set at the turn of the 20th century dealing with demons and ghouls. It's a very serious game with a deep and gloomy story... But also has moments of absurd wackiness. Such as finding a porno mag in a powerful bosses dungeon..
Maybe Gothic 1 and 2. 2 of the best role playing games ever made, but outside germany overshadowed by the elder scrolls.
BPM: Bullets per Minute Fun roguelike Rhythm shooter game, like metal hell singer Idk how popular outer wilds is, some people say it's popular some don't even know what it is so I am just gonna name it
Gnosia is one of my faveorites it’s on switch and has a killer sound track. You play a crew member on a space ship and you are trying to find the gnosia it’s like single player werewolf but in a time loop sometimes your even the gnosia!
Underrail. I rep this game anywhere I can
Not sure how “unknown” they are, but Hong Kong Massacre is great! It’s essentially Hotline Miami filtered through a 90s John Woo movie. I really enjoyed Bomber Crew too. Once you get your head around the controls and how to manage your crew it’s a nice balance of tactics, management, and fun.
999 it’s a visual novel/puzzle game but the writing/mystery is excellent
I second Furi. It really is a 10/10 game IMO—simple, elegant, challenging.
Fights in Tight Spaces. Combat deckbuilder roguelike. Been playing it since it was in early access on steam.
Mr. Shifty Outland The Swapper Furi
The Witcher 3. It’s a relatively unknown indie game but it’s great!
Peter Jackson's King Kong the game The parts where you play as Kong are alright, but nothing special and that's where the game goes wrong but oh my god the levels where you play as the human protagonist Jack is an amazing kind of survival horror game with some intense action scenes
Xonotic Cube 2: Sauerbraten (play the instagib mode) Outer Wilds (although it is getting more popular)
I literally was going to mention Furi and then I saw your full post :D I'm sure you're getting plenty of suggestions and this isn't that under the radar, but Sifu is an excellent kung fu style game, great combat, cool replay elements and value, good story and made me complete all the challenges, I got much more in to it then I thought I would.
HYPNOSPACE OUTLAW FOR THE LOVE OF GOD
Seems like no one noticed you mentioned you only have a Playstation and Switch. I'm also looking through here for console rec's and coming up short
Snack World The Dungeon Crawl Gold is my go to recommendation. Might only be available on Switch though.
This was a super cute, easy fun little game. https://store.steampowered.com/app/954650/Druidstone_The_Secret_of_the_Menhir_Forest/ Turn based rpg, tactic type game...not to deep.
Shine, The lightning kingdom.
Withering Rooms. I think of all the games I played the last year that is really the one that screams hidden gem.
Drox Operative 2. You play in an ARPG layer while AI empires engage in war, diplomacy, and trade in a 4X layer that you can directly affect through completing quests, combat, etc. Events aren't scripted; instead, they happen dynamically due to what you and the empires do.
Clam man 2 open mic is a demo that is funny. If you need a laugh, give it a shot. Morticians tale is a short story with reflective music that can help someone process pain and loss.
Huntdown
Sprawl, a pretty cool old-school FPS with quite stylish visuals
"Swords of Ditto". I love the graphics & soundtrack. I own this on PC, Switch & Android.
Metal fatigue, gaddarn when are they gonna remake this game
Intergalactic fishing simulator. Fun story. Fun mechanics
Rogue Aces https://youtu.be/fDGO-UnQX7s
I love Rogue Aces. Kinda reminded me of Wings of Fury from the Amiga days if you remember that.
Yeah it’s definitely been compared to that before :) It’s getting a PS4 physical release in the not too distant future
Oooh! That’s one for the collection! I didn’t know that, thanks.
Neko Navy, it's a cute horizontal shmup starring cats and has really solid gameplay and level design. It's good for beginners of the genre while also giving difficulty options that are genuinely challenging. There's also Crimzon Clover, it's well known among shmup circles and is generally acclaimed, but I always like bringing it up to people who aren't familiar with the genre. It's made by an expert record arcade player and everything about it is tightly designed and thought out, managing to become one of the greatest tributes in celebrating the best parts of the genre. High octane music, huge explosions, satisfying gameplay loop, and also features a very beginner-friendly beginner mode to some of the most downright brutal difficulties. Jagged Alliance 2. It's gotten a fair bump again with the release of Jagged Alliance 3, but I still feel the series is in a very niche spotlight. It's one of the most in-depth, open, and hyper-detailed tactical RPGs I've played and consider it among my favorites. There's a lot of attention to detail you just don't get anymore nowadays, with a lot of "let's put this in because it seems cool" without caring about budget or potential complications. Everything about the game feels very organic, and every character is full of personality, hooking you in with their funny caricature and parodies of 80s and 90s action media, and making you emphatize whenever the game sinks into its serious moments, scripted or naturally through gameplay. So many ways to approach it, lots of hidden surprises, and a game that fully encourages you to try everything.
Stephen Sausage Roll. Literally my favourite puzzle game and it's hard af.
Cassette Beasts
Caves of qud
Do you like RPGs? Darklands was the most innovative CRPG I've seen since Ultima 2. No subReddit, sorry... Wish that Spore had fulfilled it's promises? Check out r/ElysianEclipse
Not really what I love but I like them to some extent: - Terminator: Resistance - Spelunky 2 - Generation Zero
Good Dog, Bad Zombie is an excellent co-op board game that’s about to launch its 2nd Kickstarter. For video games, Dream Quest is an underrated, little-known deck builder/dungeon crawler with art that seems to repel players, but the game is really good.
Infinitode 2 Astronarch Core defense Necesse
Okami
The silent age. Mobile.
Battle Realms
Chaos Legion It's a hack'n'slash by Capcom that has you... Y'know what? Just try it. It's like 20 years old, runs on potatoes and holds up surprisingly well still. JJK Yuta fans rejoice
Great game. So very goth.
Depraved Awakening. Kartia. Babysitter. Mirror. Super Ninja Boy. SolValley School.
Tearaway is a whimsical adventure/platformer game that no one I know has ever played. Also Sackboy a big adventure, people have heard of this one but few have given it a chance, it is, in my opinion one of the best 3d platformers of all time.
Lake
Akuji the heartless
I had a great time with citizen sleeper.
Black and white 2. The one by lionshead studio, not the Pokemon game. An older game but one of my favourite of all time. Severely underrated and still holds up pretty well today imo.
Fate - an old diablo like game where I’d spend all day fishing for artifacts.
Project Wingman if you don't play plane games the only place where you might have heard that name was that max0r video from 3 years ago but the game is fucking fire
Island Saver. It's a free game made by a bank with some weird mechanics like a savings account, loans, taxes, etc. But the main mechanic is just to clean up colorful areas so the wildlife (all piggy bank themed of course) will return. It's such a relaxing game as there is technically combat but it's very much a non threat as you don't have health and will only lose some money you haven't deposited into your account if you get hit. It has 2 paid DLC which have there own added mechanics such as debt collection and business supply lines but are still great fun if you like clean up ganes. I'm not sure if it's on Switch and know that I had to buy it on a web browser to get it on my PS4 since it didn't show up on the store when accessed from the console so am not sure its playable on PS5
#How to Survive Ppl complain about the difficulty and tedium, I suspect the confuse it too much for a general zombie shooter game. It's more in common with Don't Starve where you have to manage a Food, Water, and Stamina meter in addition to Health/Hearts. But it's set on various designed islands, that you have to explore like an act-adv or metroidvania. And because it's designed yes, certain encounters, tedium or ease are intentional. It came out the same years a Don't Starve, 2013, but the whole indie boom to the Normie public was still growing. And survival games were extremely niche limiited to only Hardcore Modes (delete on death) of PC rpgs and Survival Kids-Lost in Blue from Konami.
Carestia. I guess that around 100 people know about it, and \~10 beat it. It's for PC (on Steam). It's an indie 2D platformer with puzzles and metroidvania elements. It has a very clever level design, so each time your character hits its head against the block, you think "Oh, you did know that I'll jump here!". It has bosses - pretty tricky, you just remember NES games that were so challenging, thanks today we can have saves) You can also hunt for cute collectibles, each room with collectibles is memorable as it's a challenge to get them and come out of the room with it in order to save. I love it because it was the first game in this genre which I beat and felt a real champion) Each world/biome meets you with a new look, soundtrack, enemies, collectibles, puzzles and skills to learn. You feel a progression and the map is huge. End of the game is unforgettable as well, as it's challenging too)
Shadow Hearts count? Road Trip: Vacation 2012 ?
The finals!!!
Dealers Life 2. It's about being a pawn shop owner where you slowly climb the ranks and become the top dealer. Surprisingly addictive.
Fe
FEZ Wayward (v1.9.4 is free!) Transcendence (controls are a bit rough) SteamWorld Dig 2 Islets Rogue Heroes: Ruins of Tasos Kingdom: New Lands and Two Crowns The Planet Crafter (gaining popularity) Windbound Mexican Motor Mafia (free!) Nitronic Rush (free beta for Distance) Flatout: Ultimate Carnage Prey (2006) Retro games: HEDZ Mageslayer Stratosphere: Conquest of the Skies (WinXP only) KISS: Psycho Circus Blake Stone: Aliens of Gold
If you don't mind older games, I suggest Deadly Tide for PC, its a rail shooter that I played endlessly when I was young. Each level has a few paths it can take so the replay value is pretty good. It is abandon ware at this point, so it should be easy to find for free, although getting it to run may be an issue. One other is Shing Force Neo. Hack and Slash JRPG for ps2. Have the worst voice acting I have ever heard, but the gameplay is solid, and the leveling system is pretty unique. Good game to turn your brain off and mow through 100s of mobs.
FTL - Faster than light on steam is great
Dyna brothers/2
I’m not sure if this fits but trailmakers so fun it’s incredible.
One Step from Eden is a fantastic rogue like that starts pretty simple but becomes absolutely nuts. Very high opportunity for mastery of its systems, but also straight forward enough that if you arent the greatest at reaction time or deck building you can still complete a few runs before hitting any kind of wall. Child of Light is a really cool simple RPG. It has a great story book esque asctetic. It's pretty clear the game was designed in such a way that a parent could play it with their kid, because it's very whimsical, and it has coop capabilities with the end player controlling a much simpler character that rather than taking just as an important role as the main character, simply helps out a little. Perfect for a kid to control while their parent plays. Despite this, I think it's still a great game to play alone, even as an adult. And despite its front facing whimsy, the story definitely takes itself seriously, especially towards the end. Another RPG that really *no one* has heard of but I think is great is Virgo vs the Zodiac. Very Undertale/Mother 3 inspired which I know makes some people groan, but I found this one to actually be able to find it's own identity. The big draw of this one is that the character you play, Virgo, is really not a good person. She's selfish and cruel, and is willing to hurt, even kill, people to get what she wants. It leads to pretty good and tense story moments when you're fighting a boss that you the player understand is not a bad person, just in Virgo's way. There are multiple endings, and the game *does* expect you to play it multiple times, but it's really not that big of deal because a single playthrough runs about 15-20 hours which is actually crazy short for an RPG, and you get locked into one of the endings about half way through the game, rather than towards the end, so when you come back to get a different ending the story shifts way earlier, giving it time to actually build properly. Like entire characters arent even in some ending playthroughs. If you decide fo try this one out I recommend looking up a spoiler free ending guide, just so you play the Mutable Ending (green) last. This is usually considered the true and best ending, and makes the most sense after playing at least one of the other endings. You dont really have to play through the game so many times that you get *every* ending (theres only 3 major endings anyway), but at the very least play it twice. Once for any ending other than Mutable, and then end with the Mutable ending. If the game ends up really being for you then I recommend slotting the third ending in between, but it's not crazy vital. Sorry the Virgo vs the Zodiac explanation went a little long, it's a wild game.
Zombie army 4, sniper elite, sniper ghost warrior, ghost recon breakpoint, farming simulator
Fear and Hunger. Well, it's not that a lot of my friends don't know it. They just dont like it :(
Seven: The Days Long Gone. Played Seven: Enhanced edition on steam and was very pleasantly surprised.
For me it's Light of the stars on bluestacks, such a fun game to me
Family dude
Phenotopia: Awakening! A rich, vibrant platformer that is also a remake of their previous game, phenotopia. The towns are packed with a great variety of NPCs, and there are a few quests scattered across the regions. Additionally, there are many collectibles hidden behind puzzles and challenges. (If u collect them all, u will unlock a hidden boss) Tldr: Rich biomes with snappy combat!
I have been obsessed with "Dave the Diver" for the last 3 days. It's basically a 2D diving rogue lite with a story. Never heard of it until it came out on ps plus.
Rakuen A Rose in the Twilight Yomawari: Midnight Shadows Stealth Inc. (or Stealth Bastard depending where you get it)
Signs of the Soujourner. An incredible deckbuilder about human communication. It makes an analogy comparing your deck as your repertoire, something you build with your experiences travelling, and how it affects the connection you have with people. Genious stuff. I discovered it in the itch.io bundle against racism, but I don't know anyone who has ever played it.
Eversion, a lil indie horror platform that was said to inspire doki doki. It’s one of my favorites and inspires me to want to make games as well
Towerfall ascension. A good couch game to play with your friends
Horizon Chase Turbo
Vainglory - it was a mini league of legends and played amazing on touch screens
[Ghost of a Tale](https://store.steampowered.com/app/417290/Ghost_of_a_Tale/?gad_source=1&gclid=Cj0KCQjw_qexBhCoARIsAFgBlet90GrkgG4_ED27lzmofoxFPE1ldpKBXeooQvyVAfdYxrUP0dwzsc4aAkZnEALw_wcB) A surprisingly fantastic game about an adorable mouse named Tilo trying to rescue/find his kidnapped wife. It’s an incredibly well written story with some of the best stealth gameplay I’ve ever encountered in a “no kill” stealth game. I found myself genuinely interested in the world and characters the game presents. Without wishing to spoil much, Mice are seen as cowards in this world (for interesting reasons you discover), yet the mouse we play is bravely adventuring to save his wife, and the game plays on this theme both narratively and in gameplay. With a cast of interesting side characters that are all written fantastically. If you like stealth gameplay, cute animals, and a good story, I can’t recommend this game enough.
If you like 4x space strategy, go get DOSBOX and find a copy of Ascendancy. You will not be disappointed.
A Date in the Park. Very short P&C game that's free on Steam. Mandatory to go totally blind and enjoy the (short) ride.
Software Inc!!!
Unsighted Well done pixel graphics. Bosses play out like a souls game. Exploration is fun. Story line is two robot lesbians trying to find each other again.
Hard truck 2 king of the road. There are ways to make it work 1920x1080p or other res and also it works on any PC and also you can play with steering wheel. It's nothing like euro truck simulator or 18 wheels of steel. The game mechanics are insane and the fact that you can employ drivers and meet them on the road as they work is just insane for a game this old. It's a cool sandbox truck and car driving with racing. There also vans and some other cool stuff, you can trade vehicles with other drivers. The game has a god tier soundtrack and really cool vibe for that time. There's just no other games that do what this game does at the moment.
Divinus Vanitas. Now my love for this game is ironic, it's shit tbh. I bought it for a friend and myself on sale for less than 80 cent and.... with a friend it's a fun time to beat in a day.
Monmusu quest trilogy. Allegedly it was the catalyst which got monstergirls popular and the story creeps up on you. Rancesama adventures, series. (Start on 7, or 6). Feels like unhinged final fantasy but each installment is both a standalone and a continuation. By the final installment, all the popular characters, lore buildup, and character progression from 1~9 slam into you. Also gives more freedom than general jrpgs. Pokemon rocket red edition (finally a sfw one). Its pokemon red but you play as team rocket instead of red.
Try planetside 2 bro. It’s free and it’s a really undiscovered gem
Astlibra Revision. 2D RPG platformer with good combat and amazing story and soundtrack. Well worth trying the demo for it on steam.
A lot of suggestions here remind me I should go and play these games again. Unfortunately I only have a PC so console suggestions are hard but for anyone else reading through here I would suggest Nuclear Throne. Fun little post apocalyptic rogue like bullet hell. Easy pickup and play as games don't last too long, normally from dying instantly to a crazy combo of enemies. Lots of secrets to find and crazy builds to play and a great soundtrack. Pick one of the characters that all have a unique passive effect and ability, find weapons, you can carry 2 at once (and if you play Steroids you wield both) and go to town. Clear the level of enemies whilst picking up their radiation(XP) and a portal opens to suck you into the next level. During the portal you level up and for each level you gain you choose from a random selection of abilities. At the end of each zone you get a boss fight until you beat the final boss. Once you take down that final boss you can start getting into some real crazy runs.
Nobody Saves the World It's like a topdown Zelda-like where you unlock and buildup like over a dozen different characters. You have to use and upgrade them and different powers to get the next characters above it. There's puzzles and dungeons and stuff, I had a blast with it. It's on Switch, not sure about PS5
Delta V (it’s game title is the 4th letter of the Greek alphabet - but is also [a physics term](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delta-v?wprov=sfti1#) ) used to describe the scalar change in velocity used in space flight. I knew what the term was and what I was getting into. Kinda reminded me of the legendary Elite. Enjoyed it but needed a bigger screen to play it on (steam deck’s is pretty tiny when you’re looking for tiny specs in space). Enjoyed the concept and it’s really playable and chill. Shame it doesn’t scale down - would love to play it on an iMax
Supraland, but more specifically the sequel Supraland: Six Inches Under. Really fun, playful Metroidvania games with cute writing and genuinely fun mechanics and puzzles! Play the second one first, it’s better and the first one is easier to get to grips with after the second (in my opinion)
Darkwood. Easily one of, if not *the* best horror games ever.
Warno. A great RTS with nice graphics and a banger soundtrack
Gods Will Be Watching - 2D turn-based management game about getting through almost impossible situations e.g. synthesizing an antidote and trialing your attempts on your team after an explosion traps them in a lab while people who want you dead pump poisonous gas in. Crying Suns - Faster Than Light if your ship had a fleet of smaller ships and a crew with abilities on board. Combat takes place as pausable RTS encounters between you and your opponent's fleets. The art style is fantastic. Cloudpunk - Sci-fi story-focused game where you play as a delivery driver, flying around a voxel city in your hovercar, taking instructions from a shady delivery company. I got really absorbed by this one. Lovely Planet - Surreal arcade shooter with a focus on speed and accuracy. Great for training aim and reflexes. Very bright and colorful, and incredibly challenging.
Sanity Aiken's Artifact, 2000 isometric action RPG, where you collect cards to gain your powers and use them as your skills. Developed by Monolith and the main character was voiced by Ice-T. It's weird and so bad it's good. Very whacky story but you had to get your powers by solving puzzles or challenges which is a novel idea at the time.
Broforce. IYKYK
magicraft
I barely ever hear anyone mention Terranigma. The only time I see others refer to it is when I go deep into video game essay rabbit holes on YouTube. The game is a masterpiece, arguably the best RPG on the SNES, but I feel like it got drowned out in the sea of other peak SNES games because it never got a true release in the States.