If Enderal isn’t on your radar yet, that is reason to buy Skyrim.

Total conversion mod that uses Skyrim’s assets to build a completely new game (lore, characters, terrain, voice acting, etc are new, and have nothing to do with the Elder Scrolls universe).

It’s crazy impressive for an indie dev crew’s passion project.

Completely free, provided you own Skyrim.

Zelda OOT, or vanilla WoW. Hearing the intro music from either is a pretty strong nostalgia hit.

…in an it was the worst thing ever kind of way - cuz that meant it was over Q_Q

Especially in the era before just looking shit up on the internet when you hit a snag. I remember scouring levels in that looking for a path that I’d missed when I couldn’t figure out where I was supposed to go next.

Definitely a highlight of the N64 for me. It’s up there with the Zeldas in my book.

My parents didn’t let me buy any shooter games other than jet force gemini

At least you landed on solid gold! Jet Force Gemini was the single best shooter for the N64. Far superior to Golden Eye. Yes, I’ll die on this hill.

It’d be pretty great if consoles finally acknowledged that they’re just a PC with a moustache and glasses nowadays; and transitioned into a digital space to effectively become officially supported emulators. Especially if launcher isn’t restricted.

These games were a highlight of my childhood. That said, I’ve tried to revisit them, and by today’s standards, they did NOT age well. Trying to remaster these would be a massive undertaking - I’ll be cheering for them, though.

When I was a teen I played WoW from vanilla through Cata… Had over a full year of in game /played time on just my main.

…and I made a lot of alts.

100% full-blown addicted.

Blizzard is actually the one example of enshittification that I can actually be thankful for - I didn’t really ever quit; they just stopped supplying my drug of choice. They definitely had the power to keep me enthralled, but instead shifted to a younger and younger target audience as I was ofc aging the opposite direction.

The Kung-Fu-Panda xpac trailer was finally my cue to accept that my dealer wasn’t going to provide that fix anymore.

Then I started making healthy life decisions discovered Ark >_<

Edit - …Ark owned my life for a bit, too:

If we’re pitching microtransactions as extremist content, I’m on board.

Portal if you want to pass the controller, Portal 2 if you want multiplayer. Both great options for what you’re describing.

Just play WoW on a private server and stop supporting Blizzard’s anti-user business model.

What did I get flipped?

Legality vs morality

Why wouldn’t torrenting the source code of proprietary software would be a legal issue?

It would be a legal issue. But it’s not a moral issue, which is why so few people are showing sympathy for Nintendo. They lose nothing if someone gets a copy of the code - there’s no victim. They do however have a LONG reputation for weaponizing the legal system by attacking fans with frivolous lawsuits - those DO have a victim, and are therefore a moral issue with Nintendo as the aggressor.

But regardless of context, again don’t conflate legality with morality. Ever. History is absolutely stuffed with atrocities that adhere to established law, that doesn’t make those atrocities okay. Videogame code is pretty minescule compared to legal attrocities like slavery or the holocost etc, but point remains that the law in-and-of-itself doesn’t mean shit.

Also fuck Nintendo.

Ya got those flipped.

Don’t conflate legality with morality.

*snaps gloves*

The force is about to be with you.

Halo CE, Halo 2, and Halo 3 are great. Then the franchise was purchased by 343 and everything since has been a soulless COD clone with a Halo skin… and a random RTS.

Image search pulls up Masters of Albion

Higher res shot:

Yeah those microtransactions didn’t lead to gambling, they are gambling.

Gambling aimed at minors via that lootbox shit was a thing even before videogames - earliest example I’m aware of are baseball cards. Our failure to legislate that shit into the grave at day 1 is why we’re in this situation now.

Spyware, now in rainbow!!

Iirc (edit - apparently incorrect) Halo was the first to use left joystick as forward/backward and left/right strafe; and right joystick as look up/down and pivot left/right.

I even recall articles counting it as a point against the game due to its ‘awkward controls’ …but apparently after a tiny learning curve, the entire community/industry got on board.

λ λ λ

Blind Guardian is pretty hit-and-miss: their shit lands somewhere on a spectrum of metal to renaissance-faire lol. Sacred Worlds is another one of my favorites.

All of Metallica’s S&M album is solid fucking gold, but the best (imo) song from it almost never gets the spotlight, so it’s tragically easy to miss: No Leaf Clover

Avenged Sevenfold isn’t symphonic metal, but they’ve got two songs that at least dip their toes in that water: The Stage, and Little Piece of Heaven.

Epica

If you know Epica you’re probably already familiar with Nightwish, but in case your not… well, Nightwish. Most of their music is more similar to Omega than the one I’m about to link, but this specific song is just so fucking weird, I love it: Scaretale. Definitely check out their other songs too!

Essence of Datum / Naxayras

You’d probably like Pelican - kind of ambient rock. Or Russian Circles, which is similar but more mellow.

Mohamed Shawky

Not familiar, and the only Mohamed Shawky’s I’m seeing on YouTube are a physicist and an athlete. Judging entirely by the name, I’m guessing it’s got some Arabic vibes, and the best I’ve got there is the first one I linked, Wheel of Time, mostly because of the intro… Antti Martikainen has some Arabic sounding songs - that dude’s music is ALL over the place… I recall one being a kind of Arabic metal that I could have SWORN was called “Ancient Worlds” but searching that isn’t coming up with anything. He does have Arabic hybrid sci-fi music lol. Skim that dude’s channel, and brace for a musical roller coaster.

Rivers of Nihil

Hmm, maybe try Lorna Shore, especially Pain Remains. Lorna Shore is WAY too throaty-howler-monkey-shit for me personally, but fortunately they’ve got instrumental versions too.

Nice mix of metal and violin.

Juuuuust in case you’re not already familiar with symphonic metal… It’s pretty fuckin great.

HyperX Cloud Alpha is the most comfortable I’ve used - could wear those all day, no pressure points. Sound quality is fantastic, largely due to the closed-back design.

And if you’re not already familiar with the difference between open- and closed-back headphones, definitely learn it! Something not often discussed in headset articles is how YOU sound when wearing them. It’s a bit weird to describe, but you ofc hear yourself when you speak, and something that alters how you’re supposed to sound can be jarring as fuck.

The you sound when you speak without having anything on your head or in your ears, would be most comparable to open-back headphones.

If you plug your ears and then speak, you’ll sound weird, and hearing yourself sound weird can make speaking feel weird.

…idk if I’m doing a good job putting this to words. For real, just stick your fingers in your ears and start saying a few sentences, you’ll hear what I mean.

I did NOT know the difference when I got my HyperX’s, and it took a while to get used to speaking with them on. Had I known the difference, I probably would have looked for an open-back model instead. I love em now, but again it did take a bit to get there.

I’ll update with links when I’m on my comp next (mobile now), but a few off the top of my head:

Portal 1 and 2. It’s so popular that it doesn’t seem like it even can be ‘unique’, but the game play really is one of a kind, and it’s pretty great.

Enderal - total conversion mod for Skyrim, but in the steam store as it’s own game. It’s got familiar combat and game mechanics, but the antagonists aren’t your typical big-bad-evil-guy, but things like emotions, mental states, and philosophies. Somehow they managed to work that kind of content into a fantasy RPG… it’s a fucking masterpiece, and it’s free if you have Skyrim in your library already (it uses Skyrim’s assets and engine, but is not related to Elder Scrolls in any way).

Zelda Majora’s Mask, for the N64. This game is fucking weird, even by the Zelda franchise’s standards. Every scene is bizarre in a way that other games haven’t hit before or since Zelda MJ. It’s built around the Kübler-Ross 5 stages of grief; it never draws attention to that, but guides you through them beautifully.

Secret World Legends. Technically an MMO, but treat it like a single player RPG - the MMO elements are shit. This game will have you running all over the globe to basically do Men In Black shit, but instead of aliens, it’s occult weirdness, and things like urban legends that turn out to be true. Heavy Lovecraftian influence. One of the more challenging parts of the game are investigative missions, which I’d encourage you to give a solid effort before turning to the web for answers. The objectives can be something like “investigate the murder of John Doe” …and that’s it. You have to tackle it the same way you would IRL, so you’d go to places that make sense like a police station or town hall. It doesn’t tell you, which makes it probably the most intellectually challenging games I’ve ever played. If you dive in, you’ll need to choose a faction when you make your character: and trust me in this, choose Illuminati. The story writing is way better than the other two for their faction-specific missions; and the rest of the game doesn’t change by faction (you’ll be in the same zones, grouping and working together with players in other factions; there’s just a few off-shoots of solo faction story time)

try using the console to set the speed to like 0.5 or even slower. When things speed up, the game physics goes nuts; slowing them down stabilizes them again.

Oh, good catch. Fixed.

Abiotic Factor

Hadn’t heard of that one… it’s like a survival builder set in Half Life 1 lol. Wishlisted!

Witcher 2’s controls are a bit janky, but it’s a solid game in and of itself for the story alone; if you can stomach some pretty bad mechanics to enjoy an otherwise decent product, I’d say start at #2.

Witcher 1 is… so bad it’s kinda comical. I’d just pull up a story summary of Witcher 1 on youtube and call it a day. If you’re a masochist, go ahead and give the actual game a whirl; but I’d recommend modding the snot out of it to at least make your character OP as fuck, allowing you to mostly skip the god-awful combat. But even then, the only selling point is the story, which again you can just pull up on YouTube.

That said, you can dive into 3 with zero knowledge of the previous two and be just fine. There are things that will go over your head, but nothing significant.

Once you get a hold on dodging/parrying/etc, you’ll feel like a damn ninja, especially on harder difficulties; but leading up to that, yeah combat is… OK. Also don’t miss out of experimenting with different builds - one of my favorites optimized using bombs, which later into it makes you a walking B-52 - fun build if you enjoy clearing trash via a wave of pure chaos, then mopping up the stronger guys by way of the sword.

And yeah, the whole package is what counts here: Witcher 3 is a fantastic all around game. It isn’t without it’s imperfections, but they are barely noticeable amidst the tsunami of ridiculously high quality you’ll be hit with from all the other features.

Orcs Must Die! $9.99 $2.99 (70% off)

Hybrid tower defense and 3rd person shooter/slasher. This game is… fucking stupid! Like by design - your character is a moron, and says some of the dumbest shit you’ll hear come out of a protagonist’s mouth. So with this game, you get a high dose of face-palmy humor paired with orc arms/heads/bones/etc flying across your screen after they get blended up by all your traps. Gameplay is surprisingly solid; you’ll get some time to think and plan where to place traps and obstacles; then you’ll get hit with a wave of orcs and other fantasy critters and try to manually pick off any that make it through the traps. There are a couple more games in this series - imo #1 is the best, but if you like this one, keep the others on your radar too.

Valheim $19.99 $9.99 (50% off)

You’re a viking that died and you find yourself in a purgatory called “Valheim” to prove you’re worthy of Valhalla. Another survival builder - with a somehow charming combination of really bad graphics paired with really good lighting. The combat is kinda clunky, but the other elements of this game make up for it. Well worth $10!! Don’t forget to turn your music on before summoning a boss.

Subnautica $29.99 $9.89 (67% off)

Sci-fi survival builder: you’re on a massive spacecraft that ends up crash landing on an ocean planet; your goal is to figure out wtf happened and find a way off the planet. This game is 80% feel-good tropical diving simulator; and 20% thalasaphobic deepsea horror. This has become one of my go-to “idk what to play” games that I keep returning to for a nice digital tropical vacation… with a dash of fleeing in terror from, uh… spoilers. No really though, if you don’t already know this game’s story, DO NOT start looking up videos and posts etc about it - just buy it and dive in.

Satisfactory $29.99 $14.99 (50% off)

Sci-fi, you’re dropped down to a lush alien planet to do what humans do best: strip all of its natural resources! Combat is limited, but boils down to fighting off wild animals - the main gist of the game is building and optimizing things like miners/conveyor belts/smeltors/assemblers/etc to automate the pillaging of the environment with increasing efficiency… which admittedly sounds more like work than play, but this title caught me a bit off guard with how fun and - true to its name - satisfying it is play.

Grounded $39.99 $19.99 (50% off)

This is basically “Honey I Shrunk The Kids” as a survival builder. Set in the 80s, you and up to three others are teens that miniaturized by… well you gotta figure out the how and why, and how to return to normal size by navigating the back yard of a scientist with some knowledge on the tech. TBH, I didn’t really expect much from this game, but found myself having a ridiculous amount of fun with it. It is REALLY well made - the attention to detail is insane, from the yard design to build pieces. I wish I had this game when I was a kid, but still enjoyed the hell out of it in my 30s.

The Witcher 3 - Wild Hunt $39.99 $3.99 (90% off)

If you’ve somehow managed to avoid Witcher until now, it’s a dark medieval fantasy, 3rd person, open world RPG based on Norse Slavic mythology. Lots of political intrigue, choices that actually impact outcomes in game. Fantastic voice acting, story, soundtrack, and combat/gameplay mechanics. This is one of the best games on the market - if you don’t already have it, now’s the time! There are also two DLCs that are each the size and scope of an entire standalone game - don’t miss those!

Also available DRM free on GOG for the same price.

(shoutout to @[email protected] for GOG intel)

One of the best games on the market. Worth every cent and then some, even at full price.

Initial scroll through looks pretty meh. There a list of good’ns going yet?

Edit-

From another thread, looks like Witcher 3 is 90% off. If you haven’t played it yet, now’s the time!

Maybe you should reevaluate what you projected?

Most of my Steam library is shit I have no intention of ever playing. I’ve bought a TON of bundles that contain one game I actually want that justifies the entire purchase; one or two that look like they have some potential, so I’ll bookmark them for a rainy day; and like 15 digital turds that I now have the key to, so… why not, might as well activate.

The ‘unplayed math’ is comically bad in my case.