I've been a lifelong gamer. Started out playing PC games (Apple IIe) but made a switch to console games in the Genesis days and haven't looked back. I bought a nice new Dell computer earlier this year and realized recently I'd like to try one of the best of the best of current PC games.
A little background about my gaming preferences... First game ever on the Apple IIe was Wizardry and I loved it! After that, I really enjoyed the Ultima games through Ultima V. I also really dug Diablo later on.
I've always been a big action/adventure gaming fan. Some of my other all-time favorite games on any platform include Zelda Ocarina of Time, MGS (Playstation I), Mario 64, and Tomb Raider.
Is there anything out right now that would take me back to my roots that is similar to a Wizardry/Ultima/Diablo type experience? I don't want to relive it but would love a state of the art similar experience.
Basically everything these days goes through a digital distributor. Even if you buy boxed games, most of them, have you put in the DVD, and then download through Steam or Origin anyways.
You may like the new Tomb Raider. But I'd wait until this game went on sale somewhere, like Steam, Greenman Gaming, etc. You can get it then for like $5-8.
There's also Diablo III. Both games are considered good. Never played Diablo III. I have Tomb Raider, it's good. Very cinematic. Not the same tomb raiding type of game, but it still plays good.
Right now Origin is giving away an old Wing Commander III game for free via Origin.
If you like FPS, you can pick up some free ones on Steam like Team Fortress 2 and Loadout. Of course there's the Call of Duty series, most recent one being Call of Duty: Ghosts. Battlefield 4 is amazing. Of course next year the new Star Wars: Battlefront game will be coming out. (PC and consoles). The next Call of Duty is supposed to be a major revamp and much improved, this fall.
You may want Dragon's Age series, including the new one Dragon's Age Inquisition coming out this fall.
Might and Magic: Heroes VI (and add-ons), Dungeon of the Endless, Age of Wonders III, Grimrock
Lots of console games are on PC, so I don't know if you've played the PS3/PS4/360/One games. If not I'd suggest Mass Effect series. Elder Scrolls: Skyrim. Fallout 3 and Fallout: New Vegas. There's probably a thousand hours of gaming just in these games alone.
Batman Arkham games. Asylum, City, Origins, and there's a new one coming out late this year or early next year.
Fighting games- Street Fighter IV, Mortal Kombat X, Injustice: Gods among us
Other games that are also on consoles like Bioshock 1, 2, and the newest one Bioshock: Infinite has one of the best stories you'll ever find in a videogame. Mind blowing. Borderlands franchise 1 and 2. A new one comes out this fall too.
If you like strategy games I'd suggest... Total War: Rome II, Civilization V, Europa Universalis III or IV. Total War Shogun II is good too. Hearts of Iron II or III, and Supreme Commander 2 are quality but a few years old. Anno franchise, newest one being in the future Anno 2070, they have other ones set in 1400-1700's.
Also look into the new Civilization Beyond Earth coming out Oct 24th.
Max Payne 3 is pretty good. Sleeping Dogs. The Witcher. The Witcher 2. Soon to come out The Witcher 3.
Metro series..2033 and Last Light.
There are some cool Transformers games. War for Cybertron, Fall of Cybertron, and a new one too.
X-Com series. X-Com Enemy Unknown, Enemy Within, and a crazy first person shooter take in X-Com Declassified. The others are the more traditional top down and turn based.
Driving games: Dirt 2, 3, Dirt: Showdown
Need For Speed Hot Pursuit II, Need For Speed Most Wanted, NFS: The Run, NFS: Rivals
Flatout Ultimate Carnage, Burnout Paradise.
If you like open world games, obviously Saints Row 3 and 4. GTA IV and GTA IV: Stories of Liberty City. GTA V will be coming out, so I'd suggest getting Saints Row franchise and jump into GTA when V comes out this fall. Watchdogs is very cool. A bit rough technically and needs a powerful computer to run decently, but it's pretty amazing.
Assassin creed franchise are cool. ACI: Jerusalem 1100's, ACII and Brotherhood: Florence 1400's, AC: Revelations Istanbul 1500's , ACIII: Boston/New York revolutionary era, ACIV: Caribbean earlier 1700's, and the new one AC Unity coming out this fall in Revolutionary France.
Lots of people seem to like Counter Strike:GO. I'm not a big fan of it, but tons are, so I know it's good, just not my style of FPS anymore. Arma II (and all the different expansions but looks like 2001 graphics), Arma III
South Park: The stick of truth. If you love South Park, this is a fun game. It's like a role playing game. JRPG style. (japanese role playing game)
On PC there's also greenlit games, which are games not quite finished, and some not even close. But there are still some gems in there well worth their purchase. I suggest Kerbel Space program. You build rockets and send your cute green alien Kerbels into space. Tons of mods so you can build all sorts of crazy things, even have a U.S.S. Enterprise, etc. You can download free already made rockets. It's really amazing. What's really cool is you can build your own rockets out of all these parts and make some really crazy looking stuff... and it's not just all rockets, but also air or space planes. Has a learning curve, but it didn't take me long, about an hour to get my first rocket going. Of course if you screw up it can blow up and all that stuff. Re-enter the atmosphere too fast and you can burn up, etc. Amazing game.
I don't have DAYZ, but lots of people love it. So I'd look into that. I'll probably get this at some point, just haven't pulled the trigger.
Other early access games; Spacebased DF-9, etc.
You do have a ton of free to play games. Warframe, DOTA 2 (one of the most popular games in the world), check out Steam which has a whole huge, massive section of Free 2 Play games. But definitely get Warframe, Team Fortress 2, Loadout, and Dota2. War thunder, Star Trek Online, Star Wars The Old Republic. Fistful of Frags, Dethonred!, even a Ghost Recon Phantoms game, etc, etc, etc, etc, etc, etc.
Want a free 2 play mech game that runs circles around Titanfall? Hawken
Divinity Original Sin seems to have a big following right now.
You can get Final Fantasy VII and VIII online with Steam now. Even an updated version of III is available.
Indie games like Monaco, Cart Life, Papers Please, A Game of Dwarves, Sang-Froid Tales of Werewolves, Surgeon Simulator 2013, Goat Simulator, Planetary Annihilation (check this one out), Prison Tycoon, The Banner Saga, Consortium, Deadlight, Super Meat Boy, Nidhogg, The Stanley Parable, Luftrausers, Carmageddon: Reincarnation (early access), Steam Marines, Starbound, Gunpoint, Kentucky Route Zero, Shelter, etc, etc, etc.
No one has more indie games then PC. 360+PS3+One+PS4+Wii U...total all those indies up and multiply by 10 and you're getting in the ballpark of how many Indie games are on PC.
You got old remakes of Another World, Dragon's Lair 1 and 2, Space Ace, etc.
The best hack and slash online game ever. Chivlary: Medieval Warfare. Have your character scream AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH and then cut off someone's head or leg or whatever. Amazing game.
Shadow Warrior, think you're Beatrix Kiddo in Kill Bill, especially the Crazy 88's scene.
Expeditions: Conquistador, Divinity: Dragon Commander, Fallen Enchantress: Legendary Heroes, Insurgency, Long Live the Queen, Lucius, Magicka, Plague Inc Evolved, Saturday Morning RPG, etc.
Lego Franchise: Lego Batman 2, Lego Marvel Super heroes, Lego Star Wars, Lego Indiana Jones
You've got the Worms franchise. Which are two sets of worms uses weapons on a 2D or 3D map (depending on which sub-franchise you choose to buy) to knock the other worms off the map. Can be fun game, especially if you go against another person locally or online.
What sucks is you missed all the big sales in May, June, and early July. Probably all the above (that's out) was on sale by 33-90 percent off via Steam, Origin, Greenman Gaming, Good Old Games (GoG), G2A, etc.
You got some crazy PC only type games like the Hacker franchise. Zombie games like Dead Island and Dead Island Riptide. I'll mention Dayz again here, it's a zombie game. The Walking Dead, more of a choice based game with an amazing story. State of Decay. Rust..and much more. Tons of zombie games.
Geopolitical games: Democracy 3, Superpower 2, Ruler of Nations, Supreme Ruler, Masters of the world, etc.
If you like Star Wars I suggest some old classics Star Wars Jedi Knight II: Jedi Outcast/Jedi Academy, Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic I and II. (basically like Mass Effect 0 as these were pretty much the formula that Mass Effect franchise became...you'll even notice the same big space station in them as they reused it in Mass Effect)
Mount and Blade franchise looks old, but tons of people love it.
Stalker series. Call of Pripyat and Shadow of Chernobyl are like a poor man version of Fallout 3/New Vegas with difficulty set to 11.
Far Cry 3 was cool. Far Cry 4 comes out this fall and looks good. Oh and Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon (it's standalone and shouldn't of been linked with Far Cry at all as it's like saying Monopoly is Pokemon). Blood Dragon is a HILARIOUS 80's movie type game set in the future. So think of all the old movies and how they thought the 2008 would be, and yet made now, after the fact, with today's technology. Amazing. Michael Biehn (of Aliens and Grindhouse: Planet Terror voices the lead). Here's the trailer. Amazing.
You got your online subscription games like World of Warcraft (not my style really), EVE (space based with a long and large playerbase..never played though but it looks fascinating but a BIG time sink)
Of course you won't want to miss out on the PC game of PC games coming out early next year Star Citizen. There's also a new Elite game that will be coming out soon, you can get early access now, but it's insane expensive. But once it goes gold it'll go back down to $50-60. I backed Star Citizen really early, so I'm holding off on Elite for now.
X3 series are seen as great space based games. I recently got Freespace 2. Haven't played it yet, and it's old but people are still modding it, and so with mods it looks halfway up to date.
You got your space based 4x games (Explore, Exploit, Expand, Exterminate) type games. Sins of a Solar Empire (or with add-on trinity). Endless Space. Galactic Civilizations II, Tropico series 3, 4, I think there might be a 5. The Last Federation, Lords of the Black Sun, Distant Worlds: Universe
Tower Defense games: Defense Grid (this is the best...hands down). Defense Grid II is coming out soon!!!!!! Sol Survivor, Defense Technica, Anomaly Defenders, Space Run.
Orcs must Die, Orcs must Die 2, Dungeon Defenders, Dungeon Defenders 2 coming soon. Plants Vs Zombies. These are all amazing games.
FTL: Faster then light. Sort of old school, try to get your spaceship from one point to the next. Really cool. One of the best games of last year.
Darksiders 1 or 2. Two worlds.
Strike Suit Zero. Yeah, space based arcadeish but different. Sort of like Robotech.
Dark Souls 1 or 2. Brutally hard, but rewarding and fun.
Prototype 2 (superhero/anti-hero) open world game. Fun.
Oh and I can't forget about Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare. A First Person Shooter like Call of Duty or Battlefield, but cartoony and pitting plants versus zombies. It's AMAZING. Get this on Origin.
Other misc games; Strike Vector, Verdun, Insurgency, Sir you are being hunted, Endless legend (early access..sort of like Endless Space), LA Noire, Dues Ex: Revolution, Mafia II, Crysis 3, Dead Space series, etc etc.
Oh and there's a new Guantlet coming out in a few months.
So yeah this is just a small snippet of games that can be had over PC. I didn't list tons of quality games. Of course many of these games are on consoles, but many aren't. Some are even on sale now on Steam, and of course there's tons of free games on Steam.
Other good FPS, games that have FPS style action but are say open world or whatever.
AAA Games
BF4 (or BF3).
Call of Duty franchise any in the last few years (new one this fall)
Arma III
Bioshock Infinite
Halflife 2 (but AAA from 2004)
Fallout 3, Fallout: New Vegas
Borderlands 1 and 2
Left 4 Dead 1 and 2
Deus Ex: Human Revolution
Crysis 1, 2, 3
Unreal Tournament franchise
Far Cry 3
Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon (Far Cry 4 this fall)
Metro 2033
Metro Last Light (or the Redux)
Portal (sort of puzzle-y)
Star Wars Jedi Knight: Jedi Outcast
Star Wars Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy
Doom 3 (4 is being made, but won't be out for a year or two)
Max Payne 3
Tomb Raider
Tom Clancy games (Rainbow Six, Ghost recon, Splinter Cell)'
Watch Dogs
Saints Row 3
Saints Row 4
Prototype 2
Dishonored
AA or Indie Games
Counterstrike: GO (same engine and company as Halflife 2, Valve)
Insurgency
Natural Selection 2
Stalker franchise (a bit older...2007 or so)
RAGE
Verdun
Sniper franchise
Red Faction franchise
Aliens Vs Predator (2010)
Dayz
Rust
Sleeping Dogs
Payday 2
Intertellar Marines
Hard Reset
Red Orchestra 2
Rising Storm
Homefront
E.Y.E. Devine Cybermancy
Team Fortress 2 (free) Once a full paid game became F2P, amazing!
Loadout (free)
Warframe (free)
Planetside 2 (free)
Tribes Ascend (free)
Tom Clancy Ghost Recon Phantoms (free)
Fistful of Frags (free)
Hawken (free...but it's mech based instead of on foot as a person)
Blacklight Retribution (free)
Also you can use this to see how much any of the games have gone for in the past year or so on Steam.
Also here is a good site that shows alot of the game sales that happen everyday (not just steam, but also GamersGate, Good Old Games, Greenman Gaming, Desura, etc)
Wow, CF88, that is an amazing gaming post that you composed! Thanks for all of that.
Unfortunately, I don't have tons of time to play so I'm looking for a couple titles to get started on. I've never been into the FPSs so I'm ruling out them. I did play the latest Tomb Raider on PS3 and loved it. One of the first games I've actually finished in years.
Funny enough, in my searches on Steam and the internet last night I came upon a couple games that appeal to me that you didn't list: Broken Age and The Swapper. Broken Age is a 2D graphic adventure by the legendary adventure game maker, Tim Schafer. (Yeah, I'm old school.) And The Swapper is an atmospheric, sci-fi puzzle platformer set in the outer reaches of space.
No problem. Steam has so many games, it's just impossible to list all the good ones and Steam doesn't even have them all lol. There's so many games coming out everyday.
Just remember in that second list I listed games with FPS type elements. So that list contains online FPS like Call of Duty, or games simply with the mechanic of having a gun or other weapons in the first person, like Tomb Raider or Bioshock Infinite.
Those indie games I mentioned might be right up your alley.
Can anyone help me to get Tie Fighter to work on my laptop? I have the disk, downloaded dosbox but I guess there is something you have to do to get the diskdrive to work.
If you're into Ultima style games, you definitely have to check out Divinity: Original Sin. It's lost in CF88's giant recommendations list (outstanding post btw) but I really do think it's exactly what you're looking for. Bonus, you can play through the whole campaign co-op (if you're into that.
