'Looking for a game' thread

[Manny V]

I'm in the mood for playing a classic dwarf fighter. A half-ton of armour and beard, thick shield, axe or hammer, every swing hits like a freight truck. What's a game where it feels particularly good?

Bardin Goreksson in Vermintide is the first thing that comes to mind (Ironbreaker class for the typical dwarf fantasy of armoured boy)

[DagothGeas5]

I am looking for a flash game I used to play but cannot find. It looked like it was made in MS Paint graphic wise and was a sort of "fever dream" style comedy point and click game, with inventory and options like click on the eye icon to change interaction to a "look interaction", click on the mouth icon to taste or speak, etc.
It started with a dude (the protagonist) cycling on his red bicycle on a road outside his home(?) to Queen's Bicycle playing in the background, then everything stops and changes tone as, to memory, a portal opens and Death, if I recall correctly, appears and eithers steals the guy's shoes or his bike and disappears. The game then goes from there, with the dude in question wanting to get back what was taken from him.
There are various areas and characters, with a certain area of a forest gradually getting darker if ventured into that I thought was quite chilling as it reminded me of EXMortis. Characters that I recall at the top of my head were a plumber that was fixing a giant sink(?) and a guy in a bird suit that looked like he came out of Muppets that would intermittently do this sound effect that I also saw used in Gothic 1

► Show Spoiler

[Xenich]

Looking for a game that has similar mechanical depth, atmosphere and exploration as Deux Ex. Do any exist?

Thief comes somewhat close but there aren't any segments like in the first half of Deus Ex where you get to wander around populated areas and talk to people.

I've never played a Thief game. Would you recommend starting with the first one? I do enjoy stealth games so I'll give it a shot

The trilogy is good, has strengths and weaknesses depending on what focus in play you enjoy. Metal age seems to be a favored among many.

This is thief brought past its original release with a different engine than its release.

https://www.thedarkmod.com/main/

[DagothGeas5]

(Sorry for double post)

I am looking for a flash game I remember playing many years ago. It was about some sort of dragon (?) and the art style was similar to something from Dark Souls, yet it was a web game on somewhere like Armorgames.com .

The game was an endless flying thing, where your dragon-thing would have to beat huge insects and monsters that looked like abominations. I recall the boss fight with one had pieces flying off, like carapace, and something that was quite brutal, but there was no blood, just cool effects. I do not recall if there was sound.

The point of view was from behind the dragon-thing you used.

I did not speak Enlgish back then, but I recall the game to be in English (UI and the likes) and though I believe there was a story or dialogue, I was just there to see the flying mechanic and how dynamic the pieces were (the sort of "move your mouse, and the tail will follow as if it's liquid" physics-thing).

I was watching a video rusty shared and I noticed finally a game that looks familiar to this one that I am still looking for. Unsure how much more of help this might be in finding it, but it is one I would dearly like to give a serious playthrough and understand the story of.
The game looked much like the flying sequence showed here for the game called Unreal (1990)

(rusty's post for reference as it is a beautiful post with many more games

Artist details his work on video games from the late 80s to 2000s in depth
https://francksauer.com/index.php/games

Outcast:
https://francksauer.com/index.php/games ... shed-games

Lots of cool stuff here

Discovered it while watching this video during a break so I might as well link it

)

[Faceless_Sentinel]

I gave up.

Please, recommend games of any genre and any platform that you think worth playing, the only limitation is: no "evil Russia/russians/China/chinese/communism/communists" themed, please.

[rusty_shackleford]

I gave up.

Please, recommend games of any genre and any platform that you think worth playing, the only limitation is: no "evil Russia/russians/communism/communists" themed, please.

What about America defeating evil China?

[Faceless_Sentinel]

I gave up.

Please, recommend games of any genre and any platform that you think worth playing, the only limitation is: no "evil Russia/russians/communism/communists" themed, please.

What about America defeating evil China?

Thanks for the remarks, i wil correct post.

[rusty_shackleford]

@Faceless_Sentinel
Depending on what kind of games you like, here are some of my favorites:

Technomancer, a Bioware-like from the studio Spiders.
Hero's Adventure: Road to Passion, a very good open world Chinese RPG.
King Arthur: Knight's Tale, very good tacticool RPG. Nothing to complain about, coherent art/world, etc.,
Archolos, fan-made game in the Gothic engine. Extremely good, I liked it more than Gothic 2.
The Witcher, the first game is the best one in the series. Combat is a bit clunky, but otherwise very good.
Divinity: Original Sin. I like the fairy tale tone/story of the first game which elevates it above the second one for me.
Divinity II: The Dragon Knight Saga. Great game that is extremely overshadowed by Larian's later work. Open world action RPG. The expansion is even better than the base game.

If you're fine with 'older' games:
Arcanum. A classic, one of the best RPGs made.
Lufia 2 for the SNES(!NOT! the remake for the 3DS), my favorite JRPG.
Gothic 2. Just excellent, you might have already played it.



All of these avoid any modern political issues(in terms of actual story content) and lack any SJW elements I can think of.

[Tweed]

I gave up.

Please, recommend games of any genre and any platform that you think worth playing, the only limitation is: no "evil Russia/russians/China/chinese/communism/communists" themed, please.

What's wrong with killing communists? Are you a communist?

[Val the Moofia Boss]

I gave up.

Please, recommend games of any genre and any platform that you think worth playing, the only limitation is: no "evil Russia/russians/China/chinese/communism/communists" themed, please.

► Great games I'd recommend

• Trails in the Sky FC or 1st Chapter remake (the empire in the background leans towards a slight Prussia/German states motif and is portrayed as being just another country rather than evil incarnate)
• Trails of Cold Steel 1 and 2 (takes place in a vaguely fantasy Prussian empire. The enemy expansionist superpower in the background cold war is an imperialist USA expy, prior to the retconning of its character in Kuro as being true and actually heroic and benign all along).
• Trails into Reverie (play the prior 4 Cold Steel games first)
• Aselia the Spirit of Eternity Sword (you will need to savescum a lot if you want to get the highest score on each mission. If you play chill and take your time you won't have to savescum and won't miss anything story wise)
• Granblue Fantasy Relink
• Granblue Fantasy (if read as a VN. Main story became engaging for me at around chapter 40/Amalthea island which takes a few hours to reach. No need to grind. A lot of the side storylines are good)
• World End Economica
• Witch on the Holy Night
• Sakura Wars 1 and 2
• Sakura Wars 5
• Shadow of the Colossus
• Final Fantasy 7
• Final Fantasy 8
• Final Fantasy 9
• Final Fantasy 10
• Final Fantasy 12 (the empire leans towards a slightly roman motif and is portrayed very sympathetically, actually the real antagonist winds up being an expansionist republic in the background)
• Final Fantasy 13
• Final Fantasy 14 (the main adversarial empire has some communist Russia motifs but leans towards being more Roman empire).
• Xenoblade Chronicles 1
• Valkyria Chronicles (the enemy empire are a vague mishmash of WW2 German and Russia but are not particularly demonized)
• Valkyria Chronicles 4 (same enemy but are portrayed even more sympathetically than in the first game. The story is more critical of the not-USA's imperialism).
• Vanguard Bandits (the empire is portrayed sympathetically, and there is a route split early on where you can leave the rebels and join the imperial princess' clique and try to root out the war mongers from within)
• Pokemon Ruby & Sapphire
• Pokemon Black & White
• Pokemon Omega Ruby & Alpha Sapphire
• Pokemon Colosseum
• Fire Emblem Awakening
• Fire Emblem Fates (the empire leans towards having a medieval europe or Roman motif. You can stay with Nohr in their route and the cast are overall sympathetic, but the writing does a poor job justifying why the heroes are going along with the obviously evil emperor's orders).
• Utawarerumono Trilogy + Monochrome Mobius
• The Banner Saga trilogy

AVOID

• Muv-Luv Total Eclipse (overall okayish VN. The main love interest aside, the Russians are depicted rather stereotypically as evil or stupid. The narrative also oddly whitewashes the US when they were portrayed with their warts as an opportunistic imperialist power in the first VN)
• Ring of Red (you fight against stereotypical communists

[Oyster Sauce]

I gave up.

Please, recommend games of any genre and any platform that you think worth playing, the only limitation is: no "evil Russia/russians/China/chinese/communism/communists" themed, please.

► Great games I'd recommend

• Trails in the Sky FC or 1st Chapter remake (the empire in the background leans towards a slight Prussia/German states motif and is portrayed as being just another country rather than evil incarnate)
• Trails of Cold Steel 1 and 2 (takes place in a vaguely fantasy Prussian empire. The enemy expansionist superpower in the background cold war is an imperialist USA expy, prior to the retconning of its character in Kuro as being true and actually heroic and benign all along).
• Trails into Reverie (play the prior 4 Cold Steel games first)
• Aselia the Spirit of Eternity Sword (you will need to savescum a lot if you want to get the highest score on each mission. If you play chill and take your time you won't have to savescum and won't miss anything story wise)
• Granblue Fantasy Relink
• Granblue Fantasy (if read as a VN. Main story became engaging for me at around chapter 40/Amalthea island which takes a few hours to reach. No need to grind. A lot of the side storylines are good)
• World End Economica
• Witch on the Holy Night
• Sakura Wars 1 and 2
• Sakura Wars 5
• Shadow of the Colossus
• Final Fantasy 7
• Final Fantasy 8
• Final Fantasy 9
• Final Fantasy 10
• Final Fantasy 12 (the empire leans towards a slightly roman motif and is portrayed very sympathetically, actually the real antagonist winds up being an expansionist republic in the background)
• Final Fantasy 13
• Final Fantasy 14 (the main adversarial empire has some communist Russia motifs but leans towards being more Roman empire).
• Xenoblade Chronicles 1
• Valkyria Chronicles (the enemy empire are a vague mishmash of WW2 German and Russia but are not particularly demonized)
• Valkyria Chronicles 4 (same enemy but are portrayed even more sympathetically than in the first game. The story is more critical of the not-USA's imperialism).
• Vanguard Bandits (the empire is portrayed sympathetically, and there is a route split early on where you can leave the rebels and join the imperial princess' clique and try to root out the war mongers from within)
• Pokemon Ruby & Sapphire
• Pokemon Black & White
• Pokemon Omega Ruby & Alpha Sapphire
• Pokemon Colosseum
• Fire Emblem Awakening
• Fire Emblem Fates (the empire leans towards having a medieval europe or Roman motif. You can stay with Nohr in their route and the cast are overall sympathetic, but the writing does a poor job justifying why the heroes are going along with the obviously evil emperor's orders).
• Utawarerumono Trilogy + Monochrome Mobius
• The Banner Saga trilogy

AVOID

• Muv-Luv Total Eclipse (overall okayish VN. The main love interest aside, the Russians are depicted rather stereotypically as evil or stupid. The narrative also oddly whitewashes the US when they were portrayed with their warts as an opportunistic imperialist power in the first VN)
• Ring of Red (you fight against stereotypical communists

If you had to trim this down to 3 games from unique series what would they be?

[Finarfin]

Looking for some games that I can get during the Autumn Fall Sale on steam. Got about 89.99 on steam wallet.

[Val the Moofia Boss]

I gave up.

Please, recommend games of any genre and any platform that you think worth playing, the only limitation is: no "evil Russia/russians/China/chinese/communism/communists" themed, please.

► Great games I'd recommend

• Trails in the Sky FC or 1st Chapter remake (the empire in the background leans towards a slight Prussia/German states motif and is portrayed as being just another country rather than evil incarnate)
• Trails of Cold Steel 1 and 2 (takes place in a vaguely fantasy Prussian empire. The enemy expansionist superpower in the background cold war is an imperialist USA expy, prior to the retconning of its character in Kuro as being true and actually heroic and benign all along).
• Trails into Reverie (play the prior 4 Cold Steel games first)
• Aselia the Spirit of Eternity Sword (you will need to savescum a lot if you want to get the highest score on each mission. If you play chill and take your time you won't have to savescum and won't miss anything story wise)
• Granblue Fantasy Relink
• Granblue Fantasy (if read as a VN. Main story became engaging for me at around chapter 40/Amalthea island which takes a few hours to reach. No need to grind. A lot of the side storylines are good)
• World End Economica
• Witch on the Holy Night
• Sakura Wars 1 and 2
• Sakura Wars 5
• Shadow of the Colossus
• Final Fantasy 7
• Final Fantasy 8
• Final Fantasy 9
• Final Fantasy 10
• Final Fantasy 12 (the empire leans towards a slightly roman motif and is portrayed very sympathetically, actually the real antagonist winds up being an expansionist republic in the background)
• Final Fantasy 13
• Final Fantasy 14 (the main adversarial empire has some communist Russia motifs but leans towards being more Roman empire).
• Xenoblade Chronicles 1
• Valkyria Chronicles (the enemy empire are a vague mishmash of WW2 German and Russia but are not particularly demonized)
• Valkyria Chronicles 4 (same enemy but are portrayed even more sympathetically than in the first game. The story is more critical of the not-USA's imperialism).
• Vanguard Bandits (the empire is portrayed sympathetically, and there is a route split early on where you can leave the rebels and join the imperial princess' clique and try to root out the war mongers from within)
• Pokemon Ruby & Sapphire
• Pokemon Black & White
• Pokemon Omega Ruby & Alpha Sapphire
• Pokemon Colosseum
• Fire Emblem Awakening
• Fire Emblem Fates (the empire leans towards having a medieval europe or Roman motif. You can stay with Nohr in their route and the cast are overall sympathetic, but the writing does a poor job justifying why the heroes are going along with the obviously evil emperor's orders).
• Utawarerumono Trilogy + Monochrome Mobius
• The Banner Saga trilogy

AVOID

• Muv-Luv Total Eclipse (overall okayish VN. The main love interest aside, the Russians are depicted rather stereotypically as evil or stupid. The narrative also oddly whitewashes the US when they were portrayed with their warts as an opportunistic imperialist power in the first VN)
• Ring of Red (you fight against stereotypical communists

If you had to trim this down to 3 games from unique series what would they be?

Hard question.

I overall especially like the first two Trails of Cold Steel games holistically (characters, plot, setting, aesthetics, music, combat, etc), and each game is 90 hours long but I thought that those 90 hours were overall actually fun (as opposed to many other long games where only a percentage of it is actually fun). But a lot of people just seem to be really put off by the stereotypical anime antics in the first hour and then write it off and quit. Trails in the Sky has less of that, but I holistically like the game less (first couple chapters are not as engaging compared to later on, combat isn't as good but the remake addresses that, wasn't as into the setting).

Can I split one of the three slots between Cold Steel and Sky?

For the second slot, I'd split it between either Shadow of the Colossus or Granblue Fantasy Relink. They are very entertaining action games. I replayed SotC 3 or 4 times, and spent 300 hours in GBF Relink. I had a lot of fun progressing through the fun last three tiers of fights as Vaseraga after beating the short campaign.

Third slot I would probably give to World End Economica. The story is tight and was impactful to me and is memorable, though you have to sit through a relatively boring first couple hours. The runnerup would be Aselia. I really like its story, but that is stretched across an 80 experience so it is not as tight as WEE. The soundtrack is fantastic, though. Almost all of the tracks are hits for me.

The problem with a lot of JRPGs like the PS1 Final Fantasies or Xenoblade 1 is that the good story is usually frontloaded in the first half or on the first disc, and then the gameplay is lacking in a lot of regards (namely the combat, and the empty worlds, or the unsatisfactory sidequests).

I would be tempted to try to fit in Valkyria Chronicles 4 in my top recs somehow, since after the first few hours the plot becomes engaging, and the mission gameplay is even better than the first game. But you would have to play through the first game, and I think Trails/SotC/WEE edges out for me if just a top 3.

So:

• Trails in the Sky FC (or the new remake 1st Chapter) or the first two Trails of Cold Steel games, whichever appeals to you the most. Play the Steam ports. The English dub for the first two CS games is above average. For CS and the Sky remake, I would advise playing on Nightmare difficulty even as a first time player, since normal is actually extremely easy. However the difficulty is frontloaded in the earlygame when you have few party members and few quartz to customize your characters, so if that is too overwhelming you can set it to hard instead. CS was my first ever Trails game and I wound up beating that on hard on my first playthrough. Do not play the original Sky game on anything other than normal.
• Shadow of the Colossus and Granblue Fantasy Relink.
• World End Economica, followed by Aselia the Spirit of Eternity Sword

[rusty_shackleford]

Another JRPG I really liked was SaGa Frontier 2. Mature story that spans well over a century between two separate family dynasties. I last played it long ago so my memory of it is sketchy at best, but I really enjoyed it.
As far as I know, it's unrelated to any of the other SaGa games, including the first Frontier.

[edit]
I think it got a remaster(? or was it the first game?) but it looked very sloppily done so either read up on it or just go to the original PS1 version.

[Oyster Sauce]

► Great games I'd recommend

• Trails in the Sky FC or 1st Chapter remake (the empire in the background leans towards a slight Prussia/German states motif and is portrayed as being just another country rather than evil incarnate)
• Trails of Cold Steel 1 and 2 (takes place in a vaguely fantasy Prussian empire. The enemy expansionist superpower in the background cold war is an imperialist USA expy, prior to the retconning of its character in Kuro as being true and actually heroic and benign all along).
• Trails into Reverie (play the prior 4 Cold Steel games first)
• Aselia the Spirit of Eternity Sword (you will need to savescum a lot if you want to get the highest score on each mission. If you play chill and take your time you won't have to savescum and won't miss anything story wise)
• Granblue Fantasy Relink
• Granblue Fantasy (if read as a VN. Main story became engaging for me at around chapter 40/Amalthea island which takes a few hours to reach. No need to grind. A lot of the side storylines are good)
• World End Economica
• Witch on the Holy Night
• Sakura Wars 1 and 2
• Sakura Wars 5
• Shadow of the Colossus
• Final Fantasy 7
• Final Fantasy 8
• Final Fantasy 9
• Final Fantasy 10
• Final Fantasy 12 (the empire leans towards a slightly roman motif and is portrayed very sympathetically, actually the real antagonist winds up being an expansionist republic in the background)
• Final Fantasy 13
• Final Fantasy 14 (the main adversarial empire has some communist Russia motifs but leans towards being more Roman empire).
• Xenoblade Chronicles 1
• Valkyria Chronicles (the enemy empire are a vague mishmash of WW2 German and Russia but are not particularly demonized)
• Valkyria Chronicles 4 (same enemy but are portrayed even more sympathetically than in the first game. The story is more critical of the not-USA's imperialism).
• Vanguard Bandits (the empire is portrayed sympathetically, and there is a route split early on where you can leave the rebels and join the imperial princess' clique and try to root out the war mongers from within)
• Pokemon Ruby & Sapphire
• Pokemon Black & White
• Pokemon Omega Ruby & Alpha Sapphire
• Pokemon Colosseum
• Fire Emblem Awakening
• Fire Emblem Fates (the empire leans towards having a medieval europe or Roman motif. You can stay with Nohr in their route and the cast are overall sympathetic, but the writing does a poor job justifying why the heroes are going along with the obviously evil emperor's orders).
• Utawarerumono Trilogy + Monochrome Mobius
• The Banner Saga trilogy

AVOID

• Muv-Luv Total Eclipse (overall okayish VN. The main love interest aside, the Russians are depicted rather stereotypically as evil or stupid. The narrative also oddly whitewashes the US when they were portrayed with their warts as an opportunistic imperialist power in the first VN)
• Ring of Red (you fight against stereotypical communists

If you had to trim this down to 3 games from unique series what would they be?

Hard question.

I overall especially like the first two Trails of Cold Steel games holistically (characters, plot, setting, aesthetics, music, combat, etc), and each game is 90 hours long but I thought that those 90 hours were overall actually fun (as opposed to many other long games where only a percentage of it is actually fun). But a lot of people just seem to be really put off by the stereotypical anime antics in the first hour and then write it off and quit. Trails in the Sky has less of that, but I holistically like the game less (first couple chapters are not as engaging compared to later on, combat isn't as good but the remake addresses that, wasn't as into the setting).

Can I split one of the three slots between Cold Steel and Sky?

For the second slot, I'd split it between either Shadow of the Colossus or Granblue Fantasy Relink. They are very entertaining action games. I replayed SotC 3 or 4 times, and spent 300 hours in GBF Relink. I had a lot of fun progressing through the fun last three tiers of fights as Vaseraga after beating the short campaign.

Third slot I would probably give to World End Economica. The story is tight and was impactful to me and is memorable, though you have to sit through a relatively boring first couple hours. The runnerup would be Aselia. I really like its story, but that is stretched across an 80 experience so it is not as tight as WEE. The soundtrack is fantastic, though. Almost all of the tracks are hits for me.

The problem with a lot of JRPGs like the PS1 Final Fantasies or Xenoblade 1 is that the good story is usually frontloaded in the first half or on the first disc, and then the gameplay is lacking in a lot of regards (namely the combat, and the empty worlds, or the unsatisfactory sidequests).

I would be tempted to try to fit in Valkyria Chronicles 4 in my top recs somehow, since after the first few hours the plot becomes engaging, and the mission gameplay is even better than the first game. But you would have to play through the first game, and I think Trails/SotC/WEE edges out for me if just a top 3.

So:

• Trails in the Sky FC (or the new remake 1st Chapter) or the first two Trails of Cold Steel games, whichever appeals to you the most. Play the Steam ports. The English dub for the first two CS games is above average.
• Shadow of the Colossus and Granblue Fantasy Relink.
• World End Economica, followed by Aselia the Spirit of Eternity Sword

I can't believe you cheated your way into giving me twice as many games as I asked for

[Tangerine]

If you had to trim this down to 3 games from unique series what would they be?

Hard question.

I overall especially like the first two Trails of Cold Steel games holistically (characters, plot, setting, aesthetics, music, combat, etc), and each game is 90 hours long but I thought that those 90 hours were overall actually fun (as opposed to many other long games where only a percentage of it is actually fun). But a lot of people just seem to be really put off by the stereotypical anime antics in the first hour and then write it off and quit. Trails in the Sky has less of that, but I holistically like the game less (first couple chapters are not as engaging compared to later on, combat isn't as good but the remake addresses that, wasn't as into the setting).

Can I split one of the three slots between Cold Steel and Sky?

For the second slot, I'd split it between either Shadow of the Colossus or Granblue Fantasy Relink. They are very entertaining action games. I replayed SotC 3 or 4 times, and spent 300 hours in GBF Relink. I had a lot of fun progressing through the fun last three tiers of fights as Vaseraga after beating the short campaign.

Third slot I would probably give to World End Economica. The story is tight and was impactful to me and is memorable, though you have to sit through a relatively boring first couple hours. The runnerup would be Aselia. I really like its story, but that is stretched across an 80 experience so it is not as tight as WEE. The soundtrack is fantastic, though. Almost all of the tracks are hits for me.

The problem with a lot of JRPGs like the PS1 Final Fantasies or Xenoblade 1 is that the good story is usually frontloaded in the first half or on the first disc, and then the gameplay is lacking in a lot of regards (namely the combat, and the empty worlds, or the unsatisfactory sidequests).

I would be tempted to try to fit in Valkyria Chronicles 4 in my top recs somehow, since after the first few hours the plot becomes engaging, and the mission gameplay is even better than the first game. But you would have to play through the first game, and I think Trails/SotC/WEE edges out for me if just a top 3.

So:

• Trails in the Sky FC (or the new remake 1st Chapter) or the first two Trails of Cold Steel games, whichever appeals to you the most. Play the Steam ports. The English dub for the first two CS games is above average.
• Shadow of the Colossus and Granblue Fantasy Relink.
• World End Economica, followed by Aselia the Spirit of Eternity Sword

I can't believe you cheated your way into giving me twice as many games as I asked for

It doesn't count when you've got trash on the list.

Final Fantasy 8.

[Oyster Sauce]

Hard question.

I overall especially like the first two Trails of Cold Steel games holistically (characters, plot, setting, aesthetics, music, combat, etc), and each game is 90 hours long but I thought that those 90 hours were overall actually fun (as opposed to many other long games where only a percentage of it is actually fun). But a lot of people just seem to be really put off by the stereotypical anime antics in the first hour and then write it off and quit. Trails in the Sky has less of that, but I holistically like the game less (first couple chapters are not as engaging compared to later on, combat isn't as good but the remake addresses that, wasn't as into the setting).

Can I split one of the three slots between Cold Steel and Sky?

For the second slot, I'd split it between either Shadow of the Colossus or Granblue Fantasy Relink. They are very entertaining action games. I replayed SotC 3 or 4 times, and spent 300 hours in GBF Relink. I had a lot of fun progressing through the fun last three tiers of fights as Vaseraga after beating the short campaign.

Third slot I would probably give to World End Economica. The story is tight and was impactful to me and is memorable, though you have to sit through a relatively boring first couple hours. The runnerup would be Aselia. I really like its story, but that is stretched across an 80 experience so it is not as tight as WEE. The soundtrack is fantastic, though. Almost all of the tracks are hits for me.

The problem with a lot of JRPGs like the PS1 Final Fantasies or Xenoblade 1 is that the good story is usually frontloaded in the first half or on the first disc, and then the gameplay is lacking in a lot of regards (namely the combat, and the empty worlds, or the unsatisfactory sidequests).

I would be tempted to try to fit in Valkyria Chronicles 4 in my top recs somehow, since after the first few hours the plot becomes engaging, and the mission gameplay is even better than the first game. But you would have to play through the first game, and I think Trails/SotC/WEE edges out for me if just a top 3.

So:

• Trails in the Sky FC (or the new remake 1st Chapter) or the first two Trails of Cold Steel games, whichever appeals to you the most. Play the Steam ports. The English dub for the first two CS games is above average.
• Shadow of the Colossus and Granblue Fantasy Relink.
• World End Economica, followed by Aselia the Spirit of Eternity Sword

I can't believe you cheated your way into giving me twice as many games as I asked for

It doesn't count when you've got trash on the list.

Final Fantasy 8.

Great game.

[Tadeusz]

Please, recommend games of any genre and any platform that you think worth playing, the only limitation is: no "evil Russia/russians/China/chinese/communism/communists" themed, please.

Do you have any preferences? What are your favorite games?
You can check out RPGs from Adventurer's Guild list and see what interests you.
Do you like puzzles and quests? You can try Antichamber and Myst 1-4.

[Faceless_Sentinel]

Do you have any preferences?

Anything will do, platformers, arcades, etc.

What are your favorite games?

Mass Effect
System Shock (remastered one)
System Shock 2 (remastered one)
Deus Ex Human Revolution
Pray (2016)
Fallout 1
Darksiders

[wndrbr]

Please, recommend games of any genre and any platform that you think worth playing, the only limitation is: no "evil Russia/russians/China/chinese/communism/communists" themed, please.

What are your favorite games?

Mass Effect
System Shock (remastered one)
System Shock 2 (remastered one)
Deus Ex Human Revolution
Pray (2016)
Fallout 1
Darksiders

Singularity

[gerey]

Mass Effect
System Shock (remastered one)
System Shock 2 (remastered one)
Deus Ex Human Revolution
Pray (2016)
Fallout 1
Darksiders

So, basically, imsimmys and cRPGs. Darksiders 1 is Zelda-like.

Have you played Thief 1, 2 and 3? They do lack the progression mechanics of SS and Deus Ex, but they have great mission designs and decades worth of fan missions and campaigns.

There's not that many imsims to go around, and especially not that many good ones. You could try looking into Arx Fatalis and Dark Messiah of Might and Magic, or if you can tolerate playing an unfinished game, Gloomwood is a good pick (the current version already has a good 10+ hours worth of content). If you can look past the scuffy graphics Ctrl+Alt+Ego is a fun one. Alien: Isolation is imsimmy adjacent. Amnesia: The Bunker is very similar to Isolation, though it gives you much more freedom in how to tackle the various objectives.

I always like to recommend Ashes 2063 / Afterglow / Hard Reset to any fans of post-apoc, just incredibly atmospheric FPS games, and free!

Tolerable Fallout-likes tend to be surprisingly rare. I assume you've already tried Arcanum? There's always ATOM and the standalone expansion, plus Underrail (though it's made by a S*rb).

[GhostShiroyama]

May I recommend Holdfast: Nations at War? Bunch of cheeky fellows shooting each other with musket while having a ball in audio / text chat :3

[Xenich]

Divinity II: The Dragon Knight Saga. Great game that is extremely overshadowed by Larian's later work. Open world action RPG. The expansion is even better than the base game.

Yes, this is a diamond in the rough. I remember Sven talking about how they were forced to this visual presentation because of the studios and it is often considered a work they weren't really in tune with because of that, but in all honesty it actually came out quite well.

I had avoided it for years because I thought it another "3d action console" sell out game, but... Larian retained a lot of their charm and structure from the Divinity games.

I could do without some of the over actioning console game play at times, but... surprisingly this is a great game.

I never did the expansion though, so if it is a lot better, I guess I need to go back and play through it again sometime.

Honestly I count this game in with their best work Divine Divinity and D:OS.

[Faceless_Sentinel]

Please, recommend games of any genre and any platform that you think worth playing, the only limitation is: no "evil Russia/russians/China/chinese/communism/communists" themed, please.

What are your favorite games?

Mass Effect
System Shock (remastered one)
System Shock 2 (remastered one)
Deus Ex Human Revolution
Pray (2016)
Fallout 1
Darksiders

Singularity

[Finarfin]

Bought Halo Master Chief Collection and Gungrave G.o.r.e

Thinking about buying but not sure.

Edit: Seems to be censored.
Edit 2: Tried out Gungrave, had bad stuttering and the controls didn't register, refunded

[DagothGeas5]

Wanted to share that I finally found the game I was looking for but am not even sure where did I ask about it. The one I love is not Zoo Tycoon 2, which, whenever I was playing, I found myself looking into things that were not there, the one I love is Zoo Empire.
It is close enough that I get them confused, but Zoo Empire, in my opinion, was much better. It also has terrain biome percentages instead of a flat color thing, which you had to closely match that I quite loved as a feature.
Just seeing the polar bears was enough to recognize it

[rusty_shackleford]

What game is this?

G15yLOHWwAAiZFs.jpg

[Oyster Sauce]

What game is this?

Dungeons & Dragons: Warriors of the Eternal Sun / Real life

[rusty_shackleford]

might have also been the pc version of crusaders of might & magic, it does start with a village near a forest being burned down and it had lava platforming

Back in the late 90s early 00s there was this PC game very similar to oblivion, which is interesting because I think it came out before. It was a 3rd person arpg. You started by a fire in a forest and then you fought all the way to a lava area with platforming. I think you could pick race and class but can't remember. You might have been able to be a werewolf or minotaur or maybe you fought them.
I think I'm the only person who's played this game because I never saw it again

How close to oblivion?
It sounds like it might have been one of those not-RPG action games like Enclave or Severance: Blade of Darkness. There was quite a few of them, they'd be classified as dorklikes now.
There was also Rune(now known as Rune Classic), Dark Vengeance, Die by the Sword

[non-edit]
got up and took a **** while thinking about this, was it Witchhaven?

I should make a thread about these, there were a bunch of them that was a small subgenre which died

[rusty_shackleford]

any games with the same feeling as the old aquamark benchmark?


OTHER than aquanox