Not really getting into any modern main stream games lately I've kind of went retro and as such I've been playing a bunch of smaller games. Here's some of the good ones you might want to take a look at in no particular order:
Gnomoria: It's Dwarf Fortress only with actual viewable graphics and not ASCI characters. It's a VERY addicting little game with a surprising amount of depth. Starting new worlds is really fun. I highly recommend it.
Xenonauts: This modern remake of X-Com is AWESOME. It honestly feels far more like X-Com than the latest Firaxis game. The Firaxis game was great, don't get me wrong, but if you liked the OG of X-Com then Xenonauts is the end-all and be-all of current re-makes. They are into their first Beta now and the game has come a LONG way in the last year. IMO Xenonauts is the X-Com remake to beat if you want to make a X-Com style game.
Shadowrun Returns: I won't say anything about this as it's in another thread here on the forums already. Needless to say if you like Shadowrun and you're not planning on getting this you need a smack upside the head, plain and simple.
Organ Trail: Do you remember the ooooold school game called Oregon Trail? Did ever think to yourself "This is pretty cool, but we need to Zombie this mo-fo up some"? Well, that's what some enterprising person out there did and it's pretty fun. The graphics won't melt your eyes out of their sockets, not by a long shot, but it's a fun little game that can be played quickly.
Starbound: Did you like Terraria but hated being limited to one world? Wish it had more variety? Then Starbound is the game for you. It's Terraria on steroids. They're launching later this year and are finally excepting pre-orders.
It's looking pretty good. It'll be interesting to see how the procedural content generation works out replayability-wise.
Indeed. It should be pretty massive. I've been browsing the forums for it for months now and from the sounds of it they may pull it off quite nicely. Of course eventually you'll just be seeing the same monsters and plants and landscapes only with pallet swaps and name changes, but if they keep fleshing it out with content additions then conceivably once the system is in place and working as intended cranking out content should be relatively easy for them.
I have to disagree when it comes to Gnomoria. While it's trying to translate the Dwarf Fortress experience to a wider, more casual audience, it fails much like The Town failed. Isometric graphics don't make up for an interface somehow clunkier than that of DF. And, when it comes to Dwarf Fortress, you do have a number of graphic packs, most of which are quite good, and some of which are downright charming.
The rest of the list seems pretty good to me. Starbound would be impossible to screw up, given what they're drawing from Terraria. Xenonaughts needs some polish and optimization, but otherwise looks like it's set to be a good Xcom clone. Organ trail is hilarious. and cheaper than a large coffee.
You forgot Legends of Dawn that is coming out soon.
Xenonauts has amazing music during the title, so catchy. Thank you for the review of Organ Trail , I though about starting it and now I want to do that, just needed an opinion about it.
I really liked Rogue Legacy
Hero Core
(free, by 1 guy, and better designed than most "AAA" games),
..I'm sure I'll think of more
Edit: Aquaria (2 guys) might just be the pinnacle of the genre imo;
and although I haven't finished it yet, The Void is quite intriguing.
I've only just begun on Fortune Summoners (1 guy?), but if you can stomach JRPG tropes, it's a pretty amazing Metroidvania/FinalFantasy/StreetFighter combination.
Organ trail is $2.49 on steam right now - just saw the sale: http://store.steampowered.com/app/233740/
Fortune Summoners was really fun. I can't really describe why though, because I'm a weirdo.
Legend of Grimrock and Don't Starve are both very good.
Antichamber is probably my favorite indie game to come out this year.
The Dream Machine is pretty cool but admittedly most of my time playing it consists of getting stuck followed by watching a walkthrough.
I am beta testing Battle World Kronos, and its looking REALLY good. Its basically Battle Isle redone and reinvented. Of over 20 games I have supported on Kickstarter, this looks the favourite to be my number one.
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/kingartgames/battle-worlds-kronos-turn-based-strategy-revisited
Shadowrun Returns is really nice... turn based strategy
Its not the same as for example XCOM but it has a certain charm about it.
Defense grid is awesome of course, and the super-grinder modes are nice too (I played this game a lot).
Prime world: defenders is also a nice game (I played this game 2 times - it's a bit simple the second time but the card-upgrade system is ... different. And you've to choose which kind of towers to upgrade, you can't upgrade all of them otherwise it takes too much time).
The Bridge is a funny little game, in an Escher-like world. It's not a long game, a few hours of play.
I got Blueberry Garden for my 6-year-old, and it is quite cute. Realize this is not the primary target group for most users here, but maybe some of you, like me, have kids....
Heroes of a Broken Land is a good little indie dungeon-crawler, with some kingdom management and multi-party dungeons.
https://forums.elementalgame.com/450050/get;3420156
Starbound Beta is out Dec 4th (in less than a week). You can get the cheapest pre-order straight from Starbound's site for $15 right now, and that will include a Steam Key as well once they launch on Greenlight later next year.
Gnomoria and Shadowrun Returns on steam sale at the moment - 50% discount
Starbound for the win.
Just out of curiousity, what is the difference between Starbound and, say, Distant Worlds (other than the obvious graphical issues)? I've found the website surprisingly uninformative. Is it turn-based or RTS, are there opponents and AI or is it more like Dwarf Fortress?
Thanks much
Starbound is like Terarria... its a 2d platformer game where you mine resources, craft tools, and kill monsters. Not a strategy game at all.I don't want to tell you what to do... but usually youtube can give you a really quick idea of how the game actually plays.
Thanks. I've never heard of Terarria. Also not entirely sure what a "platformer" is -- is that something like Super Mario Brothers?
I highly recommend Dungeon of the Endless by Amplitude, Endless Space devs. It's early access at this point but under $10 and plays very stable with new content added every 2 weeks or so. It's pretty challenging but as you learn more about the game, there's enough strategy you can leverage to outweight most random bad luck stuff.
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