Are there any games you're planning to pick up during the Steam and GOG sales?
We've got two big sales going on, and I'm currently deciding what I would like to pick up. I'm planning to get Expeditions: Rome since it's 60% off, and I'm trying to decide if I want to finally get Terra Invicta.
What patient games are the people here planning to pick up? Maybe I'll find a few that I "need" to try!
The original devs got screwed over by the publisher ZA/UM. The devs actively encourage people to pirate the game so the scumbag publisher won't get to profit off what they created.
It's a great game and the OG devs want you to play it for free by pirating :>
I bought Horizon Zero Dawn when it was 50% off. For me it was really worth it. Got every achievement for it. I plan to do the same when Horizon Forbidden West is 50% off.
It's definitely a great game, when it reaches the right price point for you
I too have a backlog, but it's fairly small. I tend to play genres of games by spells, so I often have a few of each type in my queue for the day I'm interested in that kind. While I don't force myself to finish a game I don't like, I do try to keep the number of unplayed games low!
I often find myself looking at some of the PlayStation games, but I often find myself disappointed once I start playing them. The main series of the former exclusives that I like is Uncharted, but many of the others I've just lost interest in after a few hours. That being said, Uncharted games are very short, so maybe I just don't like most long games anymore! Uncharted 4 and The Lost Legacy were both a lot of fun though.
I know the feeling of getting sidetracked by old favorites! I run into that with Morrowind as well as Stardew Valley, The Sims, Farming Simulator and a few others!
I'm keeping an eye on it as well, but I'm waiting for a major price drop/bigger sale. Divinity Original Sin 2 didn't really click with me, and BG3 reminds me of it a little too much. Fantasy isn't really my favorite setting, so it may just not be the game for me.
I am waiting half for this reason and half because I'm busy! I won't get around to playing it anytime soon, so why buy it at this price now when it'll probably be for sale cheaper in a few years, which is when I predict I will have time to play?
I finally picked up Witcher 3 for like 4 bucks. Excited to start playing that. I also got Euro Truck Simulator because it was like 1.99 and seems like a chill space out game.
The Witcher 3 is pretty good. I normally don't like a lot of fantasy games, but the Witcher and Elder Scrolls games are two that I like for some reason! I finished the whole game and both dlcs once. I started a second playthrough, but that is mostly running around and playing gwent! 😂
Both Euro and American Truck Simulator are really good games. I like to just put on a podcast or some music and drive for a while. If you find you like it, the dlc states are worth the price in my opinion. Especially since they go on sale pretty often!
Witcher 3 was great even though the pacing almost lost me.
I'm the kind of player who plays one main story mission and then has to complete all available side quests, before continuing the main quest. It's the reason the only Bethesda Game I have ever finished is Oblivion.
That's why I recommend people to stick with it and finish some main quests if you ever feel like the game loses yo.
This is why I can't replay it... the first time I played it I did everything I possibly could; all the little icons, side quests, traipsed all over each region a dozen times or more... it took hundreds of hours.
I boot it up again, manage to choke down the first "tutorial" area and get to the next are and shut it off... it's no good, I can't do it.
Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night, Dying Light, and Hades. $10 a piece on Steam.
I put a ton of hours into Bloodstained RotN when it was on gamepass, but never beat it. Castlevania: Symphony of the Night is a game I end up replaying every few years, so I really enjoyed its spiritual succesor back then (around when it first released), and they've only added more content (three new playable characters, a few game modes) to it over time.
For Dying Light, I love the Dead Rising series, but the moment to moment moving around is nothing to write home about. Dying Light has a focus on movement, and got a lot of good reviews, so I figured I'd give it a try.
For Hades, I've always loved Supergiant Games since their first game, Bastion, and I never picked up Hades because it was never priced low enough when I had money to burn. Now that Hades 2 is in early access, I watched some gameplay of that and the first shot up on my list to buy. I've been craving an isometric real time combat game too.
Dying Light's gameplay is pretty good, but I like immediately got a mod to fix the idiotic weapon break system. It's the extremely tiresome "Your hammer breaks after hitting 20 zombies" system plus "you leveled up! now you can use a better hammer with bigger numbers!". Easy enough to mod to taste.
The story, however, is kind of bad. You don't really get any choices, which is fine, but what happens is not satisfying. The DLC is also fun, but the story ending is trash. I just uninstalled it after instead of doing any of the extra bits.
--
Hades, on the other hand, is very good. No complaints.
Bloodstained is $3 on cdkeys. I Kickstarted it and got the Switch cart when the PS Vita port was cancelled. For that price, it was a no-brainer getting it for PC now, too!
I already have a lot of unplayed games, so I'm keeping my list small. I also really like indies, so here you go:
The Hex - in the "deep discount" section; I liked the dev's other two games (Pony Island and Inscryption), so I'll probably enjoy this one; they're all on sale too
Firewatch
Celeste
Gris
Filament
Chaos Reborn
These are all <$5.
And some other games I might get if I finish an in-progress game:
Psychonauts 2
Hogwarts Legacy
Bomb Rush Cyberpunk
Little Nightmares 2
These are from larger studios and are at historical lows (I think). I just need to finish some longer games before I get even more.
It sounds like you've got a plan! Once I get all the bills paid for this month I'm planning to get my partner a Steam Deck as well, so both of us are looking at games. They're a Harry Potter fan, so Hogwarts Legacy is one that came up on the list.
Is that the one where you start with a stealth mission that never appears again in the game? It acts as a mandatory tutorial and makes the whole thing unreplayable because of its heavy handed enforcement? If I'm right, this game is a really good minor evolution of the original for exactly one play through. However I wanted to enjoy it a second time a few times but never got through the intro. Hmm exactly how I'd describe metal gear solid 5. I've got great memories just can't revisit it.
Is this the one with the weird multiplayer stuff where you fight other people's orcs, and sometimes they're suspiciously like level 100 and super annoying to kill? And it has stupid sexy shelob?
I never finished it because of those things, but otherwise the core gameplay was alright.
Love the game so much. It is such a fun concept for a game and they executed so well. I’m still in the first phases of the game and unlocking new content and I’m hooked.
Just got Stardew Valley. I'm a little reluctant to start it though- it seems like one of those games I could sink hundreds of hours into and I have a huge backlog. But I'm excited to try it.
I then bought it again on Steam and have 200 hours logged, which is probably only going to grow. All of these hours happened during the adult phase of my life in which I usually have to be mildly peer-pressured into gaming instead of actually taking the initiative to do something I like (though I am trying to fix that). However, I do think that the way it breaks the game up, into days, gives a nice stopping point.
If only I could stop thinking "one more day, I still need to turn in that quest/plant that new crop in the exact place I want it/get that one last fish I need for the community center before I forget".
My partner and I both have hundreds of hours in it, so that could be possible! Try not to have super high expectations for it before you start though, I wouldn't want you to miss out on a fun game because fans hyped it beyond what it is.
That being said, both of us are pretty big fans of the game. We drove quite a distance to go to one of the Stardew Valley concerts, and it was really great. I'm not someone that likes crowds, but all the fans there were very friendly and it made for a great time.
So I've just bought a PC. I haven't had a new computer for 12 years. The newest game I've played is Subnautica (and Below Zero). I've basically missed everything from the last 15 years.
I own a few games that I haven't been able to play until now (Fallout 4, Star Wars Squadrons, Witcher 3, few others). Thinking I probably have enough games in my backlog to play those and maybe look at new stuff next sale.
Enjoy your new computer! There's some good games that came out in that time period, so you'll have plenty to enjoy. You'll probably get some really good prices on some of them too!
Yeah, you don't want to stack up too many! I've got some in my queue until I feel like playing them, but I've started moving more toward just buying a game when I want to play it rather than stacking a bunch up during sales.
I bought Deus Ex: Human Revolution for 2.99€ and I've been enjoying it. I've always heard good things about the series, but never tried it before. Definitely feeling that Cyberpunk had some inspiration from Deus Ex.
I also bought Firewatch for 4.99€ and beat it in a day. I wasn't spoiled about the story, but I had read a bit about it. At the end of the day, I'm glad I played it, but I'm not sure that I would necessarily recommend it.
All the Deus Ex games go for ridiculously cheap and are such a great fun-per-dollar ratio IMHO.
Yes, even Invisible War, if one embraces its weird consoley quirks. XD (bias: I enjoyed it on my OG Xbox back in the day. Universal ammo is so stupid though.)
Still gotta play Mankind Divided. I hope they finish the series one day. They absolutely nailed it with the iconic aesthetic, and Adam Jensen is just so freaking cool. :)
After a while I finally picked up Parkitect. I've been having a blast with OpenRTC2 lately, and everyone says if you like Rollercoaster Tycoon, Parkitect really follows that idea.
Still burning through the old school games, but I'm excited to play this one! Especially with workshop support.
I've had that game on my wishlist for years now! 😂 I enjoy that style of game, but all I end up doing is building roller coasters, so I end up sticking with things like Planet Coaster instead. I have definitely spent some time on OpenRCT2 though, so maybe I should give it a try.
Thanks, I'll check it out! Recently also got Celeste, Blasphemous 1 & 2, and the Metroidvania Humble Bundle: Axiom Verge 1 & 2, 9 Years of Shadows, Cookie Cutter, Death's Gambit, The Knight Witch... building a backlog. 😂
I have never played a From Software game. Sekiro is really tempting to get, because I never could see myself dodging/rolling around the big enemies and bosses. Mostly human-sized enemies and parrying sounds much more appealing to me.
But the difficulty has scared me off thus far and it never went below 50% off
This was my barrier of entry. As someone who put around a combined 1k hours in the Souls games, it wasn't until I treated the game differently than Souls did I finally start to make progress. Same thing happened with the aggressive, faster pace of Bloodborne.
I'm somewhat the same. Really no interest in Dark Souls/Elden Ring or any of that, but Sekiro did catch my attention before. The difficulty is a turn off though. I often play games on hard difficulty, but I prefer it to be a choice, and to be able to turn it down if it's too difficult.
It's the only game from FromSoft that I've ever beaten. I find QoL much more bearable compared to DS1.
Parrying allowed me to stand toe-to-toe against bosses also. No more rolling around.
My plug on Satisfactory is you come for playing around with and making sculptures with conveyor belts, and then stay to play with jump-pads, pneumatic hypertubes and later, trains (that actually carry freight and have a purpose). Also the planet is pretty (and you're going to ruin it all by turning it into factories).
As with other automation games, it's coding in disguise, and if you get a buzz from configuring logistics to distribute parts and fluids from sources to processing machines, then this game can take over your life. The two principle schools of players are make it efficient and make it pretty. In the end, you have a giant playground to zoom around in and watch all the parts zip this way and that down conveyors, each with actual purpose behind them.
Bought Icarus and State of Decay 2 today. One was 50% off and the other 66%. I almost bought them last night. Glad I waited. Always on the lookout for more co-op games to play with the wife. Can't wait for Ark 2!
Icarus looks interesting but I've been eyeing Enshrouded. My wife liked playing Volcanoids, Astroneer, Drake Hollow, Smalland, Conan Exiles, Dinkum, Palworld, and of course Stardew Valley, among others. Not sure which of those are on sale but check them out.
Great description. I like to get into SoD2 if zomboid is feeling too simmy. Still has survival elements but not as hard-core unless you make it that way.
Icarus is one that's caught my attention a couple of times, but I've never bought it. I don't do a lot of co-op or multiplayer in general, but it does look interesting.
I just got the pack with Tunic and Death's Door. I had Tunic in my wishlist for a while and finally bit the bullet. Yay! 2 more games into the backlog!
I'm kinda offended with these deals. They were great when games were $50. Now that they're trying to charge $70, the deals are just getting prices down to the old regular price, not seeming like a deal at all to me. Now I have to be even more patient. Oh well...
Prices are largely in line with historical prices, after inflation. $70 today is worth about the same as $50 in 2011. IIRC, new releases were often $60 back then, so new games may actually be cheaper today than ever.
That doesn't make it any better though. I'm patient because games don't release in a solid state these days, and by the time they're properly patched, they're on a solid discount. I'm not paying $70 to be a beta tester, I'd rather pay <$50 for a solid, patched game, even better if it's less.
Dead Space (remastered, I guess?). Only played a demo version that had 5 minutes of play, way back in the aughts, and have been meaning to try it since.
It's sometimes fun to go back and buy those games you found years ago! When I was pretty young I couldn't afford games and computers, so I would fix old broken computers and play mostly game demos. I got many more hours out of that than those designers probably ever imagined! Since then I've gone back and bought a lot of those games, and it definitely reminds me of some good times.
Last night for $4.99 and $2.99 I got Worms W.M.D. and Worms Armageddon on Steam since I haven't played any worms games outside of Worms 2: Armageddon on xbox360.
Tried Armageddon last night and it was pretty fun. Only gripe I have with it is that I had to plug in a mouse and keyboard to my deck dock.
Have yet to try W.M.D. yet and don't know if it has an offline singleplayer player vs computer mode, but I've seen enough videos of people playing it for me to think I'd have a good time playing it.
This was a game many people have forgotten but really, really must play. It was amazing when it came out. There is a patch set for it that is pretty necessary, I forget the details but there are walkthroughs for it.
I keep hearing that Mass Effect is a series I would like, so I finally got the Legendary Edition for $5.99.
I have also heard of Mages of Mystralia as a good game for magic mechanics, so got that for $4.99.
Trombone Champ for $5.99. I like silly memey stuff and I'm a former band kid. I also never played the trombone, which explains why I am buying the game instead of just playing my own trombone instead.
Sixty Four for $4.19, as an incremental game fan
I am not sure whether to pick up Noita because I have heard of its great magic mechanics, it also sounds like something that will frustrate me way too much. I'll probably try on a friend's computer first
The magic is that you have two major components. Wands and spells. After every level, you get an opportunity to tinker with the wands you've found by replacing spells you have on them with other wands to make something better.
It's a roguelike, and has no real tutorial, but it's definitely one of those niche games I've put serious time into.
You've got a nice variety of games to try there! Trombone Champ was pretty huge for a while there, but I had pretty much forgotten about it. Maybe I'll grab it just for the laughs.
I yoinked Undertale and Fallout 76. I just finished FO4, before that was New Vegas, and 3 before that. Finally got hooked on Fallout after years of trying and just not jiving. The show motivated me to try again.
I never got into Fallout either, although I only ever tried 4. I did have someone mention that I should try the earlier games as apparently the tone of them is different. It's sometimes hard to overcome first impressions though! It's great that the show gave you the boost to get hooked!
From a new fan, I found that 3 had the coolest environment. New Vegas bad much better gun mechanics. And 4 is good, a lot better than reviews I read made it sound. And the Nuka Town DLC was a lot of fun.
It's something I've looked at before, and while it looks like it could be a fun game, I don't have that much time to spend grinding! It definitely appears to be one of the more fair f2p games out there though.
I expected grind, considering it's free and very well made. But I don't find Warframe grind-y at all.
I do about 20% backtracking, due to playing asynchronously with a few friends, and doubling back to get them quest objectives.
Other than that, I can't think of a time I've repeated a level for any reason but failing the mission or just wanting to play it again.
The grind-y aspect is there, and stuff you can purchase is there, but it all feels like "New Game Plus" mechanics.
I've unlocked several additional mechanics and Warframe across my play without paying for them. They're amusing but the base game is so good I wasn't feeling anxious for them to unlock.
I eventually bought a character pack to support the developers, and sure enough, it played just like a "New Game Plus" variant. When I did that, I finally did revisit a bunch of old levels, to try out the new game mechanics in familiar contexts.
Warframe is the most p2w game I have ever played, and I don't understand how people can say otherwise. Imagine you could buy the best pve gear in a mmo like WoW instead of grinding out raids. Warframe is this and then some. Resources? You can buy that. Skip crafting times? Yes. Buy boosters to shorten leveling and item acquisition? Definitely multiple versions. And the game still creates problems and sells the solution, the classic monetization of inventory space.
The game is very good, has an amazing story, and the movement system is the best, but it's extreme p2w if you want it to be. At its core, It is a very grindy looter shooter which is severely monetized.
I bought Dreamfall Chapters, which is back to its historical low on Steam. I've heard good things about it, and Dustborn from the same dev looks super promising.
indeed! tonight I discovered those wide load missions that must have been from one of the cargo packs I picked up. brings a whole new element to the game!
The Total War games look really interesting, I should give them a try. I play Civilization, Age of Empires, and Crusader Kings though, so it's sometimes hard to fit a new series in. I do see that Atilla is the newest game without Denuvo though, so I might just grab it!
Personally I find that terra invicta requires way too much micromanagement and waiting for turns to pass so I can't recommend it but if that seems your speed or idk if there are mods to help then go for it
That's really what is holding me back from getting it. The idea sounds really interesting, I'm just worried that I won't enjoy the actual gameplay. I've had it in my cart a couple of times during sales but I never end up getting it.
What you said about micromanaging things does help. I don't mind a little micromanagement in games like Age of Empires or Civilization, but if you get too much of it happening I tend to get a bit sloppy. I've found it depends a lot on my goals for the play session and also how long I've been doing it.
I got Witcher 1 and SW:KOTOR for like $2. Not sure when I'll play them since I'm currently in the middle of a BG3 obsession and then I'm going to play Ghost of Tsushima. But it was cool to get them for so cheap.
Sounds like a really good deal! I've got all of the Witcher games, and they're pretty good. I'm not really a Star Wars fan, otherwise I would pick up some of the games while they're on that deep a discount! It makes me wonder how good some of them are for a non fan.
Ghost of Tsushima is a game I'm definitely keeping an eye on. I've unfortunately been disappointed with a lot of the recent PlayStation PC releases though, so I'm a bit wary. I'll wait to see what kind of discounts show up in a year or so!
Yeah I was surprised they were so cheap. That's not $2 each, that's $2 total lol. They were like 1.25 each or something. I've played TW2 and 3 and I really liked both of them, but I've heard TW1 feels really dated at this point; though really I'm just playing it to round out the series.
Not patient gaming related but I have started GoT. Its amazingly well optimized on my Steam Deck. I'm kind of blown away on how well it runs, though I've only been playing for two hours. Sometimes the game can fall apart at the end optimization wise, like Baldurs Gate 3.
For a long time I only played World of Warcraft, (I'm clean now) so I don't have a lot of experience with Sony. I think the last Sony games I played were the OG COD:MW2 and some of the first Ratchet and Clank games, but I've seen they get a lot of hate. Why is that? I did play the 2018 God of War last year and its one of my favorites.