Steam winter sale suggestions.

[Worgen]

So another Steam Winter Sale is almost upon us, so what are some games you would recommend other people check out?

If you like shoot em ups at all then Devil Blade Reboot. Its one of the best shootemups around, got great graphics, music, plays well and has very fair difficulty. I would say great for experienced players but also newcomers.

For FPS games I have to mention Hedon since will always mention Hedon because its fucken awesome.

There is also Selaco, which is awesome, it plays like Fear but in GZdoom... a magic version of GZdoom that somehow does stuff it was really never intended to do.

If you want something more RPG then why not check out Crosscode. Its a single player game but set in an mmo, got a really fun story with good characters and nice topdown gameplay with a mix of action and puzzles.

You want a 2d action game, get Tevi. Kind of a metroidvania but also a bullethell its one of those that is a bit difficult to describe but its got great characters/story and plays really really well.

 

[NerfedFalcon]

If you're into either Metroidvania or generally the act of game preservation, then Castlevania Dominus Collection has you covered either way. Three Nintendo DS games presented in a format that makes them much more playable without a Nintendo DS, with multiple touchscreen emulation options so you can use the one you like the most. (Also some sidescroller from 80s arcades and all that that implies.) I don't actually have this yet, but I plan to pick it up if by the end of the 25th someone hasn't already gifted it to me.

Immersive sim? Prey (2017) might not have much to do with the original series, but it's a brilliant and haunting horror immersive sim that's basically System Shock 3. Everything in your environment has a use, even if it's not immediately apparent - but everything in your environment might also try to kill you.

Want to play something relaxing to de-stress from Prey? Try Dorfromantik (it's a German word describing the feeling of living in an idyllic country village). Even if you're not good enough to make a huge pattern, you can still watch something beautiful emerge across your screen while you start figuring things out.

Just wanna shoot stuff while moving really fast? This is Ultrakill. Max0r describes it better than I ever could. It's in Early Access, but there's already so much (amazing) content here that it's worth buying and playing now.



And if you don't have any money at all and want to play a game that's literally free (not even any microtransactions in-game), Holocure is a game in the Vampire Survivors mould with some genuinely interesting unique mechanics that keep me (a normie who knows nothing about VTubers) coming back for just one more round.

 

[Chimpzy]

Lol, Steam servers getting absolutely hammered. Been a while since they got stomped this hard.

Kinda nostalgic really. Reminds of when Steam launched. Fuck me, it sucked back then.

 

[Worgen]

Lol, Steam servers getting absolutely hammered. Been a while since they got stomped this hard.

Kinda nostalgic really. Reminds of when Steam launched. Fuck me, it sucked back then.

Back up now. But this wasn't anywhere near like what it was, the store front always worked fine, but wishlists and profiles were wonky.

Anyway, have some more suggestions.

If you want a really good space shooter then Corus. Its a great space shooter with neat abilities like being able being able to maintain momentum going forward but shoot enemies behind you and that is just the start. Its also got a more interesting story then expected. The main character is kinda monotone but even with that she ends up being fine.

If you want a big open world game then check out Days Gone. I generally don't really like open world games, but this one does some pretty good stuff. Like giving you a personal customizable motorcycle that is your constant companion. The zombies in it also work fine and the hordes are fun to deal with once you reach that point. The story is pretty good and very well acted. Its a shame it didn't do better since I would have liked to see where it could have gone.

If you want a point and click FoxTail. Its a really excellent point and click that is annoyingly unfinished because of the russian invasion of Ukraine (devs are Ukrainian). But there is still a lot of content there. Its done in the style of the Legend of Kyrandia series, complete with excellent pixel work. Story is interesting, characters are fun and the puzzles are interesting and even have multiple solutions.

If you want a complete point and click then try Zniw Adventure. Its done more in the lucasarts style of point and click. Fun characters, great animation and good puzzles.

Another great 2d action game is Hardcore Mecha. Its one of those that also really needs more love. Its done in a chibi style but it really takes me back to the days of Cybernator, but with better controls. It also does a great job of making you feel like you are part of an army and I like any game that can make that work.

 

[meiam]

Didn't we just get a sale like last week?

Probably will be a lot of repeat from what I did in pass thread.

Trial of mana, remake done right, keep the good, polish the bad.

Citizen sleeper, disco elysium in spaaaaaaaace, sequel coming out soon.

Ixion, frostpunk in spaaaaaaaace

crystal project, its FF5 essentially, now with 200% more side quest and sorta open world

Horizon gate, its FF5 essentially, in tactic form

underrail, what if fallout but... nothing.

Star wolves, its like one of those space trucker game, except its not about space trucking for fucking once!

spellforce conquest of Eo, its a 4x marrying a HoMM

The last spell, tower defense tactics roguelike, pretty tough
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1105670/The_Last_Spell/

 

[meiam]

For FPS games I have to mention Hedon since will always mention Hedon because its fucken awesome.

There is also Selaco, which is awesome, it plays like Fear but in GZdoom... a magic version of GZdoom that somehow does stuff it was really never intended to do.

No heavy discount though : (

Another great 2d action game is Hardcore Mecha. Its one of those that also really needs more love. Its done in a chibi style but it really takes me back to the days of Cybernator, but with better controls. It also does a great job of making you feel like you are part of an army and I like any game that can make that work.

You might like metal unit, worked better for me imo, rogue like

And not release yet but just saw this and am pretty excited

 

[Worgen]

No heavy discount though : (

Both are 100% worth it, especially Hedon.

You might like metal unit, worked better for me imo, rogue like

Hmm, does look interesting.

 

[Elvis Starburst]

A lot of the games on my wishlist barely went on sale. 25% at most. Kind of sucky, you'd think this would be the time to go heavy on the discounts

 

[BrawlMan]

A lot of the games on my wishlist barely went on sale. 25% at most. Kind of sucky, you'd think this would be the time to go heavy on the discounts

Some of the games I kept on wish list are 30% or less.

 

[Worgen]

Some of the games I kept on wish list are 30% or less.

If you want Victory Heat Rally, have you tried Slipstream? I want to say I recommended it before, but I don't recall.

 

[BrawlMan]

If you want Victory Heat Rally, have you tried Slipstream? I want to say I recommended it before, but I don't recall.

Got it during the late Spring. Thank again.

 

[NerfedFalcon]

Guess I'm posting a few more of these after a glance through my Steam library.

If you don't get the hype around Call of Duty, Modern Warfare (the 2007 original) is where it all began. The multiplayer servers are defunct by now, other than all the hackers (and I mean they'll steal your PC, not that they shoot through walls), but the campaign is still worth playing: graphics hold up impressively well for a 2007 game, the missions are well-paced and well-designed (on Regular difficulty at least), and the story is the best of the series even today. It even runs well on modern computers, and comes with resolution support up to at least 2560x1440, potentially even 4K (I don't have a 4K monitor).

Speaking of 'the game that started a hype train', Slay the Spire did that for roguelike deckbuilders. There's a lot of them out there, and they all take a slightly different approach to progression through a run and individual battles (or 'battles' in the case of Balatro), but nearly all of them started from the baseline that Slay the Spire set, and its core mechanics are more than solid enough to keep people of all skill levels coming back for hundreds or thousands of runs.

Rogue Legacy 2 is one of those sequels that makes the original look like an alpha build of the sequel. It takes everything about the original game and makes it better: better class variety, better area variety, better progression, and a surprisingly involved story for the genre. The flow between runs is polished so smooth, it's easy to lose track of how many runs you've done in a row.

428: Shibuya Scramble is the most unique visual novel I've ever read, for two reasons. One is the format, following five characters through the events of a single whirlwind day one hour at a time; to progress, you have to swap characters and make different decisions that avoid railroading each other into dead ends. The other, much more obvious one is the art style, as all of the images are of real people in the real Shibuya acting out each scene, no weirdly-spaced anime eyes or rainbow hair here. The plot is also a standout, being a thriller that gradually unravels a terrorist plot interspersed with occasional wacky antics, but even the wacky antics are unlike most other VNs I've read.

And my game of the year 2024 (provisionally, I still haven't actually played Antonblast yet), this absolute masterpiece of a brainrot nostalgia trip:

I'm not joking. Play this game.

 

[Chimpzy]

A lot of the games on my wishlist barely went on sale. 25% at most. Kind of sucky, you'd think this would be the time to go heavy on the discounts

My reaction to seeing my wishlist

Also, they don't give free cards for voting in the Steam Awards and doing the discovery queue anymore. Just those fugly stickers you can't get rid of.

Like, sure, cards aren't worth much anymore, but those free ones did add up, and that little extra discount was nice to have.

 

[BrawlMan]

For those with decently powered or powerful enough PC, GG GORE Is on sale right now for nearly 5 bucks.

 

[Elvis Starburst]

My reaction to seeing my wishlist

Yeeeaaahhh, seems we're in the same boat... I guess on the one hand it's saving me money?

 

[Bedinsis]

Might as well share some highlights.


(-70%) This one I bought on a whim, not knowing what to expect other than it being a sci-fi visual novel. My only prior experience with the genre was Ace Attorney. If I were to say that there is no gameplay I'd be lying but it would be a lot closer to the truth than claiming it has much gameplay; the interaction is more there to determine how the story progresses. That story however was great. What ended up working wonders for me was the structure. Like the movie Titanic, it has two very distinct halves, the first half being a bunch of teenagers doing scientific experiments and the second half dealing with the ramifications of their discoveries. That way I got to know them and like them in a chill first half while guessing where the science would go, and therefore care about them in the more intense second half. I don't want to spoil too much, but its anime adaptation is one of the highest regarded animes of all time, so when I call the story great know that I am not alone.

It was in fact so great that I took it upon myself to try some other visual novels to see if the aspects to my liking are not things that are basic bread-and-butter of the genre, which you might have seen in the What are you currently playing?-thread. Some gold nuggets from there:


(-80%) This is a bundle of two games with the same premise: a bunch of people are looked in a series of Escape Room Puzzles, kidnapped, by the mysterious and murderous Zero. As you go through the rooms you get to know the different characters and solve the immediate goal of escaping alive and solve the overall goal of figuring out why you were kidnapped.

In both games you'll spend 70 % of the time not knowing what's going on, and the fun comes from figuring out what it may be. I enjoyed that aspect; the puzzle rooms themselves are forgettable. The first one is the stronger title, though I can see why someone would prefer the second one.


(-60%) 80 Days is an interactive novel adaptation of Jules Verne's Around the world in 80 days, with the setting changed to be a world where the world is brimming with steampunk contraptions. You are Passeportout, manservant of Phileas Fogg, charged with picking what routes to take, what novel section decisions to make and what to purchase and sell as you race against the clock to travel around the world in less than 80 days.

The recommendation here comes from the story. The different routes have different encounters and events associated with them, where you get to choose where the story goes, decisions that sometimes also affects your funds or if the route goes another way (I remember I was kidnapped by pirates once who wanted to take me somewhere else), but sometimes are just there for giving you a flavor of how the world might have been had steampunk conquered the planet. These stories are really well written, feeling like something Jules Verne himself could've written. The only weak aspect is that they are modular enough that it doesn't feel like one big story but a series of small ones. Which might be fitting for a title originally developed for the on-the-go-platform of smartphones.

Recommended to @Phoenixmgs in particular.

 

[Phoenixmgs]

(-60%) 80 Days is an interactive novel adaptation of Jules Verne's Around the world in 80 days, with the setting changed to be a world where the world is brimming with steampunk contraptions. You are Passeportout, manservant of Phileas Fogg, charged with picking what routes to take, what novel section decisions to make and what to purchase and sell as you race against the clock to travel around the world in less than 80 days.

The recommendation here comes from the story. The different routes have different encounters and events associated with them, where you get to choose where the story goes, decisions that sometimes also affects your funds or if the route goes another way (I remember I was kidnapped by pirates once who wanted to take me somewhere else), but sometimes are just there for giving you a flavor of how the world might have been had steampunk conquered the planet. These stories are really well written, feeling like something Jules Verne himself could've written. The only weak aspect is that they are modular enough that it doesn't feel like one big story but a series of small ones. Which might be fitting for a title originally developed for the on-the-go-platform of smartphones.

Recommended to @Phoenixmgs in particular.

Thanks, never heard of it and it's like 10 years old, picked it up since it's like $5, have no idea when I'll play it though since I do hardly play video games anymore. Maybe it's because I play board games 3-4 times a week, the other days I just feeling like watching stuff after work and just never get around to any video games.

---

I bought the following during the Thanksgiving/Black Friday sale (I'm guessing they're on sale again as well):

- Batman Arkham City (it was like 90% off and it's my fav of that series and I doubt I'll replay that on PS3)
- Cocoon (heard great things about it when it came out and it was at the cheapest price I've seen)
- Untitled Goose Game (I've just never gotten around to picking this up and always meant to after Dunkey's video)
- UnMetal (Metal Gear parody type game, I didn't really find the demo hilarious back when I tried it but it was so cheap)
- Tunic (heard great things, also heard to not read too much about it and haven't, finally was at a good price)
- The Pathless (love the games like Abzu, Journey, and Flower)
- Inscryption (heard great things but again heard not to read much about it)

 

[Bedinsis]

Thanks, never heard of it and it's like 10 years old, picked it up since it's like $5, have no idea when I'll play it though since I do hardly play video games anymore.

Only play it if you'd like to; I mostly recommended it after I saw that your list of favourite games included Disco Elysium (so evidently reading a lot with choices is not a turn-off) and Horizon Zero Dawn (a game the lead writer of 80 days has worked on) and because you've said you value the story in video games.

 

[Worgen]

So far I've only grabbed


and


And both of them are pretty cool. Starcom does put me in mind of a lesser but better playing Starcontrol 2. I think the story in Starcom isn't as good as Starcontrol, but its got good exploration and the combat is fun and satisfying. It could really use more music though, it has kinda generic space music that is just kinda there. But its also one of those games that feels like it might be better with a podcast on since there is a lot of travel. But its still cool and has grabbed me rather hard.

Kunitsu- Gami... this was someone's passion project, you can just feel the love someone had for this and its good too. Its a more different tower defence game, you run around beating up enemies with your sword while your guys help defend points and you direct your maiden to the tori gates to purify them. Its very Japanese but not in the usual way that means, this is pretty straight Japanese mythology and traditional dance with traditional monsters. Its very cool and I really like how after you beat a stage, you can have the villagers repair the area and pretty things up.

 

[Phoenixmgs]

Only play it if you'd like to; I mostly recommended it after I saw that your list of favourite games included Disco Elysium (so evidently reading a lot with choices is not a turn-off) and Horizon Zero Dawn (a game the lead writer of 80 days has worked on) and because you've said you value the story in video games.

I do definitely want to try it (I did check out a review that was very positive) but, again, it's mainly that I don't find time to play much video games now. I bought Baldur's Gate 3 day 1 (of actual release, not early access) and I've played it like 10 hours and really do want to play it and all but I don't feel like dedicating 2+ hour chunks of time to it. Hell, I bought a PS5 to play Dragon's Dogma and played like 2 hours; it kept crashing on my PC as it just kept using massive amounts of RAM, never releasing any I'm thinking.