Sierra had managed this in The investigation takes them all over the United States, and most importantly, features songs. Each location is so wonderfully drawn and coloured, and packed with daft details. And all the characters are superbly realised and very silly. A "preview" written for 's April 1st silliness. April Ryan, an 18 year old who can shift between the mundane world of future Earth, and the magical fantasy realms of Arcadia, sets out to restore the Balance in the universe.
And does so in an utterly enormous and phenomenally verbose adventure game. Which is perhaps an even greater indication of how strong the writing and world are, that it rises above this to be one of the best adventure games ever made. Its twin worlds are limited to sections of cities, and yet you walk away with a sense of understanding two entire civilisations.
And that soundtrack! While it earned notoriety for the prolific swearing and the appearance of a blue winky, it gained a massive following and two sequels because of its massive heart. But my mind was made up about TLJ years and years before. A making of by Kieron.
A retro by John. The sort-of sequel to Maniac Mansion has you play as three characters, rock band roadie Hoagie years in the past, slightly deranged Laverne years in the future, and ultra-nerd Bernard in the present day. Switching between each, you must help to prevent a race of tentacle beings from taking over the world. It confirmed that where Sierra was shackled by its s past, Lucas were ploughing forward into what adventures would become — and indeed still are. I can prove that in one example: interfering with the design of the American flag in the past in order to create a tentacle costume in the future.
Okay, another one: shrinking a jumper small enough to defrost a frozen hamster by putting it in the tumble dryer for years. DOTT remains the textbook which all adventure game designers should study before they even consider conceiving a puzzle.
On top of that, the care over the characters from an on-form Tim Schafer gives things an emotional depth that should surely have been impossible in such a silly caper. Get it and play it again. Or heck, for goodness sake, for the first time. The game was originally released in a rectangular prism-shaped box, to the horror of all gaming shops.
Younger readers: yes, games were released in boxes! And sold in shops! Astonishingly, nowhere is presently selling it. Good work, not-piracy! Tim Schafer playing the game. An interview with Schafer about adventure games. A screenshot gallery. We now know that if you weren't playing games in , you've been doing life all wrong. Either be born earlier, or sort your priorities. We've learned that adventure games aren't the minor niche the games press has so often, so lazily painted them into.
They form a core of some of the best games of all time. We've also learned that if you like Myst, you're wrong. Remember, your favourite adventure not getting mentioned isn't a slight. This is the best 25 out of hundreds of the things. If you believe a game is egregiously missing, leaving a comment like, "Where's Zork: Grand Inquisitor?
Writing a short piece on why Zork: Grand Inquisitor is a brilliant adventure game is helpful to everyone. Day Of The Tentacle 2. The Longest Journey 3.
Grim Fandango 6. Toonstruck 7. Space Quest IV 9. Time Gentlemen Please The Dig Kentucky Route Zero Full Throttle Machinarium To The Moon Broken Sword Fahrenheit Gabriel Knight The Blackwell Series The Walking Dead Discworld Noir Spycraft: The Great Game The Pandora Detective Police Quest III The greatest PC games of all time The best free PC games to play right now Or try our genre-specific lists, if you want a particular kind of great game to play:.
The Settlers has finally emerged from development hell, and it's fighting fit. We've been hands on with the upcoming closed beta ahead of its release in March. In defense of Cyberpunk 's constant phone calls. The Anacrusis is so much more than a sci-fi Left 4 Dead-like. Museum Of Mechanics: Lockpicking has cracked its way onto Steam. The greatest chronicle of English culture is a Duke Nukem 3D level. Monster Hunter Rise: tips for beginners.
Project Zomboid beginner's guide. If you click on a link and make a purchase we may receive a small commission. Read our editorial policy. Read more: Our interview with Chris Jones about bringing the series back. Read more: We interviewed Telltale about the game series. Notes: The voice cast is great. What else should I be playing if I like this: Perhaps dig into the Westwood Kyrandia series of adventures — also British and silly. Read more: John's retrospective for Eurogamer.
Read more: Vast amounts of coverage about the games. Read more: Our interview with Dave Gilbert about the series and more. Notes: The floppy version of Gab Knight 1 came on eleven discs, which was a real pain in the arse. Read more: Our review of the recent remake. Notes: One of the nicest details in the game is its use of multiple camera angles on the same event, which really needs to be copied more often.
Read more: John's Eurogamer retrospective. Notes: The Goat Puzzle, that is so often used as a reference point for bad puzzles, appears in this game. Read more: An interview with Charles Cecil. Notes: A sequel should appear one day. Read more: Our review. And Verdict. Notes: The voice of Ben, Roy Conrad, very sadly died in He, incredibly, is still alive. Read more: John's Eurogamer retro. Read more: Interview with the developers. Read more: John's retro for Eurogamer.
Also, so many poo jokes. Read more: Will Porter's Eurogamer retro. Notes: There was meant to be a sequel. Read more: John's retro on Eurogamer. Read more: An interview with Tim Schafer on adventures. Read more: John's EG retrospective. Phil: It's no Dishonored 2, but I really have to praise the craft Arkane put into creating Prey's space station—a seamlessly connected environment full of secrets to unlock.
It's just a shame the combat outstays its welcome. For years it's been evolving and spitting out experiments, beckoning me back time and time again to slaughter hordes of monsters and obsess over loot and builds.
The main progression system is the pinnacle of ARPG character building, and one that's kept me tinkering away for the better part of a decade. I suspect only the in-development sequel will be able to tear me away. Wes: I don't want to start a debate about game difficulty, but overcoming Sekiro's challenge was a thrill I haven't gotten from an action game since God Hand. It demands you play on its terms. The moment you parry a boss's final hit and counter with a deathblow you'll realize you've felt dead inside for years.
Morgan: Come on James, Chivalry 2 is right over there. Sekiro is hands-down my favorite From game yet. By reining in its combat options and focusing on a single weapon, they ended up with combat so good that Star Wars copied it. Fraser: Yes, it's more Assassin's Creed, with a vast open world filled with stuff to climb, people to murder and crap to collect.
While much is unchanged, I still found myself spending something like hours playing. As a Scot I hate to say it, but England is a pretty nice place to explore. It's a stunning open world, and one jam-packed with some of the series' most charismatic denizens, not least of which is Eivor, a terse but charming protagonist whose growls and sighs speak volumes. She's my favourite assassin, even over the superb Kassandra. Sarah: I absolutely adored Eivor, and her horse who I named Horace.
We both spent far too much time exploring England to compare places I've visited with their in-game counterparts. Steven: I'm such a big fan of this new direction Assassin's Creed has taken—even if it sometimes still feels a little too big for its own good. Shifting to become an RPG with a branching narrative is just such a fun way to intimately explore a romanticized version of different historical periods, and Valhalla makes some really strong improvements in the narrative department, especially in the complex relationship between Eivor and her brother.
Phil: Gonna be honest: I'm still too burned out from completing Odyssey—which, to be clear, I loved—to even consider starting this yet.
Nat: For a long time, Black Mesa was a joke. An over-ambitious attempt to completely remake Half-Life from the ground up as a standalone mod. But lo and behold, it's finally finished—and bloody hell, if it isn't a stunning thing. Black Mesa deftly reimagines Valve's debut, trimming the more tedious parts of Half-Life while remaking Xen Half-Life's notoriously flawed final chapters from the ground up.
I wouldn't say it replaces the seminal shooter outright, but it's a damn fine way to experience it from a brand new angle. Wes: A factory building game so perfectly named I defy anyone to talk about it without using the word "satisfying. My first 'factory' was a messy series of conveyor belts on a forest floor that was ugly and inefficient, so I tore it down and rebuilt.
And again. My multiplayer crew is now building towering skyscraper factories linked by automated sky trains. Some people lose a year building castles in Minecraft; I lost one building iron rods in Satisfactory, and I don't regret a second of it. Phil: Build rockets and send them into space.
Or, just as likely, fail to send them into space because of a disastrous flaw with your design. Kerbal Space Program takes all of the complicated maths needed to successfully hurl functional machines out of a planet's atmosphere and presents them in a way that celebrates creativity, expression and fun.
There's still nothing quite like Kerbal. Dave: The rescue missions Kerbal's 'career mode' spits up are some of the greatest space-based experiences you can have on a PC. Forget Elite: Dangerous, forget Homeworld, forget the Outer Wilds, when you've got Kerbward Woodward stranded, orbiting a distant planet with vast amounts of precious 'science' accumulated from a daring mission to Duna you've just got to figure out a way to get him home safe.
Especially because it's your fault for him being stuck way out there because you forgot to add a few solar extra solar cells back in the lab. From creating the rescue craft, intercepting the stranded craft, and finally getting everyone home safe… there are few more satisfying feelings in PC gaming. Evan: Depth, literally and figuratively. Creator Derek Yu calls it "spiky", a label that describes many of the things you can impale yourself upon as well as the emotional highs and lows that its teeming, subterranean lunar universe produces in players.
A great spectator game, Spelunky 2's streaming and YouTube community is another dimension of experimentation and unbelievable feats. Family gatherings, drunken parties, or lunchtime in the office—it does it all. Morgan: Party Pack 7 is a particular banger, too. Champ'd up did the impossible task of surpassing the best ever Jackbox game before it: Tee KO. Jackbox is a great way to get the party started or serve as a fun, accessible time when you're not quite ready for the night to end.
I can't even begin to count how many in-jokes between me and my pals have been born as a result of Jackbox. Rich: A triumphant reimagining of Capcom's already-excellent series that looks gorgeous and delivers some of the best co-op times you'll ever have. Incredible combat with huge depth, spectacular monsters and environments, and there's so much of it. You never want this game to end, and it feels like it never does.
Wes: expansion Iceborne adds an endgame zone you can spend months in and a vastly streamlined gathering hub for multiplayer. It's everything I didn't know I needed in the base game. Mollie: Monster Hunter: World has been winding down for a while, with the final content update releasing in October last year and the release of Rise on the Nintendo Switch not too long ago.
I'm basically waiting for that to hit PC now, but Monster Hunter: World will still remain an excellent game. It really nailed the balance between the series' traditionally tough gameplay while being super friendly to newcomers.
Also, the hunting horn absolutely whips. Doot bro for life. Chris: One of the few blockbuster games built from the ground up for VR, and certainly the best and most beautiful. Whatever Valve did under the hood with the game's locomotion, it's easily the most comfortable VR game, one that I could play for hours at a time without feeling the nausea or headaches VR usually gives me after about 40 minutes.
Plus, it cleverly rewrote some Half-Life lore that's been in the books for a decade, priming us for whatever comes next. Dave: Easily the best VR game ever made. It's also one of the finest Half-Life games too, and damn, is it ever creepy.
Stalking through broken down infested zones of City 17 to avoid the zombies, or bursting out into the streets for a firefight with the Combine, Alyx is an absolute must for Half-Life fans. And, oh my god, those liquid physics. I could spend hours just shaking vodka bottles. Rachel: First released back in February , Devotion was available on Steam for only six days before it was hit with its infamous review-bombing controversy.
Determined to re-release the game, Red Candle put it back up for sale this year, letting players finally experience its superb suburban horror. Sharing many similarities to Konami's claustrophobic house in PT, Devotion is a story about a family living in a small s apartment in Taiwan, each member having their own personal demons dragged out into the house's stark fluorescent lighting. Everything kicks off after the daughter contracts a mysterious illness, which causes the desperate father to tumble into a spiral of paranoia and misplaced spiritualism.
What's great about Devotion is that there are no literal monsters, the game is more interested in how the troubled headspaces of a family can seep into the physical space of a home. It's not often we get to see the exploration of a person's religious faith and seeing how Red Candle has used that to create an insidious story of family tragedy is like no other horror game I've played.
It's a horror tale that actually cares about its characters, and together with artful sequences and spine-chilling moments, it's truly one of the best horror stories of all time. A game that was well worth the wait.
James: Resident Evil Village is so much more than the tall vampire woman. I mean, Lady Dimitrescu certainly makes a lasting impression, but she's just one chapter of this excellent cosmic horror anthology.
This is Resident Evil doing its best A24 horror impression, moving from a frozen village overrun with lycans, through a classic game of cat and mouse in a lavish castle, and later arriving at color-drained industrial body horror—something like Hellraiser meets Saw. Village goes from goofy action to the scariest setpieces in the series' history, embracing everything I identify with Resident Evil: locked doors, ridiculous keys, and goofy characters. This is Resident Evil at its most self aware, at its scariest, and its most surprising.
Alan: The latest Resident Evil has some great stand-out moments, with a giddy number of villains and game genres checked off as you explore its chilling environs. The highlight for me was hiding beneath a bed bereft of weapons while an oversized nightmare wailed horribly while searching for our hero. It's got to be one of its most chilling moments it has to offer—I don't think I've completed a level so quickly in my life. Jacob: Resident Evil Village isn't afraid to hand you a big gun and lots of ammo.
Sure, there are moments that make you want to throw your mouse in the bin and never come back to your PC, but most of the time it's an extremely well-paced and entertaining gore flick. Mollie: I have a lot of love for The Sims 4. It had a rocky launch and issues that still persist years later, but it's the first game I boot up whenever I get that creative itch.
The build mode is genuinely fantastic, and I feel like Maxis is finally getting the hang of making consistently excellent expansion packs. The gameplay is still a little vapid compared to earlier entries, but it's a hell of a lot better than it used to be. The biggest bummer, and the reason for its steep drop this year, is how high the financial barrier to entry has become.
The base game is painfully barren, with simple additions like seasons and pets essentially locked behind paywalls. You could buy a lot of games in the Top for the same price as a complete Sims 4 collection, and that makes it harder to recommend. Totally agree with Mollie, that financial barrier is bullshit and it drags down The Sims' placement on our list. Fraser: Now I can capture sims and imprison them in a glass cell as a vampire.
The Sims 4 has really changed the way I kidnap my neighbours. Jorge: Hades is a gorgeous and stylish hack-and-slash roguelike featuring some of the best writing, voice acting, and music around. As Zagreus, the Prince of the Underworld, you try to escape to the land of the living to meet your mother. Meanwhile, your father, Hades, is doing everything in his power to keep you from her. While the combat for Hades is challenging, fun, and easy to wrap your head around, you'll spend a lot of your time chit-chatting with the denizens of the underworld, building relationships, and learning more about yourself and your dysfunctional even for Greek gods family.
Hades is a game where you tell yourself, "Ok, this is the last run, then I'm going to bed," and before you know it, you're up at 4 am for the third night in a row and calling in sick from work. Fraser: One of my favourite tactics games of all time, BattleTech is an exciting romp through a galaxy full of intrigue, ambitious nobles and giant mechs. There's a good campaign tying all the fights together, but brawling with steel monstrosities is what keeps the grin on my face. You can build your mech dream team—axe-wielding behemoths with jetpacks, gargantuan mobile weapon platforms, precious wee scouts—and then fling them into tricky battles where you have to worry about heat, terrain and limbs getting blown off.
To the victor goes the scrap. Nat: BattleTech understands that the best mech fiction fundamentally treats mechs as terrible things. The story has an air of beautiful tragedy, feudal states clashing and backstabbing each other over a handful of stars in the arse end of the galaxy. It's a tone that bleeds into every mission, making your clutch plays feel all the more desperate, every hard-fought victory all the sweeter.
It's just so much more accessible, without sacrificing any of the crazy high-level teamplay, and its emphasis on skilful solo play makes for ridiculously exciting moments where a single player can swing the game in their favor. It's also fun being a part of a cinematic universe with Legends of Runeterra and Teamfight Tactics. Rich: I still play Counter-Strike on a weekly basis and, even when the likes of Siege or Valorant have tempted me away for a time, I always come back.
Where the competition is full of gadgets and powers and classes, CS: GO's absolute purity and dedication to a core that works so well it remains irresistible. And while I've heard some awful stuff on team chat, I've also made a lot of good buddies over the years: when you have a little 'crew' that's on regularly, this game goes to another level.
Evan: It's the most popular FPS in the world, an almost decade-old giant that stands on the shoulder of arguably the most successful mod of all time sorry, DOTA.
It's one of my most-played games ever. But in , it's aging. Is it really the shooter I'd recommend to someone first right now? No way. Recent experiments like adding a battle royale mode have only revealed the greying tech that CS:GO sits upon. But as a veteran Source mapper, I have endless respect for the way it's kept the torch of community map-making lit all these years.
Source may be dated, but Counter-Strike's mappers are doing incredible things with it. Mollie: I don't even know how to put into words what Nier: Automata is and why it's so special, but I wish I could wipe my brain and experience it again for the first time.
A flawless soundtrack, satisfying combat and heart-wrenching story permeates every second of this game. It hasn't always run the best on PC, but a brand-new fix makes this the perfect time to dive in. Steven: I finally beat Automata for the first time this year and damn, I'm so glad I did.
There's just nothing like it. And while I'd love for us to also make room for Nier: Replicant, its prequel, on this list, I'd encourage anyone who loved Automata to go back and play it. It's arguably even more emotionally compromising. Fraser: I wish there were more endings so I'd have an excuse to play Nier: Automata all over again. Wes: The original Nier had such great characters and quirky diversions it turns into a text adventure for a bit at one point that it was worth playing despite some really mundane combat.
Automata fixed that problem and feels like it fully explores the ideas Yoko Taro didn't have the time or budget to explore in his previous games. It's a game we'll still be talking about in 20 years. Rachel: Although it's fallen a little on our list, Return of the Obra Dinn is still one of the best detective games on PC.
Apart from Paradise Killer, another fantastic detective game that you will have passed to get here, no other game makes you work harder for answers and celebrates your victories like Obra Dinn does. The ghostly tale it spins of the disappearance of a single ship and its crew will chill you to the bone. It still gives me the heebie-jeebies. Phil: Possibly the most perfectly paced puzzle game around. As you explore, you'll naturally stumble into hints that can recontextualise your thinking and send you down a rabbit hole of new revelations.
Chris: It does the best possible combination of things. It makes you look around and think "There is no way in hell I'll ever be able to solve this" and then a little while later leaves you saying "I've solved this and I'm a genius. Rich: I could honestly argue for this being number one, it's simply stunning.
Play it! Rachel: There have been some amazing story-led games released in the last year, which means that our old friend Kentucky Route Zero has dropped a considerable amount. Its highway adventure is still the most evocative and aetherial story on this list, full of magical-realist tales of rural America and its struggles. I'll never forget listening to a chorus of ghostly voices inside a mineshaft belonging to those who had lost their lives in a rockslide.
It's both haunting and beautiful. Nat: I didn't follow KRZ along its ten-year journey, instead playing the whole thing with my partner across a few nights last winter. A powerful, sombre, singular thing, and one of the two games to ever leave me in tears at my keyboard. Fraser: I've been waiting a long time for a historical 4X game that can give Civilization a run for its money, and here it is. Mohawk Games has taken all the best parts of the venerable series, but focused on antiquity rather than all of human history.
Every turn represents a year, which allows Old World to take a more intimate approach, exploring characters instead of just empires. There are plenty of innovations, like an Order system that teaches you to prioritise what actions you want to take that turn, but it's definitely the Crusader Kings-style characters and abundance of narrative events that feel like the most important addition.
Leaders age and die, get married, have children, plot against rivals, and you've got a whole court of people to worry about. It's Civ reimagined as a life sim and RPG. Evan: As you said, the lineage system adds a layer of passive storytelling that I didn't know I wanted in a 4X. Very interested to see how the next Civ responds to Old World. Jody: There's an argument that the real defining feature of RPGs is the areas between fights where you just talk to people, and Planescape's Sigil—a city on the inner surface of a ring with magic doors that connects it to multiple dimensions—is one of the best.
There's a guy who's been on fire so long everyone's used to it and he's become a local bar's mascot, a zombie called The Post whose body is used as a billboard, a hivemind of several thousand psychic rats, and a part-demon thief voiced by Sheena Easton. The combat isn't great, but there's not much of it and way more multidimensional weirdos worth meeting. Steven: I'd recommend Planescape as a kind of dessert to anyone who played and loved Disco Elysium.
They share so much DNA in their approach to character development and world building, and the agency they give to express yourself not just through dice rolls during combat.
I only played Planescape a few years ago, but some of its quests have wormed their way into my head—like a trip to a museum that collects every possible sensation a person could experience. One of the greatest adventures in games, set in a world realised with outstanding imagination, mingled with a deliberately vague and surprising multiplayer element that will still be delighting you on your fifth playthrough. James: Dark Souls is challenging, yeah, but like a good coach.
Take a breather, kid. Stretch out. Check yourself. Sleep on it. Come back when you're feeling better. Just don't give up. Tim: A mere four years into its life on PC, I did not expect to see Destiny 2 climbing this chart on the back of its storytelling. Once rightly derided for hiding its rich lore in grimoire cards and armour flavour text, over the last year Destiny 2 has quietly reinvented how to create ongoing narrative in a live service game.
Using a combination of choreographed NPC conversations and the occasional cutscene, a soapy plot develops from week to week, complete with twists, heel turns, and Saturday morning cartoon cliffhangers. We've seen major characters killed off, big bads come and go or have they? Or in other words, Bungie has actually found a model that delivers on the game's original promise all those E3s ago.
And it's working: keeps players interested in what's happening rather than just grinding for god roll weapons. It also helps that the mix of matchmade activities, exotic quests and hidden missions has been refined to the point that the variance in quality from season to season is way less wild than it used to be.
And if you'd rather not pay at all, there's still an incredibly robust game here to play entirely for free, including endgame content such as the Vault of Glass raid. The only reason Destiny 2 isn't even higher here is that the PVP side of the game has been neglected to the point of abandonment. Phil: As a Destiny player, I spend a lot of time complaining about Destiny. But even I will admit that the game is in a good position at the moment.
After the disappointing Season of the Hunt, which launched alongside Beyond Light, subsequent seasons have been a triumph—helped along by a handful of showcase activities, from Presage to the returning Vault of Glass.
As always, though, the promise of Destiny remains what it could be. Next year, alongside The Witch Queen expansion, we get weapon crafting and a guaranteed schedule for raids and dungeons.
It all sounds great, but the devil is in the details, and Destiny does have a habit of moving two steps back for every one forward. Robin: I think this is quietly the most exciting co-op shooter in years.
Its use of procedural generation is nothing short of remarkable, churning out fresh, fascinating, and frequently beautiful levels every session. And working together to conquer those levels, using its arsenal of tools to build, dig, and demolish your way to success, is fantastically satisfying. So many co-op games are just about being as efficient and deadly as possible, but Deep Rock feels like some kind of wonderful group project in the way it forces you to combine your creative powers and problem-solve as a team.
One of its cleverest mechanics is the way it uses light. Managing light—through throwable flares and the scout class' flare gun—is a vital part of your strategy, which feels truly unique. Being the guy who makes sure everyone can see has become my favourite role in the game. James: Cruelty Squad is a monstrous immersive sim, a game held together with duck tape and bad vibes.
As a gig economy assassin killing men that pose a threat to a higher order of immortal CEO gods in a hypersaturated mess of jagged polygons and screaming textures, it's difficult to not feel bad. But using my guts to grapple up to a sniper nest above the Cancer Megamall?
This is a shit jawbreaker with a dense pleasure chemical core. Cruelty Squad isn't cruel. It's just honest.
Morgan: It's an incredible premise with an equally mind-bending art style. Nothing about Cruelty Squad easily slots into other videogames don't even get me started on how you reload.
Even its menus have to be studied like fine art before you can parse which button means "play. Jacob: You might be wondering why Hunt: Showdown has only now made its way into our Top , many years after it first launched. The reason being this PvEvP shooter has only gone from strength to strength in , incorporating steady updates, improvements, and, finally, an immeasurably entertaining new map.
Fundamentally, though, Hunt: Showdown is and always has been a wildly tactical shooter that captures a turn of the century shootout like no other. Seriously, you'll be ducking behind boxes and barrels with bullets whizzing over head and lobbing dynamite into shacks in no time. It also rewards good teamwork and strategy, so if you've got a couple friends to play with that's absolutely the best way to experience the game.
The idea of basing a competitive shooter around realistic 18th century guns is absurd for so many reasons, but Crytek pulled it off spectacularly. Hunt's arsenal is so unique that I constantly want to switch up my playstyle to try something now. In one match I'll use the first ever pump action shotgun that loads from the top? Because Crytek is Crytek, Hunt's attention to detail in map design, sound design, and combat balance is also extremely good. It's a hard FPS to learn, but endlessly fun once you "get" it.
Rich: 2, hours on Steam probably says it all. I've literally spent days of my life playing this. OK some of that would have just been the game idling but… wow, guess I better rethink my life choices. A perfect game and has been since launch: once the controls and rhythm get their hooks in, you'll never look back.
Put it on my grave: my name was Richard Stanton, and I drove a rocket car. Tyler: 1, hours here, much in competitive Snow Day, a mode that was originally added as a joke, more or less. I think that if you can replace a ball with a hockey puck in your game and people go, "Ah, this is actually a way of life now," you must have a fundamentally brilliant foundation. Mollie: Stardew Valley has always been a great game, but the recent 1. Tons of late-game content and quality-of-life improvements has made owning a farm, marrying a reformed alcoholic and owning a small army of truffle-sniffing pigs better than ever.
Robin: Co-op is such a great addition to the formula. Rachel: I just can't get enough of Stardew Valley, especially when someone like ConcernedApe is behind it. Not only do we get massive updates for free but he's always so lovely of the community. Constantly supporting modders, using their own money as prize pools for tournaments, and personally hopping into players' code when they have an issue.
What a guy. Rich: Almost feels like the isometric strategy genre distilled down to its purest drops. A game all about precision planning, the huge amounts of combinations you can wring out of apparently simple abilities, and quickfire playthroughs that always feel different.
I don't have much appetite for the grander turn-based strategy games anymore, purely because of time, and this is the perfect replacement. Evan: It's surprisingly grim! Reminds me of Evangelion. This definitely isn't the kind of mecha anime where everyone goes out for milkshakes after defeating the great evil. FTL composer Ben Prunty's score weeps for the dimensions left behind by the player as they fail or succeed.
Narrativizing the endless loop of roguelikes is one of ITB's fine touches. Phil: Into the Breach gets a lot of mileage from an 8x8 grid. By showing you what your enemies are about to do each turn—and, more specifically, what they're about to destroy—you're challenged to unwork their plans, hopefully coming out the other end without too many losses. It invokes such an authentic, specific sense of place with its slice of Japanese country life, simultaneously idyllic and isolating. Mollie: No JRPG has ever quite matched the energy Persona 4 Golden brings, and no game has ever led me to be so deeply attached to a ragtag group of teenagers and their terrifying bear mascot.
Morgan: Yea, Persona 5 has the style, but P4 has the heart. I haven't played the game in nine years and I still can't get that damn Junes song out of my head. Phil: Filled with intriguing mystery; offering questions like "What do these bizarre murders say about our society?
Jody: Unlike other Total War games, the things I remember from Warhammer happened on the battlefield. As mad-science ratmen I've killed an elf queen then dragged her corpse away under arrow-fire to experiment on it, and as vampire pirates I've summoned a ghost ship to drop on the proud warriors of Ulthuan. I did that as an undead opera singer named Cylostra Direfin, who pronounces her surname with a flourish, "dear-fah", like a Warhammer version of Hyacinth Bucket.
The fantasy setting makes Total War ridiculous, extravagant, extra. It's great not just because I remember highlights from multiple campaigns, but because the gonzo factions make multiple campaigns worth playing. The expansions and the way each game can be connected builds on that, meaning the best Total War keeps getting better. Fraser: I'm still convinced that Three Kingdoms is the stronger strategy game, but there's no denying the seductive qualities of Warhammer.
Dragons and orcs are, admittedly, a bit more exciting than loads and loads of regular soldiers. Maybe this sounds like damning the game with faint praise, but Warhammer 2 really is amazing. There isn't another with such great and experimental factions, and Creative Assembly has really worked some magic with its DLC additions, which are often accompanied by free game-changing tweaks. The gap between 2 and 3 has been a lot more substantial than the previous gap, but we've absolutely benefited from this, as the game has kept growing in the interim.
Robin: This is the game that makes me wish I clicked with Total War. Nat: Every weekend, for the past year, I've been jumping on for a bout of Halo 3 multiplayer like it was all over again. There's never been a shooter quite like Halo, and after more than a decade away, Halo's uniquely chaotic sandbox arenas still feels fresh as ever—whether that's a tense slayer match on Blackout, or one of many absurd Forge maps folks are playing on the collection's new server browser.
With the Master Chief Collection now on PC in its entirety, 's collection has proven itself more than just a fun throwback. It's a love letter to FPS fans—letting you dive into more than a decade of Halo history within a single matchmaking playlist, or revisit Bungie's truly stellar campaigns in both original and remastered forms.
I may not be a fan of 's own additions, but you can't deny the studio's done a hell of a job bringing Master Chief back to PC. Wes: I want to thank whoever at brought back Halo 3's Rocket Race playlist, a mode I sunk hours into more than a decade ago and still love with all my heart. Beyond nostalgia, though, there's good reason to be excited about the Master Chief Collection's future.
A custom game browser is still in development, and once it's live, I expect classic Halo CTF to outlast the heat death of the universe. Rich: Can't believe this got ranked above Counter-Strike. Is it still too late to protest?
Seriously though: who doesn't love a bit of the Chief, and with MCC some of Bungie's finest work is being kept alive in the way it should be. Evan: Folks, this is how you operate a multiplayer game. Siege gets four major updates a year like clockwork, adding new operators that often scramble the meta. Older maps get reworked and full-on redesigned. New anti-toxicity measures, pinging, new secondary gadgets, attachments, and entirely overhauled operators have been implemented post-launch.
A testament to good production practices, careful roadmapping, and the insane effort it takes to maintain a popular game. Tyler: Lately, I've been enjoying opportunities to blow holes in soft walls in Favela, a map that jumped into my favorites list after it was reworked.
One of the recently added operators has a bionic arm, too, so I can punch holes in walls if I want. What a gift. After all these years, I'm a little surprised that I'm not being made to think about walls, and how they might be improved with holes, in more games.
Mollie: I'll level with you right now, I absolutely suck ass at Siege. I've never quite grappled with its learning curve, and my map and operator knowledge are practically non-existent. But when my poor friends put up with my shoddy skills, I have an unbelievable amount of fun.
No other shooter feels quite so satisfying. I imagine it's even better when you actually know what you're doing. Phil: Yakuza: Like a Dragon marks the series' transition from arcade brawler to JRPG, and swaps out the stoic long-time lead Kiryu for an entirely new ex-Yakuza—an endearing goofball who can't help but wear his heart on his sleeve.
It's still everything you expect from a Yakuza game: a lengthy main story that's filled with twists and turns, numerous sidequests that range from wacky to absolutely absurd, and a whole host of minigames that offer fun diversions to pursue as you explore the city.
Its new JRPG combat isn't just a gimmick, either. Not only is it fully woven into the story—and the personality of Ichiban and his growing party of loveable misfits—it also makes for a genuinely deep buildcrafting, with jobs, skills and hilarious summons.
Morgan: I haven't finished Like a Dragon, but Ichiban is already one of my favorite game protagonists ever. Nat: Umurangi Generation is loud, raw, angry. An anti-colonial protest wrapped in Jet Set Radio and Evangelion, handing you a wonderfully tactile camera with which to capture the end of the world. Seriously—I want to take this battered old handheld into every game I've played since, a photo mode built directly into the player's arsenal.
Umurangi doesn't sport Hitman 3's complex AI routines, but every level feels gritty and lived-in. Every candid snap of a stranger tells a story of some deadbeat dad, VR-addled waster or bloodied mech pilot trying to make their way through this deeply relatable apocalypse. See, Umurangi might take place in a world full of giant robots and squid-like Kaiju, but its tensions are our tensions. Developed by Mauri artist Veselekov, Umurangi is scathing of the global response to the Australian wildfires Umurangi meaning "Red Sky" in Ves' native tongue.
An occupying force pulls your neighbours and friends up to fight their Kaiju war, and oppresses people with curfews and giant concrete walls. By the time you hit Macro, you're exploring maps pulled straight out of 's headlines. Where other games fret over whether they're seen as "political", Umurangi embraces it—and is all the better for it. Set in modern day Dubai, massive sandstorms have buried the city.
As Capt. Martin Walker, you're sent in to find any survivors and learn what happened to the original rescue and evacuation team led by Lt. Colonel John Konrad. Votes: 3, Centuries following nuclear war, a teen leaves the safety of an underground vault in order to find their father, who left in hopes of creating a water purifier.
Votes: 18, M Action, Adventure, History. A video game where you play as sailor, privateer and assassin Edward Kenway exploring on and around the islands in the Caribbean Sea during the early 17th century. Votes: 15, T Action, Adventure, Thriller. M Action, Adventure, Thriller. Sam Fisher and his Fourth Echelon must stop a dangerous terrorist group known as the Engineers who threaten several terrorist attacks on American soil to force the US Military to pull out of its overseas bases.
T Action, Crime, Fantasy. You control Batman as he fights to subdue The Joker and his fellow inmates when they seize control of the Asylum on Arkham Island. Votes: 25, Armed with his deadly double-chained blades, Kratos must take on Greek mythology's darkest creatures to destroy Olympus and the mighty Zeus himself. Votes: 9, Join an elite team of highly trained soldiers. Armed to the teeth with unrivaled combat technology and cutting-edge military hardware, Ghost Recon takes you to the globe's most deadly war zones to hunt down the highest value targets.
Votes: 1, Earth is under attack by a monstrous race of gigantic living ships known as the Reapers. Even if Commander Shepard could unite all surviving species in the galaxy, only a miracle could save them. Then again, Shepard did come back from the dead. M Action, Comedy, Crime. After the Saints have transformed from a small town street gang to pop culture giants, they decide to take over another city called Steelport.
However when things take an unexpected turn for the worst, Drake must rely on those closest to him in order to find the Cintomani Stone. Votes: 23, T Action, Horror, Mystery. Whilst in Arizona, Alan Wake finds himself again confronting his evil twin, Mr. Scratch, who spreads darkness where ever he goes. Votes: After losing his daughter, NSA operative Sam Fisher is given his most dangerous assignment yet: go undercover with a terrorist organization.
Niko Bellic comes to Liberty City, America to live the good life, but ends up having to assist his dangerously indebted cousin Roman with his financial troubles, by any mostly illegal means necessary. Votes: 33, Based on the film, the player controls Logan, a veteran who used to work for William Stryker in his gang of mutants. Now, Stryker has come back to Logan for help. Play as Wolverine as you hunt down Sabretooth and fight other mutants.
M Action, Adventure, War. Ten years after a terrible attack that wipes out part of the population, two brothers must rebel against a federation controlled by a psychotic soldier who once was part of the rebellion called "The Ghosts".
Votes: 8,
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