What PC games have I missed over the past 3 years?

[vonkaar]

First off... I own a Wii... and a mame box for all of my arcade/legacy games. But no 360 or PS3. No desire to get them either... I hardly have enough time as it is.

Anyway... My wife bought my Christmas present early this year... I got a new core i7 system with a badass video card and all the good stuff. So... I'm finally back to the 'cutting edge' on PC power and I can play good games again. I've spent the past few years playing games from the 90s, or BARELY scraping by on semi-modern games (HOMM5, Doom3, etc). What should I "buy" and... what games are actually worth >buying< (read: it's worth it to play online, where a cracked game would be blocked)? Obviously, Diablo3 is the big one on my future list... but... for now...

My list:

Crysis
DragonAge
Borderlands
Fallout 3 (yeah... I haven't even SEEN this yet...)
Half Life 2
Left 4 Dead 1 & 2
Torchlight (yes/no?)
GTA4

But, those are mostly all current games. What should I check out from 07 and 08? Hell, 2006 might have had good games that I missed out on. It seems like forever since I've had a decent system. I'm upgrading from a Pentium-D with a shitty video card... if that gives you any indication.

Help me, oh valiant NT'ers!

[10sun]

My list in order:

Fallout 3 - Purchase
Half Life 2 especially Counterstrike: Source for replay value. - Purchase or I could check and see how many Steam accounts I have with it (I bought like 3 copies for LAN parties).
STALKER - Cracking is a hassle, but not sure how much multiplayer fun this offers.
Latest Command and Conquer games - love them single player & online.
Sid Meier's Pirates! - Purchase for no reason other than it says Sid Meier & Pirates in the same breath.
Civ IV etc. - Good for some fun I suppose.

I would leave Left 4 Dead off your list; I played through twice by myself, played through a couple of times with friends... I much rather prefer Serious Sam: Second Encounter. It ends up making me sick to my stomach (motion sickness perhaps?) & irritable, go figure?

Borderlands was fun as a play through, but very similar to Diablo 2 in terms of replay; some people might enjoy grinding through for the "best gear", but I got bored after playing through the storyline four times to get two maxed out characters (weapon skills are still not capped, but I'm not spending hours upon hours working those up). Plus there is a high incidence of cheating online (mod'ing characters takes no effort or intelligence, just a simple program).

The most fun I've had lately is playing GBA games on my TV.

-Adam

[vonkaar]

Oh, I've definitely played all of the Civ games. I'll grab Pirates too because Sid is a deity in my home.

No on L4D? That's weird, the videos made it look awesome and I love zombie games.

[Arlos]

Dragon Age is a must-buy. It's one of the best FRPGs to come out in the last 10 years, easy. Hell, it's one of the best RPGs period in the last decade. Easily blows Neverwinter Nights (1 and 2) out of the water.

Another RPG I enjoyed recently is Mass Effect, actually. (and hey, it has the added bonus that my brother helped make the game. ) You might check that one out too, especially since I suspect you can get it at a bargain price. Plus, Mass Effect 2 is due out in January or so, and will allow you to import characters from the first game.

-Arlos

[vonkaar]

check & check

[Drem]

Mirror's Edge if you grew up as a kid that liked to jump around and climb stuff all the time or were a gymnast. I don't care what Tossica says, I've played this game religiously since I heard about it. After you beat the story (no big whoop) you can get into all the racing. Which is amazing. It's like playing Prince of Persia first person. And the emphasis is all about acrobatics. You can steal guns from dudes but you only get the clip it comes with

Get Hellgate: London because the original creators of Diablo made a new company and put that game out. It's like what Borderlands wishes it was. Which is also why I'm worried that Diablo 3 is gonna just be a Titan's Quest or Dungeon Siege/Space Siege clone, because the creators aren't around anymore

Mass Effect is pretty and enjoyable but it got old for me, like Borderlands did, because every mission was essentially the same (go to X, collect/kill X, return)

Also get Supreme Commander

And the Witcher

And you won't be disappointed with Crysis. I still think it's my fav FPS lately

[Tossica]

Mirror's Edge if you grew up as a kid that liked to jump around and climb stuff all the time or were a gymnast. I don't care what Tossica says, I've played this game religiously since I heard about it.

Huh? I loved that game.

[brinstar]

seconding the STALKER love. i never played the original (shadow of chernobyl) but i loved the fuck out of the later prequel (clear sky). the sequel (call of pripyat) comes out in Q1 of 2010 and it holds the distinction of being #1 on my to-do list once college is over and i get my free time back. only caveat for these games is that they're pretty buggy right out of the box, so don't bother playing them until you've run all the patches. there are tons of mods/hacks out there but the only one i can truly recommend is a performance mod that p much doubles your framerates, as even zippy boxes have trouble with the graphics (gg russian game designers)

fallout 3 was okay
borderlands is pretty good, a bro and i just started the 2nd playthrough
i've heard good things about torchlight but haven't looked into it at all

aside from those things i'm p much in the same boat, haven't done much gaming since i jumped back into college a couple years back

[Durothil Skyreaver]

Fallout 3 - super easy to get countless mods that improve the game and expand on what is available. Its like Oblivion in the regard that out of the box it is good, but throw in some mods and it becomes awesome.
Stalker - The first game is pretty awesome, second game is good too.
Crysis - Right up until the alien parts it is awesome, the sequel is much better.
Left 4 Dead 1&2 - I'd say if you were to get one, get L4D2 - much more variety in the gameplay and in campaigns.

[leah]

seconding the STALKER love. i never played the original (shadow of chernobyl) but i loved the fuck out of the later prequel (clear sky). the sequel (call of pripyat) comes out in Q1 of 2010 and it holds the distinction of being #1 on my to-do list once college is over and i get my free time back. only caveat for these games is that they're pretty buggy right out of the box, so don't bother playing them until you've run all the patches. there are tons of mods/hacks out there but the only one i can truly recommend is a performance mod that p much doubles your framerates, as even zippy boxes have trouble with the graphics (gg russian game designers)

fallout 3 was okay
borderlands is pretty good, a bro and i just started the 2nd playthrough
i've heard good things about torchlight but haven't looked into it at all

aside from those things i'm p much in the same boat, haven't done much gaming since i jumped back into college a couple years back

GRETCHEN. stop trying to make "p" happen.

my input from a spectator's perspective: mass effect is good, but whoever said the thing about all the missions pretty much being the same was definitely correct. also josh really liked L4D and all the orange box games, but Crysis, Hellgate: London, and STALKER didn't really hold his attention (or mine, as a spectator). just my 2cp, for whatever it's worth.

[brinstar]

poops tried stalker? when did that happen

[Tikker]

if you like RTS at all, Supreme Commander, and Sins of a Solar Empire are great

Supreme commander is the more polished, but Sins is more fun (imo)

Mass Effect was really fun for me. one of the few games I've sat down and beaten and felt satisfied after it was over

Dragon Age......if you liked baldurs gate, get it
I'm enjoying it, but if I forget about it for a week, I doubt I'd be bothered to go back to it

um, what else

Oblivion was great, fallout was so-so

[leah]

poops tried stalker? when did that happen

i think so? or was that you? i'm pretty sure he tried it right after he got his new rig because of the uber graphics but maybe that was just crysis.

[10sun]

if you like RTS at all, Supreme Commander, and Sins of a Solar Empire are great

Supreme commander is the more polished, but Sins is more fun (imo)

Mass Effect was really fun for me. one of the few games I've sat down and beaten and felt satisfied after it was over

Dragon Age......if you liked baldurs gate, get it
I'm enjoying it, but if I forget about it for a week, I doubt I'd be bothered to go back to it

um, what else

Oblivion was great, fallout was so-so

I'd second the Sins of a Solar Empire if it weren't anti-trackball; I played it with a mouse and loved it though.

What Brinstar said about STALKER being buggy out of the box because of Russian programmers; Russian programmers are very similar to their literary counterparts of the 19th century, long winded and convoluted... you might make it through the first half only to be flummoxed midway through the story. Had to restart STALKER:CS like three times before I was finally able to play through to the end because of a bug that locked me up

[brinstar]

oh yeah and in case you don't feel like digging up my STALKER: Clear Sky thread, here's a reminder

do NOT attempt to fight the machine gun in the army outpost at the south end of Cordon - it is invulnerable, it has deadly aim and it will absolutely fuck you up (even in really good gear)

[Drem]

that game's not Russian it's Ukrainian

and i thought you said it was just okay and was a one-time play, toss /shrug no worries

i think fallout 3 is awesome if you are interested in finding everything. i put more time into that game than any other game recently. did almost everything. including finding all the named weapons. and if you don't have the DLCs you probly shouldn't play it. way too short w/o them