If you define 2015-2025 as “fun,” then I’ve definitely lost the plot.
Also, fuck Ark, ya goddamn time black hole.
I hate the inexorable passage of time, thanks!
I want to chime in with two recommendations that stray a bit from the beaten path:
SOMA
I see you don’t only want people to feel old but also experience existential crisis.
I want my pain to be inflicted on others.
Not going over ones others have already mentioned:
TitanFall 2 is an incredible shooter, with really good single player campaign… came out in 2016, and since, though its official servers went down, people figured out how to run private servers and mod the client to work with them, look up Northstar.
Even works on linux, there’s a whole entire custom Proton branch just for TitanFall2/NorthStar.
FTL came out in 2012, but the Advanced Edition came out in 2014, maybe that counts?
Stardew Valley came out in 2016.
No Man’s Sky came out in 2016.
Alien Isolation came out in 2014.
Undertale, 2015.
Metal Gear Solid V, 2015.
… 2015 +/- 1 was a pretty good era for a lot of pretty great games, imo.
And some non-GOG gems, to continue this trend:
Elite: Dangeous - best space-sim out there, no other comes close. Also one of the few live-service games with a great community around it.
Anno 2205 - Seem by many as the black sheep in the anno series, it’s still a great game with a fantastic future vibe.
Craft the world ( hey, it’s also on gog ) - dwarf fortress like game
Civilization: Beyond Earth - Firaxis’ attempt at a contemporary Alpha Centauri, based on the Civ 5 engine. Great game in itself, with some great ideas. Also gets a lot of hate for some reason.
Planetbase ( also on gog ) - Great space-colony builder
Hah, going along with Anno 2205, I think that Civilization: Beyond Earth, is actually a competent, not perfect, but generally good spin on the Civ series.
That came out in 2014, a bit earlier.
Yeah, I was rounding things a bit. Great year for gaming
It seems no one has posted a link to the promo yet, so… just getting that out of the way.
Edit: As far as recommendations, I haven’t actually played, or even heard of most of the games, but Double Dragon Trilogy for $1.19 feels like a no-brainer if you like retro or arcade beat-em-ups. I don’t think I’ve played them since the early 90s, so it might be nice to revisit them.
Double Dragon 1 and 2 have terrible slow down issues. This isn’t a bad port, this is from the original games. It can get nearly unplayable at certain points.
Double Dragon 3 is just not very good. The Mega Drive port runs a little bit better than the arcade though.
Besides Witcher and Hotline Miami, what do you guys recommend from those ancient times?
Depends on what you’re looking for. Shantae and the Pirate’s Curse is a great metroidvania platformer, Shadowrun Hongkong if you want to experience a cyberpunk+fantasy RPG, Rebel Galaxy for a space game with some trading and naval-style combat (ships don’t move in up/down directions), Van Helsing for a diablo-like experience
I’m also seeing Hyperdimension Neptunia on the sale, though I have no clue if it’s any good. I always get baffled by the amount of games in that series
The Witness (2016) is a really good puzzler, as is The Talos Principle (2014) (it’s gotten a UE5 remaster now).
SOMA is right there on the laptop.
Absolutely excellent game.
Crypt of the NecroDancer is a steal at $3. And it definitely made me feel old seeing it on this list 😭
I just went through what’s on sale, I didn’t verify the release dates or anything.
Kerbal Space Program is a great time. It’s the kind of game where it either grabs you and doesn’t let go, or you’ll drop it pretty fast.
I liked Sunless Sea, but then you really just have to give a game an Eldritch aesthetic and I’ll probably be there for it.
The Escapists is a neat game to play with some friends.
Fallout 4 has some flaws, especially if you’re a fan of the previous games, but it’s a decent game anyways.
KSP is still the best ‘build an entire space program’ sim, now that KSP2 has erm, failed to launch, or maybe suffered a RUD… and KSP 1 now has a decade of quite frankly astonishing expansive mods.
Try KSP Realism Overhaul and Principa if you want to up the difficulty a bit, lol.
I actually thought kerbal was a bit older. Maybe it was the years of early access or something
Very first public version in 2011, Steam Early Acces in 2013, release in 2015.
