Thread by @DominicTarason

I've been hooting about the best of the best games, but honestly, some of the most fun I've had in years has been with games with seriously rough edges. So here's a tweet (twixt?)-thread about some stranger, more offbeat games you might dig in the sale.

As mentioned earlier today, Astlibra is a gem but it also sometimes looks hilariously amateurish. Almost all the art in there is stock RPG maker stuff never meant to be used in a platformer, giving it an unhinged photo-collage aesthetic in places.

Frebbventure is a big weird adventure platformer that probably bites off more than it can chew, but does so with gusto. Tons of playable heroes, frequent genre switches, janky soundtrack and a story that oscillates between Looney Tunes & DBZ. I loved it.

store.steampowered.com/app/2004670/Fr…

Liked the new Robocop and hankering for more stompy, awkward satirical cyber-policing? Minilaw is a deep, indie immersive sim/roguelike take. Instead of a cyborg, you're a regular grunt strapped into a semi-AI-controlled exoskeleton that won't let you die

store.steampowered.com/app/503180/Min…

Automaton Lung was, if not THE last, one of the final games released for the Nintendo 3DS, now on PC.

An intentionally disjointed & surreal exploration platformer that feels like abandoned prototype of a game. All massive, hollow spaces and abstract foes

store.steampowered.com/app/2158900/Au…

Salamander County Public Television (unrelated to any other SCPs you may know) is a brilliant bit of comedy. A fumblecore minigame compilation made entirely out of shutterstock video & photo clip-art, held together with a genuinely funny story. Top comedy

store.steampowered.com/app/1521810/Sa…

Hellsinker isn't so much 'rough' as it is just 'unfit for stock human brains'. A dizzyingly complex hyper-technical cult shmup that can, eventually, be mastered. But you'll probably be a different person afterwards.

Me? I can still barely process the UI.

store.steampowered.com/app/1067720/He…

Garage: Bad Dream Adventure was an obscure, Japanese-only adventure with survival sim elements released back in 1999. Recently remastered & finally translated.

It is grim, unpleasant and abrasive. The vibes are utterly rancid, and yet it feels like art.

store.steampowered.com/app/1946430/Ga…

Sometimes a game is polished, just designed by freaks. Tokyo Twilight Ghost Hunters is a VN that's sometimes a dungeon crawler, sometimes a board game, sometimes strategy, and has the weirdest dialogue system ever: You pick a Mood & Sense. Lick EVERYTHING

store.steampowered.com/app/425460/Tok…

Also recently released on PC is the more popular predecessor to TTGH - Kowloon High-School Chronicle, which feels like a mashup of Persona & Indiana Jones.

Tomb-raiding dungeon crawling plus school drama. Also contains a whole retro RPG-within-an-RPG.

store.steampowered.com/app/1053390/Ko…

Dungeon Munchies is an oddball story-driven Korean platform hack n' slasher about an undead chef's intern. Frequently very funny, often heavier than expected

It feels weirdly rough and shaky to play. Oddly raw, presentation, but satisfying buildcrafting.

store.steampowered.com/app/799640/Dun…

Cepheus Protocol's mad ambition and feature creep may mean it never fully leaves early access, and it's a bit shaky now, but there's a spark of something special in this Prototype/WWZ-inspired RTS. Plays like World In Conflict meets Men of War + zombies.

store.steampowered.com/app/979640/Cep…

Speaking of early access ambition, Onirism is ALL of the games. Jack of all trades, master of none, but it's a solid shot at dozens of ideas, from plain platforming to Goldeneye spy stuff, Serious Sam hordes, multiplayer party games and more. Very French.

store.steampowered.com/app/1057640/On…

Back to the abrasive and raw, Tamashii, Estigma and Teocida are a loose trilogy. Two platform puzzlers, one arcade maze game, all laden with surreal psychosexual fleshy imagery, religious allusions & fiery proselytizing. Absolutely packed with secrets too

store.steampowered.com/search/?develo…

Meatgrinder is a short, arcade FPS with singleminded focus: EXPLOSIONS. Adrenaline is your health, Crank style. Rush forward, hopping between vehicles (trucks, trains, planes, etc), shooting bad dudes.

Can be a bit rough and glitchy but the idea *works*.

store.steampowered.com/app/1968710/ME…

Another raw and intense FPS - Project Downfall. Basically a first-person Hotline Miami. While visually abrasive and occasionally janky, it's VERY ambitious, with a hugely branching, replayable story, 12 ends + tons of hidden levels and secret unlockables.

store.steampowered.com/app/992730/Pro…

Hitting nearly maximum raw abrasiveness, Producer 2021 is what happens when you leave one of those Japan-only NES graphic adventures at the bottom of a dumpster to ferment for a few decades. Short, surreal, worm-based computing, business, success, respect

store.steampowered.com/app/1667320/PR…

Cruelty Squad is peak sludgecore. Early Rainbow Six high on corporate grindset and hallucinogen-laced cocaine. Embrace hell both as a mindset and something to strive for, in and organizational sense. Now with fewer bugs, and a nascent mod & mapping scene.

store.steampowered.com/app/1388770/Cr…

More corporate nightmare vibes with Deadeye Deepfake Simulacrum. A surprisingly deep fusion of roguelike and immersive sim, played from an abstract blueprint perspective. Command-line hacking and a handler that's worryingly horny for corporate malfeasance

store.steampowered.com/app/1545990/De…

Will likely continue this thread later, but for now I leave you with the Cursed trilogy! They're FREE!

The first is a short & messy tribute to Shadowgate, but the second and third games are low-fi but wildly more ambitious action/RPG/adventure hybrids.

store.steampowered.com/search/?develo…

Goddamn, this thread's popular, huh? Time for more offbeat Steam sale picks!

The Dishwasher: Vampire Smile is like modern Ninja Gaiden in 2D. Raw and sketchy art, wall-of-noise music, chaotic visual effects. Screaming raw metal vibes, as it should be.

store.steampowered.com/app/268990/The…

Also from the same dev, Charlie Murder. Like River City Ransom but punk. A bit more coherent, but absolute chaos with four player in co-op. Also has a Birdemic level for a real deep reference cut.

Most of the studio's games are on sale and share a vibe.

store.steampowered.com/app/405290/Cha…

Continuing the brawl with Streets Of Fury. Before making the amazing Streets Of Rage 4, Guard Crush didn't have any artists, so they just dressed up and filmed themselves & friends. Looks goofy, plays great.

And yes, that is a Nostalgia Critic (ew) cameo

store.steampowered.com/app/350910/Str…

Lost Technology is an an old (but fun), HUGE Japanese indie grand strategy game with RTS battles. When it first launched on Steam in 2017 it had only a couple campaigns translated.

They're STILL translating it. The latest campaign launched this September

store.steampowered.com/app/420520/Los…

Lucah: Born Of A Dream is a fine example of a fantastic game with a hard-to-sell art style. Beneath scribbly, furious pencil lines lit in glaring neon lies a Bayonetta-inspired combat engine and a dreamlike story of queer rebellion against religious dogma

store.steampowered.com/app/896460/Luc…

Sometimes a game is a whole cultural crash-course. Amazing Cultivation Simulator is a colony sim ala Rimworld, but also a dizzingly complex simulator of the nuances of Chinese Xianxia fantasy stories, from elemental feng shui to god-shattering kung fu.

store.steampowered.com/app/955900/Ama…

Sometimes a game just feels transgressive. The Citadel is a Japanese indie FPS inspired by Marathon, Wolfenstein, and early 90s hyperviolent anime OVAs.

It has a vibe like no other, if you can stomach borderline-fetishistic depictions of shattered bodies

store.steampowered.com/app/1378290/Th…

Wow, got a couple hundred new followers just from this thread. Okay, here's a few more deep cuts!

Worlds is a bit unstable on modern machines, but is still a fascinating dimension-hopping tactical stealth with very Madness-inspired character design.

store.steampowered.com/app/304850/Wor…

A House Of Many Doors is a Sunless Sea-inspired RPG about navigating a dimensional confluence in a centipede-legged train/tank. It undersold and was long abandoned, but just got a huge joint community patch and content update *this week*. It's good'un.

store.steampowered.com/app/437250/A_H…

Dreamwild is a surreal bunnyhopping roguelike movement shooter, and also sometimes an isometric adventure with pre-rendered sprites.

If Starsiege Tribes skiing combat excites you, then you'll feel right at home here, swooncing across the weird landscapes

store.steampowered.com/app/2168450/DR…

The World Is Your Weapon is a (literal) deconstruction of generic tile-based RPG Maker games. You run a weapon store. What kind of weapons do you sell? Anything that isn't or isn't nailed down. You can pick up the background tiles and hit goblins with em.

store.steampowered.com/app/1056490/Th…

It has some rough edges, but there's nothing else like Abyss Odyssey. A roguelike RPG based on turn-of-the-century Chilean mythology with Smash Bros style combat, and published by Sega of all things.

You collect new bodies along the way, Pokemon style.

store.steampowered.com/app/255070/Aby…

Xross Dreams is a game custom-made for puzzle-battle perverts. Imagine Puyo Puyo Tetris only instead of it being two puzzle games, there's 10+ characters, each of which is a *completely different game*. And you have a two-character tag team. Brain hurty.

store.steampowered.com/app/1866570/Xr…

Speaking of perverts.. G String has a very bad title but the game is otherwise quite normal, just a staggering project for a one-woman team hammering away at it for over a decade. A Half-Life 2 style dystopian cyberpunk setting with a huge update due soon

store.steampowered.com/app/1224600/G_…

I might add more to this thread tomorrow, but now, I leave you with another free oddball: Juice Galaxy, making its Steam debut today although its been on Itch for ages.

A surreal, wobbly stoner action-RPG. Flop around, eat weird monsters. Become as juice

store.steampowered.com/app/1708150/Ju…

Let's resume with one that really shouldn't be obscure. The Upturned is the previous game by the dude behind cult mega-hit Lethal Company. It's a single-player horror comedy about a slightly cursed hotel. Pick up and throw ALL THE THINGS.

It's VERY funny

store.steampowered.com/app/1717770/Th…

Brutal Orchestra is a thematically funky roguelike with JRPG-ish combat. A road-trip through a clammy, fleshy hell populated by weird (often hilarious) pervs.

Teach a man to fish and he can feed himself. Teach a fish to man, and shit's going to get weird

store.steampowered.com/app/1734320/Br…

The whole Spark The Electric Jester series is one of the best things to come from the Sonic fan-game scene, and it's all by one guy. The first game is like 2D Sonic + Kirby, the latter two are like Sonic Adventure with the fat trimmed. All w/ great music.

store.steampowered.com/bundle/10933/S…

Every time I mention Clash: Artifacts of Chaos, a bunch of people say 'Why'd nobody say they made a Zeno Clash 3!?'.

So now you know. A strange third-person brawler road trip through a post-human land where a bizarre collectible dice-game is the only law

store.steampowered.com/app/1430680/Cl…

It's time for me to gush about Copy Kitty.

A personal favourite with a weird art style. A surprisingly technical, deep and lengthy platform shooter where you combine up to three enemy weapons into a hybrid screen-clearing firework of doom. Game's rad.

store.steampowered.com/app/349250/Cop…

Pig Eat Ball is weird, gross and a lot of fun. A sometimes-puzzley action adventure about a flying pig that eats tennis balls. Eat too much, get round, barf to vent tennis balls and blast the room. Many weird, wet sounds and bizarre gameplay mechanics.

store.steampowered.com/app/339090/Pig…

Timeshifters is a low-budget but surprisingly fleshed out tribute to the original Timesplitters, one of the weirder console classic FPS games. Short, replayable levels that get more complex on higher difficulties, botmatches and a built-in map editor.

store.steampowered.com/app/1533470/Ti…

Ctrl Alt Ego is an immersive sim (Prey, Deus Ex, etc) set in a very 80s British TV version of the future, all cheap plastic and blinking lights. You're a cyber-ghost that can hack and possess robot bodies, and you get to solve problems however you see fit

store.steampowered.com/app/1571940/Ct…

Kandria is an odd duck. A metroidvania with Celeste-style movement minus ability gating. If you know the movement tech, you can go anywhere, do anything. Is it sequence breaking if there's no sequence?

Very human post-apocalyptic story. Sad android hours

store.steampowered.com/app/1261430/Ka…

Bleak Faith: Forsaken is exactly the kind of jank-but-ambitous game that I admire. A tiny indie team making a madly ambitious souls-like set in a decaying sci-fi megastructure.

Was REAL rough at launch but is receiving HUGE game-overhauling updates now.

store.steampowered.com/app/1173220/Bl…

HyperRogue would be a relatively simple dungeon crawler, if it wasn't set on a non-Euclidian endless hyperbolic plane. A dizzying experiment in navigating impossible spaces. Has a whole bunch of alternate modes and challenges, too, if you can handle it.

store.steampowered.com/app/342610/Hyp…

Less challenging but more dizzying is Hyperbolica. Another set in warped space, this time first-person and with full VR support, if you want a mindblowing (and stomach-testing) experience. Lighter, fluffier and funnier than its dungeon-crawl counterpart.

store.steampowered.com/app/1256230/Hy…

What happens when you take a standard kill-the-demon-king JRPG, keep the structure replace the entire aesthetic with surreal claymation vibes. The Hylics series, that's what. The first game is smaller, grimier and less coherent, giving it a distinct feel.

store.steampowered.com/search/?develo…

ADACA is a testament to what a solo dev can do with just a modern engine (Unreal) and some stock asset packs (Synty's Polygon art). A huge, ambitious and shockingly polished fusion of Half-Life 2 and Halo with a STALKER-styled sandbox mode on the side.

store.steampowered.com/app/1765780/AD…

How to make a Last Command:

Take two shots Snake (yes, from every Nokia phone ever)
One part bullet-hell boss rush
One part Nier Automata's hacking
A long pour of post-human cyber-angst
Garnish with cute anime girls and serve over cold, hard ICE.

store.steampowered.com/app/1487270/La…

Wrapping up the thread (for now) with more FREE games.

Did you know that the anime Kemono Friends has a permissive fanworks license? Folks can just make whole games (like Cellien May Cry, a Vita-styled action dungeon crawler) and publish them on Steam.

store.steampowered.com/app/1962920/Ke…

Ultra Fight Da Kyanta 2 is the most fighting game ever, and also the most FREE.

Every character is OP, broken and unfair to fight against. Every match-up is terrible. Everything moves too fast and makes no sense. It also has pro tier rollback netcode.

store.steampowered.com/app/1026840/Ul…

And lastly, for now: Moonring. Only a few weeks old and clearly excellent. It SHOULD be a commercial release, but it's free.

A very old-school RPG inspired by the early Ultima games, text parser dialogue, intricate moon-based magic and an open world.

store.steampowered.com/app/2373630/Mo…

It's a new day, so it's time for more obscure sale picks!

Filcher is a Thief-like stealth game set in a classy art-deco world. Feels like being a catburglar in Batman: TAS. Relatively short (only 9 missions) but quite replayable on higher difficulties.

store.steampowered.com/app/1355650/Fi…

Grotto is one of the most underrated games by Brainwash Gang, a consistently underrated studio.

A furry soothsaying sim. You read cosmic signs, then give guidance to visiting tribesfolk. Whether your advice has anything to do with the signs is up to you.

store.steampowered.com/app/1538850/Gr…

Klei are a very well known studio, but Hot Lava is their most weirdly niche game.

A first-person speedrunning platformer inspired by the screwball physics of Half-Life & Counter-Strike. Bunnyhop, strafe-jump & edge-surf to exceed your max running speed.

store.steampowered.com/app/382560/Hot…

Every game by Calappa Games (formerly Nussoft) is a bit fishy. Neo Aquarium, Ace Of Seafood and Fight Crab are even more bizarre mechanically than their anarchic underwater aesthetic suggests.

Fish wish lasers, tiny warships & rocket-jousting crustaceans

store.steampowered.com/search/?develo…

Heaven Will Be Mine is a short visual novel that says that 'mecha anime as queer subtext' theory is for cowards. It's ALL text here. Colossal reality-warping war-mechs flirting while skirmishing and tearing each other apart as completely unveiled erotica.

store.steampowered.com/app/836450/Hea…

Space Warlord Organ Trading Simulator is an extremely ethical stock market simulator for people with very short attention spans and possibly limited understanding of commodity trading and even money. Rapid-fire arcade trading with many weird story routes.

store.steampowered.com/app/1507780/Sp…

Highfleet is unique. A physics-based airship shooter/sim set in a retro-dieselpunk world. Design craft, trade, negotiate, maybe engage in some light nuclear war and intercept/decrypt radio signals by hand.

A recent big mod adds a campaign set in Thracia.

store.steampowered.com/app/1434950/Hi…

Three Fairies' Hoppin' Flappin' Great Journey is an AI-programming JRPG set in the world of Touhou. Automate battles by creating scripts for your trio of idiot fairies to follow.

The translation and engine are a bit jank, but it's mechanically satisfying

store.steampowered.com/app/1533590/Th…

Sephonie is a weird & deeply underrated parkour exploration platformer with movement that feels kinda like skateboarding. A crew of scientists investigate and commune with a sapient psychic island. Surreal dreamlike storytelling meets high-concept sci-fi

store.steampowered.com/app/1248840/Se…

Immortal Defense is one of the oldest (2007), weirdest and still best indie tower defence games ever made. Hunt prey as an extradimensional deity, summoning aspects of yourself as weapons. Has a wild sci-fi story spanning a huge span of time and space.

store.steampowered.com/app/298360/Imm…

Assault Spy is a fun little Devil May Cry-style character action game by a tiny (I think solo?) indie dev.

The main character is a corporate spy using a weighted combat briefcase and business cards. The other character is an American, so she has guns.

store.steampowered.com/app/767930/Ass…

Another older good'un with shades of DMC is Valdis Story, a combat and RPG-heavy metroidvania with four playable characters, each with their own distinct combat styles and plenty of ways to build stats and gear them up. Holds up well for a decade old.

store.steampowered.com/app/252030/Val…

Moons & Pilots Of Darsalon feel like a pair of long-lost Amiga games. Moons is like a physics'y hybrid of Lemmings, Abe's Odyssey and Worms. Pilots is an uncompromising arcade cave-flier in the style of Lunar Lander or Subterranea.


store.steampowered.com/app/1234180/Mo…
store.steampowered.com/app/1291050/Pi…

KILLBUG was Australian team Samurai Punk's last game. It's also one of their best. A short-session survival FPS in the vein of Devil Daggers, but with a complex environment to navigate and plenty of movement-shooter twists. Short & sharp, but deep.

store.steampowered.com/app/2211730/KI…

Another arcade gem, Horizon Vanguard is best in VR, but supports mouse/keyboard too. If you've got the goggles, it feels like if Virtua-era Sega made VR games. Your hoverbike's guns shoot enemies on a flat plane and your pistol is for blasting flying foes

store.steampowered.com/app/598740/HOR…

Don't let the slightly 'how to draw anime' art put you off Infinite Adventures if you dig Wizardry-style dungeon crawlers. A huge range of classes and character progression options lets you really carve out your own path and style with a 6-character party

store.steampowered.com/app/607820/Inf…

Supplice is just one of the best games out there using the GZDoom engine, and it's only one third done. Drum-tight combat, great music, fantastic level design. Well worth the $12 for the current two episodes, but there's four more to come in later updates

store.steampowered.com/app/1693280/Su…

Redo! is an uncompromising exploration platformer inspired by classic manga Blame!. Only instead of an immortal, overpowered combat android, you're a fragile human in a world of deadly machine lifeforms. Dark, oppressive vibes and fittingly tough combat.

store.steampowered.com/app/950300/RED…

A bit rough but interesting and only $1, Red Dust is a hardcore tactical FPS inspired by Receiver. Rescue catgirls in space from a robot invasion while loading individual rounds into magazines and upgrading your systems.

Uncompromising & sometimes unfair

store.steampowered.com/app/1348400/Re…

Project Starship X is horribly undersold, but has no real flaws that I can think of. A fast roguelike shmup with a wacky cartoon take on eldritch horror. Dare you face the eldest old one - Cthulhu's Grandma? Or maybe just visit Space Texas and go bowling?

store.steampowered.com/app/1175430/Pr…

Nebulous: Fleet Command is still deep in early access, but fascinating already. A hardcore space-naval battle sim that feels like those 'realistic' Homeworld mods but finally done right. Just skirmishes right now, but with a full campaign mode planned.

store.steampowered.com/app/887570/NEB…

A long time ago, a fan adapted Doom into a free turn-based roguelike. It was very good. Bethesda's lawyers complained.

The dev said 'I don't need your Doom brand anyway!' and made an expanded, commercial 3D remake called Jupiter Hell. It is excellent.

store.steampowered.com/app/811320/Jup…

Another excellent old-school roguelike - Golden Krone Hotel. Graphically primitive, but mechanically enthralling. Vampire-themed, with you switching form, turning beams of sunlight from sanctuary into deadly threats or vice versa.

Gamepad-friendly, too!

store.steampowered.com/app/497800/Gol…

Ghost Song is a story-heavy metroidvania that hits different. You're not out to save the universe. You might not even save yourself.

Quiet, human stories and horrible space-violence abound. Reminds me of Iain M Banks' novels: Big universe, small people.

store.steampowered.com/app/347800/Gho…

The only other game to hit those Banks-esque notes for me is Echo. Ultra Ultra's only game. Stealth survival horror.

A young woman with family problems explores a fractal body-duplicating megastructure with the aid of her sassy sapient spaceship on radio

store.steampowered.com/app/551770/ECH…

Got to give a recommendation to Beton Brutal as well, and not just because I played it for my GDQ debut. A first-person platformer inspired by Minecraft parkour maps. Weirdly beautiful brutalist vibes - painted concrete overgrown with vines

Falling hurts

store.steampowered.com/app/2330500/BE…

More games!

Prey For The Gods got its name scrungled by Bethesda lawyers, but not its awesome logo. It's an ambitious indie fusion of Shadow Of The Colossus boss-hunting and Breath of The Wild exploration that should have had way longer in the limelight.

store.steampowered.com/app/494430/Pra…

Ultionus is ultra-niche, but does great within that space. A pseudo-remake of obscure '87 platform shooter Phantis, with a little more humor. A buxom space heroine has already saved the universe, but now needs to kick a sexist spacebook troll in the balls

store.steampowered.com/app/279160/Ult…

Like cool parry systems? Way Of The Passive Fist is almost as much rhythm game as brawler. Perfectly evade attacks until enemies are tired out, then down them with a finger-poke. Was a bit raw at launch but got some huge post-release updates and tuning.

store.steampowered.com/app/625680/Way…

Astalon: Tears Of The Earth is just a really dang good exploration-heavy Metroidvania with some La-Mulana vibes. Great music, fun character-switching mechanics. My only gripe is that aiming for the best possible ending makes for a far-too-easy finale.

store.steampowered.com/app/1046400/As…

Deathbulge: Battle Of The Bands is only a few months old, but very undersold. A genuinely funny musical-themed comedy JRPG based on an also-great webcomic, although you don't have to have read it to understand anything. Clever take on ATB-style combat.

store.steampowered.com/app/1083790/De…

The Astro Saga is a bundle of ELEVEN Japanese indie arcade games. Some shmups, some platformers, some Cybernator-style mech games, all good, short-but-replayable and set in the same shared universe.

I especially like Mechblaze, Satazius and Rocketron.

store.steampowered.com/bundle/12969/T…

Demon Turf is another woefully undersold gem. An expressive 3D platformer ala Mario Odyssey, with tons of moves and multiple valid ways to navigate the levels. Has a funky sprites-on-3D aesthetic. Recently re-launched with some tune-ups and integrated DLC

store.steampowered.com/app/1325900/De…

Earth's Dawn is a game that strains against its own ambitions. A tiny indie team try to challenge Vanillaware with a huge hack n' slasher where you fight huge alien monsters and min-max your character RPG-style. Has some grind, but does a lot right.

store.steampowered.com/app/494600/EAR…

Quester is a fascinating ultra-minimalist dungeon crawler set in post-apocalyptic Japan. Scavenge for food and supplies, recruit survivors, explore further. Crunchy, satisfying mechanics, plus great character/monster art, and some nice tunes too.

store.steampowered.com/app/1754460/QU…

A fresh Early Access release and only slightly discounted, but I'm confident Fortune's Run will grow into a true classic. Dark Forces (off-brand Star Wars setting and all) meets Deus Ex with movement-shooter combat.

It is intense, technical and demanding

store.steampowered.com/app/1692240/Fo…

And let's wrap up the wallet destruction with Forza Polpo. A soft pastel tribute to Jumping Flash, the cult PSX FPS platformer. It is incredibly undersold and deserves more love.

Next: Some free picks because I've hurt your budgets enough this week.

store.steampowered.com/app/1187870/FO…

I Wanna Maker is FREE and just left early access. Mario Maker but for I Wanna Be The Guy fangames. Thousands of user-made worlds, plus a full campaign mode of its own

The difficulty starts off gentle. It's a good teacher. The masocore stuff happens later

store.steampowered.com/app/1114940/I_…

Weird And Unfortunate Things Are Happening is FREE and an excellent cosmic horror JRPG. Surprisingly lengthy with a great (if mostly borrowed) soundtrack and surprisingly funny. Also more than a little bit gay. It really shouldn't be free, but it is.

store.steampowered.com/app/2274410/We…

Zero-K is an excellent, massive, FREE RTS inspired by the classic Total Annihilation. Huge armies, physics-driven combat, an active online multiplayer scene, a lengthy solo campaign and plenty of comp-stomp options. Amazing this is free and still growing.

store.steampowered.com/app/334920/Zer…

Battle For Wesnoth is FREE and has been around for over twenty years now, continually expanding and refined by its community. Sprawling fantasy turn-based strategy. A little Fire Emblem, a little Advance Wars. Dozens of solo story campaigns, mods & modes.

store.steampowered.com/app/599390/Bat…

And lastly (for now) a FREE retro FPS, because that's my jam. AWOL is an extremely 90s (thematically and mechanically) game running on the Build engine. Special Forces vs Generic Bad Terrorists is a bit played out, but it's good fun. Solo with NPC buddies

store.steampowered.com/app/1740150/AW…

And because this thread has grown hideously out of control, here's a Nitter link so folks outside of Musk's Wild Ride can read this thread.



Also a link to the first post. You're now trapped in an endless cycle of game discounts!

nitter.unixfox.eu/DominicTarason…

@threadreaderapp Unroll me please.