Keep an eye on the ExoDos project. They're beginning to release Windows game compilations in addition to DOS. They use Launchbox as a frontend and have everything optimally pre-configured.
General PC Game Recommendation Thread
- Thread starter Clippy
- Start date
- Joined
- Jan 22, 2025
- Messages
- 48
- Reaction score
- 67
- Points
- 127
Populous the Beginning (1999)
A unique RTS where you take command of an all-powerful female Shaman and her all-male tribe to populate the world (possibly via parthenogenesis), raze the opposing tribe, reincarnate to another world, and finally, ascend to godhood. This isn't some anime-ish story where the main girl becomes a goddess because other entity takes pity on her, no. Work hard, use your powerful spells, conquer the solar system, become an omnipotent god.You can purchase this game from GOG and it should work fine, but the full experience is using the Multiverse Launcher (https://thebeginning.uk/multiverse/) to add stuff from the PS1 version. You don't want to play the PS1 version, it's slow and takes 15 slots of memory card.
My Memory of Us (2018)
It's a fairy tale based on certain country occupation by certain Failed Artist, told from the eyes of a child, narrated by Sir Patrick Stewart. It's a puzzle platformer, a good one at that. If you fancy Oddworld Abe's Oddysey / Exoddus, this will be right up your alley, albeit much easier. A little turn-off warning tho: it's in black and white, and of course if you get the subtle story telling, you can get quite disturbed.The music is few, but they incorporate the leitmotif well, something that's extremely rare in modern gaming.
- Joined
- Dec 1, 2024
- Messages
- 550
- Reaction score
- 927
- Points
- 1,977
Some real old stuff; you might need DOSbox:
- Wasteland — Basically the prototype of Fallout. Good if you like old fashioned WRPGs. There's a remake and sequels if you want something more modern.
- Rodent's Revenge — Simple but fun casual game. Make cats sad by cornering them. There are a few clones of it out there, including Jingles Defense (NES homebrew).
- Rise of the Triad — Dumb old FPS that might have been the high point of the "Doom clone" fad. Has both god mode and dog mode.
- I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream — Classic sci-fi adventure game. Based on the story by Harlan Ellison, who wrote and acted in this game.
- Deja Vu — While Shadowgate is considered the greatest of the MACventure games, this is a pretty close 2nd. Has a sequel.
- Dark Seed — The quintessential HR Giger game. If you like Giger's art, play it; if you don't, you might want to find something less phallic to play.
- Dreamweb — Considered the most depressing game ever. If you like cyberpunk and don't need a happy ending, go for it.
- Full Tilt! Pinball — The full, better version of Space Cadet Pinball (that game that came with Windows for a while), as it has higher resolution and more tables than SCP.
AstroFire - 1994 - Top Down Shooter
A solid successor to Asteroids. You fly around in space and shoot various space-based objects, like asteroids and flying saucers, and collect powerups/gems.
Xcom: UFO Defense - 1994 - Strategy
Has topped a lot of Greatest of All Time lists. The original has much deeper RPG and Grand Strategy elements with less of a focus on individual soldiers and a greater sense of scale than more modern successors. Features a real time overworld, with base-building of a sort, and turn-based tactical battles to defeat alien invaders. Best played through Openxcom (which has a bit of a modding scene) but note that it requires original game files. Also has a Playstation and Amiga CD32 version with improved audio that can be selected as an alternative in Openxcom.
Xcom: Terror from the Deep - 1995 - Strategy
More of the same but with underwater tactical battles instead. Widely considered inferior to its predecessor (much of the team had left the studio) but still decent. Also had a Playstation version and is also compatible with Openxcom. IIRC there's a mod out there that attempt to marry the first and second game into a unified experience.
Crusader: No Remorse - 1995 - Isometric Shooter
Octopus did a great review on it here: https://retrogametalk.com/threads/crusader-no-remorse-dos-blasting-gold.2979/
Crusader: No Regret - 1996 - Isometric Shooter
Essentially just a standalone mission expansion pack to the above. I don't believe this one made it to PSX or Saturn.
Xcom: Apocalypse - 1997 - Strategy
Has similar tactical combat to its predecessors but adds the option to play real time battles instead. The setting is also quite different in that the overworld focuses on a single city and you must ply or defeat various political, corporate, and criminal factions which will in turn affect different narrative and gameplay outcomes based on their themes and relationship to the alien invaders. This entry can be a little less accessible only because it lacks a modern open-source engine re-implementation.
H.E.D.Z.: Head Extreme Destruction Zone - 1998 - 3rd Person Shooter
Very unusual game in which the enemies, throughout each level, will drop their heads when they're defeated and you can then "become" that character. There are 225 unique heads with different attributes and attack methods and you can choose 5 to go into each mission. Difficult to run on modern hardware.
Deus Ex - 2000 - aRPG
Another GOAT list topper. A first person RPG with decidedly clunky but amusing first-person and melee combat and a focus on an extremely gripping narrative. Very similar to Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines but arguably less buggy and with a sci-fi setting. Has several mods that greatly improve and somewhat modernize the overall experience: such as GMDX (I've played and can recommend V10, at least), Transcended, and Revision.
Dungeon Siege - 2002 - aRPG
Similar to Diablo albeit it is 3D, has a rotatable camera perspective, and features the ability to recruit up to 7 additional characters to form an 8 person party. Dungeon Siege is also a bit more of a traditional fantasy setting than the dark fantasy of Diablo. You can queue up a melee weapon, ranged weapon, and two magic spells to be swapped between by hotkeys that can affect individual characters or the entire party at the same time. Combat is automatic with some settings you can mess with to change aggro behavior and formation. This game can be a bit harder to run correctly on modern hardware, especially at higher resolutions; however, there are numerous guides on Steam and GOG for fixing these resolution scaling issues and there are mods which improve the appearance and add some QoL features.
A solid successor to Asteroids. You fly around in space and shoot various space-based objects, like asteroids and flying saucers, and collect powerups/gems.
Xcom: UFO Defense - 1994 - Strategy
Has topped a lot of Greatest of All Time lists. The original has much deeper RPG and Grand Strategy elements with less of a focus on individual soldiers and a greater sense of scale than more modern successors. Features a real time overworld, with base-building of a sort, and turn-based tactical battles to defeat alien invaders. Best played through Openxcom (which has a bit of a modding scene) but note that it requires original game files. Also has a Playstation and Amiga CD32 version with improved audio that can be selected as an alternative in Openxcom.
Xcom: Terror from the Deep - 1995 - Strategy
More of the same but with underwater tactical battles instead. Widely considered inferior to its predecessor (much of the team had left the studio) but still decent. Also had a Playstation version and is also compatible with Openxcom. IIRC there's a mod out there that attempt to marry the first and second game into a unified experience.
Crusader: No Remorse - 1995 - Isometric Shooter
Octopus did a great review on it here: https://retrogametalk.com/threads/crusader-no-remorse-dos-blasting-gold.2979/
Crusader: No Regret - 1996 - Isometric Shooter
Essentially just a standalone mission expansion pack to the above. I don't believe this one made it to PSX or Saturn.
Xcom: Apocalypse - 1997 - Strategy
Has similar tactical combat to its predecessors but adds the option to play real time battles instead. The setting is also quite different in that the overworld focuses on a single city and you must ply or defeat various political, corporate, and criminal factions which will in turn affect different narrative and gameplay outcomes based on their themes and relationship to the alien invaders. This entry can be a little less accessible only because it lacks a modern open-source engine re-implementation.
H.E.D.Z.: Head Extreme Destruction Zone - 1998 - 3rd Person Shooter
Very unusual game in which the enemies, throughout each level, will drop their heads when they're defeated and you can then "become" that character. There are 225 unique heads with different attributes and attack methods and you can choose 5 to go into each mission. Difficult to run on modern hardware.
Deus Ex - 2000 - aRPG
Another GOAT list topper. A first person RPG with decidedly clunky but amusing first-person and melee combat and a focus on an extremely gripping narrative. Very similar to Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines but arguably less buggy and with a sci-fi setting. Has several mods that greatly improve and somewhat modernize the overall experience: such as GMDX (I've played and can recommend V10, at least), Transcended, and Revision.
Dungeon Siege - 2002 - aRPG
Similar to Diablo albeit it is 3D, has a rotatable camera perspective, and features the ability to recruit up to 7 additional characters to form an 8 person party. Dungeon Siege is also a bit more of a traditional fantasy setting than the dark fantasy of Diablo. You can queue up a melee weapon, ranged weapon, and two magic spells to be swapped between by hotkeys that can affect individual characters or the entire party at the same time. Combat is automatic with some settings you can mess with to change aggro behavior and formation. This game can be a bit harder to run correctly on modern hardware, especially at higher resolutions; however, there are numerous guides on Steam and GOG for fixing these resolution scaling issues and there are mods which improve the appearance and add some QoL features.
- Joined
- Jan 12, 2025
- Messages
- 15
- Reaction score
- 14
- Points
- 52
I only read the last 2 posts and I can totally agree on some of the games, like the Crusader games are fantastic, XCom: Apocalypse still my favorite XCom game until today, Deja Vu and sequel, whereas I also have to mention Borrowed Time and Tass Times in Tonetown, Wasteland games are fantastic too, actually I'm still playing Wasteland 3, and my special recommendation goes for Dreamweb, what an awesome adventure and to date one of my favorite ingame music, amazing.
Castle of the Winds (1993) - Rogue-like
It's a nice little time capsule into the past, running on Windows 3.1. One of the first perhaps Rogue-like games of old (and the first one i played). Using very simple graphics you delve into an underground maze to get answers regarding your parents death. Simple GUI of drag and drop to equip items. Gameplay it's probably on par with AD&D 2e.
The first half of the game is freeware/shareware, the second half was commercial.
www.mobygames.com
It's a nice little time capsule into the past, running on Windows 3.1. One of the first perhaps Rogue-like games of old (and the first one i played). Using very simple graphics you delve into an underground maze to get answers regarding your parents death. Simple GUI of drag and drop to equip items. Gameplay it's probably on par with AD&D 2e.
The first half of the game is freeware/shareware, the second half was commercial.
Castle of the Winds screenshots - MobyGames
In-game screenshots for Castle of the Winds
www.mobygames.com
- Joined
- Feb 6, 2025
- Messages
- 1
- Reaction score
- 0
- Points
- 1
Ground Control (2000)
An RTS game developed by Massive Entertainment and published by Rebellion
A squad based tactical RTS set in a sci-fi universe. Worth a shot if you like games simila to Company of Heroes/ Dawn of War but don't enjoy base building.
An RTS game developed by Massive Entertainment and published by Rebellion
A squad based tactical RTS set in a sci-fi universe. Worth a shot if you like games simila to Company of Heroes/ Dawn of War but don't enjoy base building.
Wing Commander 3 is great if anyone wants to get into older arcadey flight games since you can play it without a joystick and it's got a ton of FMV scenes with Mark Hamil as the protagonist. There is also a group working on "remastering" the fourth game that has a working demo out now. https://wcrespace.com/
Always feels like a genre that got left behind along with squad based shooters and you never see a ton of modern versions of these kinds of games.
Always feels like a genre that got left behind along with squad based shooters and you never see a ton of modern versions of these kinds of games.
Attachments
- Joined
- Dec 16, 2024
- Messages
- 11
- Reaction score
- 11
- Points
- 52
Other posts have mentioned it but as always, if you haven't played Deus Ex yet, you owe it to yourself to at least try it, it's like $1 on sale at GoG atm.
It has fantastic atmosphere, fantastic music, a great story and is jank in all the right places. The music especially is something so good you'll hear it pop up in 90% of youtube video essays at some point.
It has fantastic atmosphere, fantastic music, a great story and is jank in all the right places. The music especially is something so good you'll hear it pop up in 90% of youtube video essays at some point.
- Joined
- Dec 27, 2024
- Messages
- 124
- Solutions
- 1
- Reaction score
- 510
- Points
- 1,227
Freespace 2
if you like wing commander, you'll also like Freespace 2. The engine is open source and runs on modern systems.
if you like wing commander, you'll also like Freespace 2. The engine is open source and runs on modern systems.
They're nowhere near as in-depth as the stuff listed here, but I thought the Desktop Adventure games they did with Indiana Jones and Yoda were pretty fun little puzzlers.
There's a DOS port of Cross Country USA that's a real mellow experience that I think is fun.
There's a DOS port of Cross Country USA that's a real mellow experience that I think is fun.
Time for big time RTS if you didn't play RTS before you are quite missing out on being the leader of armies instead of mostly being a soldier or controlling one guy.
Im gonna recommend something for new comers and that is command and conquer games if you EVER gonna recommend RTS for new comers just tell them about command and conquer its the least complicated of RTS and introduces you to the basic RTS formula with economy and army there isn't things like damage calculation or much of upgrades unless its CNC3 or generals even then combat is straightforward and it can be satisfying to blow things with a scud storm so yeah if you want to get into RTS give generals or red alert 2 a try.
The age of empires series is a bit more complicated than CNC the game is also slower paced too instead of modern warfare its the antiquity (aoe1/aom) middle ages (aoe2/aoe4) or the industrial age or Napoleonic age (aoe3) instead of 1 source of income its usually 4 since its eras don't have much guns swords and melee weapons are a thing this creates the dynamic of ranged troops and melee or close quarters combat troops while modern warfare has all troops usually ranged and even longer ranged like artillery or rocket buggies and katyshas they mostly don't come around until later stages of the game and are quite fragile and expensive in age of empires ranged troops are a thing since the 2nd age the game works in a age system each "age" signals a part of your civilisation advancing through human history periods like feudal ages which had things like archers and bows going into castle ages unlocks knights and crossbows religion and high education like university and advanced types of fortifications like castles don't expect 100% historical accuracy just to be clear , all civilisations usually share the same units so a French swordsman looks same as a persian swordsman difference however is made by unique bonuses and unique upgrades and tech tree one civilisation can have full armor upgrades another can lack the last armor upgrade these end up creating different playstyles
*one game to note is age of mmythology well its age of empires but this time you get to play in a world where old and pagan religions myths all come to exist ever wished to command an army of bullmen? Horsemen? Minatours , Cyclops , the valkyires the mummies medusa all turned into soldiers you command this installment is unique by having only 4 civilisations or 5 they are the greeks , the ancient Egyptians , and the norse (vikings really) , the expansion "THE TITANS" adds the lost people of Atlantis which in my opinion is the best depiction of the mythical Atlantis ever! , there is also the chinese , units here are very different both in design and stats greeks have hoplites and norse ulfsarks both are generalist infantry but hoplites are tougher but slower and more expensive the ulfsarks are faster deal more damage and cheaper but are quite the glasscanon.
And I would recommend probably the most important RTS ever made Warcraft 3 usually the 2 past collection of games I recommended allow you to command and massive sized armies well that's not something in Warcraft 3 the game has you focus more on individual units and of course heroes get to play very iimportant role in this game "hero units" are usually high priority beings with better stats than normal units the catch is if they die you lose the mission well WarCraft 3 has heroes play more important role by being a hybrid of both RPG and RTS the hero is something of the leader of the army and you can only get 3 of them each has his or her own unique spell kit 3 basic spells and 1 ultimate spell each hero is categorized into either agility hero , strength hero or intelligence hero since users of this site seem very familiar of RPG im not gonna elaborate on what each stat or hero does you will get it immediately when you command the heroes aside from normal game you can dive into the world of fan made content these maps or custom maps we call them allow for turning WC3 into an entirely different game you can play FPS , full on RPG even mario! And everyone should be aware of canned bread.
While I won't recommend warcraft 2 to new comers cuz its dated as heck as for warcraft 1 I only played a remake of it in warcraft 3 so I can't really recommend it.
There is also sudden strike series which attempts at being more realistic of sorts you command grand sizes armies of ww2 nations each soldier has his own ammo pool his own experience bar which effects his combat performance and more since the game ditches the idea of base building combat is all there is here if you like slow paced RTS then sudden strike is worth a try.
Counter strike: seriously play Counter strike if you haven't already that's all im gonna say.
Im gonna recommend something for new comers and that is command and conquer games if you EVER gonna recommend RTS for new comers just tell them about command and conquer its the least complicated of RTS and introduces you to the basic RTS formula with economy and army there isn't things like damage calculation or much of upgrades unless its CNC3 or generals even then combat is straightforward and it can be satisfying to blow things with a scud storm so yeah if you want to get into RTS give generals or red alert 2 a try.
The age of empires series is a bit more complicated than CNC the game is also slower paced too instead of modern warfare its the antiquity (aoe1/aom) middle ages (aoe2/aoe4) or the industrial age or Napoleonic age (aoe3) instead of 1 source of income its usually 4 since its eras don't have much guns swords and melee weapons are a thing this creates the dynamic of ranged troops and melee or close quarters combat troops while modern warfare has all troops usually ranged and even longer ranged like artillery or rocket buggies and katyshas they mostly don't come around until later stages of the game and are quite fragile and expensive in age of empires ranged troops are a thing since the 2nd age the game works in a age system each "age" signals a part of your civilisation advancing through human history periods like feudal ages which had things like archers and bows going into castle ages unlocks knights and crossbows religion and high education like university and advanced types of fortifications like castles don't expect 100% historical accuracy just to be clear , all civilisations usually share the same units so a French swordsman looks same as a persian swordsman difference however is made by unique bonuses and unique upgrades and tech tree one civilisation can have full armor upgrades another can lack the last armor upgrade these end up creating different playstyles
*one game to note is age of mmythology well its age of empires but this time you get to play in a world where old and pagan religions myths all come to exist ever wished to command an army of bullmen? Horsemen? Minatours , Cyclops , the valkyires the mummies medusa all turned into soldiers you command this installment is unique by having only 4 civilisations or 5 they are the greeks , the ancient Egyptians , and the norse (vikings really) , the expansion "THE TITANS" adds the lost people of Atlantis which in my opinion is the best depiction of the mythical Atlantis ever! , there is also the chinese , units here are very different both in design and stats greeks have hoplites and norse ulfsarks both are generalist infantry but hoplites are tougher but slower and more expensive the ulfsarks are faster deal more damage and cheaper but are quite the glasscanon.
And I would recommend probably the most important RTS ever made Warcraft 3 usually the 2 past collection of games I recommended allow you to command and massive sized armies well that's not something in Warcraft 3 the game has you focus more on individual units and of course heroes get to play very iimportant role in this game "hero units" are usually high priority beings with better stats than normal units the catch is if they die you lose the mission well WarCraft 3 has heroes play more important role by being a hybrid of both RPG and RTS the hero is something of the leader of the army and you can only get 3 of them each has his or her own unique spell kit 3 basic spells and 1 ultimate spell each hero is categorized into either agility hero , strength hero or intelligence hero since users of this site seem very familiar of RPG im not gonna elaborate on what each stat or hero does you will get it immediately when you command the heroes aside from normal game you can dive into the world of fan made content these maps or custom maps we call them allow for turning WC3 into an entirely different game you can play FPS , full on RPG even mario! And everyone should be aware of canned bread.
While I won't recommend warcraft 2 to new comers cuz its dated as heck as for warcraft 1 I only played a remake of it in warcraft 3 so I can't really recommend it.
There is also sudden strike series which attempts at being more realistic of sorts you command grand sizes armies of ww2 nations each soldier has his own ammo pool his own experience bar which effects his combat performance and more since the game ditches the idea of base building combat is all there is here if you like slow paced RTS then sudden strike is worth a try.
Counter strike: seriously play Counter strike if you haven't already that's all im gonna say.
The entire ys series and trails of series should be added not just oath, but if we're talking specifically games that were pc only originally...
Xanadu Next, ys 6 and ys origin, all 3 eventually got console ports but most took years, all can be found on steam, gog, epic and even humble bundle.
Ys 1 and 2 Eternal Complete this version of the first 2 games isn't on anything but pc, since the soundtrack of each remake is different i'm placing this here, you'd probably have to pirate this one as it had no official english release but did get a fan translation.
The Legend of Heroes: Trails in the sky FC, SC and The 3rd all originally released exclusively on windows pc's and are all available from Steam, Gog and Epic, utterly amazing jrpg's.
As for others...
Resident Evil 4 original had 3 versions i think on pc but the best and one i suggest is the steam version which increased the framerate (though this made qte's MUCH harder at 60 fps, take my advice and mod it to fix the qte issue) upscaled the textures, made the game more overall functional and fixed the controls, this is imo the best version of resident evil 4 out there and i prefer it over the remake.
The Planet Crafter is a resource management survival game, aka a chill game, no enemies, only suffocation, hunger and thirst can kill you, a calming game you can play for hours and lose yourself in.
Xanadu Next, ys 6 and ys origin, all 3 eventually got console ports but most took years, all can be found on steam, gog, epic and even humble bundle.
Ys 1 and 2 Eternal Complete this version of the first 2 games isn't on anything but pc, since the soundtrack of each remake is different i'm placing this here, you'd probably have to pirate this one as it had no official english release but did get a fan translation.
The Legend of Heroes: Trails in the sky FC, SC and The 3rd all originally released exclusively on windows pc's and are all available from Steam, Gog and Epic, utterly amazing jrpg's.
As for others...
Resident Evil 4 original had 3 versions i think on pc but the best and one i suggest is the steam version which increased the framerate (though this made qte's MUCH harder at 60 fps, take my advice and mod it to fix the qte issue) upscaled the textures, made the game more overall functional and fixed the controls, this is imo the best version of resident evil 4 out there and i prefer it over the remake.
The Planet Crafter is a resource management survival game, aka a chill game, no enemies, only suffocation, hunger and thirst can kill you, a calming game you can play for hours and lose yourself in.
- Joined
- Dec 3, 2024
- Messages
- 2,115
- Reaction score
- 2,291
- Points
- 3,477
At least the latest version is on Steam.
Every modern Ys games are on Steam/GoG thankfully.
Fallout Tactics: Brotherhood Of Steel (2001)
A tactical squad based game set in the post apocalyptic Fallout universe.
this game is awesome but its really hard to play it these days..
if you really want to play it, the steam version is normally only a couple of bucks but its broken af and not fun to play at all. However you can mod that version with "FOT Redux"
and get it running perfectly, its a bit of a hassle but totally worth it
A tactical squad based game set in the post apocalyptic Fallout universe.
this game is awesome but its really hard to play it these days..
if you really want to play it, the steam version is normally only a couple of bucks but its broken af and not fun to play at all. However you can mod that version with "FOT Redux"
and get it running perfectly, its a bit of a hassle but totally worth it
Last edited:
I really love the visuals of this thing, its engine looks exactly like how I imagined a black isle's fallout 3 and iirc there's even actual working vehicles in the game. But tactical games are a bit intimidating for me. You not only have to build a character, but a whole squad and get used to the game stats right away in order to not mess up their build and maybe there's more mechanics like resource management? I have no idea. That being said, I did play and finish Wasteland 2...
Wasteland 2 looks cool & kinda similar, definitely the same fallout vibes
im not really a fan of "tactics" games either but this one is fun! its kinda like using VATS in the later games where you freeze time to target a certain area on an enemy and each shot uses up AP.
its not overly complicated but its quite brutal, sometimes you'll just randomly get your head blowen off by a good shot and then its game over so you gotta save & load it all the time
personally i use the trial and error method and die several times before i find the right "tactic"
and as for resource management, each team member has their own inventory and you find ALOT of stuff everywhere so there is no shortage of food/stimpaks or ammo and soooo many weapons!
Last edited:
Play Homeworld and nobody else will get hurt. ?
But to expand upon that, Homeworld and Homeworld: Cataclysm (Emergence) are really worth a play. I'm not very good at RTS games because they're too fast for me, but Homeworld has a slower pace and you can do basically everything while paused. That doesn't mean they're not intense or easy though. It's a true 3D RTS, so both you and the enemies can attack from any angle and you have the massively helpful sensor manager that allows you to view basically the entire stage and issue commands from there. The campaigns are the highlight though, really good storytelling, music, acting, the whole package! Also, if you miss manuals, these games have fucking manuals. I'm sure you wanted a bunch of lore you can only find out from the manuals, as well as the full stats and lore for every ship in the game. The HW1 manual is over 100 pages, HW:C is almost 150 and HW2 is about 70. All of the manuals can be easily found in .pdf format in seconds with a Google search. We need to discuss the remaster and how to play the games though.
I do own the remaster, but I have not played much of it. It only includes Homeworld 1&2 because they lost the source code for Cataclysm. Weak. One of my best buds and fellow Homeworld fan has played through the remaster campaign and does not like the changes they've made. For starters, HW1R is on a completely different engine, it was ported to HW2's engine and that has it's own set of quirks and a bunch of bugs. They have made a lot of changes to balance, UI, mechanics and other stuff.
The real dealbreaker is the nerfing of ship capturing and the dynamic enemy fleet size. Ship capturing is neat because you get ships for free! This even includes unique ships you can't get by any other methods. The fleet size change makes it so that the size of the enemy's fleet changes with the size of your own. My friend had it break AI scripting because of the size of the enemy fleet as well as them having a fleet so massive that he would die immediately, forcing him to load an earlier save to scuttle a bunch of his ships so he wasn't instapulped. Thankfully there is the Homeworld Remastered Players Patch that allows you to adjust the fleet scaling as well as balancing things closer to the original release and fixing bugs. I would still recommend visiting PCGamingWiki, but that applies to basically every PC game for me. Sadly, not even PCGamingWiki can fix the remastered developers from not letting you choose to play the campaign as the Taiidan, only skirmish battles. Yeah the Kushan are the canon faction, but the Taiidan have such cooler ships.
The remastered collection does include the original versions of 1&2 and this is the only way to get them legally unless you get a used copy, not that such a thing matters in a place like this.
You can purchase the Remastered collection from Steam, GoG and EGS. If you've never played the original you probably won't have any problems with the changes to the remastered edition and even if you do, the original is still there. From what I know, the classic versions are more or less the same as the fully patched original releases, just tweaked a bit to play nice with newer systems. Another advantage to going with the remastered collection is it's mod support. There are plenty of mods for the original games, but the remastered collection has Steam workshop support and many of the old mods (mainly for 2) have been ported to the workshop for easy acquisition. Though, once again, a trip to PCGamingWiki is recommended for widescreen support.
As for Cataclysm, it's my favorite of the series in pretty much every way. The engine is the same as the original, but with some nice QoL changes. There's less ship variety, but the ships are more versatile instead. The motherships aren't just sitting ducks, they both have different offensive potentials. Finally, I just love the story and the Beast. They're a bio-mechanical virus that take over ships by breaking the crew down at a cellular level and turning them into living biocircuitry. The crew are still alive and the Beast uses their knowledge to know how to operate any ship instantly. So when you see a bunch of red mass on the cockpit and on various parts of a ship, that was once the crew, now turned into bio-circuitry and organic armor. Horrible, but also metal as fuck.
You can pick up a used copy or get it off GoG under the name Homeworld: Emergence. I need to bitch for a second. They renamed it Emergence because Blizzard has a copyright on Cataclysm due to the WoW expansion. Have a super duper fuck you Blizzard. Homeworld: Cataclysm came out first! Fuck Blizzard in general, they haven't made a good game since Hearthstone. Anyway, the GoG copy is your best bet, but it requires PCGamingWiki more than the other two games.
Wow, that's a whole lot of words so far. I'll wrap this up quick.
I've mentioned HW2 but not said anything about the game itself. It's... okay. It looked great for it's time and has held up really well. The soundtrack is great as well, just way different in tone than the previous two games. They changed around a lot of the gameplay and that made my aforementioned friend as well as other Homeworld vets not like the game as much. I didn't mind though, I thought it still played well. But the biggest sin the game commits is the story. The game went through a troubled production and the story is just a mess. It's some mystical focused religious prophecy shit with some ancient mysterious race called the Progenitors. Wow, what a unique name. Not much more to say. It's fine, just a disappointment compared to the prior games. You can't not get it if you get the remastered collection and most of the mods are for it, so it's worth having around. However, it also commits the sin of the race with the much cooler ships being the bad guys. D: At least you can play as them in skirmish games.
Not much to say about Homeworld: Deserts of Kharak. I own it, but have only played a couple story missions and skirmish battles. There are some really cool looking unit and level designs, but it's not set in space so it loses one of the biggest draws of the older games. My friend says it's a good enough time, so I'll play it someday.
Homeworld Mobile. Hmm. Visually it looked nice and it was neat that it was continuing the story of the series, but it was a micro-transaction and grinding riddled mobile game in the end. Never played it, can't anymore anyway, it only lasted for two years.
Finally, Homeworld 3. Never played it, not too interested. It looks super pretty and supposedly has good audio stuff but I've heard nothing but bad things otherwise. Even my bud has no interest in it. Naturally they planned to milk the game as long as possible with DLC, but the game flopped and it got one last patch in November of 2024 along with shitting out some factions that can't be used in skirmish. I dunno, watch Mandalore's review on it for more information, I have none for you. It's not retro anyway so fuck it.
Hmm, that was not quick, but it was nice talking about one of my favorite series, you can probably tell I'm pretty passionate about it. I hope this sparked interest for at least someone. :> If nothing else, Mandalore's reviews on the series might be of interest.
TL;DR Fuck you, Randy Bitchford!
But to expand upon that, Homeworld and Homeworld: Cataclysm (Emergence) are really worth a play. I'm not very good at RTS games because they're too fast for me, but Homeworld has a slower pace and you can do basically everything while paused. That doesn't mean they're not intense or easy though. It's a true 3D RTS, so both you and the enemies can attack from any angle and you have the massively helpful sensor manager that allows you to view basically the entire stage and issue commands from there. The campaigns are the highlight though, really good storytelling, music, acting, the whole package! Also, if you miss manuals, these games have fucking manuals. I'm sure you wanted a bunch of lore you can only find out from the manuals, as well as the full stats and lore for every ship in the game. The HW1 manual is over 100 pages, HW:C is almost 150 and HW2 is about 70. All of the manuals can be easily found in .pdf format in seconds with a Google search. We need to discuss the remaster and how to play the games though.
I do own the remaster, but I have not played much of it. It only includes Homeworld 1&2 because they lost the source code for Cataclysm. Weak. One of my best buds and fellow Homeworld fan has played through the remaster campaign and does not like the changes they've made. For starters, HW1R is on a completely different engine, it was ported to HW2's engine and that has it's own set of quirks and a bunch of bugs. They have made a lot of changes to balance, UI, mechanics and other stuff.
The real dealbreaker is the nerfing of ship capturing and the dynamic enemy fleet size. Ship capturing is neat because you get ships for free! This even includes unique ships you can't get by any other methods. The fleet size change makes it so that the size of the enemy's fleet changes with the size of your own. My friend had it break AI scripting because of the size of the enemy fleet as well as them having a fleet so massive that he would die immediately, forcing him to load an earlier save to scuttle a bunch of his ships so he wasn't instapulped. Thankfully there is the Homeworld Remastered Players Patch that allows you to adjust the fleet scaling as well as balancing things closer to the original release and fixing bugs. I would still recommend visiting PCGamingWiki, but that applies to basically every PC game for me. Sadly, not even PCGamingWiki can fix the remastered developers from not letting you choose to play the campaign as the Taiidan, only skirmish battles. Yeah the Kushan are the canon faction, but the Taiidan have such cooler ships.
The remastered collection does include the original versions of 1&2 and this is the only way to get them legally unless you get a used copy, not that such a thing matters in a place like this.
You can purchase the Remastered collection from Steam, GoG and EGS. If you've never played the original you probably won't have any problems with the changes to the remastered edition and even if you do, the original is still there. From what I know, the classic versions are more or less the same as the fully patched original releases, just tweaked a bit to play nice with newer systems. Another advantage to going with the remastered collection is it's mod support. There are plenty of mods for the original games, but the remastered collection has Steam workshop support and many of the old mods (mainly for 2) have been ported to the workshop for easy acquisition. Though, once again, a trip to PCGamingWiki is recommended for widescreen support.As for Cataclysm, it's my favorite of the series in pretty much every way. The engine is the same as the original, but with some nice QoL changes. There's less ship variety, but the ships are more versatile instead. The motherships aren't just sitting ducks, they both have different offensive potentials. Finally, I just love the story and the Beast. They're a bio-mechanical virus that take over ships by breaking the crew down at a cellular level and turning them into living biocircuitry. The crew are still alive and the Beast uses their knowledge to know how to operate any ship instantly. So when you see a bunch of red mass on the cockpit and on various parts of a ship, that was once the crew, now turned into bio-circuitry and organic armor. Horrible, but also metal as fuck.
You can pick up a used copy or get it off GoG under the name Homeworld: Emergence. I need to bitch for a second. They renamed it Emergence because Blizzard has a copyright on Cataclysm due to the WoW expansion. Have a super duper fuck you Blizzard. Homeworld: Cataclysm came out first! Fuck Blizzard in general, they haven't made a good game since Hearthstone. Anyway, the GoG copy is your best bet, but it requires PCGamingWiki more than the other two games.
Wow, that's a whole lot of words so far. I'll wrap this up quick.
I've mentioned HW2 but not said anything about the game itself. It's... okay. It looked great for it's time and has held up really well. The soundtrack is great as well, just way different in tone than the previous two games. They changed around a lot of the gameplay and that made my aforementioned friend as well as other Homeworld vets not like the game as much. I didn't mind though, I thought it still played well. But the biggest sin the game commits is the story. The game went through a troubled production and the story is just a mess. It's some mystical focused religious prophecy shit with some ancient mysterious race called the Progenitors. Wow, what a unique name. Not much more to say. It's fine, just a disappointment compared to the prior games. You can't not get it if you get the remastered collection and most of the mods are for it, so it's worth having around. However, it also commits the sin of the race with the much cooler ships being the bad guys. D: At least you can play as them in skirmish games.
Not much to say about Homeworld: Deserts of Kharak. I own it, but have only played a couple story missions and skirmish battles. There are some really cool looking unit and level designs, but it's not set in space so it loses one of the biggest draws of the older games. My friend says it's a good enough time, so I'll play it someday.
Homeworld Mobile. Hmm. Visually it looked nice and it was neat that it was continuing the story of the series, but it was a micro-transaction and grinding riddled mobile game in the end. Never played it, can't anymore anyway, it only lasted for two years.
Finally, Homeworld 3. Never played it, not too interested. It looks super pretty and supposedly has good audio stuff but I've heard nothing but bad things otherwise. Even my bud has no interest in it. Naturally they planned to milk the game as long as possible with DLC, but the game flopped and it got one last patch in November of 2024 along with shitting out some factions that can't be used in skirmish. I dunno, watch Mandalore's review on it for more information, I have none for you. It's not retro anyway so fuck it.
Hmm, that was not quick, but it was nice talking about one of my favorite series, you can probably tell I'm pretty passionate about it. I hope this sparked interest for at least someone. :> If nothing else, Mandalore's reviews on the series might be of interest.
TL;DR Fuck you, Randy Bitchford!
Ender Lillies and Ender Magnolia, both great metroidvanias.
Prisoner of Ice is an adventure game, and a pretty good one too. It is very much a Cthulhu game; I think it had an alternate title as well.
Something like Call of Cthulhu: Prisoner of Ice, I do not remember honestly. It's been years since I installed or played it. I do remember enjoying it a lot, though. But I love anything H.P. Lovecraft-related.
I highly suggest playing it if you can find it.
That one shop, GOG, may have it. not checked, mind you.
I have my box copy of it still.
Something like Call of Cthulhu: Prisoner of Ice, I do not remember honestly. It's been years since I installed or played it. I do remember enjoying it a lot, though. But I love anything H.P. Lovecraft-related.
I highly suggest playing it if you can find it.
That one shop, GOG, may have it. not checked, mind you.
I have my box copy of it still.
I played this back near release and i'm not sure how I managed to finish it. It's really unforgiving at times. I remember there was map where you encounter a squad of entrenched Super Mutants and if you take them out you get depleted uranium rounds for a M2 machine gun.
Which decimated everything.
wow good job man! finishing that game is quite the achievement ?
i also plan to finish it someday! XD
The Temple of Elemental Evil is a Banger old-skool Turn based RPG.
Set in the D&D world,and tbh i don't know what Rule set it goes by, rather which Revision.
I Know it was a fun game tho, and Very Diablo looking, maybe Diablo 2.
You can even Kill the NPC's as i recall, if you wanna go True Chaotic evil in it.
Also, Hard as Nails. you aren't gonna just spam-click and win this. the Enemy A.I. <for the time> was rather Cheap and would kill you 1 hit if they got a lucky Dice roll
Still hella fun if you like Old D&D
Set in the D&D world,and tbh i don't know what Rule set it goes by, rather which Revision.
I Know it was a fun game tho, and Very Diablo looking, maybe Diablo 2.
You can even Kill the NPC's as i recall, if you wanna go True Chaotic evil in it.
Also, Hard as Nails. you aren't gonna just spam-click and win this. the Enemy A.I. <for the time> was rather Cheap and would kill you 1 hit if they got a lucky Dice roll
Still hella fun if you like Old D&D
Users who are viewing this thread
Online statistics
- Members online
- 169
- Guests online
- 326
- Total visitors
- 495