Oh, and just in the moment I hit send, I remembered another gem from the olden times:
Unreal World: Basically the survival game. 99% of today’s survival games are just a pale shadow of this. I mean, nowadays there are even “survival” games without hunger mechanics or proper simulation of wounds… No, this is not one of those easy mode survival games. This is Fantasy Finland, and it’s the Fantasy Iron Age. Available for free or, if you want updates faster, also for money on Steam.
Oh neat, I’ll have to check this out. I’m not into the whole Open World Survival Crafting pandemic that has taken root but if this is like the best of the best of survival games then it should be fun!
If I weren’t currently at work and would have time to think about the answer, I could probably come up with more titles, but those are the top 2 that come to mind, if I ignore cRPGs (at least that’s how I read your “avoiding final fantasy-esque” requirement):
Settlers 2: It’s new enough to still look decent by today’s standards, and has amazing game design. Available at GoG.
Star Control 2: One of the best early open world games. The graphics have definitely aged by today’s standard, but the humour hasn’t. Or maybe it has, but just a bit. Available for free and open source.
My relationship with cRPGs is weird. I adore disco elysium and citizen sleeper, two of my favourite games. I enjoyed the first ~30 hours of Divinity Original Sin 2 before I just got uber fatigued on how much the game got in the way of the characters for me. Final Fantasy (style) games i just get so exhausted by all the faffing around with party composition and stats and junctions and equipment and skills and whatever the fuck else. What I live for in my tabletop experiences is high storytelling and roleplay, where I can do a little fooling around with fun combat builds and whatnot without getting too bogged down, and my videogaming preferences mirror that.
I guess what I’m saying is that a crpg with a greater focus on the RP and less on the G really fits my tastes, so earthbound is a natural fit.
Settlers and star control both look somewhat neat! I’ll have a look, many thanks.
Older JRPGs in particular are definitely a bit of an acquired taste. There are a lot of games that I love dearly but have a hard time recommending to anyone who didn't grow up on that style of game.
That said, Chrono Trigger is the one that really stands the test of time and I think is the best entry point into the classics. Or just try some more modern games, the genre has evolved considerably.
Earthbound is probably the one I'd put next after CT, but it's a bit of a slow burn that's honestly carried by its writing. Mother 3 raises the bar considerably, but you gotta play EB before M3.
Yeah, I’ve had such a love/hate experience with JRPGs. When the game gets out of the way and lets me just explore the world and its characters I fall in love. And then the gameplay comes back and I have to get out my spreadsheets and shit and I just fall asleep. CT comes highly recommended so I’m looking forward to giving that a go alongside EB and M3. I have Sea of Stars on my backlog which is apparently a spiritual successor to CT so that’ll probably follow along nicely.
I know you want to avoid Final Fantasy style games, but both Chrono Trigger and FF Tactics Advance are unique takes on JRPGs (you’re open to Earthbound, after all). They are also timeless, IMO, and stand up against modern titles.
Kirby’s Adventure is great all around. Has saves, interesting gameplay, tight controls, excellent music, secondary secret objectives, and it’s just goddamn adorable. It’s also better than Kirby Superstar, IMO, but do try both.
I tried a kirby game at some point and I found myself annoyed with the platforming, but it might have been a bad choice of title. I’ll give adventure a go!
someone else mentioned FFT, is there a reason to go for FFTA in particular?
chrono trigger is highly regarded, i may give it a go. maybe it’ll be a good primer before I ever play Sea of Stars.
TMNT3: Manhattan Project was a fucking JAM i played the ever loving shit out of that when I was younger. Thanks for the nostalgia hit.
Battletoads I’ll have to check out, it’s another one of those that has been on my radar but I just never tried for some reason.
I have never even remotely heard of Little Nemo: Dreammaster, I’ll have a look!
Someone else recommended mega man, so I’m definitely gonna have to check this out
SM64, what a gem. Despite the janky collision and truly awful camera it really is a classic for a reason
Kirby’s Adventure just feels the best to control. I don’t like the way they changed how powers work in Superstar, and I think the variety, controls, and level design aren’t as good. Sometimes, more isn’t always better.
FFTA is the best in the series, but it’s also the most unique story. FFT is still the usual “fantasy” universe you’re familiar with, but there’s an interesting element of isekai in FFTA.
Battletoads is hard, but not impossible. Everyone remembers the third level with the bikes being a pita, but I did it as a kid. Tip: towards the end, there’s a part where walls will come at you faster and faster, but if you try to stick to the middle and move just enough out of the way, you can weave back and forth. Don’t overcorrect; light touch. If you get really good, there’s even a secret in that part that lets you skip several levels. Look for a sparkle!
Little Nemo is based on a comic, and it’s a really unique puzzle/action platformer. I haven’t played anything quite like it, but it was one of the first NES games I owned.
Mega Man 2 unequivocally has some of the best chiptunes in any game. There’s a reason there’s so many remixes on OC Remix just from that game.
Starfox 64 is the original SNES Starfox but with better graphics, gameplay, and story. There’s also multiple endings…
Someone else mentioned that they liked the GBA remake of Adventure more - would you say it’s worth going that route or sticking to the OG?
I suppose I’ll have a look at FFT and FFTA both and see what’s up.
Ah I remember how painfully unforgiving those old side scrolling games could be, I’ll find my way through battletoads :D
Definitely excited to try Little Nemo, it’s one of the few recommendations people have posted that I genuinely just have never heard of
Man I have always enjoyed when I heard Mega Man soundtrack pop up in other places, the tunes are sublime. Just never played the actual games the music is from lol.
Looking forward to Starfox 64 it sounds like a good one!
The GBA port is…okay. It has some of the “improvements” that the SNES got, and the balance just feels off, to me. I would say that it still controls better than the SNES version, however.
Give them all a try, though. Maybe the NES version will feel lacking to you and you’ll love the SNES ones!
Not really, when you don’t buy games when they come out. A lot of mine are freebies, and I never buy anything that isn’t a deep discount (especially from AAA studios), which means “new” for me is often several years old already.
Do note that in your post you mentioned things that have aged well, and while I think it’s fine, they can feel a bit clunky, especially in comparison to some of the games heavily influenced by them (e.g. Dishonored, among others).
Edit: I’m mostly referring to direct melee combat here, and not the rest of the game. Truth is, you probably won’t find yourself using it much against humans, but the sword can feel a bit dated against some of the nonhuman creatures. And now that I think about it, Dishonored’s swordplay isn’t exactly super fluid either unless you’re countering and parrying.
You might want to add some mods just to touch some things up.
Also, while the second game is my favourite, don’t sleep on the third, especially if you like horror because one of the later levels is fucking incredible. I say all of this as someone who ordinarily hates supernatural-type horror.
And the third game also expands on the lore, which I like.
All of them are available on GOG and Steam.
Similar to Thief, the original Deus Ex is a great game which might also show its age a bit, but I think stands the test of time for the most part.
I’ll look into mods, thank you for the recommendation :)
I do love having GOG versions available.
I remember playing the original Deus Ex and I think my mum forced me to stop playing because it was too violent or some such nonsense (this being the same mother that had me playing Oddworld while I sat on her lap at the ripe old age of like 5. A game that routinely features people and monsters being blown/crushed/ground/shot/shredded/chewed to giblets). I may have to look this up again.
The main patch you’ll want is TFix/T2Fix, posted on TTLG Forums. I think it comes prepatched from GOG, on Steam you’ll have to patch it yourself.
@comicallycluttered what do you mean by very clunky? I don’t think they are at all. Except maybe the default control scheme which is pretty bad today, but you can rebind everything (or use my bind file, works for both games)
No prob. The first game actually has some fantastic mods and also a ton of incredibly well-crafted fan-made levels.
You might want a few tiny mods for Deus Ex as well, though it doesn’t really require much.
Kind of funny that it was “too violent” because you can go through most of the game without even killing anyone. It’s my preferred playstyle, just sleep darts and stealth stuff.
Actually, you’ll have a bit of a rough time if you go in guns ablaze. A lot of people used to shooters end up being obliterated on the first level when they initially play it, which is what happened to me when I first played it on release. Came back to it years later after I’d discovered Thief and suddenly felt right at home.
Edit: Oh, and it’s also available on GOG. Most of the earlier immersive sims (Thief, Deus Ex, System Shock, Ultima, Arx Fatalis, etc.) are.
And yeah, like I was quite young so the idea of having weapons and not using them probably went a bit over my head at the time so it ended up being violent. I was also coming off of the back of games like Duke Nukem 3d and DOOM (which I somehow was not discouraged from playing - go figure)
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