Buddy wants to build his first gaming PC, and Winter is Coming.

Cantido

A distant friend of mine recently retired with pension and wants to build a work/gaming PC with his two sons for Christmas. He is considering VR as well. I already gave him my part preferences and referred him to my favorite gaming PC building/repair shop for second opinions.

I already warned him about setting an entertainment budget and will later discuss problematic things about the industry, such as the state of the Oculus Rift (I'll get into DLC later.)

I am putting together a list of "This is why you are a PC gamer" games list, while including things that thive on PC such as 4Xs. Then when the Steam sale happens and he sets his budget, I will compare this list to what is actually on sale, as well as his budget, to give him and his kids the most bang for his buck.

I have a blind spot. I dislike isometric WRPGs. I really should go back and finish Divinity II's tutorial and kill those damned slimes... Recommendations would be welcome.


Shovel Knight
Just Shapes and Beats
Sonic Mania
Tunic
Spiritfarer
Ori and the Blind Forest
Enter the Gungeon
Black Mesa
Half Life 2
Portal 1 & 2
Outer Wilds
Bastion
Enter the Gungeon
Stellaris
Civilization
Undertale
Freedom Planet
Everhood
Metal Slug
Actraiser
Megaman
Brigador
Horizon: Zero Dawn
Alien Isolation
Deep Rock Galactic
Dishonored
Elden Ring
Monaco
Slay the Spire
Hades
Homeworld Collection
Skyrim
Northgard
The Banner Saga
Disco Elysium
Lovers in a Dangerous Spacetime
Observation
Inscryption
Freedom Planet
Total Warhammer
Spec Ops: The Line
Amid Evil
Subnautica

EDIT
Little Nightmares
The Eternal Castle
Deep Rock Galactic
Cuphead
Hollow Knight
Axiom Verge
Victoiria 3

I made a separate list for VR:
Project Wingman
Wanderer
Panoptic
Half Life Alyx
Beat Saber
Power Beats VR
Ragnarock

Any other recommendations?

Rear Admiral Choco

I've never been much of an isometric RPG guy but Expeditions: Rome is an excellent entry in that genre imo

Xaquin

Terraria and Hollow Knight!

TychoCelchuuu

Pillars of Eternity 1 and 2.

see317

Is your friend (or their kids) a gamer at all? Tabletop? Console?

My suggestions:
X-Wing, TIE Fighter, X-Wing Alliance.
All are available on GoG for 40 bucks total.

Maybe the Shadowrun games?
X-com games could be fun.

Also be sure to point them to HumbleBundle. Lot of good deals there.

BlindZenDriver

see317 wrote: »

Is your friend (or their kids) a gamer at all? Tabletop? Console?

<SNIP>

Also be sure to point them to HumbleBundle. Lot of good deals there.

Definitely the Humble Bundle thing.

Also Epic wants to have their slice of the game platform market, so on their "Steam" they are giving away games for free- they do so in the form of one or two games per week, lots are Indy titles but there is also old or not so-new AAA titles. All that is needed to do is to log into Epic Games Launcher and "buy" the free stuff, they usually change what is free every Thursday.

Now for recommendations not all ready suggested:

Deus Ex series, all titles are good except Deus Ex II
Limbo
Inside
Light Matter
Lonely Mountains Downhill
Far Cry series
Grand Theft Auto V
Torchlight series(A sort of Diablo, but not so dark and lots of charm)
Elite Dangerous
Microsoft Flight Simulator (There is perhaps a VR edition of this, but not sure)
Halo The Master Chief Collection
Deep Rock Galactic https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2021/08/how-deep-rock-galactics-dwarf-miners-have-helped-me-survive-the-pandemic/
Forza series

Also on Civilization from the original list, maybe starting with V is better than VI, as I think the later is to much micro management.

Cambiata

Mass Effect

Cantido

BlindZenDriver wrote: »

see317 wrote: »

Is your friend (or their kids) a gamer at all? Tabletop? Console?

<SNIP>

Also be sure to point them to HumbleBundle. Lot of good deals there.

Definitely the Humble Bundle thing.

Also Epic wants to have their slice of the game platform market, so on their "Steam" they are giving away games for free- they do so in the form of one or two games per week, lots are Indy titles but there is also old or not so-new AAA titles. All that is needed to do is to log into Epic Games Launcher and "buy" the free stuff, they usually change what is free every Thursday.

Now for recommendations not all ready suggested:

Deus Ex series, all titles are good except Deus Ex II
Limbo
Inside
Light Matter
Lonely Mountains Downhill
Far Cry series
Grand Theft Auto V
Torchlight series(A sort of Diablo, but not so dark and lots of charm)
Elite Dangerous
Microsoft Flight Simulator (There is perhaps a VR edition of this, but not sure)
Halo The Master Chief Collection
Deep Rock Galactic https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2021/08/how-deep-rock-galactics-dwarf-miners-have-helped-me-survive-the-pandemic/
Forza series

Also on Civilization from the original list, maybe starting with V is better than VI, as I think the later is to much micro management.

I had Deep Rock Galactic written down but it didn't make it to the OP. Thanks. What a perfect and evergreen game.

Cantido

I just added The Eternal Castle
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OkWdaz6Ut2s

spool32

If he wants VR, he really should go for the Steam option. It's extremely good and also not owned by goddamn Facebook Meta.

A couple of Survival / factory type games
Valheim
Satisfactory

Play the meta
The Stanley Parable

And also play the different meta
League of Legends
Teamfight Tactics

And the king of looter/shooters + co-op for days
Borderlands (1 and 2 so cheap)
Tiny Tina's Wonderlands

And on VR
*** FINAL APPROACH ***

Jazz

Mass Effect: Legendary Edition
Stray
American Truck Simulator & Euro Truck Simulator 2
Crusader Kings 3
Rimworld
Cyberpunk 2077
Monkey Island series
Thief Gold & Thief 2
Doom series
Vampire Survivors
F1 series (2021 would be my pick of the currently available ones)
Star Wars Squadrons
Shadowrun trilogy
Final Fantasy VII Remake Intergrade

MichaelLC

I see Bastion on there.

I'd just replace that with Supergiant Games (all of them).

SummaryJudgment

Rimworld definitely, but really ROCK AND STONE

That's an easy 2000 hours of play between the two for $60. Incredible.

Burtletoy

I play a lot more Risk of Rain 2 with my regular 4 person pc gaming group than space dwarfs, but they're both good, for sure.

Dirtmuncher

VR
Beatsaber
Frontier: elite dangerous

Minecraft

Mmorpg
Eve
Guildwars 2
The old Republic

No man's sky

It really depends on what he thinks is fun.

Jasconius

X-Com 2
War Thunder
Civilization (4 and 5 are my favorites, but 6 is fine)

Jazz

Dirtmuncher wrote: »

VR
Beatsaber
Frontier: elite dangerous

Minecraft

Mmorpg
Eve
Guildwars 2
The old Republic

No man's sky

It really depends on what he thinks is fun.

I love that you put Frontier in as a prefix. Someone who knows their history

Mugsley

Portal is reportedly getting a graphics overhaul soon.

Battletech
GRIS
Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice (a decent pair of headphones is a must)

BlindZenDriver

Mugsley wrote: »

Portal is reportedly getting a graphics overhaul soon.

Nvidia made a ray tracing update to it. Should be a free download for those that have the original game, not sure if it is Nvidia GPU only or not.

Lilnoobs

AMD can run it, but it's a slideshow. Not sure about intel. Seems like you want at least nvidia 3000x series

BlindZenDriver

Lilnoobs wrote: »

AMD can run it, but it's a slideshow. Not sure about intel. Seems like you want at least nvidia 3000x series

I dug in a bit more and it seems you want at least a mid range 30x0 Nvidia series or one of the new 7x00 series AMD cards, it makes sense since it is really meant to show case RT and that is just with the new generation AMD has something there. It take RT Portal version is also an illustration of how RT is only eye candy in most cases, as the game play is unchanged.

Currently one can get more performance with AMD. RT is only really for the fast Nvidia cards and the new AMD cards as it such a drain, even with cards that have RT hardware support.


PS. Something else, if playing Civilization V one should definitively not miss the mods available for it. Like for example there is one which makes playing much less of a click fest, in that it makes information on for example city states and luxuries much easier available.

Cantido

An update on my friend: He held off on buying a PC in 2022. He will reconsider this spring. A good move, considering GPUs.

He moved to a certain area: the exact area where I lived and two absolute ace PC gaming shops worked on my box. I happily told him he could buy the parts and delegate the build to either of them.

Recommendations have been appreciated though.

Apogee

The recent Turkey Relief Bundle would be a good way to get many games and help a good cause: https://www.humblebundle.com/games/turkiye-syria-earthquake-relief-bundle