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What are the 5 best games to introduce someone to PC games?
This year, I re-established contact with a childhood friend and brought him back to PC gaming. I played several recent games with him, some casual multiplayer games (Back 4 Blood, Chivalry 2) and rekindling things we loved in the 90s (MechWarrior 5, Streets of Rage 4). I think many of you have had this experience, because our hobbies have become more and more mainstream over time.
Looking at PC gaming through the eyes of a novice made me think: What is the best way to get someone into PC gaming today? Is it better to give them homework and history, the core game that makes PC games unique (whatever that means), or something easier for them to enjoy immediately?
This is a surprising problem. You are the certified representative of the board of directors of your hobby. They are a susceptible infant game player. Their happiness is a plastic thing in your hands. You don’t want to put someone directly into the Kerbal Space Program as their first PC game. Counterpoint: Actually, throw your innocent friends into the abyss, let them struggle, and then experience the joy of successfully launching the shuttle to Mün.
Let’s see if we can list the introductory games that we all agree on. I believe that will go well.
“Only classics”
- German Army Headquarters 3D
- UFO: unknown enemy
- SimCity 2000
- Baldur’s Gate 2
- Eternal task
paper: Understanding PC gaming means understanding how it started
Drink your Ovaltine, child. As the editor-in-chief of the oldest computer game publication, I should tell you that to appreciate this hobby means to understand its origins. Respect your elders, etc.
So here, play some old games. Swift. Will I play these old games myself in 2021? Haha no.
I don’t think this indoctrination method is effective for almost anyone.We respect the legacy of these games very much and this is reflected in our The most important computer game List.But this industry has a tendency to transform old things forever This means that each of these types of classic works can be easily obtained in four to five modern forms, with modern resolutions, user interfaces, and mods and other conveniences.
This is the same reason as ours Top 100 Focus on the best games immediately: Most people would rather play XCOM 2 than their ancestors in 1994.
This list does not cut it. This is homework. This is the original unseasoned soup. Don’t most of us prefer to watch HBO’s “Succession” than “King Lear”?
Let’s test this theory.
“Strengthening the classics”
- Black countertop
- Command and Conquer Remastered Edition
- Mass Effect Legend
- Total War: Rome Remake
- Secrets of Monkey Island: Special Edition
paper: Old and improved
What can be better than classics? shining classic. Even Da Vinci needs to be repainted, right?
We have platform-defining action and strategy games here, as well as absolutely acclaimed remakes of classic adventure games. “Mass Effect” feels like a safe, rich RPG game for novices, but math experts will notice that, technically speaking, it turns our five-match roster into eight.
The real complication is that the issue of nostalgia still hangs over some of these games. Our Total War experts will put a few others, Newer game In the series before Rome. And I think C&C Remastered is only suitable for those who can recite all the powerful chords in Red Alert’s Hell March.
Putting things that we played 10 or 20 years ago on a pedestal, we didn’t really let people understand the hobbies that exist today. Let us quickly guide this list of recommendations to the present, shall we?
“All cool kids are playing”
- Fortress night
- League of Legends
- Counter Strike: GO
- my world
- GTA online mode
paper: Millions can’t be wrong, right?
PC games are just a grand popularity contest. Fortnite is the most popular game among the most popular game genres. LoL and CS:GO are competitive classics. Minecraft has always been a formative gaming experience for tens of millions of children. Eight years later, GTA5 is still on the retail sales rankings.
In this thinking exercise, we are now halfway through. I think we assume that friends or acquaintances who are curious about PC games have a month or two to study the games we send them. But most of the popular games we recommend are “forever games”, which are hobbies in themselves. I don’t know if anyone is playing more than two of these games at the same time, this is not a good sign!
Somehow, we have to grasp the essence of what makes PC gaming unique-let’s see what happens if we double our efforts on PC monopoly.
“abyss”
- Crusader King 3
- Weapon 3
- Half-Life: Alyx
- Eve online
- Dwarf Fortress
paper: splash!Congratulations, you are drowning now
Hell yes. Do you want computer games? Okay, buddy.
what is that? You don’t understand how to marry dynasty members with non-vassal rulers in Crusader Kings 3 to extend your rule over Northern Ireland? You don’t have a house suitable for a $1,000 Steam VR setup? You don’t know how to read the topographic map? shame. Maybe this hobby is not for you.
To be honest, I believe these are some of the games that represent the modern core of hardcore PC games.For one affim Friends, this may be exactly what I want to show them. These rich experiences make full use of the processing power of the platform, the close contact between PC games and the vibrant Internet community, or VR, you can say that it is still the most cutting-edge form of PC games. In Dwarf Fortress, you have a story generator generated by ASCII, which fully believes that players can create fun by themselves. There is no more PC than this.
Speaking of games developed by a two-person team…So far, one corner that we haven’t paid much attention to is indie games. What would happen if we tried to introduce someone to PC games only through great indie games?
“Give me independence or give me death”
- Hollow Knight
- Bliss Disco
- Kill the spire
- Wilderness myth
- The return of Obra Dinn
paper: Self-published games are less commercial and more creative
Ha ha. This is actually a good list. These games are well balanced with each other, like the olive and cheese charcuterie board of “you may not have heard of it.” We have real narrative RPG masterpieces, the best designed deck builders in the world, fascinating and difficult adventure platform games, and the mystery of the black and white maritime insurance mediator in 1803.
But we lack multiplayer games here, don’t we. Smaller studios have historically not been good at producing rich, always-on competitive games. In an era when multiplayer games are very popular and longevity, this seems like a big oversight.At this point, why didn’t we get Apex Legends here, which is our highest ranked multiplayer game Top 100?
What we really want are infinite gloves picked from every corner of the PC gaming world.
“Infinite Gloves”
- Modern classics: The Witcher 3
- Multiplayer competition: Apex Legend
- Warm cooperation: Wallheim
- forever: Ultimate doom
- Wildcard: Jackbox Party Pack 8
“Infinite Gloves”, left-handed alternative version
- Modern classics: Red Dead Redemption 2
- Multiplayer competition: Dota 2
- Warm cooperation: Stardew Valley
- forever: Half-Life 2
- Wildcard: Papers, please
paper: Conference of various excellent games
If I learned one thing from the laminated posters in public school cafeterias, it is that a balanced diet is the key. In the previous list of suggestions, we focused too much on the concept, and the suggestions created were not particularly coordinated.
These are different games and have nothing in common on the theme. None of these games belong to the same genre. We have longer games, shorter games, multiplayer games (but one of them is a cooperative game), and some recognition of the history of PC games, but not at the expense of today’s fun. At most, in Apex and Dota 2, we have a “skyscraper” game, which may become our own sub-hobby for more than a year.
I want to include The Jackbox Party Pack 8 in this list because it is one of the most interesting experiences when you play PC games with other people in your living room, and it can be said that it demonstrates the advantages of PC games as a device-independent platform one.
I think it works fine.
On the Internet, we sign articles with empty words such as “tell us what you think in the comments,” just to end things smartly. But in this case, I sincerely ask you to send me a list of five games that you think will be the most successful in turning non-or retired PC gamers into our hobbies.