Good non Big-budget games?

A

Andrew_Carr

2[H]4U
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Feb 26, 2005
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Anyone have some good recommendations for smaller budget games? Things like Nexus: the Jupiter Incident seem good.

I'm kinda sick of seeing things like no LAN play for SC2 and no dedicated servers for MW2(although I'd never buy MW2 anyway...), while good games by smaller developers get passed by.

So yeah, if anyone's got a suggestion for something that's good(doesn't have to be perfect) and doesn't have DRM, please post it here. Right now I'm looking at Sins of a Solar Empire and Nexus, but that's about it.

So far I'm enjoying:

RTS - Men of War
FPS - TF2/HL2 mods(NeoTokyo, RO, Resistance & Liberation)
 
A few that stick out in my mind and I have enjoyed:

1. Trine - Strategy/Puzzle
2. Torchlight - Action Hack 'n Slash RPG Dungeon Crawler
3. Warzone 2100 - RTS - originally released in 1999, but is now freeware. See: this thread.

EDIT: Genres placed next to titles.
 
Bandits: phoenix rising was pretty epic for a low budget game, and the gfx were pretty good at the time as well.
 
Warzone 2100 is FANTASTIC!

Also check out Earth 2100 series for a similar game, but very challenging.
 
Killing Zone, seriously it's $20 and you'll be glad you bought it. It's kinda like L4D.

Unreal Tournament 3

Demigod

Age of Empires 3

If you want a game that takes a long time to play, Sins of a Solar Empire. Maps can take days to complete.

World in Conflict

RPG Fantasy Pack, comes with Gothic 3, Loki, and Dungeon Lords.
http://www.bestbuy.com/site/RPG+Fan...&st=rpg pack&lp=1&cp=1#tabbed-customerreviews

All of these games cost $20-30, with the exception of World in Conflict. It came out about 2 years ago, so I would expect the price to be around $30.

GL
 
Hmm.. is Torchlight mostly a Diablo type game? Is there much of a storyline? (I'm more a Baldur's Gate type person than an Oblivion/Diablo type I guess).
 
Andrew_Carr said:
Hmm.. is Torchlight mostly a Diablo type game? Is there much of a storyline? (I'm more a Baldur's Gate type person than an Oblivion/Diablo type I guess).
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Hey man, I know you want some cheaper games, but if you really like Baldur's Gate then you HAVE to get Dragon Age: Origins. It just came out a few days ago. The people who made Baldur's Gate worked on Dragon Age. It's soooo much fun too.

Look into it. The game takes 80-100 hours to complete, and it's finally a real RPG game.

You'll be happier you bought this game over any cheaper game.
 
Yeah, I'm still thinking about DA. On the one hand it's nice that they've cut back on the DRM, which for EA is really something, but on the other I really don't like the online activation.
 
Oh, and has anyone played League of Legends yet? Looks like it has no DRM, but I haven't heard too much about it(other than it's a DotA based game).
 
I grabbed Killing Floor and Men of War off Steam recently and they're great not to have a large budget. Also most BF2 mods I've played like Point of Existence and Project Reality are pretty nice considering they're free.
 
right now im totally into Madballs in babo : invasion

its like 15$ on steam. Try the demo out.
 
I'm still so mad I lent out BF2. Lost the play disc. Played the game for all of 30 mins :(

Killing Floor looks good though. I think I'll pick it up. Looks like no DRM as well(right?).
 
e-geek said:
Yeah i admit BF2 Was a good non big-budget game.
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yeah.... right.. Anyway, just bitching about it. I bought it for whatever reason but never really played it. So now I have to listen to people commiserate about it and it's annoying.
 
Andrew_Carr said:
Oblivion/Diablo.
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Minor nitpick but these two do not belong in the same category, drastically differing game play types.

No DRM with KF to my knowledge, just grab it off of Steam. It's developed by Tripwire in Roswell, Ga. I live maybe 20 mins away and get some sick pings on their dev servers.
 
I'd also recommend giving Killing Floor a shot. It only has one game mode, wave based survival (there are also objective maps but there are only a handful and no one plays them) which could be boring if you constantly play, but the developers constantly update the game with new weapons, classes, enemies, maps so I'm constantly going back into the game.

I've only spent $20 on the game and I've been playing on and off for probably over 50 hours since release, it's a great value if you like coop zombie shooting.
 
MetalX said:
Minor nitpick but these two do not belong in the same category, drastically differing game play types.

No DRM with KF to my knowledge, just grab it off of Steam. It's developed by Tripwire in Roswell, Ga. I live maybe 20 mins away and get some sick pings on their dev servers.
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Ah, nice. I remember reading about that when I bought Red Orchestra. I was really surprised they were so close to me as well(north of Atlanta).


[Edit:] I dunno, I guess they're different and I'd never thought of them being similar until I made that post. But I never really enjoyed the storyline of Oblivion too much. It was fun to fight, but that was about it.
 
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Andrew_Carr said:
Does Mount & Blade look more like this:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/9/92/M&B_worldmap.jpg

or this?

http://www.taleworlds.com/mb_showimage.html?img=Images/Screen_shots/006.jpg


I've heard it's an excellent game, but the Wikipedia image makes it seem like a real eye sore.
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Both. One is the world map, the other is during a battle.

There's a lot of graphics mods (higher res textures, HDR, etc.). They're not *optimized* but the game should run fine anyway. It's more cpu taxing due to all the units in the battle needing AI.

The game in general has a BOAT LOAD of mods. It seems overwhelming at first but I had a lot of fun with the mods.
 
Andrew_Carr said:
So far I'm enjoying:

RTS - Men of War
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Win!

I can't believe so few people really bother to play this game for what it is. It's got some issues, but it's still the best gaming experience I've had this year and will probably carry me through the next as well. Multiplayer is a blast and the game has so much more going for it than some of the other big titles out there.

Even cheaper than many of the other titles already listed, as it is currently $15 at gamersgate.
 
FrozenLiquidity said:
Win!

I can't believe so few people really bother to play this game for what it is. It's got some issues, but it's still the best gaming experience I've had this year and will probably carry me through the next as well. Multiplayer is a blast and the game has so much more going for it than some of the other big titles out there.

Even cheaper than many of the other titles already listed, as it is currently $15 at gamersgate.
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I agree, i have been on board and loving it ever since Soldiers, Heroes of WWII Came out.


Direct Control, Completely Destructable environments, open world game play, Co-op multiplayer etc.. etc.. etc..

and i loved the difficulty of the game, it wasn't easy.. it took me a long time to finish SHOWWII and i enjoyed every minute of it. :)

have you tried the expansion yet? (Red Tide)..
 
The expansion's only singleplayer so I haven't picked it up. While I like the single player for Men of War(it's nice when my internet connection goes to crap, which is about half of the day), another set of missions just isn't worth it imo.
 
H-street said:
I agree, i have been on board and loving it ever since Soldiers, Heroes of WWII Came out.


Direct Control, Completely Destructable environments, open world game play, Co-op multiplayer etc.. etc.. etc..

and i loved the difficulty of the game, it wasn't easy.. it took me a long time to finish SHOWWII and i enjoyed every minute of it. :)

have you tried the expansion yet? (Red Tide)..
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Glad to see I'm not the only one who likes it! :D

I haven't gotten the expansion yet, thogh I expect to be picking it up sooner or later. After playing through all of the single-player missions and spending a good amount of time in the dynamic campaign generator, I decided I'd give MP a whirl. I've been hooked ever since.

Funny thing is I didn't know about this entire series of games until I saw S:HoWW2 on GOG and picked it up. After that I had to get Faces of War and Men of War. Worth it for the single player alone, but I am getting a ton of mileage out of MP.

Andrew_Carr said:
The expansion's only singleplayer so I haven't picked it up. While I like the single player for Men of War(it's nice when my internet connection goes to crap, which is about half of the day), another set of missions just isn't worth it imo.
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I'll get it eventually, but I am occupying my free time with the multiplayer aspect and have a lot of other stuff on my hands involving the game. I am sure I will be playing it when I get the time though.

All I can say is that MP is where it's at. :D (well, once you're playing with a few guys on vent, and not trying to deal with dumb pubbie teams)
 
I've been limited to my laptop for a few months, so I've been playing some lighter games:

King's Bounty - Strategy/RPG, similar to HOMM, but better... way better.
Torchlight - Diablo Clone, very well done, bright, and addictive. No Multiplay though.
Nox - Older Action RPG. Good replayability, lots of fun, very active.
Braid - Sidescrolling Puzzler, unique premise. Control time. Pretty cool.
N+ - Lode Runner-esq , get the gold
Plant's vs Zombies - Tower Defense. Good for one play through. Got some giggles out of it.
Tropico (the old one) - RTS, kinda economic strategy, you are president of a small Caribbean island.
 
Where would you find some of those games? Just searching on google?
 
Retsam said:
Where would you find some of those games? Just searching on google?
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King's Bounty - http://www.amazon.com/Kings-Bounty-Legend-Pc/dp/B0012N2AB6
Torchlight - http://www.torchlightgame.com/
Nox - I used to own this one, but it's been a long time and I have no clue where the disc is, so I just torrented it.
Braid - http://store.steampowered.com/app/26800/
N+ - http://www.thewayoftheninja.org/
Plant's vs Zombies - http://store.steampowered.com/app/3590/
Tropico (the old one) - Same as Nox. I don't feel bad about torrenting games I've paid for in the past.
 
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LuminaryJanitor said:
There's an HD remake of Serious Sam coming out soon.


Steam is DRM...
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If I can buy a game off steam though and simply move it to another folder and not have to play on Steam, I don't mind. Which is what I like about Men of War. Buy it for 15$ off steam(since there's no PC game shops around that'll have it), then transfer the game files and start it up without steam. It's nice.
 
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