The Best Games You've Never Played

Halo, Half-Life, BioShock - all great games to be sure, but they've all been covered to death. Now it's time to look at the underdogs and devote some time to the games that managed to slip through the cracks but which remain worth a look.

Some of them you may have dabbled with or looked at, others you'll have disregarded entirely as you scanned the shelves at your local GameStation or international variant. Either way, here it is; bit-tech.net's list of underappreciated classics and bargain bin treasures. If you've got any cash left over after your Christmas shopping spree or if you just refuse to buy into all that BioShock hype then you could do a lot worse than to pick some of these up.

[Skerj]

Bloodlines is dope as hell, excellent story and great atmosphere. Creepy as all living hell in some areas. I still love Beyond Good and Evil and hope that since Ubi has gotten such success with Assassin's Creed, they have enough money to continue BG&E. Had Neverhood back in the day, awesome game as well. Outcast, omfg I forgot about that game, my PC couldn't run it back then so now I have to track it down.

[LJWooly]

Agreed, Beyond Good & Evil was a hell of a game, hard to believe that hardly anyone's played it.
Why didn't it sell that well, though? Almost everyone who reviewed it sais it was good, but no one bought it. Well, whoever didn't play it missed out, 'cos it was great.

Oh yeah, and Outcast was fantastic, you should definitely track it down.

[Skerj]

I don't know, sometimes critical acclaim isn't enough to get people to get out and pick up a game. I remember seeing a lot of commercials for it as well. I guess it just didn't appeal to the masses due to the lack of testosterone or silicon at the time.

[N4GayFanturds]

Deus Ex: The Invisible Wars was fantasticlly good!

[MK_Red]

Deus Ex 2 was a good game but the reason it's not considered a classic and doesn't have many fans is because how poorly it ends up when compared to the uber great original Deus Ex which is simply a timeless classic.

[JCDenton]

Deus Ex Invisible War was very good game, but like MK_Red said, it was not-worthy sequel of a GREAT game and which is probably one of the best video games of all time.

Back to the subject:

"Outcast" was excellent game! I remember playing it 7-8 years.

"The Neverhood" was one of the best and funniest adventure/puzzle game I've ever played. I'll never forget that idiotically funny music when I was solving one of the first puzzles (letter "H" puzzle for those who played it ;) )

"Onescapee" was great a-la "Another World" game (Amiga port), but it wasn't mentioned here....

etc... So many games, so little time (and space) :)

[ElfShotTheFood]

There are some good choices there, but personally I couldn't stand BG&E.

Sorry.

[Nicosia]

Outcast – 1999 - Man i remeber that game, i was like WTF!!!01001001 so freaking beautiful. Also loved the blooper reel. Didn't finish it though..must be laying around here.

[SpaceCowgirl]

Planescape: Torment
I have always wanted to play this game but I can never seem to find it at any of the stores I go to, very aggravating. The idea of anything even remotely similar to fallout was very appealing to me.

Beyond Good and Evil
VEry cool game, but the ending has made me angry and spiteful with this game which I will continue to be until ubisoft fixes this.

Vampires...

Well I did have a lot of fun with this game, until it glitched out and I could not progress further in the story, which made me very angry. Maybe now that it has better patches and stuff I will try playing it again, but still to release such a shoddy effort and just let the fans fix it is very disappointing to me.

[JohnCarpenter]

Yes, Outcast was better than a lot of newer/later games. Great story, graphic's and music score. Some nice eastereggs like the guy in the tend playing the star wars theme. I also loved planescape.

[MK_Red]

OH MY GOD!!! Some of these gems are among my fave games ever :)
Super uber awesome find. Outcast is the game that Assassin's Creed reminded me in some parts :) and along with Neverhood, they are indeed classics.
And then, there is TORMENT, my 3rd all time fave and 2nd best RPG I've ever played. Beyond Good & Evil is also classic. I also like Arx Fatalis and Vampire Bloodlines but they were seriously flawed and buggy.

Then... there is Psychonauts, THE best and most innovative game created in the last 5-8 years. A game that Mario Galaxy took many elements from and ended up a best seller and critic fave.
Ico, Call of Cthulhu and all other classics. It's simly shamefull that most gamers missed them.

Personally I'm ashamed that I haven't played games from first 2 pages but at least I got the rest :)

[Charlie2688]

Well that is a tuff one but I will try to list some of them in no particular order
-Half Life (cant beat the original one, all worship the crowbar)
-Fallout (one of the finniest RPGs ever made, cant beat Dogmeat as one of the best party members EVER made)
-System Shock 2 (Still THE best FPS/RPG combo and is almost a perfect game, sadly his bastard and mentally challenged son Bioshock disappointed his father)
-Diablo (the game that generated my addiction for this kinds of game and made me LOVE to loot)
-Age of Empires 2 (Classic RTS perfection of the golden age of RTSs no game has yet to be so balanced as this one)
-Shin Megami Tensai Nocture (The decadence, the sorrow, the loneliness, the suffering and the emptiness this game with its graphics/music and story generate on the player more than a game its an experience
-Killer 7 (misjudge and uncomprehended by many the bizarreness of this game will only appeal to a few but he few ones were be the lucky ones since not every day you get a game as sick and twisted as this one)

[MK_Red]

Great list but I have to disagree with you about 2 things and both about System Shock 2.
While SS2 is indeed a classic and near perfect game, I believe THE best FPS/RPG is Deus Ex. Also I wouldn't call BioShock disappointing since it's not a FPS/RPG. It's a pure FPS with a whole different approach. I'd call BioShock as friend of System Shock 2 not it's son.

[Charlie2688]

Bioshock its the "spiritual" successor to System Shock so technically its his son (unless he has a son I don't know off O.o or was adopted >.>)

The problem I found with Bioshock and why it was the HUGE disappointment it is, is to find out that it basically a bastard or lazy remake of System Shock 2 were the dev didn't even bothered to changed the story much less the plot twists and took about 5 min to rename the old characters with new names (some even share the same F-CKING voice actor they did in System SHock 2) and change the setting all the rest goes downhill since its pretty obvious the devs wanted a LOT of people to buy and like the game so pretty much like Bethesda they BRUTALLY chopped and simplified EVERY single part of what made System Shock 2 (since its a no no to make complex and challenging games and expect good sales...see STALKER) so great to the point I even find insulting to System Shock fans since they dumbed down pretty much every single aspect to the point that they went behind the evolutionary curve of System Sock 2...and even the FIRST system shock...like if they were "un-evolving" the formula like making the sequel to mario galaxi play exactly like the first one on the NES

now what does the future hold for us? probably Bioshock 2 might have a original story and characters (and plot twists too?)? unless they plant to remake System Shock 1 now and call it a new game you know cuz of the shinier graphics and PR and MAYBE ALL the huge things they add to the sequel will bring it close to the 1994 formula of System Shock 1...but hey that is wishful thinking :)

and lets not even go to System Shock 3 since...E...A...holds the right -_-

and having played both I think System Shock 2 still has the edge over Deus Ex, Deus Ex does win in story :P

[JCDenton]

Yes, Deus Ex is THE BEST RPG/FPS ever! ;)

All those games you mentioned....ahhhhh, those were the days...

[Skerj]

Hah dude I'm playing SMT:Nocturne now, and I fully freaking agree. Persona 3's impending release made me go back and play Persona 2 again (PSP rocks for this) to refresh even though it was hardly needed. After completing Persona 3 I went on another Shin Megami Tensei kick and went back and replayed Digital Devil Saga 1&2, and now I'm on Nocturne again. The Atlus team truly is a master of RPG storytelling and I hope some of it rubs off on Square. They're ALWAYS unique, never cliched, and rarely predictable.

And Deus Ex is still my favorite FPS of all time because of its gameplay depth, wickedly immersive world, and one of the most awesome storylines in recent memory. I was so sad that Invisible War stripped away most of the RPG elements and gave me this graphically superior pale ghost of its former self. I own IW but to this day I've been unable to complete it because of that.

STALKER and Bloodlines remain the only two games that offer the same FPS/RPG hybrid gameplay that I hold in almost as high esteem as DE. I loved the hell out of System Shock II when it came out but DE took the crown from it. SSII is still one of my favorite games of all time and far far superior to Bioshock for the same reasons DE owns Invisible War.

[Charlie2688]

@Skerj: Nice to see someone around here that knows his gaming, bubbles for you :)

by the way WOW someone else that actually got STALKER I hope you got the "true" ending I passed thru heaven and hell for it :P ; ic ant believe that this is one of the few game that actually "teaches" you how to properly aim and fire a gun

and remember to try to get the true ending for Shin Megami Tensei Nocturne too! its a LONGER path but the reward at the end is better :D also remember to get Dante :P

[THX7168]

"The Neverhood was created using clay models and stop motion animation"

Sounds really interesting and unique. I wish I could have seen that game.

Pretty much every game on that list, other than Condemned: Criminal Origins, I've never heard of let alone played.

I hear very often that Beyond Good & Evil was great. Anyone know if GameCube games are backwards compatible with the Wii. If they are I wouldn't mind renting it and playing it on my brother's Wii (which sounds a lot more disturbing than it should).

[Skerj]

Yeah they are compatible (roughly the same thing anyway), you should be able to find it fairly cheap for either of the 3 last gen systems.

[funkeystu]

Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines was awesome - probably the most atmospheric game I've ever played, the story was top notch and the I really enjoyed the gameplay (best fps/rpg since Deus Ex 1). It's undoubtedly in my top3 of all time.

Its just $10 off steam until the new year (when it will go back up to $20) - I suggest everyone tries it.

[Fanboy Slaughter]

I still have my original v1.0 copy of Vampire Bloodlines, and thank god for those hardcore patchers, because I bought it and didn't touch it for almost a year because of the glitchy mess it was. I then stumbled upon the fan patches and got it going, and what I got was an addicting game that kept me absolutely enthralled for months. Voice-over and acting were top-notch, combat wasn't nearly as clunky as people complained it was, and I loved the adaptive FPS aspect, your accuracy gets better if you spend XP on ranged combat, etc. This game is probably the BEST FPS/RPG currently out, and it has yet to be topped.

[n4gTurnsU_WickedGay]

i'm glad to see i'm not the only one who loved bloodlines. it is a much deeper rpg than i thought it would be. for instance, if you play a Nosferatu(the ugly vampires)you have to take the sewers everywhere and feed off of rats. but if you play as any other clan you get almost no blood from rats. and if you play as a Malkavian(the insane vampires)you speak in riddles and metaphors. it's the little stuff that makes a game like bloodlines amazing. not to mention all the hidden side quests.

[ChaosKnight]

Bloodlines is actually one of my favorite games! It had such a fun dialogue interface... even though the battle system was a bit clumsy (especially hand-to-hand). But still, I loved the RPG elements and the whole adventure was a blast =) And no one played Condemned? I own it for PC and it is such a thriller... actually scared me a couple times.

[SabreMan]

one of my favorite games of recent years is Red Orchestra on the pc it ran through Steam under the Unreal engine and is imo aq very underrated experience infact it's a superb game, especially if your into WWII the Armour maps in particular are stunning and by all accounts the tanks handle just like the real life counterparts did
I have certainly missed playing it since i gave up pc gaming about six months ago, another gem i picked up several months ago is Cosmic Smash on the Japanese Sega Dreamcast

[Captain Tuttle]

That Fallout 1&2, Planescape: Torment and Bloodlines were all made by basically the same people. We need more people like that in the industry, or rather, companies that will allow those people to realize their visions.

[KidMakeshift]

It's about time Realms of The Haunting got some love, yet no mention of Dreamfall nor it's prequel

I've always heard good things about the Broken Sword series

[NanoGeekTech]

Folklore..............

Great graphics
Great music
Good story
Great frame rates no slow downs with tons going on.....

--Some of the BEST Boss battles since old school gaming

--Gives you the best sense on how Ghostbuster can play if done right...

--perfect use of the Sixaxis

--Great length....15hrs plus of game play
--created your own dungeons and upload it online.....
--Download new missions and custumes for FREE...

--very cool and different experience........

[blynx182]

Konami's single most undervalued franchise.

[2tired2day2hate]

does anyone know how to play these games on xp since they are made for 95/98's dos?

[DarkSniper]

Dark Sniper strongly suggests those who have not played the Indigo Prohecy/Farenheit to pick this game up at all costs. You can find this game at your local game store or download the XBOX version via XBOX Live. Regardless of what platform you play, it's strongly suggested by Dark Sniper that you play this game.

Dark Sniper will provide honesty towards his Sony Snipers and suggest you play this game only on your Playstation 2 or XBOX/XBOX 360. Sniper tried to play this game on his 60 gig PLAYSTATION 3® and had issues with emulation towards the end of the game. Please keep that in mind.

Thanks,

$niper