errr....
Half-Life 2: Episode 1 when it's released at the end of the month. Assuming that you're saying not to suggest Half-Life 2 because it's a given, rather than because you've played and don't like it
. And then go back and play
Half-Life 1 if you haven't. And the
Opposing Force and
Blue Shift expansions (which you get for free just for owning HL1 these days). They've aged, but fairly well. Don't bother with Half-Life:Source. Get the proper version.
Unfortunantly, I've pretty much used the PC as a shooter machine for the last few years and little more
I used to dig strategy games like
Homeworld (absolutely brilliant) but I don't really like what strategy anymore* and I generally just don't have the time for it. That and RPGs as well, but then I always found PC RPGs really dry. I could tell there were dice being rolled somewhere, and that put me off a lot. Shooting stuff is a great stress-reliever, hence why I do a lot of it! Other shooters that are good:
Doom 3 is SCARY but the "ooh that monster hid behind that door" and "ooh that closet opened really quick and a monster came out" tricks get old QUICKLY. Far Cry is... kind of coolish. The story and characters are absolutely bloody awful, but those big island crawling, mercenary battles are pretty amazing.
Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay is a suprisingly good stealthy type game, but you need to stomach being Vin Diesel. Quake 4 is another shooter that's kind of good. Scary, gory, nasty, but a bit too familiar.
Online shooter wise,
Unreal Tournament 2004 is my personal fave... but... not to sound harsh, the game is 95% likely to suck
if you do I've been playing an unhealthy ammount of these games in my lifetime, and I still get obliterated routinely in 9 out of 10 UT2004 games. Some people out there play inhuman ammounts, and accordingly, their skills are inhuman. All in all, it's not very forgiving to beginners, and because it's been around for a little while, most servers are full of experienced players and it's hard to find somewhere a beginner or even intermediate player can enjoy themself. The bot mode is competent, but who really wants to play these games against computer controlled opponents? As with anything with the PC, download the demo, see if you like it first. Unless you're dialup, in which case you should probably priortise getting running water in your home.
Oh, and another factor to consider when playing FPS games, or most PC games for that matter: You can't mind being a guy or be put off too much by the things that routinely happen to guys in games (fending off Alyx Vance's advances with a crowbar for instance. Though I don't imagine that will be as much of a problem with you
). The only game that springs to mind where you can choose to be a girl is in Deus Ex: Invisible War, a game that wouldn't recommend that highly because it sucks. Oh and you can be a girl, alien or robot in most online shooters. Except Counter-Strike which is drenched in testostorone. Well, except those 14 year olds that haven't quite done that maturity thing yet.
OMG GHEY FAG HAXXOR
neptune2venus said:
Are there some underrated classic PC games? I don't mind what genre as long as they are good. I like a bit of obscurity
To end the list, a few classic games which can be tough to get hold off but are well worth it:
System Shock 1 and 2 rock. The original is extremely dated, getting it to run on a new PC is a marathon, but it's a really deep game that just superficially looks and plays a bit like the original Doom. The Sequel was just... wow. Scary, inventive, not all about shooting. Then you've got the original
Deus Ex which was all political and ****, with some cool roleplaying and stealth elements. The
Thief games were great for stealth too, even Deadly Shadows which just looks kind of naff. Nice fantasy setting completely lacking from the predominantly sci-fi mentioned above.
Looking to the future, UT2007, Bioshock, Crysis and whatever valve do next with Half-Life 2 are all things to get hyped about.
* Just thought of an exception:
Darwinia. That game is so cool! You have to move your little computer people and fight the bad red virus. All very good fun, available on Steam.