You have finally built your own PC gaming rig. You are ready to defend Earth from alien invasions, fight your way out of a city full of zombies, and become the world champion Zuma player. Well, maybe not that last one, but it is time to see what all the hard work has to offer you. But after building that new computer system, you are now down to a $100 to buy games for the newborn. Summer break just started and there just isn’t any room in your budget for games beyond what you are holding right now. How do you get the most game for your buck?
If you are new to PC gaming, on a tight budget right now, or just want some games to play while you wait for an upcoming release, I got you covered. I am a fan and user of Steam, so everything here can be found on Steam as of writing this article. I am 99% sure you can also find many of these items on Impulse or Direct2Drive as well.
Triple A ++
The new PC was just you gearing up for the upcoming Triple A releases due out by the end of the year. You’ve got the money, so its time to put down your cash for Guild Wars 2, Battlefield 3, Duke Nukem Forever, Brink, or Portal 2. I would make sure I am getting the game I have been excited about since last year’s announcement. Many of them were definitely worth the wait.
Obviously this will cut into our $100 budget by up to $60, but don’t worry about it. There are a variety of ways to spend the rest of the money get up to 13 games with what we have left. First up is a current Steam sale you just can’t hate.
The Potato Sack is a bundle deal of 13 of the biggest Indie hits for $38.72. This price is a mind boggling 75% off. The game include range from simple, fun time wasting to full narrative stories complete with graphical eye-candy. Lets just look at this list:
AaAaAA! – Reckless Disregard for Gravity is a game where you navigate your way through floating, futuristic cities after you base jump off the top. As you fall you rack up points by risking your life and graffiti tagging buildings. This is the one title on this list I have not played, but I have heard it is addictive fun for everyone.
1…2…3 KICK IT!, AudioSurf, and BIT.TRIP BEAT are all ways to turn music into games. AudioSurf uses old nostalgic musical tracks to control the pace and difficulty of a race course while you try to collect colored bricks for points. BIT.TRIP BEAT is pong on acid. As long as you do well, you get to listen to the great musical score. Fail, and get dropped back into the regular world of pong. It is a surprisingly difficult acid trip down memory lane. Finally you have KICK IT! which will use your music library to build stages. Imagine what it would be like if you were flying through the visualization window in your media player, and you got a good idea of what KICK IT! will be like to play.
Rush and Cogs (above) are both great puzzle games to tease your brain. Cogs combines the classic game of pipes with sliding puzzles while you attempt to build small devices to play music or fly. To top it off, this has to be done on 3D surfaces within a time limit. If you ever played Pipes in some form, this is the game for you. Rush is akin to Portal as it gives you some very basic rules of play. Then Rush lets you use those rules to solve complex 3D puzzles that will have you scratching your head for hours. It will be a great way to get Cogs out of your system for puzzle lovers.
Defense Grid: The Awakening is the greatest tower defense game you can find. This is a fully realized game that will put the hundreds of flash based tower defense games to shame. 20 different levels, 15 enemy types, 10 different towers with 3 levels each, and 3 $1.00 map packs if that ever gets old. I personally will never play a flash tower defense game again.
Super Meat Boy (above) and Toki Tori brings the dated 2D platform system back to life. Both have unique powers, fun gameplay, and stages that will have you jumping out of your seat when you win. You may want to buy or borrow a controller for these titles. Trust me, it makes everything much easier to play and more fun because of it.
To round out the bundle, you have The Ball, Killing Floor, and Amnesia: Dark Decent. All three are Indie games with Triple A graphics. The Ball is the only game I know of where you have to beat the entire game using a single weapon…..a magic, 8 foot tall, ball of stone and evil. Amnesia will scare your pants off, or at least teach you how to run like an 8 year old girl. This is horror game that understands how to leave you uneasy and scared for your life. Killing Floor is a dark zombie survival game with a simple plot (kill everything), but deep gameplay you can enjoy with up to 5 other people. With a multitude of zombie types, plenty of ways to kill them, and rather large areas to fight them in, you will spend a lot of time telling at your buddy to watch your back while you reload.
Complete Gaming Newbie
If you are new to gaming period and you want to know what you MUST play or have missed in the past few years, start here. There are a lot of games to include on a must play title list, so I will give you the ones from my list you can get the most playtime and value with.
First on the list is the cornerstone of everyone’s MUST play list: The Orange Box. A retail bundle now available on Steam for $19.99 that includes all of Half-Life 2, Team Fortress 2, and Portal. Not to mention you will get Half-Life 2: Deathmatch for free as well.
First, play as the Gordon Freeman, voted the best game hero of all time by gamers. Fight for human freedom against aliens, zombies, and human traitors in one the most epic single player games in history.
The ground breaking Portal. A short game that single handedly reminded an entire industry that gamers will play a puzzle game triple A title. No need for assault rifles, massive explosions, or zombie mods. Just you, the portal gun, and a computer who things of you as a lab rat to be studied. This will make you want Portal 2 so you should definitely look for a sale and spend your next $100 there.
Round out this bundle with Team Fortress 2. TF2 gave the players more control to the players than any other title like it. What started out for me as a funny cartoonish multiplayer FPS, has taken me to places I would need to buy other games to enjoy. I have had surf contests, played dodgeball with flame throwers and heat seeking missiles, fought bosses who randomly appear in vs. matches, and fought epic battles on stages from other games. Team Fortress 2 is also an ongoing development project by Valve were they add new items and features as long as people are playing the game. There are now more items you can find, buy, and kill people with in Team Fortress 2 than every FPS released this century combined.
Screenshots will never do this title justice. Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, now for $19.99, is my favorite western RPG of all time. You can expect this game to finally be eclipsed by the upcoming Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, but this is one mother of an introduction to new comers. This game is awe inspiring despite its bugs and problems on its own, but that is not what pushes it over the top for me.
Bethesda played to the PC platform’s strength and encouraged players to mod Oblivion. A quick stop by Tes Nexus install Oblivion Mod Manager, and introduce yourself to a whole new addiction only found on PC.
My personal copy of Oblivion ran with approximate 65 different mods. These mods added dozens of new locations, 3 new cities, 1 new race, improved graphics, added 50+ new weapons, 25+ new armors, provided more realistic weather patterns, and made the women in Oblivion much more pleasing to look at. I’m guy, sue me. These mods gave me hundreds of hours of additional gameplay I will never forget.
It says a lot about a game that only takes about 4 hours to beat, that I have now played for over 40 hours. Magicka is the best $9.99. I have spent since gas was $1.09 for regular unleaded. An infamously buggy worldwide launch, has been patched into a great game. A sense of humor just for gamers and unique gameplay mechanics combine into one of the best times you can have with friends in a game.
It is hard to describe what exactly makes Magicka such a great game. This is just one you are going to have to trust me about. If you have a few friends with PC’s and $10, multiplayer mode is a dangerous and rewarding time. Just connect via Steam’s voice chat and prepare to laugh and abuse “Revive”.
Ultimate Bang for your Buck
If you get the previous 3 titles and the Potato Sack, you will have 18 games for under $100. They are not the newest games or games you will see TV commercials for now, but I promise anyone can find months, possible years of fun in them. While this alone seems great, let me show you some PC gaming offers that you can’t find on a console: FREE GAMES!
As you can see, some game titles will have a listen on their Steam store page with a link to a free game. Often they will be famous mods Steam just makes it easy for you to find. Others are just plain free because they were made by gamers for gamers. MyDigitalLife has a list of free games you can get from Steam.
Lets start with a free Mod I play right now. If you buy the Orange Box and play Half-Life 2, you may wonder, “What do the other people in City 17 do when I am not around to help fight?” Well the answer is do their best to survive in this war. Welcome to Modular Combat.
It takes what I know and love about Half-Life 2 and turns it into an all out war. You and/or other humans (actual players) will fight waves of baddies using any means necessary to win. All the guns from HL2, level up improve your stats, and use modules to give yourself temporary super powers like flight, throwing energy balls, or spawning minions. It is fast paced shootout that further expands the Half-Life universe.
Finally, to round out your new collection, I recommend you get a copy of Alien Swarm. This was suppose to be sold in Steam and is based on the Source engine. But Valve liked the work so much, they gave the guys who made the game jobs. Now we gamers get Alien Swarm for free. You probably noticed in the first screenshot this is not installed on my rig anymore. It’s a long story about a friend of a friend and team killing. But that’s a tale for another day.
Alien Swarm is a 4 player co-op, top view shooter about a marine squad sent to investigate a space station where communication has been out for days. You will find this completely free game fun on normal and more than you can handle alone on hard. I went in expecting a decent game for free, and found a game I would have gladly have dished out at least $10 to buy.
Mix and Match
If you are not interested in the whole Potato Sack or already own some of the titles, you can buy the games in it for 50% off. With Steam you can always just gift the extra copies to a friends as well. I know the Potato Sack will not be on sale forever, but Steam offers dozens of great titles for $15 or less daily worth every dime like Shank and Monday Night Combat.
There you have it people, a quick list of ideas on how to spend $100 on games for your new rig. I just wanted to show what normally amounts to 2 games can be turned into an entire library of titles. For our newbie PC players and veterans alike, I hope you find something here to help you get more game for your buck.
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