Obscure games I love (WIP)
There are some games that are just a bit too weird for mainstream, or reach an almost cult classic status. As I slowly remember these games, I'll add them to this list.
List items
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Even among fans of the genre, this game is a bit obscure, unless you remember the intense marketing campaign in the late 90's featuring a nude Donna DeCianni with the game's logo tattooed on her, having basically nothing to do with the game overall other than to catch your attention.
This game has such a unique feel and ethos about it. The vehicles are sort of futuristic, space drone vehicles, but the game takes place in various underground systems and facilities on earth. Guns have weird names like Suss Gun and Trojax which sound very futuristic and really have no real life comparisons to real life weapons. The vast majority of enemies are unmanned drones and tanks protecting treasure and areas from would be scavengers left with no other commands from their now-dead superiors in a post-apocalypse. Hazards, switch puzzles, and rival scavengers also prevent you from reaching your goal. The game features a rhythmic and ambient drum and bass soundtrack that combines feelings of dread, discovery, or energy, as some tracks have the techno-electronic feel of something you'd expect from a rave or a club. Despite Forsaken's drab and muddy apperances, the world has a sense of comedy to it as drivers deliver humorous or characteristic quips after killing some enemies or upon dying and coming back to life with the lives system.
Forsaken isn't considered amazing by most people standards, but the feel of it has made a lasting impression on its fans.
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A high speed, cyberpunk style twin-stick arcade shoot em up exclusively on PC with the closest analogues to Geometry Wars, Robotron, and Super Stardust series of games. Control a rolling ball with the ability to shoot, slow down time, and activate a bomb around itself with the goal of surviving or earning a high score in various modes.
Released on Steam in 2011 at a time where the indie movement was growing, yet the storefront wasn't oversaturated by cheaply made trash, Waves stuck out as a pretty decent game to make it on the lucrative PC game store.
The game does resemble Geometry Wars with a neon colored basic shape shooting other neon colored basic shapes in a futuristic, wireframe-esque Tron-like setting for high score. However, for me Waves was a perfect marraige of artstyle, controls, mechanics, music and sound effects.
The electronic/techno soundtrack produced by SMILETRON is an absolute delight, especially with a subwoofer and speakers turned up, The game stuck out to me when I got deep into a near trance-like state, playing the game a bit loudly on my surround sound speaker system with the bass thumping as I narrowly escaped death using the slow-mo mechanic, bombs, and point blank kills which granted double score.
I was disappointed when I heard one of my favorite Youtuber, TotalBiscuit wasn't impressed by it, though gave the game it's proper respect for its production value and soundtrack. To be fair, Waves is by no means innovative, but I feel it does the "Tron-like twin stick shooter" perfectly, especially when you get "into the zone" of a good run.
Like any good arcade style game, Waves is infinitely replayable.
Squid in a Box released an early access sequel called Waves Notorious, which for all intents and purposes, is a more robust and potentially better game, but I don't like it nearly as much, as it feels a touch too hard compared to the original.
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My Steam library is full of of games with weird names or I run across often while browsing my library. I often put these game off to later, as I have many more games I want to play, but I found myself playing it for some reason and was pleasantly surprised. My memory of this game is foggy, but i do remember enjoying a sort of adventure puzzle platformer where you can cut parts of the environment to make platforms. It has a strange, comic book art style and a comedy styling. Combine this with a short time complete (under 3 hours for me) and you have a weird indie game in your backlog that's actually worth getting through.
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My memory of Nox is now foggy, but I do remember enjoying this Diablo-esque action RPG with a comedy flare to it. It's an older game that kind of lost to time, but it can still be purchased on GoG.com. I played this during downtime at work on a laptop and had a blast.
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A high speed, cyberpunk style twin-stick arcade shoot em up exclusively on PC with the closest analogues to Geometry Wars, Robotron, and Super Stardust series of games. Control a rolling ball with the ability to shoot, slow down time, and activate a bomb around itself with the goal of surviving or earning a high score in various modes. The electronic/techno soundtrack produced by SMILETRON is an absolute delight, especially with a subwoofer and speakers turned up, which allowed me to enter a near trance like state while being lost in an intense run. Like any good arcade style game, Waves is infinitely replayable.
Squid in a Box released an early access sequel called Waves Notorious, which for all intents and purposes, is a more robust and potentially better game, but I don't like it nearly as much, as it feels a touch too hard compared to the original.
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I have a soft spot for a good Breakout/Arkanoid clone. Reaxxion is one of those games, released in the era of inexpensive, colorful family friendly arcade style games from PopCap and more specifically, MumboJumbo, the publishers of the Luxor and 7 Wonders series.
Reaxxion's conceit is your paddle is also your ball - or more understandably your "Health bar". Each stage starts with the paddle ejecting a portion of itself in the form of a ball to destroy blocks, as if the paddle and ball is made of some sort of space-age/magical Mercury. If you miss the ball on its return, instead of losing a life, your battle sacrifices another portion of itself to make a ball, thus shrinking itself, incentivizing the player to play more carefully, else the game will become harder. Some bricks drop more of this "Mercury", allowing you to extend the paddle. However, the paddle can be overloaded and explode with too much of this metal. The player can mitigate this by holding the mouse button to manually release more balls, giving you more ammo to clear the stage.
Unfortunately, MumboJumbo is effectively defunct and while you may be able to purchase their games from certain outlets, you can no longer find the game on Steam store, let alone purchase it.
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Developed by Splash Damage, it's a semi-modern, online only Mutliplayer shooter about to mercenary factions completing gradual objectives on stage, often including escorting an Electric Vehicle (EV) that doubles as a tank to the other end of the stage. Dirty Bomb is an interesting mix of Call of Duty (game speed, mostly realistic guns), Overwatch (ability based characters with various strengths/weaknesses), Brink (Parkour), and Enemy Territory (class based, objective based FPS gameplay.
DB troublesome existence, and didn't quite make the money need to sustain itself, so SD stopped updating the game. While official servers are closed, community servers are still available, leading to a small, but dedicated fanbase of the game still playing it regularly. The gunplay and movement of Dirty Bomb has a unique and exciting feel to it, that isn't quite replicated by any other game, making it a blast to play - until you and your team are destroyed by players who are way too good at this game.
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As I said before, I like a good Breakout clone. Wizorb is one of the "early Steam indie games" featurin a wizard tasked with destroying enemies and blocks with his powers, including transforming to a paddle and ball. If you like Breakout games and have a taste for fantasy games with wizards and mages, then you have to give Wizorb a go.
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So Tetris isn't exactly obscure, but this particular version I don't hear much about from fans of Tetris. It's probably my favorite version of Tetris - mostly because it is a bit more forgiving than other Tetris games because you can flip your tetrimino back upwards on the side walls if you spam the rotation button. I don't know if this was a bug or intended feature, but it's the one Tetris game I can survive well into it's later stages.
It's a bit basic in terms of content and presentation, but I enjoy the music (specifically, C-Type) and feel of the game. One of my favorite gaming memories is sweating as I reached level 30 as bricks fell near instantly.
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Did I mention I like Breakout clones.
I don't know if this one is actually obscure, i hear other people bring it up, but it isn't super popular either. I believe this also released on PS3 and maybe Xbox 360.
This one has a great presentation and music and allows you to use a vacuum to suck in your ball and loose blocks.
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A shame this never got a true sequel. Sure, it got some mobile or Facebook game, but never a sequel or re-release. If you're a fan of RPG mechanics fused with completely other genre's like Puzzle Quest 2 or Peglin, then give this a go.
Runespell is a combination of poker and turned based RPG combat.
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An anime platforming brawler. Imagine if a beat em up had Smash Bros style controls.
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