Any of the classic valve games (half life, portal, and their sequels).
If auto shooters are your thing, vampire survivors is less than a small coffee.
Dead space (the remake) is $15.
Halo MCC is $10.
Titanfall 2 is $3.
The “new” tomb raider trilogy are all less than $5 each or get the bundle.
Alan wake is $5.
Prey is $3.
And Batman Arkham origins is $2.
Just a handful of good games for cheap. There’s many more out there.
Lot of great suggestions here- I grabbed MCC myself. Was kinda stunned that it's... I think five games ranging from absolutely era defining (at least for me) to solid games. For $10 I'm not sure that can be beat.
Second this on Prey. Definitely is a love letter to immersive Sims like System Shock and Deus Ex. Hell there is a rumor that before Bethesda wanted to cover up the homicide of Prey 2, "Prey" 2017 was going to be called Neuroshock. Shame Arkane Austin was forced into live service shit with RedFall that they obviously had zero interest in and most original Arkane alumni left before the inevitable closure when they saw the writing on the wall.
I played through it again a couple months ago but when I went to check the DLC it looks like they haven't ever done more than 35% discount even though they came out in 2017 and 2019. Meanwhile the base game has done 90% off in the past (also the current price). Guess they figure if you like it enough to go looking for DLC you'll probably pay more.
Divinity 2 is great, it's similar to BG3 (since the same studio made it) just not as long / expansive. The main gimmick of the game is you can spill shit on the floor to change how the next battle plays out, barrelmancers will love it.
Keep talking and nobody explodes: incredible fun with friends, even better if the help has the documents physically printed, there's this magic that happens when you frantically search for the right page and try to keep calm
Titanfall 2 : worth it just for the campaign, I don't know about the state of multiplayer anymore (servers are back i think, no more need for a custom client), I last played it last year, people were understandably sweaty, movement and gameplay is unparalleled
Vermintide 2 : in its best state ever it seems, hours of fun and great challenges, interesting mods for qol and to add to the game's longevity, I dream of when Darktide will reach that point- Firewatch : nice story, beautiful art direction, ending is "controversial" in that it is kind of abrupt with little payoff, but the journey is great, imo a really good walking simulator
Metro Exodus : superb open world, great conclusion to the series, pays off even more if you read the book, day night cycle, each map feels handmade given the amount of details, best "skewmorphic" interface in games
Edit : fuck me i edited my comment and accidentally deleted the paragraph about Firewatch, tldr beautiful art direction
All excellent recommendations, and I'll triple down on the Vermintide 2 recommendation. One of the best bang for buck indi games out there. Darktide has similarly hit a state where I can recommend it as well finally, even if it took an embarrassingly long time to get to a Vermintide 2 level of playability. If you like the -tide games, give it a go.
Patient in that it came out way back at the beginning of twenty ‘ought twenty-four, cheap in that its fifty percent off; the new prince of Persia game is precisely correctly priced at twenty dollars and fun as hell.
Touhou Artificial Dream in Arcadia. Sort of a recent fangame title, by today's standards, but if you're looking for some cool mid-to-late-1990s-inspired PC dungeoneering action (Shin Megami Tensei being a heavy inspiration), it's currently at ninety-two percent off.
Chorus - AA paranormal 3d spaceship combat game Cyber Hook - First person grapple hook platform racer Tangle Tower - Charming point and click detective game Patch Quest - Bullet hell roguelike Subsurface Circular - Robot murder mystery visual novel Yes Your Grace - Addictive story driven king resource management game They Bleed Pixels - Brutal 2d action platformer Devil Daggers - Single arena fps where you try to survive 500 seconds (and fail) Loop Hero Soundtrack - The game is pretty well known, but its soundtrack is amazing enough to buy or pirate even if you don't want to play it
WotC fixes a lot of serious integral problems in the base game. In my opinion, XCOM enemy unknown is better than XCOM 2, but WotC easily beats both. So if you've heard bad things about XCOM 2, then keep in mind it's probably fixed in WotC.
Incredibly hard an unintuitive though. Expect to need to watch countless tutorials before you build something usable. Defo not really for people who game like 3hrs a week.
The Binding of Isaac Rebirth Complete Bundle as well as its individual components are at a new all time low. The game is an absolute classic and IMO it's still the best at what it does. It's perfect on the Steam Deck too.
If you like the base game I highly recommend all the DLCs. Besides a ton of new content they also add many quality of life changes that make the game even more enjoyable.
It's my favorite game, but you really need to put in a ton of time to really get much out of it.
That said, EU5 is probably going to be announced sometime next year given the dev diaries we've had, which means this will probably get another steep discount (and maybe a Humble Bundle or something) and you may want to just get the next game after a year or so. It's a good price IMO, but I only recommend getting it if you'll play it in the next few months.
The Last Case of Benedict Fox being around 90% off was the only one with an acceptable price tag for me. Got it even cheaper via a bundle because I already owned Arise.
I thought the game was okay. Combat was a bit wonky and the story a bit hard to follow, but do to the length it may be worth it. Especially if your into occult magic/cthulu themes.
I rarely buy games even on sale (don't remember when I last bought a game, must not have been this year) but I'm definitely getting that one! That's a steal. Just... how do I set a reminder to buy it in the morning? (okay I added an event in my calendar, I think I'm good)
The Owlcat Pathfinder CRPGs aren't on the deep discounts list, but Kingmaker is 85% off ($2.99) and Wrath Of The Righteous is 70% off ($11.99). Both are solid games.
Owlcat is a Russian company that is very outspoken pro-Putin, pro-Ukraine war. The EULA of the games essentially tells you that they'll install spyware.
Do not buy their games! If you already own them, do not install their games!
Do you have any sources for this? I tried to look into it, but I can't find them making any political statements and they seem to be mostly centred in Cyprus, so how much do they actually support Russia besides being (originally?) Russian and thus at risk if speaking out against Putin?
Pathfinder Wrath of the Righteous is an amazing game if you can look past the politics though.
Also, the spyware thing is pretty standard now - it's usually called "telemetry" in most EULAs. I haven't read it closely enough to know if they're overreaching any worse than others, but they did walk back including the AppFlyer tool after pushback from users.
I'd recommend Last Epoch, lots of interesting customization options but not overwhelming like PoE.
I did not expect when I created a rogue to be using 2 handed maces, but zipping around swinging the heaviest weapon I could find 5 times a second was very satisfying.
Technically it's an early access. The company is asking you to send them money so you can beta test their game. If you wait six months, the game will be fully released and free.
I have been considering this. Is it a fun solo game? Any problems on the deck, like small text? I also wonder if there are any problems with it being always online.
Yeah it's fun if you like games with a dark atmosphere. The text is perfect and the game is fully voiced over as well. The interface gets some time getting used to. It's a lot of features crammed on the screen.