Steam’s Summer Sale is going strong, with hundreds of PC games discounted to celebrate the season where none of us leave our houses. Figuring out which games to buy can be a daunting ask; there’s only so much time in the day to spend ignoring loved ones and responsibilities. If you need an escape from your boring delivery job in the middle of nowhere, I’ve got a few games that might be worth checking out.
If you do plan on buying anything on Steam, I highly recommend taking a look at your own library first. You’d be surprised how many great games you might have sitting in there, ones you never even knew you had. I’ve bought Humble Bundles or been gifted games and completely forgot about their existence, only to be really bored one day and need a game to kill time. I never would have played through the amazing Knights Of The Old Republic if I hadn’t done some digging on my PC.
Anyway, here’s my list of must-buy games for the 2017 Steam Summer Sale:
Dead Rising 3 - I first learned of my girlfriend’s anger problem after watching her play Dead Rising 3 for a few hours. She reveled in the slaughter, mowing down zombies with the Joker’s grimace slapped across her face. If you have some steam (no pun intended) to let out, taking Frank West on a murder spree through a Christmas wonderland isn’t a terrible idea. For nine bucks -- that’s 70 percent off -- there’s no reason not to. Remember, a hammer with grenades duct-taped to it sounds way less awesome than it actually is.
Half-Life 2 - If you consider yourself a video game fan, you need to play this game. Without Half-Life 2 , most modern story-driven shooters couldn’t exist. Gordon Freeman might just be a silent protagonist, but the world around him is so rich and nuanced with such an amazing story that he doesn’t even need to speak. One of my top five games of all time, Valve’s seminal FPS set the bar high for every other game. If you have a little sibling that thinks a game needs to have Minecraft building in order to be good, gift them some Half-Life. For one dollar, it’s worth every penny.
Slime Rancher - On first glance, Slime Rancher looks like a chibi-fueled game about cute blobs. As you start to explore the game’s world, you realize that capturing, maintaining and feeding a horde of slimes can be pretty challenging. There’s a reason this indie video game took Steam by storm when it was released in June 2016. It’s fun, but also challenging, a compliment I don’t give out to too many games. It’s only $13.39, which is a splurge for players investing their fortunes in Steam games. Still, if you want a game that’s easy to pick up but hard to master, you can’t do much better than Slime Rancher.
Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War - Master Collection- In high school, I was obsessed with fighting my tiny, plastic space men against my friends Orks. We’d spend every weekend rolling dice, blowing up imaginary tanks and just enjoying ourselves. The closest I’ve ever gotten to recreating that experience is the first Dawn Of War , the perfect RTS. Games like Age Of Mythology took up most of my time, controlling small groups of mythical beasts and halberdiers with reckless abandon for their lives. If you’ve never played Dawn Of War , for $9.99 it’s worth the investment. The game is old and doesn’t look as shiny as some of the others on this list, but it’s a solid experience for anyone who’s played Halo Wars and wants to know what a real RTS feels like.
