Remember that five years ago, many of us were finally transitioning out of the COVID-19 lockdown? We were learning again how to talk to each other outside laggy Zoom calls with the resolution of a 2009 webcam—and enjoyed some really great games, too.
While we had industry-defining hits like Hades and Forza Horizon 5, many other games that didn’t have such a huge impact became so relevant that they are still worth playing after five years of new game releases with flashier graphics and new mechanics.
And we’d better start getting used to playing older games. The artificial intelligence apocalypse leading to RAM shortages and rising computer costs (via IDC) has been so relentless that I believe most of us will soon be unable to afford a PC upgrade. Doomspeak aside, I’ve played this list of new games and new editions released in 2021 and can attest that they’re timeless and absolutely worth playing today. And if you don’t take my word for it, their latest Steam reviews back me up.
Disco Elysium – The Final Cut
If you’ve played Baldur’s Gate 3 and enjoyed the narrative possibilities and how the world reacted to your choices, you will love Disco Elysium. This noir, story-first detective RPG prioritizes role-playing and campaign construction through a complex skill tree where each trait affects how you respond to dialogues and solve puzzles. They’re also affected by the political alignment mechanic that your character can navigate between communism, fascism, ultraliberalism, and moralism.
Disco Elysium presents text in a vertical, smartphone-shaped box, which already felt more natural in 2021 than reading the traditional horizontal boxes of other games. I wish every other developer had made that change, but it didn’t happen.
I’m not a completionist, but those who are will have a lot to work toward in Disco Elysium. I’ve finished it in a little over 27 hours and got only six out of 45 achievements, so there is a lot more to explore in future runs. The Final Cut edition was released in 2021 and received 88 percent positive reviews on Steam over the last 30 days, showing that new players also like the game.
Inscryption
Inscryption is a tense, spooky deckbuilder with escape-room mechanics. You start the game as if you were booting another game inside it, which leaves you trapped in a poorly-lit cabin with a mysterious figure. You have to defeat it in a card game for a chance to escape, which is just the beginning of this meta-adventure. Inscryption has mechanical and narrative twists that make it the best title for a deep and engaging story in a card game.
It’s the highest-rated game on this list because its dark narrative is incredible and ties well with the many gameplay mechanics, which feel like part of the story. If you’re looking for a challenging one-shot deckbuilder, Inscryption is a great choice. But if you want a story that will keep surprising you… well, Inscryption is a great choice. Building overpowered cards and getting through the story in the process is amazing, even if you’re not into card games.
Inscryption got 96 percent positive reviews on Steam in the last 30 days. The game has an ending, so you don’t have to keep playing it over and over to unlock new challenges like in roguelike deck builders.
Griftlands
Griftlands is a roguelike deckbuilder with role-playing that’s above average for the genre. I recommend you first see the game as a story-driven title and think of the cards as your way of interacting with the world. You have Battle and Negotiation decks that represent combat and persuasion story choices, so you have some freedom to explore the world in different ways across runs to unlock slightly different storylines.
Slay the Spire and Monster Train fans like me will have fun with Griftlands for a couple of dozen hours. Just don’t jump into it expecting endless gameplay, because the story gets stale after you explore it enough times. Still, I have 33 hours of playtime on it because I’ve played it late into their beta and early into their release, so I’m sure you can also have a very long playing history in it as well. Griftlands has 91 percent positive reviews from recent Steam reviews despite having a low player count today.
Loop Hero
Loop Hero is a roguelike RPG that blends automatic battles, deck building, and tile placement. Your character is stuck in a looped road, and you can modify tiles in this path to add monsters, buildings, and resources to interact with when you pass through that area again. As in many roguelikes, you have to find a character build and a combination of tiles that will give you a run long enough to advance to the next stage and eventually win.
I’ve logged 57 hours in Loop Hero and got all 50 achievements, which is more than I remember. I swear I’m really not a completionist, but the gameplay of unlocking new tiles, getting new gear, and making the best combination of tiles is so interesting and addictive that it’s easy to commit to exploring the game in full.
Running my save from five years ago reminded me that Loop Hero is complex even outside of the main gameplay systems. It features alchemy, crafting, and base-building elements that all affect your future runs. I’m not surprised it got 88 percent positive reviews on Steam in the last 30 days.
Mass Effect: Legendary Edition
I’ve just finished playing the first game in the Mass Effect series through the Legendary Edition and loved it, like 90 percent of the people who played it in the last 30 days on Steam. This sci-fi RPG has great character customization and many role-playing options, which were the main reasons I enjoyed it so much, despite not being a big fan of science fiction. I admit adding a 19-year-old game on this list is cheating, but this edition was released on Steam in 2021, and it’s thanks to it that I’ve played a Mass Effect game for the first time. It comes with full Steam Deck support, which was a big reason I got the game.
The original Mass Effect runs well on the Deck and is a great introduction to the franchise. In this universe, humanity can travel to distant planets and galaxies thanks to the special mass relay technology it discovered on Mars. As the protagonist, you have to solve intergalactic problems with different beings like the Geth and Reapers while maintaining relationships with allied and neutral races.
I had never played a BioWare game in full, and now I understand that the role-playing and freedom to be good, neutral, or evil, and building your character accordingly, is part of why players love old-school games the developer published, like the first Mass Effect. The Legendary Edition is the ideal version to commit to if you end up loving the first game, since it also comes with the rest of the original trilogy.
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