Like last year i wanted to highlight some of the video game releases i really enjoyed in 2024. They are quite different than the ones last year and two of those i have been playing in early access and been waiting for for a while now.
Last Epoch is an action RPG in the vein of classics like Diablo.
This game i already bought and supported in an very early stage a little over five years ago, even before the early access release on Steam. As someone who grew up playing games like Diablo 2 LoD and Titan Quest, the general idea of this game got me really excited. Also they promised Linux support, which they had for quite some time, but sadly dropped. It runs very well with proton though. I didn't play the game for over a year before the release, which allowed me to enjoy the vast majority of changes and addition they did in the last year of development.
The game itself provides a very "classic" experience to the genre. They took the Diablo 2/Titan Quest formula and extended it in a way which makes the game feel modern and original, but still providing the core feel and experience of the older games in the genre. The base skill system is like a mixture of the "gain skills with higher levels" system of Diablo 2 and the "thermometer" one from Titan Quest. Next to that you have a little "skill board" with different trees for each active skill. This adds just enough spice to the formula so it feels somewhat familiar, yet allows for a wide variety of exciting build options in a unique manner.
As usual the game gives you a lengthy story to play through before reaching endgame. The story itself is somewhat original, but is not super deep. The time travel adds a nice twist to it though. Seeing certain areas of the world in different epochs of their existence is a nice little detail. But as with most more modern ARPGs the length of the story and the fact that you are forced to play through it with every new character, is actually one of the downsides i see in this game. Even though i enjoyed playing through the story the first few times, it gets a bit annoying to do so everytime you create a new character. You can skip certain parts of the story via "shortcut dungeons", but i would much rather be able to simply start new Characters with the endgame loop once i played through the story once, as Diablo 3 for example did it. Although i have to say i find the story part still way more enjoyable compared to what Path of Exile puts you through(PoE classic when?).
The endgame is a mixture of the map system known through Torchlight and Path of Exile and the rifts from Diablo 3. Its split up into multiple "timelines" in which you have a tree of nodes called "echoes". Everytime you beat an echo new echoes appear in the tree. The echoes have different properties and a certain kind of loot you get from a chest at the end. Each timeline has "quest echoes" you can do after you did a certain amount of the general echoes. Once you did all quest echoes the timeline is complete and you can continue on to the next timeline. Again something that feels somewhat familiar, but changes it just enough to feel fresh and fun, while keeping the well working core mechanics.
Another important part of those games is loot and crafting. To me the crafting system of Last Epoch is one of its highlights. Its simple, yet sophisticated enough to be interesting. You can collect craftable affixes in the form of shards. These are either dropped or extracted from gear. Each piece of gear has a crafting potential, which limits the amount of times it can be crafted on. Items to influence the crafting process, called glyphs, allow further tuning. Next to the "normal" loot there are also idols, which are basically charms as we know them from Diablo 2.
All in all if you like the classic ARPG gameloop from games like Diablo 2, Titan Quest, Grim Dawn or Torchlight 2, I would absolutely recommend to give Last Epoch a shot. It just scratches that itch of the classics, while giving a more modern endgame, a nice twist to some well known mechanics and systems and QoL features.
Last Epoch website.On first glance it might look like yet another Diablo style ARPG, but its a "survivor-like", which took a lot of inspiration from the old Diablo games, but mainly on the aesthitcs side of things.
Over the last few years i played a few "survivor-like" games, whilst i enjoyed most of them for a short while, Halls of Torment really stood out to me. As with all these games, you play a character which gets attacked by a horde of enemies. You collect experience points, level up and unlock different skills. After each run you start again, but maybe with a little improvement to your character. In the beginning Halls of Torment feels like exactly that and not much more, but then it starts to add little mechanics and build options. So you might get a new playable class or a new vendor unlocked, because you finished some quest. This not only gives you a sense of progression, but also keeps the game exciting. The pacing with which those additions come in is also really well made in my opinion. Not to fast so you are overwhelmed and not to slow so you would get bored before you even encounter them. I'll leave it at that to not spoil to much, since discovering those things while playing the game, was one of the things that excited me the most about the game.
The aesthetics of the game are amazing. I really got hit with nostalgia playing this game from the looks alone. The assets are also very well made and suit that retro dark fantasy vibe very well. It got me way more immersed, than the art style of similiar games like Brotato.
So if you like survivor-likes or are a fan of roguelike games in general, i can only recommend looking into Halls of Torment. No matter if you are looking for a game that sucks you in for hours or one that you can play in little 30 min sessions, its great. Also the hellish price of 6.66 is a very good deal.
Halls of Torment websiteTFC: The Fertile Crescent is a little RPG game, which on first glance looks like a demake of Age of Empires, but it suprises with some original mechanics and an absolutely adorable pixelart style.
Set in the bronze age of the near east, you try to grow a little village. You construct different kinds of buildings, recruit units for different tasks and collect resources. The mechanic that sets TFC apart from other games in this genre is the way food is handled. Not only is it required for training units, you also need to have a high enough food production to sustain your population. If you can create a big food surplus you'll get certain bonuses. If you have to little food, your people will start starving and die after a little while. When you are not able to stabilise your food income, you will even lose the whole game after a timer has run out. While you people are starving they also work slower and production of new units takes longer. This not only has its own tactical thing to it, but gives you the same thrill as games with similiar mechanics(Northgard for example) when you start running out of food. The soil has different fertility levels, so you also have to make sure to place your buildings wisely to get the most out of them, especially farms.
During the game, your civilization will gain knowledge, which you can spend to unlock new technologies. These technologies give access to different kinds of new buildings, units and other bonuses. After you unlocked a certain amount of technologies your civilization can advance into the next age and you get to pick a major civilization with some unique technologies to unlock. The major civilizations to choose from are Assyrians, Babylonians and Egyptians. This allows for a lot of different builds and also to adapt to game situation, since you can develop your civilization in another direction as planned when needed.
On the map you'll find different kind of neutral buildings, which can be captured by building an outpost next to them. These buildings bring different bonuses and can be quite influental to the outcome of the game. They provide the game with some strategic points on the map which you should try to capture and hold. Having not only to focus on attacking the enemy base, but some more locations on the map, makes the game feel a bit more dynamic, which i like.
TFC shows a lot of depth and replayability, while being simple enough to enjoy it without studying the game for a while first. With this its a great game for competetive and casual RTS players alike. I read about it online on its release day, bought it and didn't regret it for a second. This really is a little hidden RTS gem.
TFC: The Fertile Crescent Steam pageThe last year has been full of nostalgia hits for me with the three games i mentioned above. In 2025 i hope to see the releases of some early access games i have been waiting for and maybe even playing for a while now. Games like Project Zomboid and Project Gorgon for example. These are two great games, which i would love to see reach 1.0, to maybe get visible to a bigger audience. There are also newer games on the horizon which i am excited to see in a final stage, like Dins Champion and Enshrouded for example.
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