Best Steam Summer Sale Deals: Day 4
Don't call it a comeback.
What are the best Steam Summer Sale deals? Each day for the duration of the sale, we'll be offering our picks - based on price, what we like, and what we think more people should play. Read on for the five best deals from day 4 of the sale.
You know the score by now: timed deals only unless you're on the deliberate wallet-emptying manoeuvre. More excitingly: E3 starts today! Whether you're on the stay-up-til 4 plan like yours truly or the idea of corporate processed hype leaves you cold (or both), chances are the timing of conferences and announcements will have some effect on what's on deal and when. Sequels to Dishonored, Doom, Watch_Dogs and many others are expected and may or may not have associated discounts for their previous iterations.
GOG's sale is also ongoing, including some pretty cheap bundles of more than four games, if you're just looking for a chunk of stuff to play. Currently there's a bunch of adventure games and some weird Interplay games up for grabs. GOG's also running a spend more, get more promotion that unlocks games 'for free' as you buy. Sim City 2000, STALKER: Clear Sky and Xenonauts are the three and all come highly recommended.
And now, Deals 2 - Hell On Steam:
5. Grim Fandango Remastered
50% off: $7.49 / £5.49 / €7.49, Store page
HD remake of one of the best adventure games ever made. The tale of Manny Calevera and his four year journey through the land of the dead is in fact authoritatively exactly the fifth best adventure of all time. If you disagree we'll set John on you with a copy of Myst. Wonderful art and writing combine with, well, just alright puzzles and incredible world building in one of classic Lucas' best works. The HD edition makes sure it runs at a reasonable resolution and on your modern hardware. Alec gave musings on release in January.
4. Transistor
75% off: $4.99 / £3.74 / €4.74, Store page
Follow up to Bastion, though unrelated plotwise, Transistor is so very rare in having both an in-depth, interesting and highly customisable combat system coupled with some of the best art ever seen in games. The cyber-world it builds is odd but colourful in the extreme and sets the scene for an intriguing story of conspiracy and computer viruses. The music is another home run too. Dearly departed Nathan gave full account of all its best bits in his review.
3. Far Cry 4
50% off: $29.99 / £22.49 / €29.99, Store page
Ubisoft's latest ubi-game of tower climbing, animal skinning, world exploring, jeep-driving adventure in mountainous (and imaginary) Kyrat. For another tenner/equivelents you can also grab the franchise pack which contains the previous three games in the series and spin-off Blood Dragon. They've all been similar but each has its fervent supports to decry the rest. Graham and John were both fans, calling it the best(est best) co-op of last year, John giving it a three-part diary and one-part video on all the ways to muck about in it. Graham also reviewed it.
2. Endless Legend
50% off: $17.49 / £13.49 / €14.99, Store page
The hottest kids on the PC block right now are Amplitude with their interconnected universe of RPGs and strategies, and Endless Legend is their best game. A civ-like with new ideas lavished on it like it's never known human kindness. An incredibly weird set of unique races with their own goals, tactics and abilities set out to conquer the sci-fantasy world by trade, war and diplomacy. It was our game of the year 2015 and naturally its best 4X. Adam would dare to go so far to say it is the eighth best strategy game of all time. He's sadly mad, you see.
1. Alien: Isolation
75% off: $12.49 / £7.99 / €12.49, Store page
The highly anticipated horror game based on the long-running and variable franchise was a storming success. Hunted by the titular beast you play Amanda Ripley as she attempts escape of the space station she's foolishly ended up on. It's pure terror and we were so scared we gave it the title of best horror game of 2015. We just didn't want it to eat us, but Adam and co also thing it is that good, as he spoke to in his original review and follow-up focusing on the alien itself. While we haven't taken the time for best horror games yet, Alec was impressed enough to name it 20th on his FPS list.
No specific recommendations from the comments yesterday, but it was correctly pointed out that both Little Inferno and Gods Will Be Watching are in the price-of-a-coffee range and interesting enough to be worth playing, even if they turn out not to be specifically to your taste. The former is about burning all your toys while the latter is a very odd survival/adventure combo.
Short detour today, through this:
