I love obscure and overlooked games and want to share a bunch with all of you. Most “hidden gem” threads end up listing titles with thousands of reviews or that got some level of marketing. I aim to mostly avoid that. While you may see a few familiar games here, everything in the list below has under 1500 reviews on Steam and most have far less. Far fewer had any notable marketing push or appearance in gaming shows or directs. And since the Steam Sale is ongoing, it’s the perfect time to try these games for yourself.
If you’d like more recommendations, comment with at least three games you like and I’ll respond with a couple more indie games hopefully suited to your tastes. Hope you enjoy!
False Skies - 37 Reviews
- A JRPG with simple GameBoy graphics but scale matching and surpassing lots of genre classics. It’s most similar to Dragon Quest III, since both deal with custom parties and somewhat open exploration of their worlds.
Hyperspace Delivery Service - 37 Reviews
- A Star Trek inspired take on Oregon Trail. There’s a bunch of minigames based around travel and planets and events like fighting space pirates to make each trip across space feel fresh.
Treasures of the Aegean - 57 Reviews
- Imagine if Tomb Raider was a 2D metroidvania and had a timeloop mechanic. That’s this game. The parkour system feels great too.
DIG - Deep in Galaxies - 79 Reviews
- Terraria/Starbound + Noita + Spelunky = this game. Fly through space to dig through planets and create broken character builds. The first free content update was also just released.
Star Drift Evolution - 169 Reviews
- A racing game with 75 tracks, 51 vehicles, multiple camera modes, and some great handling. Probably most similar to Art of Rally, but this has more variety.
Prodigal - 182 Reviews
- A Zelda-like game with Stardew Valley-esque characters and interactions. Loads of dungeons and a charming (if simple) story all wrapped in a GameBoy Color aesthetic.
Intergalactic Fishing - 211 Reviews
- Travel to infinite lakes and fish in them. Despite the simple graphics there’s a lot being simulated and yet the complexity of it all never makes the game overwhelming.
Elsinor - 235 Reviews
- An adventure game about Hamlet, but you play as Ophelia and she’s caught in a Groundhog Day scenario. While I don’t think this is the best narrative game (that would be Scarlet Hollow), I do think this is the most intriguing one with so many clever and interesting ideas to share.
RITE - 251 Reviews
- A difficult precision platformer like Celeste, Super Meat Boy, and I Wanna Be The Guy. It’s split into dozens of bite-sized levels so it’s easy to pick up for short play sessions.
Ctrl Alt Ego - 350 Reviews
- An immersive sim that stands toe to toe with classics like Deus Ex and Prey. You play as a detached consciousness which can jump between robots to make your way through various missions and levels however you want.
The Eternal Cylinder - 383 Reviews
- This is like Spore, but even weirder and there’s a cylinder that’s going to kill your aliens.
ADACA - 449 Reviews
- Imagine S.T.A.L.K.E.R. with Halo’s weapons and a special move that’s Half Life 2’s gravity gun and you’ve got ADACA. The two current story acts are just an introduction to the more open zone mode with quests and mysteries to explore and solve.
Legend Bowl - 723 Reviews
- If you ever played Tecmo Bowl or Superbowl on the SNES, this is basically an upgraded version. I think this is the best American Football game on Steam. Mutant Football League is a close second.
Environmental Station Alpha - 1046 Reviews
- It’s really difficult, but I think this is the best encapsulation of the Metroidvania formula. Plus the postgame is more substantial than you’ll probably expect.
Heaven's Vault - 1410 Reviews
- Did you like uncovering the secrets of an ancient alien civilization in Outer Wilds? This offers something like that, with a slower pace, more direct narrative, and focus on learning a lost language.
Northern Journey - 1453 Reviews
- Explore a mystical and mysterious Nordic region. The atmosphere this game builds for itself through environments and music is possibly the best I’ve ever experienced in any game ever. It’s really that good.
Thanks for the list, a few games really caught my eye.
Here is my contribution - Tametsi
A minesweeper which has hand-crafted levels so you can always solve it with logic instead of relying on luck when you are out of logical moves.
RUINER: Isometric twin-stick shooter with a 10/10 soundtrack. Basically zero advertisement, i only ever found out about it because I listen to similar music and got the soundtrack reccomended to me by the YT algorithm.
Oh I keep seeing this being recommended to me. How does it compare to The Ascent?
The Ascent is a longer game and leans harder into RPG elements than Ruiner ever does. For me, Ruiner ran better and like @Catastrophic235@midwest.social says, the music is incredible. Blows The Ascent's soundtrack out of the water. Ruiner might have slightly tighter controls too, but I'd have to replay to confirm since I played it with a mouse/keyboard while I played The Ascent with a controller.
I still remember the Dropsy thread on SomethingAwful. Crazy that it turned into an actual game!
Never played the ascent but heard it was meh. Controls for Ruiner were pretty tight, my only complaint is that I'd sometimes get caught on an object/wall that wasn't very easy to see, but it was never more than a minor inconvenience.
I've seen Tametsi, Hexcells, and Bombe continually recommended online as hidden gems but I've put off buying any because I'm not much of a Minesweeper fan. I should really give them a try sometime though, since I think the luck aspect is my least favorite part of Minesweeper. Thanks for sharing!
Hexceed is free, lite Hexcells, I read, if you want to try before you buy.
I bought Tametsi recently based at another recommendation thread. It's really good - it eliminates the big issue with minesweeper which is that sometimes you have to guess. In Tametsi you always have enough information for your next move which completely changes how it feels. It almost ends up feeling more like Sudoku with the "ok so if that's true then that can't be true" type steps in logic.