Steam is awesome--we all know it. But it could be better, and I'm not just talking about Valve hiring jshackles so Enhanced Steam can be official.
Some time ago, I made a list of games that should be on Steam, just for fun. Within a year, Thief, System Shock 2, Serious Sam 2, and a bunch of other games ended up arriving on Steam. I was ecstatic. But... some of the games I wanted haven't made it, and I'm not sure they ever will.
Anywho, I thought I'd list a few and get a discussion going about what games should come to Steam. I'm sure there are other games that should be on Steam but aren't, like obscure ports from back in the day or whatever (hi, Silent Hill 2).
No One Lives Forever 1 & 2
The funniest games ever made, and some of the greatest shooters of all time, the No One Lives Forever games are currently in a... weird situation that prevents them from coming to Steam. My understanding is that this situation is an ongoing one, so there's hope they might come at some point, but I could have outdated info, or it could just be wrong. I dunno yet.
Contrary to what you may have heard, there actually is a great Aliens game out there, and it's not just a flawed gem dripping in nostalgia like some of the earlier Aliens titles. Aliens vs Predator 2 is the highest-rated Alien series game of all time, as far as I can tell, and with good reason: the studio behind FEAR and No One Lives Forever developed it.
AvP2 appears to be over at Activision, due to them being Vivendi, Vivendi buying Sierra, Sierra buying Fox... or something crazy like that. Point is: Sega has the rights to distribute Alien games, but Activision appears to own Aliens vs Predator 2. If we want to see it on Steam, Sega would need to acquire the game, as far as I can tell, from Activision.
SWAT 4's online is dead, which is sad, because it's one of the coolest co-op shooters in the world. Developed by the Bioshock guys--though, apparently, almost entirely without Ken Levine, it's one of their coolest titles. You might not know this, but SWAT is actually the fourth game in what started out as a 2D adventure game series--the SWAT series was originally an offshoot of the Police Quest series, itself an offshoot of the Quest line of games. (Gog has three King's Quest packages).
It's worth noting that SWAT 3, alongside Ultima Underworld, is one of the first examples of "other genre to first-person conversion" that demonstrates that everything is way better as an FPS. SWAT 4 needs to come to Steam, but it'd be nice if SWAT 3 could hit as well.
Honestly, I'm not sure what the deal is. Activision owns these games. There's literally nothing stopping them from doing this, to the best of my knowledge.
The funny thing about this Prey picture is that, despite being a PC cover, Wiki has it labeled as a 360 version. Whatever. I am one of the few people lucky enough to own the game. At some point, Valve "ran out" of keys, and Bethesda, who bought the series from 3D Realms (which itself has been picked up by Interceptor Entertainment, who have been doing awesome things lately), never gave them new ones.
Honestly? I have no idea why this isn't on Steam.
None.
It should literally be as easy as "hey, Steam, here, have some more keys."
Yeah.
Wolfenstein 2009 was Raven's bad-at-the-time-but-on-further-reflection-I-realize-I-actually-love-the-pants-off-this-game entry into id's longstanding series. It was awesome. I can't stop thinking about it. I want it, and I want it badly, but due to real-life circumstances that involve being so poor I can't even afford to skip work to visit a doctor's appointment (also, I can't afford a doctor's appointment right now, and need one desperately)... I can't spend the $150 or so that traders are asking for it.
On its final weekend on the store, it sold for $5.
Okay, so the game didn't sell amazingly well, which is probably why Bethesda didn't pick it back up from Activision, who are responsible for nearly all of the games on this list, for some weird reason. For a long while, they let the other id-created, Raven-developed, Activision-published Raven game, Quake IV, languish, but they eventually picked it up. Wolfenstein got no such love. Basically, Bethesda needs to get the rights to Wolfenstein 2009 back from id, so we can get a Wolfenstein complete pack at some point.
For now, I'm just going to have to figure a way to sell my body parts so I can buy the game I want the most from traders.
Let's try someone who isn't Activision for a while.
Okay, I get it, licensed stuff is hard, which is why all devs forever should only ever develop original IPs, and no one should ever, ever lose the source code. I actually don't know too much about why The Thing isn't really available any more, but I'm fairly certain that it's licensing stuff.
Or it could be that Konami are just dumb. They've also got Silent Hill and Metal Gear Solid ports, which are absolutely terrible, that could totally be on Steam. Konami should take a page from the book of Revengeance: they have a huuuuge PC audience licking their lips, waiting for Konami games.
People I know who have played Pariah love it, despite its mixed reception. It's by Digital Extremes, who basically made a ton of content for the Unreal Tournament games, and also did The Darkness II, which is way better than I was led to believe. I think they also did Warframe, but I could be wrong on that.
Digital Extremes is like the Raven of Canada: cool, interesting games that everyone forgets about, even though they're secretly awesome and everyone should play them a lot.
No idea why this isn't on Steam, but it seems that Groove Games, the publisher, doesn't really jam with Steam.
Pandora: First Contact is weird. It is exactly the kind of game that would do well on Steam, being an indie Alpha Centauri that looks gorgeous, but back in 2011, someone from the dev team said something... uh... really bizarre.
Riiiight. Some of Matrix's games have come to Steam, but Pandora isn't one of them. I think this is something that we could prooobably set up an email/twitter campaign for. I'd love to buy this, but I'd be hesitant to buy it on a platform that isn't Steam.
So, back in the day, Microsoft was one of the best publishers out there, because all they did was make some of the best PC game series on the planet. A lot of people think "blah, they just do Xbox," and yeah, right now, you'd be right, but back in the day, wow, their PC output was awesome.
One of these series was Close Combat. I'm not sure about the legal issues, but somehow, these games are still getting made and published... by Matrix Games. This includes a remake of the awesome Close Combat III, pictured above. For whatever reason, Matrix has seemed pretty averse to Steam. They have a ton of games, but only three on Steam. Their first was released in March 2014. It's nuts.
The Madness games.
Need I say more?
...seriously, you guys remember these, right? Started by Terminal Reality in 1996, with Monster Truck Madness, and ultimately developed by, among other places, the studio that went on to develop Red Dead Redemption (hi, Rockstar San Diego), the Madness games were just... awesome. At least, I remember them being awesome. What do I know, I was like twelve years old at the time and barely remember anything.
But I do remember having fun. I think this is just a case of Microsoft not releasing stuff. Monster Truck Madness wasn't even Terminal Reality's first project with Microsoft...
Yeah, yeah, I know, Descent was waaaay more popular, but for me, a kid with almost no access to video games at the time, Hellbender's demo was mind-boggling. You could shoot stuff. The levels weren't real places, like the flight simulators I'd been used to, growing up. Also, the ship was voiced by Scully.
Okay, so maybe I'm going a bit too far back in time, and this stuff would be better on GoG. So let's skip ahead a bit, to the late-90s...
I am happy that Age of Empires 2 and Age of Mythology are now on Steam, but it's a crime that the greatest Age of Empires of all--heck, the greatest RTS this side of Homeworld (which is coming to Steam!)--still isn't on Steam. I'm not talking about the original game, which is awesome and amazing and everyone should play. I'm talking about Rise of Rome.
This was the first non-educational, non-flight simulator I ever played. Actually, the demo, which has missions not in the original game at all, was. I must have destroyed Rome and Regulus a few hundred times over growing up.
I miss it.
I was gonna do an entry on Flight Simulator, Zoo Tycoon, Deadly Tide, the MechWarrior games, and a ton of other Microsoft stuff, but I think you guys get the point. Microsoft's got a huge backlog of stuff that could, and should, be on Steam.
You can actually get the first free, but no such luck for the sequel, which was led by Harvey Smith, one of the lead designers of Dishonored and Deus Ex. I actually really enjoyed the sequel, even though it was a deeply problematic game, rushed by Midway (due to impending bankruptcy, as far as I can tell). Smith's vocal frustration with the way Midway hurt his game led to his termination. But, seriously, it's a flawed gem. The first game, I don't remember much, but I do seem to recall David Duchovny in it.
At one point, Grant Morrison (the comic book guy) was writing a screenplay adaptation of it for Warner Brothers.
No idea why WB hasn't released these games on Steam. It's not like they'd need to do much to get the 2005 or 2007 era games to run.
Again, like Area 51, the first installment, you can get for free.
Hidden & Dangerous was by the guys who developed the original Mafia, a game that you can't get on Steam for reasons beyond my comprehension--there, that's another game that needs to come back to Steam. I picked up my Steam copy as a preorder bonus for Mafia II.
It's a cool game--you control four soldiers, they do stealthy stuff during WWII. Great missions, fun maps, cool stuff. A bit archaic, with unwieldy, even frustrating controls, but I'll never forget my time playing the games. What I would give for another game in the same vein.
Maybe when they're done working on Kingdom Come: Deliverance, the guys who left the studio could consider a spiritual successor.
But in the mean time, I'd like to see the original games and their expansions come to Steam. Not sure what's stopping 2K, but apparently the process is hard.
I always feel sad knowing there are great games out there that I either missed or would just like to go back to. When something drops off the radar, it's always a bit sad. I often find myself wishing they'd survive to see the light of day.
I deliberately left a ton of games off this list--the OP was getting waaaaay too long--so you guys have a ton of stuff to pick from. What computer games, stuff that actually exists on the platform, would you like to see on Steam?
...aww, heck, one more for the road.
Lucasarts never really made a lot of sense, but Disney seeems downright allergic to Steam. Lego Pirates of the Caribbean, most of the Lucasarts adventure games, X-Wing vs TIE Fighter, Galactic Battlegrounds, Split/Second, Stubbs the Zombie (removed from Steam because it was an awful port, apparently; Ray's the Dead is coming, though, and is basically the same thing from the same guys)...
Disney, why?
Some time ago, I made a list of games that should be on Steam, just for fun. Within a year, Thief, System Shock 2, Serious Sam 2, and a bunch of other games ended up arriving on Steam. I was ecstatic. But... some of the games I wanted haven't made it, and I'm not sure they ever will.
Anywho, I thought I'd list a few and get a discussion going about what games should come to Steam. I'm sure there are other games that should be on Steam but aren't, like obscure ports from back in the day or whatever (hi, Silent Hill 2).
No One Lives Forever 1 & 2
The funniest games ever made, and some of the greatest shooters of all time, the No One Lives Forever games are currently in a... weird situation that prevents them from coming to Steam. My understanding is that this situation is an ongoing one, so there's hope they might come at some point, but I could have outdated info, or it could just be wrong. I dunno yet.
Contrary to what you may have heard, there actually is a great Aliens game out there, and it's not just a flawed gem dripping in nostalgia like some of the earlier Aliens titles. Aliens vs Predator 2 is the highest-rated Alien series game of all time, as far as I can tell, and with good reason: the studio behind FEAR and No One Lives Forever developed it.
AvP2 appears to be over at Activision, due to them being Vivendi, Vivendi buying Sierra, Sierra buying Fox... or something crazy like that. Point is: Sega has the rights to distribute Alien games, but Activision appears to own Aliens vs Predator 2. If we want to see it on Steam, Sega would need to acquire the game, as far as I can tell, from Activision.
SWAT 4's online is dead, which is sad, because it's one of the coolest co-op shooters in the world. Developed by the Bioshock guys--though, apparently, almost entirely without Ken Levine, it's one of their coolest titles. You might not know this, but SWAT is actually the fourth game in what started out as a 2D adventure game series--the SWAT series was originally an offshoot of the Police Quest series, itself an offshoot of the Quest line of games. (Gog has three King's Quest packages).
It's worth noting that SWAT 3, alongside Ultima Underworld, is one of the first examples of "other genre to first-person conversion" that demonstrates that everything is way better as an FPS. SWAT 4 needs to come to Steam, but it'd be nice if SWAT 3 could hit as well.
Honestly, I'm not sure what the deal is. Activision owns these games. There's literally nothing stopping them from doing this, to the best of my knowledge.
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The funny thing about this Prey picture is that, despite being a PC cover, Wiki has it labeled as a 360 version. Whatever. I am one of the few people lucky enough to own the game. At some point, Valve "ran out" of keys, and Bethesda, who bought the series from 3D Realms (which itself has been picked up by Interceptor Entertainment, who have been doing awesome things lately), never gave them new ones.
Honestly? I have no idea why this isn't on Steam.
None.
It should literally be as easy as "hey, Steam, here, have some more keys."
.jpg)
Yeah.
Wolfenstein 2009 was Raven's bad-at-the-time-but-on-further-reflection-I-realize-I-actually-love-the-pants-off-this-game entry into id's longstanding series. It was awesome. I can't stop thinking about it. I want it, and I want it badly, but due to real-life circumstances that involve being so poor I can't even afford to skip work to visit a doctor's appointment (also, I can't afford a doctor's appointment right now, and need one desperately)... I can't spend the $150 or so that traders are asking for it.
On its final weekend on the store, it sold for $5.
Okay, so the game didn't sell amazingly well, which is probably why Bethesda didn't pick it back up from Activision, who are responsible for nearly all of the games on this list, for some weird reason. For a long while, they let the other id-created, Raven-developed, Activision-published Raven game, Quake IV, languish, but they eventually picked it up. Wolfenstein got no such love. Basically, Bethesda needs to get the rights to Wolfenstein 2009 back from id, so we can get a Wolfenstein complete pack at some point.
For now, I'm just going to have to figure a way to sell my body parts so I can buy the game I want the most from traders.
Let's try someone who isn't Activision for a while.
Okay, I get it, licensed stuff is hard, which is why all devs forever should only ever develop original IPs, and no one should ever, ever lose the source code. I actually don't know too much about why The Thing isn't really available any more, but I'm fairly certain that it's licensing stuff.
Or it could be that Konami are just dumb. They've also got Silent Hill and Metal Gear Solid ports, which are absolutely terrible, that could totally be on Steam. Konami should take a page from the book of Revengeance: they have a huuuuge PC audience licking their lips, waiting for Konami games.
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People I know who have played Pariah love it, despite its mixed reception. It's by Digital Extremes, who basically made a ton of content for the Unreal Tournament games, and also did The Darkness II, which is way better than I was led to believe. I think they also did Warframe, but I could be wrong on that.
Digital Extremes is like the Raven of Canada: cool, interesting games that everyone forgets about, even though they're secretly awesome and everyone should play them a lot.
No idea why this isn't on Steam, but it seems that Groove Games, the publisher, doesn't really jam with Steam.
Pandora: First Contact is weird. It is exactly the kind of game that would do well on Steam, being an indie Alpha Centauri that looks gorgeous, but back in 2011, someone from the dev team said something... uh... really bizarre.
Very unlikely - Steam would not be interested in these type of games. They only want cheap mass-market games. Can you imagine War in the East at $80It just wouldn't happen.
Riiiight. Some of Matrix's games have come to Steam, but Pandora isn't one of them. I think this is something that we could prooobably set up an email/twitter campaign for. I'd love to buy this, but I'd be hesitant to buy it on a platform that isn't Steam.
So, back in the day, Microsoft was one of the best publishers out there, because all they did was make some of the best PC game series on the planet. A lot of people think "blah, they just do Xbox," and yeah, right now, you'd be right, but back in the day, wow, their PC output was awesome.
One of these series was Close Combat. I'm not sure about the legal issues, but somehow, these games are still getting made and published... by Matrix Games. This includes a remake of the awesome Close Combat III, pictured above. For whatever reason, Matrix has seemed pretty averse to Steam. They have a ton of games, but only three on Steam. Their first was released in March 2014. It's nuts.
The Madness games.
Need I say more?
...seriously, you guys remember these, right? Started by Terminal Reality in 1996, with Monster Truck Madness, and ultimately developed by, among other places, the studio that went on to develop Red Dead Redemption (hi, Rockstar San Diego), the Madness games were just... awesome. At least, I remember them being awesome. What do I know, I was like twelve years old at the time and barely remember anything.
But I do remember having fun. I think this is just a case of Microsoft not releasing stuff. Monster Truck Madness wasn't even Terminal Reality's first project with Microsoft...
Yeah, yeah, I know, Descent was waaaay more popular, but for me, a kid with almost no access to video games at the time, Hellbender's demo was mind-boggling. You could shoot stuff. The levels weren't real places, like the flight simulators I'd been used to, growing up. Also, the ship was voiced by Scully.
Okay, so maybe I'm going a bit too far back in time, and this stuff would be better on GoG. So let's skip ahead a bit, to the late-90s...
I am happy that Age of Empires 2 and Age of Mythology are now on Steam, but it's a crime that the greatest Age of Empires of all--heck, the greatest RTS this side of Homeworld (which is coming to Steam!)--still isn't on Steam. I'm not talking about the original game, which is awesome and amazing and everyone should play. I'm talking about Rise of Rome.
This was the first non-educational, non-flight simulator I ever played. Actually, the demo, which has missions not in the original game at all, was. I must have destroyed Rome and Regulus a few hundred times over growing up.
I miss it.
I was gonna do an entry on Flight Simulator, Zoo Tycoon, Deadly Tide, the MechWarrior games, and a ton of other Microsoft stuff, but I think you guys get the point. Microsoft's got a huge backlog of stuff that could, and should, be on Steam.
You can actually get the first free, but no such luck for the sequel, which was led by Harvey Smith, one of the lead designers of Dishonored and Deus Ex. I actually really enjoyed the sequel, even though it was a deeply problematic game, rushed by Midway (due to impending bankruptcy, as far as I can tell). Smith's vocal frustration with the way Midway hurt his game led to his termination. But, seriously, it's a flawed gem. The first game, I don't remember much, but I do seem to recall David Duchovny in it.
At one point, Grant Morrison (the comic book guy) was writing a screenplay adaptation of it for Warner Brothers.
No idea why WB hasn't released these games on Steam. It's not like they'd need to do much to get the 2005 or 2007 era games to run.
Again, like Area 51, the first installment, you can get for free.
Hidden & Dangerous was by the guys who developed the original Mafia, a game that you can't get on Steam for reasons beyond my comprehension--there, that's another game that needs to come back to Steam. I picked up my Steam copy as a preorder bonus for Mafia II.
It's a cool game--you control four soldiers, they do stealthy stuff during WWII. Great missions, fun maps, cool stuff. A bit archaic, with unwieldy, even frustrating controls, but I'll never forget my time playing the games. What I would give for another game in the same vein.
Maybe when they're done working on Kingdom Come: Deliverance, the guys who left the studio could consider a spiritual successor.
But in the mean time, I'd like to see the original games and their expansions come to Steam. Not sure what's stopping 2K, but apparently the process is hard.
I always feel sad knowing there are great games out there that I either missed or would just like to go back to. When something drops off the radar, it's always a bit sad. I often find myself wishing they'd survive to see the light of day.
I deliberately left a ton of games off this list--the OP was getting waaaaay too long--so you guys have a ton of stuff to pick from. What computer games, stuff that actually exists on the platform, would you like to see on Steam?
...aww, heck, one more for the road.
Lucasarts never really made a lot of sense, but Disney seeems downright allergic to Steam. Lego Pirates of the Caribbean, most of the Lucasarts adventure games, X-Wing vs TIE Fighter, Galactic Battlegrounds, Split/Second, Stubbs the Zombie (removed from Steam because it was an awful port, apparently; Ray's the Dead is coming, though, and is basically the same thing from the same guys)...
Disney, why?
