Niche gamer soundoff!

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FrozenLiquidity

[H]ard|Gawd
Joined
Aug 28, 2007
Messages
1,588
You know who you are. Your tastes in gameplay and what you enjoy about a game is different from others. You have a hard time enjoying many of the mainstream games, and often find yourself playing games that no one else has ever heard of, or that none of your friends play. Whatever the reason, you know what you're not like most gamers and have found your calling off the beaten path of game design. This thread is for you! Sound off!

So maybe this [H]ard gaming community isn't geared specifically to your interests, but if you're a niche gamer, you may be able to find a few other niche gamers here that share your interests. With a bit of luck, you may end up with a few new gaming buddys to play your obscure game of choice with!

So lets hear from those niche gamers. The games they'd like to play, the games they're looking at for the future. Out with it! :D


I'm a self-admitted niche gamer, and my current games are as follows (listing MP only):
  • Red Orchestra
  • Darkest Hour
  • Forgotten Hope 2 (BF2 mod)
  • Project Reality (BF2 mod)
  • Men of War
  • Men of War: Assault Squad
  • Dawn of Discovery
  • Company of Heroes (ok, not terribly niche, but very few others play anymore)
  • Sins of a Solar Empire
  • Sword of the Stars
  • America's Army (2.X)

Upcoming games I'm interested in:
  • Red Orchestra 2: Heroes of Stalingrad
  • Sword of the Stars 2
  • IL-2 CoD (if they fix it)

Others that I want to try: Arma 2, AA3, WWII Online...

I'm sure I have forgotten some. I'll update later. How about yours?
 
I love the idea of the deep, 40+ hour RPGs, but I can never get into them because I never set enough time aside, or I'll start one and play about 3 hours, and then I don't come back to it again for months and then I have to start over from the beginning because I forgot what was going on. So Mass Effect, Elder Scrolls, Dragon Age, even Fallout 3....I try to come to terms with the fact that I'll never finish or even start these games.

Amnesia and Portal are great games. Haven't played Portal 2 co-op yet.

Dirt 2 and GTA games are great because I can play them in short bursts

BFBC2 is my go-to multiplayer shooter

I play Rift with the wife every now and then, but time is rare when the kids are asleep and we aren't dead tired!

Looking forward to Diablo 3!!!!


Maybe all or most of the games are mainstream, but I feel like I'm a niche player because I'm not playing Call of Duty, Team Fortress 2, WoW, Counter-Strike, etc. With few exceptions, I don't buy games unless they're on an extreme sale, usually on Steam. I stock up during their Xmas sale and I don't get around the playing all the games I bought during the rest of the year.

I've seen/heard a lot about Red Orchestra 2 in PC Gamer magazine and their podcast. I might just get that one!
 
Been playing a bit of WWII online. It's a good example of gameplay over graphics. Graphics are absolutely terrible. Gameplay is pretty fun. There's tedium too though, unfortunately, and sadly I think some of it could be fixed by an increased player base. I also played during non-peak hours, so that could be part of the reason.

Loved men of war. Assault squad feels different. I like the new vehicles, but its controls just don't seem as good to me(personal preference maybe). Performance on ati cards has gotten better, but still not where I'd like it.
 
I still play Tribes 1-2 from time to time. Yeah, it's an FPS but I haven't found anything else like it. It's not a niche, but it's an old game and there are only 30 - 100 people online at any given time.
 
Big BF2 pr fan though I just started playing a month or 2 ago. I love arma 2 it has a great community. Looking forward to arma 3 and red orchestra 2. Never played sword of the stars but I love 4x games so I am rather excited to see if sword of the stars 2 is any good.
 
MunkyJoe said:
Amnesia and Portal are great games. Haven't played Portal 2 co-op yet.

Dirt 2 and GTA games are great because I can play them in short bursts

BFBC2 is my go-to multiplayer shooter

I play Rift with the wife every now and then, but time is rare when the kids are asleep and we aren't dead tired!

Looking forward to Diablo 3!!!!


Maybe all or most of the games are mainstream, but I feel like I'm a niche player because I'm not playing Call of Duty, Team Fortress 2, WoW, Counter-Strike, etc. With few exceptions, I don't buy games unless they're on an extreme sale, usually on Steam. I stock up during their Xmas sale and I don't get around the playing all the games I bought during the rest of the year.

I've seen/heard a lot about Red Orchestra 2 in PC Gamer magazine and their podcast. I might just get that one!
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I don't know really where to draw the line. Personally I don't consider BFBC2 terrible "niche". It may not be the most popular one out there, but most of the people I know own it, and it's probably got at least 1000 players on at any given time.

TBH, I don't consider any of the games you listed to be terrible niche, but I would definitely encourage your enthusiasm for RO2! The first one has a lot of dedicated and die-hard fans, and they're making the sequel as a PC exclusive. It may not have the destructibility that the Battlefield games do, but it's definitely worth checking out. If I could only buy one game for the rest of the year, RO2 would be it.

Andrew_Carr said:
Been playing a bit of WWII online. It's a good example of gameplay over graphics. Graphics are absolutely terrible. Gameplay is pretty fun. There's tedium too though, unfortunately, and sadly I think some of it could be fixed by an increased player base. I also played during non-peak hours, so that could be part of the reason.

Loved men of war. Assault squad feels different. I like the new vehicles, but its controls just don't seem as good to me(personal preference maybe). Performance on ati cards has gotten better, but still not where I'd like it.
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AS is a bit different, yes. I still like to play them both, and the controls really shouldn't be too difficult considering they're just as rebindable as they were before. So I am not sure what you're getting at with that point? Either way, I haven't gotten to play as much of it yet as I'd like, and I'm totally interested in scratching my Men of War itch again. Did you ever try it online?

I've seen a friend play WWII online and it looks like something I could get into, but I am not positive. He has a second account he'll let me use, so I guess it's something I'll have to check out when I have the time!

Virtus said:
I still play Tribes 1-2 from time to time. Yeah, it's an FPS but I haven't found anything else like it. It's not a niche, but it's an old game and there are only 30 - 100 people online at any given time.
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Wow, I didn't know people still played Tribes... The last time I played was Tribes 2 at the big InfernaLAN at Intel last year. That was a good throwback. I hope they can recapture the feeling of Tribes 1 or 2 in the Tribes reboot, but we'll see...

shifty68 said:
Big BF2 pr fan though I just started playing a month or 2 ago. I love arma 2 it has a great community. Looking forward to arma 3 and red orchestra 2. Never played sword of the stars but I love 4x games so I am rather excited to see if sword of the stars 2 is any good.
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I played a bit of BF2 PR, I keep on meaning to go back and play it more! Unfortunately, I always get caught up on other games. Still, I have some really great memories of PR. It's really one of the best mods I've played. Great team atmosphere.
I never got into ArmA2, maybe it was the performance issues I encountered, maybe it was the interface or the learning it took (somehow I got past that with other games, so I don't know why I'd get caught up on it here - the only real trend I am seeing is that I prefer the WW2 stuff).

If Arma3 can fix those issues, It might be my next big one. Though right now it's looking like Red Orchestra 2 might do that - especially once the modders dive into it (which they already have, thanks to tripwire providing them early access to their kits).

Sword of the Stars is a good one, the first one is still very playable and fun, if you like the 4x turn-based stuff. I can't wait for the next one. It will probably be my next day 1 computer game purchase.
 
Yes pr does have a great community
Tactical gamer is the best server I have played on because almost every one on the server hops on to mumble, whick makes for some great team play
 
FrozenLiquidity said:
AS is a bit different, yes. I still like to play them both, and the controls really shouldn't be too difficult considering they're just as rebindable as they were before. So I am not sure what you're getting at with that point? Either way, I haven't gotten to play as much of it yet as I'd like, and I'm totally interested in scratching my Men of War itch again. Did you ever try it online?

I've seen a friend play WWII online and it looks like something I could get into, but I am not positive. He has a second account he'll let me use, so I guess it's something I'll have to check out when I have the time!
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It just bugged me I guess. At firs the MoW controls were a little bit weird, but after an hour or so, maybe less, they felt really natural and I realized the devs made a good decision on most of the default controls. The AS controls felt more standard and more like regular RTS ones, but the trade-off is that they weren't as good imo. So remapping them was a minor annoyance.

I'd probably play on a friends account. I bought 3 months of WWII online and only played for about a week. I think the monthly fee is a bit steep for a game with such poor production value. I'll check back on it, but unless the population is drastically different than when I played it it's probably not worth the monthly fee if you're not an addict.
 
My choice in an ideal game is so niche that I'll probably never find it! Barring that I have or am playing:

I love to play offline split-screen multiplayer racing and FPS games. My friends and I used to play Quake III Arena on the Dreamcast.

I also love 3D adventure games. The last one was Myst V - the last Myst game. I don't think there are any more of these around anymore.

I love to create my own content for games, and ideally I would find a game, game engine, or GCS RPG which allows me to create my own content for a role playing game. The last time I found an editor in an RPG was Oblivion (not niche I know, but I'm not playing it because I hate the editor.)

I'm into some of the extreme mapping in FarCry Instincts Predator. Probably not many people playing or mapping for that anymore.

I recently played Risen for the Xbox 360 and loved it. That was definiotely a niche title!

I started playing Dreamfall for the Xbox after playing and finishing The Longest Journey.

Divinity II has been sitting on my shelf for a while and someday I will play it.

So my ideal game? An RPG where you have an entire planet to explore, and in which you have an editor so you can add your own content. No storyline driving your forward, several plot lines exist and you can follow whichever ones you choose. The focus is not the same as most RPGs both written and video game where you have some dark army or some evil individual your character (the protagonist or antagonist) must defeat. No in my idea game the focus is more on exploration and adventure. You are whatever character you choose, and your only goal is to develop said character in the huge world awaiting them. You can learn how to fight, cast spells, fly swim, jump, climb (yes actually climbing a a skill), maybe even build buildings (interactive real-time editing - why not?) and so forth - interacting with the world in the exact same way you could if you were really there in place of your character.

I'll probably never see such a game in my lifetime, but if it ever came out it would be truly niche.
- Deathbliss
 
Well I used to play AA(I can't stand the new one, 3.0 is it?). I played WaW for a long time even when there were barely any servers left(I still love the game, but no one plays :/). CoH I guess since you mentioned it.

SP, Morrowind(None of my friends in school even know the game lol).
 
Ya, AA 3.0 sucks, 2.x is still my fav of them....still play CoH on occasion as well

xIronCrossx said:
Well I used to play AA(I can't stand the new one, 3.0 is it?). I played WaW for a long time even when there were barely any servers left(I still love the game, but no one plays :/). CoH I guess since you mentioned it.

SP, Morrowind(None of my friends in school even know the game lol).
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I might have to get AA 2 again, just to see how it is!

CoH got kinda boring after the 2.301, new leveling system sucks. I used to be a level 8 max(so proud of myself back then :)). Now I am level 15/16 with basically all factions(2v2 ranked, don't like 1v1 much).
 
I wouldn't exactly call these niche, but:

Arma 2 is incredible. I play with an organized group a few times a week running coordinated missions. It's an absolute blast. Nothing can compare.

DCS A-10C is great as well if you like sims.

Really excited about Arma 3. BI's Take On Helicopters preview is definitely showing an improved flight model over Arma 2 -- if they can make the planes a little more sim that would bode very well for Arma 3.
 
xIronCrossx said:
Well I used to play AA(I can't stand the new one, 3.0 is it?). I played WaW for a long time even when there were barely any servers left(I still love the game, but no one plays :/). CoH I guess since you mentioned it.

SP, Morrowind(None of my friends in school even know the game lol).
Click to expand...

I keep on wanting to play Morrowind with all the mods now. I never played it the first time around, but a game these days has to do quite a bit to rise above the sea of mediocracy and grab me in before I get bored of it.

I think I will eventually get around to playing it... I just don't know when that will be.

-Sn1PeR- said:
I wouldn't exactly call these niche, but:

Arma 2 is incredible. I play with an organized group a few times a week running coordinated missions. It's an absolute blast. Nothing can compare.

DCS A-10C is great as well if you like sims.

Really excited about Arma 3. BI's Take On Helicopters preview is definitely showing an improved flight model over Arma 2 -- if they can make the planes a little more sim that would bode very well for Arma 3.
Click to expand...

I've since gotten a little more into Arma 2. Had a LAN in July in which a few friends had it, and we played a few coop missions together. Some of them were a real blast and with the teamwork and cooperationg we had, it was really enjoyable to make to try to make it through some really tough and long missions (only to have the game crash on us :p ).

Will definitely be playing more of that in the future though.

W.Feather said:
AA 2.x here :D

plus a few others
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Any tips for getting AA 2.x working on Win 7 x64? I tried firing that up a few weeks ago and was met with a ton of errors and problems that I just didn't want to deal with at the time. Is there a quick and easy way to get this installed? What does the MP look like these days?
 
Among some of the niche games I have seen listed, I am a big "4X" fan.

I am anxiously anticipating the next in the X series X: Rebirth.
 
The last relatively modern PC game I enjoyed was Dragon Age. I love TBS games, but I won't get Civ5 due to Steam DRM.

Lately I've been playing more retro games than anything. Going to finally finish Baldur's Gate II soon!! I'm finding nothing scratches that itch like Dungeon Keeper or Master of Orion 2. Or Betrayal At Krondor which I was playing last year - I need to get back to that.

I'm more mainstream on the Xbox though...if older games count as mainstream. We play mostly Gears of War 1 and Soul Calibur 4. I guess that makes us niche on the 360 :p
 
I like alot of the games like Dawn of discovery and AI Wars. AI Wars solo is F*ing Hard... Star ruler.. Eve Online. I cant stand FPS games with a movie every 5 minutes, it drives me crazy.

I think I am in the 5% subcategory of gamer that is generally neglected by developers :( Then again my gaming habits are generally off of the sudo norm. I would rather play a game on Hard/Brutal and lose repeatedly getting better than play on easy/medium and win..
 
wow, I thought noone playes Sword of the Stars! Very cool to know that some one does, and maybe we could get a multiplayer game going. It will take days to play out through. I am very much looking forward to the second one. ( Sept 20th is the release date I guess)

Anyone want to add Age of Wonders2 or Shadow Magic to this list? I know its a really old game, but I still have it on the PC.
 
A game that never really picked up, but I thought was fantastic is Advent Rising. I liked the gameplay, abilities, and the storyline. I wish they finished the series.
 
A few of my own:

Arma2:CO w/ ACE2 Realism Mod (not exactly niche in itself, but I consider the realism mod itself to be)
DCS:A-10 / Black Shark
X3 Terran Conflict (a really awesome space sim, especially with the right mods!)
FreeSpace 2 w/ SCP
Sword of the Stars
Star Ruler
Dwarf Fortress
Dungeon Crawl : Stone Soup (a freeware major throwback rogue-like)
Dungeons of Dredmor
Cthulhu Saves the World

I'm sure there's more here that I've missed.
 
With Sword of the Stars 2 coming out tomorrow, I imagine we could get a game going - the unfortunate part of that is that the games will take so long that I doubt we'd be able to finish it. :p

I'd be down for a comp stomp in that sometime.
 
I'd like to try out a co-op game, time permitting. Rather busy with a full time job and classes 4 nights a week though.
 
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