Best Single Player PC Games?

I just came across this blog post about the best games for PC in single player and saw that Kingdom Come: Deliverance was there, so I thought some of you might like seeing that, it’s in good company too! Do you guys agree with the list?

Post: https://www.eneba.com/blog/6-best-single-player-pc-games/

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These games won many awards or were very popular. There is no doubt one finds his favourite game amongst them.

1st, No
2nd, Yes
3rd, No
4th, Yes or maybe
5th, Yes
6th, Yes but not every mission or not every title of the universe

Thief: The Dark Project

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I don’t know numbers 2 or 6 (except by name) but they’ve missed out The Witcher 3!

Certainly one of the best single-player games of recent years in my opinion!

It’s also a rather one-sided list, with only action-oriented games. A brilliant puzzle game like The Witness is also missing from their list.

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Witcher 3 was one of my all time favorites. Actually the first witcher was a goodun too. When I got tired of the magic this and enchanted that, I always returned to warband. Was never a fan of zombie nonsense. I can imagine Bannerlord would have made that list if they’d bloodywell get on with it,lol.

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Agree with tnleeuw on both accounts; Witcher 3 is certainly one of the best (even if fantasy is not your cup of tea).
Also, very one sided list. Like, how to compare those games with Portal? A genius game if you ask me.

And to add to it; it seems your age determines how you see the list. Me for one, I’m 38 and remember how old games like Prince of Persia blew my mind, or Duke Nukem 3D that got my friends and me hooked on the pc for hours, laughing and having fun.
How should you make a list like that? It is hard to keep it objective.

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This list is crap. I make a better one:

  • Gothic 1-3
  • Risen 1-3
  • Elex
  • Penumbra series
  • Amnesia series
  • SOMA
  • Silent Hill 1-3
  • Indiana Jones and the Infernal Machine
  • Dragon’s Lair 3D
  • Need For Speed: Porsche Unleashed & High Stakes
  • Scratches: Director’s Cut
  • The Cat Lady
  • Downfall (2009 & 2016 Redux)
  • Dark Fall: Lost Souls
  • Neverending Nightmares
  • Limbo
  • Inside
  • Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the Earth
  • No One Lives Forever
  • Portal 1+2
  • Kingdom Come: Deliverance

No. Witcher 3 is in truth a quite bad and boring game. But it is mainstream, so the most people are hyped by this game.

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I don’t agree.
It became mainstream because it was that good. Besides, what is wrong with mainstream? I hate that people look down on something because it became mainstream. Probably because they try to stand out by not being mainstream (not saying you do this), trying to be hip or something silly.
What I think sometimes that gets mixed up here, is mainstream and those typical products full of cliches (no matter if we are talking games, books, movies or any other product). Often big companies, especially based in USA, use this tactic to become mainstream, because mainstream means lots of money. Witcher games are not that at all, they are very much different from what the majority thought about fantasy (especialy outside of east europe).

Why do I think Witcher 3 is that good? Really, do we anno 2019 still need to discuss this?
Storyline is strong and well written. Not many games with a storyline like this. Loved that dark side it took sometimes.
Characters idem dito; strong and well written. Some of the best in the industry if you ask me. Best part of the game to me.
Gameplay felt natural.
Graphics where good looking.
World was interesting, divers and beautiful.

Lot’s of people had a great experience. How can you argue this game is not up there with the best?

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It doesn’t matter whether to agree or not. The Witcher 3 have a great story telling? Are you serious? Cutscenes, Cutscenes, Cutscenes, following the trail, following the trail, Cutscene! Boring quests and a game design with quest markers/ teleport by click on a map or learn skills by clicking in the skill menu. This is great story telling? This is what story telling shoult not be! Have you ever played Gothic? This is how story telling and game design is done right.

My critics about Witcher 3 translated by Google translator:

Understandably enough, “The Witcher 3” at least prefers the exemplary quest design of “Gothic”, because CD Projekt Red chose this game from 2001 as inspiration and this decision left the hope for a role play with neat depth really come up. Unfortunately, the around 400-strong developers from Poland have barely managed to duplicate this outstanding design concept of the approximately 20-man-old German developer in his professionalism. Instead, you spend well three quarters of all quests with this stupid tracking system. Geralt activates his witch’s senses with a click on the right mouse button, the view blurs, tracks and objects now glow red, which you just have to run after to find your way to the destination, where the next Cutscene will be played , Or you just work out silly question marks by collecting pieces of paper, which were clapped intelligently on a pin board in this game with such highly praised storytelling. Once you have picked all the pieces, new ones are already hanging there! Who calls this as intelligent quest design or storytelling, can simply have no claims. “A well designed world could tell its story in silence”. Of these, Witcher 3 is very far away. A casual game for the mainstream, which is extremely overrated. Weak main story, good side quests, good level areas, too many and too long game breaks. For the casual Marvel mainstream but the perfect game. For people with a claim probably nothing. The big disappointment started with the tutorial. Such newfangled casual elements are already in principle a no-go, which immediately gives me the feeling to play only a “video game” and not something that feels serious. After this tutorial crap (press “ß” to throw a bomb, press “Y” for your witch’s sense) and those Schmonz, where I would have preferred peppered my keyboard in the corner, because the control simply did not work, it went on a cutscene! And more cutscenes !!! And more cutscenes !!! You suddenly wake up in a different location and are surprised by hectic action sequences, as one is attacked by a horde of monsters. Okay, what a weak beginning for a roleplaying game I thought. I just saw numbers and life bars buzzing around the minds of opponents everywhere - that made me feel like a dumb boss-knocker / online RPG for consoles. Such a thing is absolutely cheap design and incompatible with a game that wants to convey an atmospheric world. Same applies to all these constant quest pop-ups, informational messages, and infinitely many unimportant hints that are displayed on the edge of the picture. Although you can turn it all off, if you rummage through long lists of options and settings, but already such options are not in a credible solid masterpiece. Slipping from one cutscene to the other and getting torn out of the game again and again is not exactly an indication of professional storytelling. I always feel like being on a leash in an interactive movie. From a RPG praised in the sky, I do not expect any conventional, superficial standard fare, such as a skill tree in the form of a talent tree, where you can dodge points for new skills or create items. It would have been right to integrate all these things directly into the world. In Gothic, other NPCs taught in combat, new skills were trained in dialogue form with appropriate teachers, and their items were placed on suitable equipment such as a computer. a blacksmith or an alchemy table directly in the game world ago. Without opening any menu window and digging through number tables! In order to get a card, you even had to become a card maker in Gothic, provided you could afford one. That’s why it always created a very unique atmosphere, which I also use as a benchmark for all role-playing games. Gothic is clearly the prime example of a very high game design ideology. Gothic is the game that every developer should first have played and studied to learn how to create a credible game world. The best German speakers, rugged rough dialogues, a rough world in which every nook was modeled by hand. Since The Witcher 3, which also honestly also offers a breathtaking game world, can not reach the water in any way. I could write novels, which makes The Witcher 3 all design wrong.

Especially important is a self-explanatory control without unnecessary complications. Just take a look at the options, how many functions are stored there! How long did it take me to figure out how to use a torch? A simple torch !!! Why is not enough just a click on the appropriate item? No, you first have to move it to a designated equipment field and then close the inventory, open another submenu via Tab, then select the object again via a turntable, then middle-click it -> Yes, you read correctly, to use with MIDDLE MOUSE BUTTON in the game. And sometimes you have to click on the middle mouse button several times, because that does not work too well. Incredible!!! I do not even dare to go into the inventory because there are so many redundant options in it that I do not want to use at all. Why the hell does a RPG need something like that? When fighting you just click on the mouse and Geralt, who is a great fighter from the beginning and wears swords and armor, flies like an action hero through the air. Meanwhile, he turns around himself several times.

Another RPG-typical mistake is to use the word “quest” in the game. This is one of the worst immersion killers ever. If I do something for someone in real life, is that a quest for me? Certainly not! This word does not appear in the general German linguistic usage - that exists especially only in games and is therefore not credible. Something like that looks extremely superficially designed. Unfortunately, every modern RPG has a quest pop-up message every few minutes, such as “New Quest: Find the Key to the Locked Door.” I always feel like being in a game made by idiots for idiots who do not know how to develop sensible games. Instead, you constantly run after the quest marker on the mini-map - because you rely on such help functions in the exaggerated size of the game world, which unfortunately only on ground instead of on draft. Yes, the game worlds in today’s RPGs are often as huge as an ocean, but only as shallow as a puddle. In Gothic, the world was manageable, but to the benefit of the draft. Because less is often more. Too big a world often leads to the fact that you are constantly teleporting back and forth instead of really exploring the world with enthusiasm. For The Witcher 3, simply click on the location on the map while teleporting while standing at a crossroads. Really believable. Once you’ve done a place in The Witcher 3, there’s little reason to return there again. But the first region is much larger than the whole world of Gothic 2 (and that seemed to me huge), but how quickly did you do everything there ?! It takes a few hours of play and you go already to the next region. It could have anchored this whole landmass much more effectively with the plot. Already with Skyrim I lost myself after the 100th dungeon in endless boredom. A too open and oversized world is not good. What needs a good game, is a common thread, a solid storyline that sometimes leads you through a certain bottleneck.

I can’t take many characters who should be evil seriously. Compared to the dirty archbishons from Gothic, these are just jokes. Geralt hurts her as the strong monster hunter anyway flat or makes cool slogans. The dialogues are often inconsequential and the voice actors mostly just read their lyrics. I would have wished for a little more language talent, which makes you feel treated like dirt. That Geralt can hypnotize his opponents directly with his sorcerers is just stupid, annoying and destroying the atmosphere.

Another criticism is the appearance of the opponents. Of course you can also design video games by just putting one opponent after the other. But you just have to ask yourself what you want to achieve. If you want a game that feels just fake and artificial, so that you as a player constantly think, “Ah, okay, there’s a monster now, oh, that’s what the game designer got to challenge me …” or you want something create “organic”? Something that feels like a world that could exist so theoretically and does not just represent itself as a “video game”? In any case, Piranha Bytes was always the main supporter of Gothic, if not the initiator of organic game design. At The Witcher, on the other hand, as with most other RPGs, the superficial, artificial game design is used: the main thing is to do everything checklist-wise. Here is a monster, then a reward, then 2 monsters, 2 rewards, etc. I just did not feel so much that the monsters were part of the world and nature, but just just set it up so the player had a chance had to do. Gothic, on the other hand, did not have the critters to kill you as an “opponent” but because they just live in the world.

The Boss bouts seem to me like a silly online Hack ‘n’ Slay and do not fit the medieval mood at all. Especially when it comes to lightning magic and neat bang-bang effects are used. That’s all too often known from these cheap commercial fun-oriented mainstream action games. This is also what the monster animations look like, moving from an action movie like typical fantasy creatures. Way too hectic. Again, Gothic was vastly superior to 2001. Scavengers pecked in the grass, lay down to sleep at night, went hunting in packs, quietly sneaking up instead of jumping to their throats. Each creature had its own daily routine and species-appropriate behavior and was not introduced into the world as an “adversary” but was simply part of a living world and existed there to live.

For me, the Witcher 3 is unfortunately ironed too much for the mass suitability to get as many target groups under one hat. This strategy may be financially successful for some companies, but this is not exactly an indication of the quality of games. So if you want to make it right for the mass market (whether that’s always necessary or sensible, let’s ignore it here), then one faces the problem of bringing these many different requirements under one roof. And then comes as the result of a soft-rinsed and smooth-iron uniform mush out. A game with a profile and character also has corners and edges, and each of them could be a gripe for any subgroup on the mass market. You can imagine it a bit like having ten million people and only one dish. And then it starts. There come the vegetarians who do not want meat. Then the religious, who want to have everything kosher (or the like). Then the people with the different food allergies, so that’s all gone. The people with high blood pressure must avoid salt, the figure-conscious are afraid of every calorie, the lactose intolerant tolerate no dairy products, and so on and so forth. And if you want to take that into account, then you have no choice but to cook a water soup at the end - only ingredient: water.

It’s not that every one of these 10 million people likes to have food that tastes like nothing and has no nutritional value. But only in the totality does the water soup result as a consequence of wanting to reconcile all requirements. You just have to omit everything. A bowl of water can then be sold to anyone.

Some quests are also written interesting with surprising twists, but unfortunately the game is not really engaging and is very often also yawning boring. Horse racing on every corner, from the bathhouse to the masked ball, playing plays, participating in weddings, pigs, and always apply the same stupid game principle, bleak, bleak, barren !!! That was something of a boring nonsense. Every piss-quest from “Elex” was a thousand times hornier! After all, the add-on “Blood and Wine” with the Duchess was significantly better than the main story of Witcher 3, but still does not reach the level that I expect due to the flattened for mass suitability casual gameplay.

It’s also admitted that Witcher 3 is the best RPG for many, but as a fan you have to be critical and for me it’s clearly not the best game I’ve ever played. Overall, it’s an average good game - but that’s about it - hopping it like there’s nothing better I think is wrong. The Witcher 1 & 2 have promised me much more, even if they have their own weaknesses. The encounter with Letho could not have been better translated into a role play. I’m not a fan of classic bosses, and I criticized “Risen” just as much for that. In the final battle, Piranha Bytes has apparently copied in cheap console games - otherwise, the silly fussing around the fire Titan can not be described. That’s why the scene with Letho, who’s been hunted all over the game and most players were surprisingly alive, was a very strong moment. The game ended without a fight with a ridiculous monster - terrific! Some elements of The Witcher have been incredibly successful. But overall, nothing comes to Gothic 1 & 2, even Gothic 3 is better. Because for me belongs to a role play, which wants to be titled masterpiece, much more. There have been so many pearls in recent years that dared to row against the current and stubbornly implement their own vision. It’s just too bad how these whole AAA productions are hyped, while hardly anyone mentions the really good game gems. Especially Frictional Games with “Penumbra”, “Amnesia” and “SOMA” have released three gems presenting storytelling of the highest caliber and even smaller 2D adventure games like “The Cat Lady” or “Neverending Nightmares” know how to make a story emotionally told. All these masterpieces are far from being hyped. In contrast, The Witcher 3 is really nothing more than a conventional fantasy fairy-tale without any meaning.

I am sorry to comment on this criticism, but over the years I have gained a lot of experience with games and my demands are accordingly high. If you are always used to the best wine, you will not be satisfied with something less. I also do not jump on the hypetension of the media, but think myself and if there are better games, I call the hype about The Witcher 3 or Skyrim not appropriate.

Just a tip; those cutscenes you mention, they contain story…
If you don’t see that (wich you just said you don’t), just leave it be.

Oh, just to be clear; I’m not going to read that whole bulk of text your google translation produced. No point in it if you think cutscenes contain no story.

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The problem is not about containing cutscenes story. The problem is that cutscenes are the worst thing developers could use to tell a story. A good story is told by playing the game and not by watching cutscenes that rip you out of the immersion!

You asked me why I think Witcher 3 is a bad game and so I posted a text and now you say you won’t read it. So what then?

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Arggh gonna call chessqueens post the elder scrolllllllllls.

pfft fuck that list. That list was jotted on bog roll. No Deus Ex?

Elder Scrolls is laughable high-fantasy with elves and purple bees, stretched in length that ends in infinite boring quantity. I never played Deus Ex, but I’m sure no Sci-fi game can beat SOMA.

delete my post

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Witcher 3 sucks because of many things I mentioned. Cutscenes are a general no go in any game if you want to create first-hand intelligent & immersive story telling. I recommend you to read the 10 game design rules by Thomas Grip, lead designer from Frictional Games.

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Yep. Its garbage. It was made for the consoles so isn’t a true PC game.

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Even the graphics are very bad in Witcher 3. Objects poping-in 5 meters in front of Geralt. Bad water texture etc. A game from 2014 called “The Vanishing of Ethan Carter” have a lot better graphics!

delete my post

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