PC game recommendations?

[heavy liquid]

After almost five years, I've recently just upgraded my computer to modern standards.  Nothing bleeding edge, but it's decent.  New widescreen LCD, Athlon 64 3700, 2 GB memory and a GeForce 7900GT.

I've already burned through both Half-Life 2 and Episode One, (AWESOME.  So looking forward to Ep. 2) and now I'm jonesing for something else.

Does anyone have any recommendations? 

I have my eye on Sin: Emergence.  I've heard it's decent.  Not as good as HL2, but still good... more action and less puzzles.  Has anyone here played it?

Keep in mind that I'm not a big fan of RTS games; they've never really interested me much.  And I've played Prey and Far Cry on the 360.  Oh, and I've played WoW, and I don't really want to go back.  It was fun, but I feel lucky to have been able to get out.  The game is crack.  Although it wasn't too difficult to leave since I wasn't interested in investing the crazy time it takes to do raiding, so once I hit lvl 60 I was cool with leaving. 

And bonus for games that are widescreen... it will be hard for me to go back after playing HL2 and 360 games in widescreen.  They just look so beautiful.

[Wobedraggled]

Amercian McGee's Scrapland

I love that damn game, but get a hack as it uses that lame starforce crap.

[Solo]

If you don't mind older games, I cannot recommend Deus Ex enough. For my money, the greatest game ever made. First-person RPG set in a cyberpunk/1984 type world.

[Cruelsphere]

F.E.A.R and Oblivion

[Van Cruncheon]

Titan Quest is a decent Diablo 2 clone with gorgeous graphics.

Heroes of Might and Magic V is a good update to the series.

Rise of Legends and Age of Empires 3 are the two best RTS post-Starcraft RTS games on the market.

[Fatghost28]

F.E.A.R and Oblivion

Yup.  Also I really enjoyed Age of Empires III.

[rocketman]

Warcraft 3, just for DOTA.

Painkiller, Quake 4

With the WoW Expansion coming out, you might want to start playing again. Draenai can be shamans and Blood Elves can be Paladins.

[The Black Stallion]

No One Lives Forever 1

No One Lives Forever 2

Max Payne 2

Call of Duty

Call of Duty 2

GTA San Andreas


My list is pure piff.

[Cruelsphere]

There's a new expansion out for Civilization 4 as well.
Warlords!

[Wobedraggled]

I forgot savage.

http://www.s2games.com/savage/index.php

rts/3rd person fps hybrid

[heavy liquid]

Thanks for the suggestions!

Some of these I've already played the console versions (Oblivion, Scrapland, Deus Ex and all of Stallion's games except NoLF2). 

Like I said, I'm not a big RTS person, but maybe I'll try out Age of Empires 3.  I've heard so many good things about it. 

Titan Quest screens look really nice, I'm going to look into that as well as Savage.  I forgot about F.E.A.R.  I was planning on buying it for the 360, but maybe I'll pick up the PC version instead.  It'll be $20 cheaper, anyway.

And has no one's played Sin: Emergence Ep. 1?  I'll probably pick it up since it's only $15 at Best Buy.

[ToxicAdam]

Goto Gigex.com. They have a ton of demos you can try out first, before you buy.

[heavy liquid]

So I bought Sin: Emergence, and I give it a solid "meh".  I don't know if it gets any better, but it's actually pretty awful, especially after playing Half-Life 2 and and Episode One back to back.  It's like Keira Knightley broke up with me and now I'm dating Rosie O'Donnell.

On the plus side, I like how it's set up through Steam.  I know Steam has gotten some crap, but I actually like it.  It kind of reminds me of Xbox Live:  You can download demos, trailers and full games through their service. If it help cut down on piracy, I'm all for it.  And their customer support is great.  My Episode One register code wasn't working for whatever reason, so I sent in a support ticket.  They got back to me and fixed it a day and a half later.  On a saturday.  I applaud that kind of service.

So I'm thinking I'm going to move on to F.E.A.R.  Can anyone tell me what the difference is between the regular edition and the "Director's Cut"?  And if anyone has any other suggestions, please post 'em!

[Phoenix Dark]

If your a poor bastard, I suggest Wolfenstein Enemy Terrority. Class based WWII FPS. Awesome game.

[Cyanista]

Titan Quest is pretty good, if you like diablo-esque stuff.  Guild wars is gorgeous and fun MMO-lite.  I, of course, also reccommend the NOLF franchise, but I don't think you need a top of the line machine to do that.

CivCity:Rome is fun if you like citybuilders!

[Van Cruncheon]

Dungeon Siege 2 and the expansion are good albeit homely fun. Much, MUCH better than the original.

[etiolate]

Guild Waaaaaaaars

[LiuKangBakingAPie]

With the WoW Expansion coming out, you might want to start playing again. Draenai can be shamans and Blood Elves can be Paladins.

This is a reason not to want it.

[heavy liquid]

Guild Waaaaaaaars

Tell me what you like about Guild Wars.  I've played World of Warcraft and Final Fantasy IX, and I loved WoW... 

Can I solo in Guild Wars?  That was the big selling point of WoW for me.  I do like that Guild Wars doesn't have a monthly fee.

I bought F.E.A.R. yesterday, and I'm a little bit into it now.  It's pretty good, at least I'm enjoying it much more than Sin: Emergence.  It's much prettier with lots of effects and definitely making my computer and graphics card work.  That said, I still pine for Half-Life.  Valve is just amazing when it comes to being able to tell a good story and immersing the player with top notch character models and animation.  *sigh*  Maybe I'll try Titan Quest next.

[Phoenix Dark]

Guild Wars was fun for awhile, but it got boring to me. I put it down for months, and then picked it up for weekend binges everynow and then.

[LiuKangBakingAPie]

Guild Wars is not an MMO at all in any way. You form a party and go into instanced, separate servers, just like any other online game. It's heavily PVP oriented.

[heavy liquid]

Guild Wars is not an MMO at all in any way. You form a party and go into instanced, separate servers, just like any other online game. It's heavily PVP oriented.

Oh, I didn't know that.  I knew it was a big PVP game, but didn't realize that you're in instances.  How many people are in a party?  Is there any major "city" or whatever where many characters interact, or is it all instanced?

[Cyanista]

All the cities are where you interact with other players, to form parties and whatnot.  The cities are the only "massively multiplayer" aspect of the game.

And no, you can't really solo very well, outside the first area.  You can fill your party with NPC henchmen, but they are kind of hit or miss as to how they perform. 

I will say the distinguished mentally-challenged henchmen are more consistent than your average arena net customer. 

[etiolate]

Guild Waaaaaaaars

Can I solo in Guild Wars?  That was the big selling point of WoW for me.  I do like that Guild Wars doesn't have a monthly fee.

You can sort of Solo.  Guild Wars is team based mostly though. Every member having a role and all that.  You can choose to play without others and use henchman(bots) in their place, but rarely do you venture out completely alone.  It's not like in WoW, where you can pick out an enemy and fight them one on one.  It's always mobs.  There are a couple builds that can completely solo, like the Mo/W 55 build, but even those you have to level up and get to the point where you have the right skills and runes to do it. The starter area is solo. 

As for the MMO/MORPG setup, it's like the later level part of WoW, where you make a group in town and then the group goes to the instance. Cities, Towns and outposts are spread around the area and are pretty much MMO like, but explorable(aka fighting) areas are instanced and party sizes range from 4-8 as you progress.

As for the playing by yourself and the quality of henchman, I actually prefer the henchies to the unknowable of random invites. I don't use henchies for Missions, but for regular quests they serve me just fine and troublefree.