PC & Modern Multi-Platform

Strategy and simulation

The reason the keyboard is still attached.

• 1

  Civilization VI (2016)

  • PC
  • Switch
  • PS4
  • Xbox
  • Mobile

  One more turn, for six thousand years. Districts made cities a spatial puzzle rather than a list of buildings, which is the biggest change the series has made.

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• 2

  Total War: Warhammer III (2022)

  • PC

  Turn-based empire management that drops into real-time battles with thousands of units. The Warhammer setting freed the series from having to be plausible.

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• 3

  RimWorld (2018)

  • PC
  • Console

  A colony simulator that is really a story generator, and the stories are usually disasters. The mod scene is larger than the game.

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• 4

  Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition (2019)

  • PC
  • Xbox

  A 1999 real-time strategy game still receiving expansions, because nobody has improved on it. Villagers, four resources, and a wall you should have built earlier.

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• 5

  Cities: Skylines II (2023)

  • PC
  • Console

  A city builder where traffic is the real opponent. Rough at release and still the most detailed thing of its kind.

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• 6

  Mount and Blade II: Bannerlord (2022)

  • PC
  • Console

  Start as a nobody with a horse, end running a faction. The only game that lets you be a single soldier inside your own strategy layer.

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• 7

  Arma 3 (2013)

  • PC

  A military simulator rather than a shooter — kilometres of map, real ballistics, and a mission editor that has outlived several sequels' worth of mods.

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• 8

  iRacing (2008)

  • PC

  A subscription racing service with laser-scanned tracks and a licensing system that penalises contact. As close to motorsport administration as a game gets.

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The big PC RPGs

Clear a month. Several of these are longer than that.

• 9

  Disco Elysium (2019)

  • PC
  • PS4
  • Xbox
  • Switch

  An RPG with no combat, where the skills are parts of your own mind and several of them lie to you. The best-written game there is.

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• 10

  Cyberpunk 2077 (2020)

  • PC
  • PS5
  • Xbox

  A disaster at launch and, several years of work later, one of the best first-person RPGs there is. Night City is the achievement.

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• 11

  Dragon's Dogma 2 (2024)

  • PC
  • PS5
  • Xbox

  An action RPG with a party of AI pawns you train and lend to other players. Deliberately inconvenient, and the combat is worth it.

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• 12

  Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 (2025)

  • PC
  • PS5
  • Xbox

  Turn-based combat with parries and dodges on every enemy attack, in a setting that looks like nothing else. A small studio's first game.

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• 13

  Sea of Stars (2023)

  • PC
  • Switch
  • PS5
  • Xbox

  A deliberate throwback to the 16-bit RPG, with timed hits and no random encounters. Kinder than the games it is imitating.

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Best PC co-op games

Worth buying twice, or free.

• 14

  It Takes Two (2021)

  • PC
  • PS5
  • Xbox
  • Switch

  A co-op game that never reuses a mechanic, and cannot be played alone. One copy covers both players.

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• 15

  A Way Out (2018)

  • PC
  • PS4
  • Xbox

  The same studio's prison-break game, in permanent split screen even online. Three or four hours and entirely built for two.

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• 16

  The Jackbox Party Pack (2014 onwards)

  • PC
  • Console
  • Streaming

  Everyone plays on their own phone, so the room only needs one copy. The best thing to own for a gathering where most people do not play games.

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• 17

  Enshrouded (2024)

  • PC
  • PS5
  • Xbox

  Survival crafting with an action-RPG spine and voxel building, which means you carve into the terrain rather than snap to a grid.

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• 18

  Human Fall Flat 2 (2025)

  • PC
  • Console

  Physics puzzles solved badly by wobbling humans. Funnier with four people than with one, and almost the whole point is failing.

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