Great Steam Gift Games Under $20
As you may have noticed from the one or two or THIRTY EIGHT HUNDRED emails and ads you’ve been seeing all around the place, this week was the last week to purchase most gifts online and still get them shipped before Christmas strikes (without paying somebody outrageous amounts of money to throw items on a faster truck). I don’t know about the rest of you, but there’s still people on my list which means a lot of store-shopping, present wrapping and money spending I just don’t want to do. So this year I’m turning to Steam to help my wallet, preserve my time, and save my fingers from too many wrapping papercuts.
Steam seems to want to help all of us last minute gift-givers by even starting the Holiday Sale this week! All of these games are under $20 and make awesome gifts for your geeky friends and nerdy family. Additionally you might consider doing what I do and forcing every single one of my friends, be they real life or online, to make a Steam wishlist.
Universe Sandbox
For: The one who wants to work for NASA
What better gift could you give than God-like power over a universe? That way beats socks. Play ping-pong with suns, throw planets into each other, plot starfields that look like dongs, Universe Sandbox is a great game for letting your imagination run wild.
Long Live the Queen
For: The anime otaku/A Song of Ice and Fire fan
Have you ever wanted to be Petry “Littlefinger” Baelish, setting up intrigue, ferreting out noble plots and making rulers of innocent little girls? This is…sort of the game for you. Very similar to Gainex’s Princess Maker games, Long Live the Queen is a life simulator game with a cheery palette and anime-style character designs masking an engine to create complex ways for little girl princess Elodie to die (in a variety of horrible methods). Navigating growing from princess to queen is difficult, and the player needs to manage Elodie’s moods and education, as well as make important choices for the future of the kingdom. Or what dress to wear, which treacherous noble to dance with at the ball and when to eat those (POISONED) chocolates. Long Live the Queen is deceptively fun – play throughs are quick but hard. This game is currently very popular in my apartment but no one I know has actually beat the damn thing. We have, however, been treated to just how many ways the game offers Elodie to die. This game is ridiculously fun and fantastically frustrating.
The Stanley Parable
For: The wanna-be game dev who talks too much philosophy
This is a game about games, talking about story in game and…a lot of other stuff. Funny and harrowing and thought-provoking, I can’t recommend The Stanley Parable for everybody, but you know that one friend you have who looks for deeper meaning in every piece of pop culture to cross his or her path? This is the game for them. They will play the hell out of this game, trying every turn, fighting against inevitability and laughing, cursing and crying along with the amazing narrator. Then they’ll try to explain this game to you and will likely run out of words beyond ‘WHAT’ and ‘WOW.’
Audiosurf (1 or 2)
For: The music fan with a short attention span or the guy who eats a lot of special mushrooms
Audiosurf is one of my favorite games of all times. It’s a beautifully simple concept – use internet radio or your own music to generate a track and guide a ship through obstacles, scoring points as you groove through a track that matches whatever song you’re rocking out to. The execution is gorgeous, using vibrant colors and simple but elegant 3D graphics to make a game that’s really fun to pick up and put down as often as you want. Thanks to the song choice and generated track, you can really customize your experience, making either a nice track to chill out on or a punishing run through dips, dives and turns. I haven’t tried Audiosurf 2 yet, which is now on Steam as an Early Access game, but I’ve heard some great word of mouth about it so far.
Surgeon Simulator
For: Everyone
This game is ridiculous in the best way. Use five keys and a mouse to perform surgery. Laugh, cry, throw your computer out of the window in frustration. Surgeon Simulator is a great tongue-in-cheek parody of the simulator craze, a game that doesn’t tell you much, but it does give you many methods to throw somebody’s brain across the room.
