In the spirit of spreading joy through these articles, I’d like to highlight the 3 hidden gems of my steam library I can’t stop talking about.
If you’re a friend or in similar circles, these games may appear obvious because I’ve mentioned them or forced others to play them. I still consider them as hidden gems because they’re indie games that didn’t hit the levels of success that our titans of the industry such as Balatro and Undertale hit. The following 3 games are all affordable, easy to run on any hardware, and are inviting to newcomers to gaming as well as frequent players. If you haven’t played a game on this list, I can do nothing but recommend it to you within this article as well as any conversation we have concerning topics involved. Let us begin, in no particular order, with:
I Am Your Beast
This fast-paced FPS speedrunning shooter is a phenomenal thriller by Strange Scaffold, headed by the incredible writer and director Xalavier Nelson Jr. With crazy past projects such as El Paso, Elsewhere and Space Warlord Organ Trading Simulator, there’s likely at least one name on his resume that you’ll recognize for its innovative style. I am Your Beast plays as a level-based speedrun style game, giving players a task and inviting them to hone a path to cut as much time as possible off their journey from point A to point B. With extra points and time awarded for stylish moves and a satisfying amount of hitstop and aim assist to sell the trained ex-soldier main character of Alphonse Harding, the journey is unparalleled even by similar games such as the earlier Neon White. As an advocate for Neon White’s incredible story and stylistic choices, I find that I Am Your Beast leans a bit tighter into the speedrunning roots of execution and corner-cutting for its expectations of the player while Neon White often wants you to solve the puzzle of what the correct path has to be in order to achieve its best rank. While there’s many paths in both games, I Am Your Beast demands retry after retry if it’s to reward the player with the coveted top ranks. While both games are good, I Am Your Beast is on a whole other level.
And part of that is the story, interspersed between stages in the form of audio between its characters. Xalavier Nelson Jr. himself plays Harding, a main character with unbelievable wit that mixes flawlessly with his apathetic nature. It lends itself to an incredible opening tutorial scene that I’ve replayed 4 times just to show to various people and lure them into playing the game for themselves, a chilling sequence where amazing voice work lends itself to the beginning of a promising tale. And it is—a story of government military action and one man’s struggle to break free of the violence in a story that, while entirely impossible to relate to physically given the context, still functions as a deeply engaging story that transforms into a beautiful emotional ride that leaves me feeling tearful by the end. Various lines of the story make their way into my vocabulary as I laugh to myself everytime they come back up in dialogue. So please, give yourself the pleasure of enjoying the story and gameplay in I Am Your Beast for $20 on Steam.
“I’m whittling a bird out of soap, Charles. I don’t know what kind of bird it is because I’m new to whittling, but it’s…some kind of bird. The only thing keeping me from my bird shaped object is you sending another company of motherfuckers into my home. This can end whenever you decide.”
Tiny Rogues
“Tiny Rogues” is another fast-paced game, a top down bullet hell action roguelite that transcends any other I’ve played in the genre. I’m not a big fan of roguelites, but I play quite a few looking for ones that’ll rope me in—Hades, Risk of Rain, Balatro, Inscription, Enter the Gungeon—more than I’d guess the average person would. Of all of them, with the exception of Balatro and maybe Hades, I would put Tiny Rogues at the top. With a bullet hell style game that brings me a fantastic joy in moment-to-moment combat as well as a massive collection of new weapons and gear to make every run unique, the game immediately climbed to a 90 hour playtime as I hunted all of its 86 achievements down. Its first runs are much easier than typical roguelikes, giving you a win over Death in what could be your first or second playthrough. It’s then that the game slowly begins opening up—starting meta progression a lot faster than other games in the genre and allowing you to choose your own levels of difficulty that allows for a modular experience that’ll give you the challenge you want regardless of your skill level. While I Am Your Beast achieved excellence in story, Tiny Rogues holds a personal space in my heart for its buildcrafting and mechanical design.
Inspired by some of the greatest games of all time such as Dark Souls and Terraria, stat scaling and mechanics are tuned and optimized for a clear experience that creates incredible options for building a character. With 34 playable characters with unique skills, the game’s weapons and gear all effectively keyword their abilities and provide a lot of clarity as to how things will function in tandem. This clarity is what creates a fluid build crafting experience—with full information on the gear and notes that appear to explain their particular triggers and effects, you can easily ascertain how your gear will work together and easily plan ahead with the choice of focusing on keywords and compounding effects. I find that other games require lots of alternative websites or prior legacy knowledge in order to get a hang of their systems, but Tiny Rogues manages to give it all to the player without overloading them with information. So please, enjoy Tiny Rogues for $10 on steam and see how far you get before those fatal words appear once more on your screen.
“Death claims another.”
[Bad End Theaterdef3
“Bad End Theater” is a narrative visual novel with multiple endings—a smaller playtime than the former games, but a story that’s brought me to tears multiple times and leads me to fall in love with its characters. In it, Tragedy invites you to a theater of stories that follows a simple theme—every story ends with a bad ending. You’ll direct 4 characters through a play, exploring the endings in a choose your own adventure style format with plenty of ways to see these characters meet tragic ends. The game is about 2 hours in length for a full playthrough, something I’d highly recommend for its $10 price tag. Give it a play with 3 other friends and let them laugh and cry alongside you, looking for each ending of the 41 provided (and don’t worry, there’s a map to help you along).
While I’d love to sell this even more to you, the game is best enjoyed entirely blind. I can still mention the incredible pixel art and phenomenal writing, but despite the game’s unassuming appearance there are a lot of details I want to avoid sharing to allow you to enjoy the full experience. If you’ve trusted me on the previous two entries in this article, I highly recommend giving me enough trust to check this one out on Steam. As one last teaser, I’ll give you a small detail I’d like to keep in your mind. There’s one lyric track in the game’s soundtrack, reserved for the true ending and made with the voice of SynthV’s Eleanor Forte. I request that you wait to hear it in game, but I’ll leave you with its first verse:
“To the lost, the cold;
Take your seats everyone
Welcome to Bad End Theater!
When the curtains close,
You come away stronger
Or maybe you’ll break
Not my fault you sought this pain.
Share in my misery
For all eternity
Labyrinth of suffering.”
So please, if you haven’t played a game on this list and one of them seems particularly intriguing, pick it up on Steam and give it a try this weekend.