Come one, come all! Got a game that's not AAA (or god forbid AAAA) but you loved anyhow? Welcome to show and tell. Talk about your favorite, why people should play it, and what you love most about it. And yes, I'm aware this may just be end up being 25 comments about stardew valley.
I want to start by recommending Kingdom, a series with relatively simple (but elegant) graphics and side scrolling tower defence style gameplay. It doesn't sound like much but the presentation encourages this beautiful sense of exploration of mechanics. Amos Roddy did the music, which tells you just how much I love the soundtrack I didn't even have to look up his name. There are a few games, but I specifically recommend Kingdom: Two Crowns as it includes co-op and has some nice style options (European, Japanese, and more comprehensive Norse DLC that changes more than looks)
If that's not your speed maybe you'd the better known Stanley Parable. I won't say much on it as it's a fantastically written experience I'd recommend to anyone with a pulse. The less you know going into it the better, and it's very accessible in terms of design because it's largely a (hilarious and witty) walking simulator.
Finally, I'd recommend the Mount and Blade series. Bannerlord is the most recent but it's predecessor, Warband is a very loved game too. Essentially this series drops you into a grounded medieval sandbox world as a character you define, then you just go play. Want to be a merchant and make all the money managing a bunch of stores and contending with the unrest and banditry caused by warring kingdom? You can do that. Want to /be/ that bandit raiding caravans? You can. How about the classic Lancelot experience of being a tournament fighting, seige winning, lady wooing, knightly machine? Absolutely. And better yet, when the king shafts you of that territory you really wanted to be granted you can just rebel and become a king in your own right (long term results and stability of your kingdom may vary by circumstance). It's definitely worth a peek if you haven't looked at any of the games in the series.
And that's what I've got today. Hope you guys have some fun recommendations, stories and anecdotes for trade!
I've spent an outrageous percentage of this year playing the poker solitaire/deck builder/roguelike that is Balatro.
I didn't like roguelikes until dicey dungeons came along, and since then my favourite games have been that, slay the spire, Hades (haven't played 2 yet) and now this.
If you like deck builders, I highly recommend it. A very smart twist on the solitaire genre.
If you liked dicey dungeons, take a look at Slice and Dice. It's a dice rolling rogue-like where you fight your way through a 20-room dungeon, finding equipment and upgrading your heroes along the way. It also has the best feature of rlany rogue-like I've played, an undo button. You can get it on steam, but it's also on itch.io and you can get it for both mobile and PC for one purchase.
I have it on android! It's been a trusty travel game for me. I do find the upgrade pathways a little narrow though. Maybe I haven't quite got the knack for it yet, but I find that I don't have enough agency over if a run is successful. That is to say, I lose and too often can't point to something I could have done differently.