No More Room In Hell
The mere mention of “zombie survival” is enough to induce an eye roll in many gamers these days, but No More Room In Hell is well-crafted enough to remain relevant. Like many others of its ilk, it’s best played cooperatively in order to increase your chances of survival and complete its objectives, the steps of which are different in each playthrough so as to keep things fresh. It’s quite difficult, pitting players against overwhelming odds and forcing them to use ammo and weapons conservatively. Pop on over to its official Steam page and get installin’.
Flipside
Requires Half-Life 2. The shortest game on this list, and by far the most removed from the original Half-Life 2. Flipside turns the Source engine into a 2.5D platform game starring an escaped mental patient. The schtick, as alluded to in the title, is the ability to “flip” the world from a bright and colorful landscape to a dark, twisted nightmare. Doing so will reveal new paths to take and will enable or nullify enemies. It’s crazy, funny, and is especially eye-catching with its cardboard cutout look. We’d love to see the idea developer further, but in the meantime, you can snatch the small demo over at these parts.
Minerva: Metastasis
Requires Half-Life 2: Episode One. At first, Minerva: Metastatis might not seem so special. It is, basically, just a small-to-medium-sized map pack for Half-Life 2. But to describe it in such dismissive terms is to do it a grave injustice. The developer argued that Half-Life 2 and its expansions consisted largely of a series of boxed rooms, and decided to create maps with more inspiration and creativity. To that end, he succeeded admirably: Minerva‘s design easily puts Valve to shame, managing to pull off solid gameplay topped off with an absorbing, somber story told entirely through text. It holds up pretty well even today and will remind you why you fell in love with Half-Life 2 in the first place. Sneak on over here to get it.
