It’s the season for making unnecessary and utterly subjective lists about 2018, and it’s always felt like a missed opportunity not getting in on that action being that a lot of what I do here is purely subjective. With that in mind, what follows is a list of 6 hidden gems that are especially worth your attention amid the tidal wave of gaming options. Obviously the list will be comprised solely of games that I’ve personally played—this is a limiting factor for all lists since too many games are released for a single person to possibly play, but it’s still worth mentioning. As for the definition of “hidden gem,” I’m choosing to stick with games that currently have fewer than 50 user reviews on Steam (sorry to the excellent Candleman: The Complete Journey and Elea – Episode 1), which is pretty much the only way I could take a year’s worth of enjoyable game surprises and distill that down to a manageable group of 6.

Azure Saga: Pathfinder

Store page: Azure Saga: Pathfinder
Current number of user reviews: 44

Click here for my Azure Saga: Pathfinder review

Azure Saga: Pathfinder is a game that I frequently find myself thinking back on, as its release version was plagued with a handful of bugs and translation issues that marred what was otherwise an incredibly innovative turn-based jRPG. Those bugs have largely been fixed, and the translation is supposedly in a better state, too, but even its more maddening initial state was strangely entrancing. Part of that boils down to the combat, which stripped traditional turn-based jRPG combat down to its basics and built entirely new mechanics around that. Turn order is much more deterministic than in most such games, meaning swapping characters around to have a healer undo counterattack damage is one of many legitimate strategic choices. In fact, the combat is so surprisingly strategic that you can overcome even significantly stronger enemies with enough clever planning. There are also a variety of full-party attacks that have various different effects and unlock automatically whenever certain characters select certain attacks in battle, which counteracts the random encounters by constantly giving you the chance to unlock something that further enhances your strategic options. All in all, Azure Saga: Pathfinder is the type of flawed gem so unique that it can easily outshine more expensive competitors.

Tempest Citadel

Store page: Tempest Citadel
Current number of user reviews: 17

Click here for my Tempest Citadel review

As much as I love strategy games, RTS gameplay has never been something I could get a handle on or enjoy, which is why it’s so striking that Tempest Citadel managed to suck me into real-time, RTS-esque battles. The way it accomplished this was by reducing the scope of each battle to something manageable, as well as having battles resolve automatically unless you jump in to assist. This allows you to start off leaning on your management abilities, only jumping in to make use of more complex strategies once you start to get a feel for the flow of battles and have ideas for how to optimize your approach. A number of people appear to have gone into Tempest Citadel thinking that it was a game like XCOM, which is definitely one way to end up disappointed by its many unique differences to most strategy games, but there’s brilliance here once you accept that the campaign is mostly linear (outside of its 3 endings that mostly split near the very end) and start to get the hang of the combat.

Omen Exitio: Plague

Store page: Omen Exitio: Plague
Current number of user reviews: 40

Click here for my Omen Exitio: Plague review

Omen Exitio: Plague is a triumph of eldritch horror communicated through an engrossing choose-your-own-adventure game style, but that doesn’t really cut to the heart of what makes it so engaging. This isn’t a game where you’re constantly being assailed by tentacled horrors so much as it’s a game where you forge friendships with genuinely likable characters, build up a number of skills to pass skill checks for more favorable outcomes whenever you attempt something elaborate, and suddenly find yourself in the middle of cultist scheming that strips everything familiar and comforting away from you while your sanity remains an open question. Omen Exitio: Plague has a handful of different endings and story branches that can see you visiting different locations depending on your choices, and you’ll be absorbed by the asphyxiating atmosphere long before recognizing the limitations of the format. This is storytelling (and horror) done right, refusing to indulge cheap jump scares and instead relying on an omnipresent sense of dread and creepy conspiracies.

Lost in Harmony

Store page: Lost in Harmony
Current number of user reviews: 6

Click here for my Lost in Harmony review

Including music-runner game Lost in Harmony on the list is a bit of a cheat on my part since it originally released in 2016 on mobile devices, but that was a predatory freemium incarnation that I refuse to accept as a legitimate game. The 2018 version, on the other hand, stripped all of that stuff out and reworked the interaction to better suit a controller (or keyboard, though I wouldn’t recommend it), allowing its story to shine. And what a story it ends up being! The explicit story developments are communicated through the text messages of main character Kaito and his rapidly deteriorating friend Aya—I didn’t even have to look their names up despite last playing Lost in Harmony 6 months ago because of how hard the story hit me—while the more subtle emotional stuff is filled in through the scenery’s metaphors. Some of the stages are calm journeys, but before long, bad news is met with stages awash in bombastic classical music and full of war scenery, and these shifts bring you along for the ride without trying to emotionally manipulate you. And hey, once you’re sufficiently depressed, you can jump over to the other game mode that consists of an escaped robot dodging things to electronic music. It’s a weird combination.

Malfortune

Store page: Malfortune
Current number of user reviews: 0 (come on, people)

Click here for my Malfortune review

While I played some great twin-stick shooters in 2018, Malfortune is the one that really stands out as being something special. I mean, this is a twin-stick bullet hell shooter with a unique story revolving around personified emotions, bosses who can be either killed or spared (with the dialogue changing more than you’d expect to reflect these choices since you’re removing those emotions from existence), and a great sense of humor. The combat system revolves around a dash attack that recharges over time and bullets that are earned for successful dash attacks, which adds a lot of quick strategy to the incredibly tricky fights. Malfortune may not capture the nostalgia for SNES games that Undertale tapped into, but otherwise, there’s a lot that the two games have in common, and it’s absurd to me that it didn’t catch on. I suspect that this has something to do with the art style, and possibly the absence of music outside of boss fights, but there’s a lot to love about Malfortune regardless and it’s ludicrous that it didn’t receive the 15 minutes of fame it very much deserved.

Of Gods and Men: The Daybreak Empire

Store page: Of Gods and Men: The Daybreak Empire
Current number of user reviews: 14

Of Gods and Men: The Daybreak Empire review

Turn-based strategy games are my favorite thing in the entire world, and especially those made in the image of classic Fire Emblem (which has since lost its way). Of Gods and Men: The Daybreak Empire may not be a 1:1 recreation of what I loved about that series, but this might be for the best; instead of borrowing its combat system from another game wholesale like so many other strategy games do, it marries the basic elements of Fire Emblem with a QTE-based combat system that actually works to benefit each turn’s risk and reward, as well as an overworld map that allows you to hire and deploy disposable units like in King Arthur: The Role-Playing Wargame and others. This is a great combination of elements that allows the gameplay to be familiar and yet totally unlike other strategy games. There’s just something immensely fulfilling about balancing your conquest with the need to defend against foreign invaders, and while the story may not be as full of twists and turns as most games on this list, the gameplay elevates the experience.

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