
girl on purpose. i make computer things, and also some other stuff with @gaywritinggirl too
at the end of 2022 when folks were recommending their favorite overlooked titles in a resetera thread, i saw somebody recommend norco. i thought to myself, "ha, what are they on about? every games writer's been talking up norco for the past year." but when i took a closer look, i realized the thread was full of people who had never heard of norco before, and were pretty impressed. the truth is that while there's a big seo difference between "popular games" and "niche games," it really comes down to multiple interlapping circles w/ their own niche interests. as far as certain folks are concerned, the best game of 2022 might be bobo the cat, unterweg in dusterburg, knee-deep in knee-deep in zdoom or, yeah, norco. the way to find new, cool and unexpected games isn't to drill deeper and deeper into the same hole in the ground but to jump into somebody else's hole and take a look. many games journalists are unfortunately too busy chasing leads to do that, because there's a crapton of games to cover. but if you have nothing to lose, then...
i was surprised when i brought up Euro Truck Sim 2 to a friend who’s aware of a lot of titles like me and she didn’t know about it at all. and i was similarly pissed when i didn’t learn about Mudrunner, which would’ve been a game i would enjoy so much during my ETS2 phase.
so yeah, i agree that the most interesting and overlooked games are likely the “popular” titles in other circles you’ve never heard about. it’s always thrilling to find a subculture that has its own canon/top games and you get deep into them. it’s what i love about VIPRPGs since they are probably bored of their own favorite titles but for me, it was incredible.