It’s Friday, which means two things: the weekend is finally within reach, and the NAG team is once again doing everything in its power to ensure nobody has any money left by Monday.
This week’s wishlist is a particularly questionable collection of life choices. We’ve got underground home renovations, time-travelling tourists, intergalactic friendly fire, organised crime, Scottish war cries, and Cody deliberately trying to start a fight with lordraz0r.
So, you know, a perfectly normal Friday at NAG.
Some of us are here for the bargains. Some of us are here for the adventure. And at least one of us appears to be here purely to annoy another writer.
We’ve rounded up six games worth a look, ranging from ridiculously cheap to completely free (and we all know how that usually ends).
Your bank account might not thank us, but your Steam library certainly will.
Core Keeper
Price: R111 marked down from R185
Get It Here
Why It’s On lordraz0r’s Wishlist:
That mix of exploration and building is exactly why it’s on my wishlist. I love the idea of heading out into the unknown, finding something useful and bringing it home to build something better.
There’s room to fuss over the farm and get the house looking right, then pick up a weapon and see what’s waiting further underground. That sounds like a very dangerous combination for my free time.
The co-op is another selling point. Miachu and I could build our own little underground home, then head off together to find whatever strange thing lives beyond it and slay it or bring it home to be an (un)willing pet of ours.
What Is Core Keeper:
Core Keeper is a sandbox survival adventure set in a mysterious underground world.
You mine resources, craft equipment, build a base, grow crops and fish while exploring strange biomes and battling enormous bosses.
Along the way, you develop your skills, discover new loot and uncover the secrets of the ancient Core. Play alone or team up with up to seven friends.
Old Skies
Price: R110 marked down from R157
Get It Here
Why It’s on Arielle’s Wishlist:
Give me a good old-fashioned point-and-click adventure, and I’m already halfway to the checkout.
Throw in time travel, historical mysteries and the opportunity to make some spectacularly bad decisions across multiple centuries? Sold.
I grew up on games like King’s Quest and Laura Bow, so this feels like coming home. Except home is apparently a temporal paradox, and I’m probably responsible.
What Is Old Skies:
Old Skies is a time-travelling point-and-click adventure that puts you in the shoes of Fia Quinn, an agent tasked with babysitting wealthy tourists through 200 years of history.
Across seven trips, you’ll explore everything from Prohibition-era speakeasies to the Gilded Age, solve time-bending puzzles, and try to stop your clients from breaking history.
Because apparently, even time travel can’t save you from difficult customers.
Helldivers 2
Price: R539 marked down from R1,199
Get It Here
Why It’s on Miachu’s Wishlist:
Helldivers 2 is on my wishlist because, apparently, I enjoy the idea of being dropped onto an alien planet with friends, given a ridiculous amount of firepower, and trusted not to accidentally kill everyone.
Spoiler: I cannot make that promise.
It looks like the perfect mix of chaotic teamwork, ridiculous explosions and the kind of friendly fire that turns “WE GOT THIS!” into “WHO JUST BLEW ME UP?!”
Basically, it’s cooperative chaos with guns. For Super Earth!
What Is Helldivers 2:
The Galaxy’s Last Line of Offence. Enlist in the Helldivers and join the fight for freedom across a hostile galaxy in a fast, frantic, and ferocious third-person shooter.
Mafia Trilogy
Price: R199 marked down from R999
Get It Here
Why It’s On BigMacDaddy’s Wishlist:
I have always held Mafia above GTA as a game. Something about that tone, setting and atmosphere has me way more entertained than some modern American hellscape. Gross.
And you get to be in a mob, which instantly makes you cooler. Will GTA 6 finally be able to catch my attention? Well, given I can buy every single NAG staff member a copy of the Mafia trilogy instead of the GTA 6 game and still save money, you tell me.
Go get that gabbagool!
What Is Mafia Trilogy:
From the roaring twenties, the Great Depression, World War II and the Counterculture Era, the Mafia trilogy is a tapestry of some of the most significant periods of the criminal enterprise in America.
Follow the anthological stories of Tommy, Vito and Lincoln and explore their beautiful worlds captured in a time capsule.
Also, the trilogy package contains all the DLCs of Mafia 3. Ain’t that groovy!
Aion 2
Price: “Free”
Get It Here
Why It’s On Cody’s Wishlist:
One reason: I want to see if this will get under LordRazor’s skin. *wink wink
What Is Aion 2:
Aion 2 is a fantasy MMORPG set around 200 years after the original game. Players take control of Deava’s, which have the ability to sprout wings at any time, enabling combat in the sky.
It squeezes together fast pacing and high-action in the combat sections of the game, and includes multiple classes, PvP and PvE, dungeons, raids and even solo sections for those of us who still struggle to make friends… Like me.
Tears of Metal
Price: R192 marked down from R240
Get It Here
Why It’s On Sock0Puppet’s Wishlist:
I played the Demo during a Steam Next Fest about a year ago. With some friends. From the moment we landed until the moment we finished the demo, it felt like we were high.
This game is in that perfect sweet spot of “Complicated fighter management” and “Holy S#$T DO YOU SEE THAT?!”
Not once while playing it can you be truly bored, and throw in the fact that all of your friends can run into random directions without you…and things get weird. Real weird.
What Is Tears of Metal:
Tears of Metal is a solo or up to 4 player co-op action roguelike that I assume tries to CAPTURE THE GLORY OF OUR SCOTTISH ANCESTORS WEE LADDY!
Uh, sorry, not sure where that came from.
You play as a warrior of different types, with different powers, and you go running in with a team of soldiers TO FIGHT THE ENGLISH DOGS AND RECLAIM THE GLORY OF SCOTLAND! RALLY YER FORCES LASSIE, IT’S TIME TO SHOW THESE DOGS WHY WE PROTECT THE MOTHER STONE!
AAAAARRRGGGGGHHHHHH!!!!!
And there you have it. Six games, six questionable justifications, and absolutely no evidence that anyone on the NAG team understands the concept of financial responsibility.
Lordraz0r and Miachu are apparently planning to start an underground family, although Miachu might accidentally blow it up before they finish decorating. BigMacDaddy is joining the Mafia, Arielle has decided to make time travel everyone’s problem, and Sock0Puppet has seemingly declared war on England.
Meanwhile, Cody has chosen a free game specifically to irritate lordraz0r, which might be the most financially responsible thing he’s ever done.
As always, let us know which games are currently tempting you, what bargains you’ve spotted, and whether you’ve already made a purchase you’ll be explaining to your significant other as a “long-term investment.”
Happy Friday, happy gaming, and remember: it’s not impulse buying if you’ve had it on your wishlist for six months.
Then it’s just patience finally paying off.