March 30, 2026
Gaming one year behind
Triple-A gaming has hit a lull. In the past few years, more and more of my favourites each year have been indie titles like 1000xResist or bigger games from unexpected sources such as Baldur's Gate.
Each December, top 10 round ups and best-of discussions have become the single best source of great new games for me.
That usually means very busy Decembers and Januarys as I cram as much in as possible before making my own list. And it means playing lots of indies alone on the underpowered laptop in my office.
Instead, I want to play more indie games throughout the year and play them on my TV. But I also want to get away from Windows as much as possible as part of this project.
I've gotten a second-hand UM773 Lite Ryzen 7 7735HS from Minis Forum on backmarket.ie.
I'm running Bazzite for Steam with Heroic launcher for Epic and GoG. And using a PS5 controller.
The mini-PC also lets me run Jellyfin, so I can stream from the home server.
Retrograde
But this got me thinking. I'm not a dabbler. I don't want to play demos or buy and try a whole range of indies. I just want to know what I'm going to like. I want to rely on recommendations and reviews from people I trust.
So why not just shift one year behind the industry? Each December, make a list of the best of the best from that year, but play it at my own pace the following year.
The folks on the No Clip podcast kinda liked this idea.
I can likely play a lot of this at a discount next year, grabbing what I need in sales on Steam or PSN.
It will take self restraint to make this work. I already have a watchlist from 2026 growing in my notebook. Who knows if I can resist the urge to grab these as the year goes on.
But think about how great my 2027 is going to be!
2026 watchlist
- Esoteric Ebb
- Titanium Court
- Perfect Tides: Station to Station
- Alabaster Dawn
- The Eternal Life of Goldman
- Rockbeast
- Mixtape
- Soros
- Pragmata