Take 1 portion John Wick, 3 ladles Tarkov, and a dash of FEAR. Boil down to the bare essentials, then season with a dash of J-Horror. Serve in small but frequent doses.

This is the seeming impetus behind HOLE. A small (only 3 nominal levels) extraction shooter created by a couple of folks from Japan, this game to me has successfully dug up what it is that makes games like Tarkov and Receiver interesting, without adding on the anxiety of losing hours of progress, massive inventory management, or weapons management.

Gameplay is fast yet tactical. You start with a 9mm handgun with only ten rounds, and upgrade to the FPS standards of Assault Rifle, Shotgun and Sniper Rifle. Upgrades are ground out in gameplay.

The J-horror adds some flair to what might be a rather sterile outing, introducing some frame-jammed elements and UI screwery to mix things up. Extraction is done, of all things, via a floating microwave, but somehow it still evokes the same feelings as other games in the genre.

You may forget shooting your way out to an extract, only to fail after being shot by a silenced pistol from a shadowed doorway. As the gameplay loop is so fast and slick though, it doesn't feel like a drag but just a minor slap on the wrist.

Total playtime til all items unlocked for me was less than 8 hours, so not a poopsock game. For the price though? Well worth a little lucre, and rumor has it the dev will be developing a successor based on the feedback received here. I hope the next game will trend the same way.

another horror game on par with DCS

It's not quite Fallout 2, but it's a darn sight nicer to play than Wasteland 2 IMO. Some might balk at the stats simplification but it's just enough for my lazy ass.

Statting up a sniper to use that Ambush perk is really great, as well as that really strong Quick Draw perk for Explosives chars. Hopefully the rebalance doesn't mean flattening out all these fun perks, but rather adding some spice to the other ones.

blowing up Embryo's misogynistic ass with fusion bombs never gets old

A great idea, with lots of features that I sorely miss in the more high-end flight simulators.

Unfortunately, the controls being totally virtual mean that your hands are going to be holding some awkward poses, what with not having an actual stick to rest your hand on. Not one for long periods of manuevering.

Still, if you have enough money for a VR headset, why not?

It feels exactly like how it did, 25 years ago, in my child brain. Plus, now that I actually can think for more than 15 seconds I can get past mission 4!

single player quake 3 arena comes to mind lol, but it's good in its own way.

In House of the Dying Sun, you play as a Dragon, a mercenary and outlaw paid for by corporations in order to destabilize and prepare the world of Solo Nobre, once ruled by a just and despot Great Lea- oh hell, sorry, that's my review for Brigador. Let's try that again...

In House of the Dying Sun, you play as the Dragon, recently released from your centuries long cryosleep to wreak vengeance in the name of your deceased Emperor. Rebellious generals and duplicitous members of Imperial Nobility have assassinated Him, triggering a final sanction and unleashing His greatest weapon upon the throneworld.

I could tell you this is a stylish quick firing space first person shooter (simulation apparently now being owned solely by the sort of folk who get overly excited about the rocket equation and delta V) but you probably saw that in the video.

Let's talk about how it feels like instead. It feels FAST. Even in the quietest movements there's a feeling of motility, a sense that sitting still would be pretty embarrasing. Your fighter wants to move, and with only 2 upgrade slots for your machine you will be making choices that will close the door on your "shields and armor" safezone to venture into hot new flavors of death dealing. Flavors like "Kamikaze" and "stutterjump fly-by shotgun blasting".

Let's look at that style. Imperial equipment, all sharp edges, convex curves and aggressive coloring denoting that they are at the Top of the Food Chain, even as they fight from a position of inferiority in every mission. Witness how quickly your enemies wither under your Autocannon, how quickly your own assets fall under the guns of the Enemy, sniper turrets and torpedo-launching dreadnaughts.

Listen to the sound of astronomic silence, punctuated only by muffled gunfire, the thrum of your engines and the whirring of your reloading mechanisms. Read the blurbs of lore, like perfectly carved Doritos of sci-fi, just enough to get you excited, but not bored. The UI, so light and flab-free (except maybe the joystick support, but if you aren't rocking a spare 360 pad or something what are you doing here come on this is the 21st century don't you play emulated games?).

In my opinion there is definitely still a place for the minimalist, curated game. We don't need to have an indie scape littered with six million different styles of procedurally generated playing fields, all interacted with in the same manner. For Marauder to stand to their own principles and murder their own ludological children for the sake of principle is, I believe, something to applaud.

Buy the game, try it out. If you're not into the short play times, simplistic upgrade trees and gamepad-focused, light Newtonian play this may not be your thing. But who are you to judge a game merely on bullet points, really?

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What a huge, wonderful, time sink. Even better with mods that fix geometry and gameplay. Quest mods like the New Vegas Bounties and such just seal the deal.