Help me help Mike help himself (to Steam)

[noiseredux]

I've convinced Mike to give Steam a try. If he likes it, he'll look into upgrading his PC or getting a new devoted to gaming. For now, we must not scare him off. So I need your help selecting a game for him to get into. There's a lot of rules though...

1. Cheap - The game should be a cheap one as he's just giving this a whirl. Under $10 is good. Under $5 is better. (Keep an eye on sales).

2. Low Performance - He doesn't have a gaming PC. No GPU. So this has to be easy to run.

3. Genres - Y'all know Mike. He's into arcade-ish stuff. Fighting, shmups, puzzle games, platformers, etc.

4. Multiplayer - It should have ONLINE multiplayer so he can play along w/ me.

5. Big Picture Mode - is a huge plus.

6. Controller - Must support 360 pad. No mucking with Joy2Key or Pinnacle.

...suggestions???

[MrPopo]

I was coming up with ideas until you added in the multiplayer requirement. Pretty much all of the multiplayer I've done on the PC is either FPS or RTS.

Oh, I just remembered a game we did at a LAN party once: Magicka. Ignore the shitton of DLC; it's a bunch of minor addons that you don't need.

[mjmjr25]

Ha, thanks for starting this, Brad. Yr too cute funny

Wow, that Magicka looks nice.

I should add - I really prefer a stick or at least pad support. The free game I downloaded and played last night was keyboard only - major turnoff for me.

[noiseredux]

Do you think he can run Magika w no GPU popo?

[MrPopo]

The last time I had a computer with no GPU was back in 2000, where it technically had a GPU but it was on the list of "Unsupported GPUs" that came with early 3D games. Not "does not meet minimum specs", but "unsupported". So my knowledge of what can and cannot be run with integrated graphics is spotty at best. But looking at the specs, it calls for a P4 and an 8800. The 8800 was new back in 2007, so depending on what he has now his integrated graphics might be able to handle it.

[mjmjr25]

I have this BEAST:

[Fragems]

Get him hooked with some bundles. There are some really good ones out there at the moment. Bundle Stars especially seems to have some great deals at the moment.

http://www.bundlestars.com/all-bundles/

Some interesting shmups in this BYO bundle.

http://groupees.com/doujin2?indiekings

You can always have him check his system with he system requirements lab site they are pretty reliable for the most part.

http://www.systemrequirementslab.com/cyri

[GSZX1337]

I had a ton of fun with Altitude.

[BogusMeatFactory]

some games I would suggest could include Jamestown (goes on sale all the time and is currently $9.99). You could also do Wizorb, which is a breakout-style game mixed with an 8-bit RPG ($2.99), Rochard is a nice indie puzzle/platformer game ($1.99). You also have the gundemonium games, which are bullet-hell style SHMUPS for about $3.99 a piece. There is also, the greatest game ever... AGRICULTURAL SIMULATOR 2011: EXTENDED EDITION!!!!!

Heck the Humble Bundle going on right now is cheap and you get tons of awesome games.

All the stuff listed has controller support and seem to be pretty low on the spectrum of requirements. I hope that is of some help!

[RyaNtheSlayA]

I have this BEAST:

That wont be doing Magicka I don't think.

So lets see. For multiplayer:

Altitude (amazing game with a pretty dead community)
Awesomenauts
Terraria (requires some setup to play over the internet)
(maybe) Minecraft
(maybe) Trackmania United
Worms

For single player:

DEFCON
Dungeons of Dredmor (awesome rogue-lite, this one gets a big +++ from me)
EDGE
Frozen Synapse (amazing turn based Rainbow Six planning style game with great music)
Jamestown (a nice shmup with purdy retro style graphics)
Rogue Legacy (a platformer with rogue-like elements, super fun)
Super Meat Boy (the most notable super-hard platformer on PC)

Those are just off of my library and many of those don't have controller support (though I know some do). There are just too many good games on Steam that you can play on even non-gaming hardware that it would be impossible to name all the great ones, and you'll really limit yourself if you aren't willing to use a M&K to play at least sometimes.

Edit: Bolded the ones that support controller