For all the jokes the gaming populace makes thatValvedoesn’t release games, we have to give credit where credit is due. When Gabe Newell’s notoriously opaque company does put out a product, it tends to be a big deal.
Related:Best FPS Games On Steam Deck
But maybe Valve’s most important contribution to the industry (outside creating the leading PC marketplace inSteam) was the creation and release of the Source engine. Thanks to its flexibility and easy-to-access SDK, the Source engine has led to countless fan games and mods for the games developed with it. However, plenty of full releases have been created using it too.
15Day Of Defeat
When most people talk about Day of Defeat, they are actually talking about Day of Defeat: Source. The original Day of Defeat was actually a mod based on the first Team Fortress (itself a standalone mod). That first Day of Defeat was one of the last games developed by Valve that was published by an outside publisher,Activision.
By the time the total conversion, Day of Defeat: Source, came out Valve had releasedHalf-Life 2: Episode 1, Counter-Strike, and launched Steam. As a result, any PC shooter fans using this new-fangled launcher looking for some WW2 action all took to DoD Source, and thus a PC cult classic was born.
14GoldenEye: Source
We said that the Source engine was beloved by modders, but when they weren’t putting Shrek or Peter Griffin inGarry’s Mod, sometimes these hobbyist developers came together to release full-blown projects… They just might not have sought the IP holders' approval first.
Related:Best N64 Games Of All Time
GoldenEye: Source was a loving recreation of the N64 classic,Goldeneye’s multiplayer for PC. Was it promptly taken down by MGM and the James Bond Company? Of course, it was. A shame.
13Zeno Clash
We were going to say that games like Zeno Clash don’t get made anymore, but they do, because developer ACE Team still exists and puts out strange games almost every year. That is the best way to describe Zeno Clash, though - it’sweirdin the extreme.
A first-person melee brawler that focuses as much on building a strangely beautiful and gross world, there aren’t many games like Zeno Clash. If you’ve never played it before, you owe yourself taking the time to look at is odd and engrossing art at least.
12Dear Esther
Often cited as the first walking sim, Dear Ester was created as less of a game andmore of an art piece experiment. You simply explore an Island picking up notes, listening to the narration, and unraveling the story that happened before you got here.
Related:Best Walking Simulators On Game Pass
Despite the engine being old and the game being dated in many ways, there is still a haunting beauty to Dear Esther. And we had to recognize the impact it has had on the video game industry.
11Dark Messiah: Might And Magic
Do you like ragdoll physics?Do you like games that have a dedicated kick button? Do you like it when dumb enemies loiter dangerously close to chasms and cliffsides? Then do we have a game for you!
Before Arkane was best known forDishonored, the studio was wetting its beak in the immersive space with Dark Messiah. It’s an FPS full of exaggerated physics and level design that encourages you to kill goblins in the most hilarious ways - and is still very fun years later.
There are very few co-op games that have left such a lasting legacy asLeft 4 Dead. Both these games are just pure, distilled, co-op perfection.
Related:Best Co-Op Games On Steam
Over a decade and a half after their release, it is still pretty easy to find an online lobby, as pretty much everyone that owns a PC has these in their library. Because of that, it’s always fun to go back to with friends. L4D is timeless.
9Dota 2
Speaking of timeless multiplayer experiences,Dotais one of the few MOBAs, along withLoL, that survived past the initial popularity of the early 2010s. However, unlike Left 4 Dead, it hasn’t remained a staple of Steam installs by being an unchanging constant in PC gamers' lives. Instead, Valve has totally overhauled the game, its characters, and items more times than we can count.
It seems to have worked though. Even though the game has since migrated off of the Source engine and onto Source 2, it still sees hundreds of thousands of players each day, and the International is still the biggest event of the esports calendar every year.
8Team Fortress 2
Team Fortress 2is a game that has been through it all since its release in 2007. From the highs of constant season updates, and the rush for unusual hats, to the lows of content droughts and hacked servers.
There are few communities as embattled as the TF2 one, but we can hardly blame them for still coming back to the game. Even after all these years, it’s still probably the best-balanced hero shooter of all time.
7Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines
The Source engine really does seem to be inextricably tied to games that have shaped the industry, andVampire: The Masquerade- Bloodlines is no exception. One of only a handful of games developed by Troika, Bloodlines is a cult classic role-playing game inspired by the creative leads' work on the original Fallout games.
Related:Every Fallout Game, Ranked
Many of these leads would go on to foundObsidian Softwareand work on games likeFallout: New Vegas,The Outer Worlds, andPillars of Eternity- all of which drew heavy inspiration from the mechanics of Bloodlines.
6The Stanley Parable
If Dear Esther was the first walking sim, thenThe Stanley Parableis almost the end point of the genre.
Not only meta and fourth-wall breaking, but The Stanley Parable is also a cutting contemplation of what it means to be a game developer, player agency, and so much more.
