Thelsim

You might like Shadows of Doubt. It’s a procedural generated detective game where you have to solve murders. The entire city is generated, every npc has their own routine and you can pretty much go anywhere. There’s sneaking, hacking, talking, etc.

It’s still in early access, but it’s already a lot of fun.

Oh wow, that takes me back… This game actually got me into reading the book. I played so much of this when I was little, I loved the story and the characters.
When I saw the movie in the rental store I got really excited. I didn’t even know there was more to Dune than the game. I asked my parents if we could rent it but my dad told me (rather gruffly) to go and read the book instead.
I was so annoyed at the time, but looking back I have to admit he did the right thing :)

I played it but it was just ok. It was mostly fun to mess around in for short periods, but most of the story missions were meh. The one about the AI designer’s house (Coming Home) was interesting though.

I really don’t know what kind of games you like, I love loooooooong RPG’s myself and can recommend Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous if you’re happy to invest a big chunk of your time. Just turn down the difficulty and enjoy the story if the stats are mind boggling (I know I did). Creating the character you want to be is so much more fun than worrying if you’re powerful enough to defeat the final boss.
The Pillars of Eternity games are also RPG’s who’s story I really enjoyed.

Oh, one more. I really enjoyed Roadwarden as well. But that’s more of a visual novel kind of game.

You can use the \blend command if you want to combine two images without any prompt.

https://docs.midjourney.com/docs/blend

You’re technically right. But I think we both know that I meant regular gun shooty bits, not portal gun shooty bits :)

Mirror’s edge still had shooty bits if you wanted to. But of course the proper play-through is the one where you take the 100% non-lethal approach :)

Hmmm… The plot of the first one has nothing to do with the second. But you do get a lot of world building and some characters are properly introduced in the first.
I guess you should play the first as well if you want the best experience. It’s also a good game, though the puzzles are a little more… frustrating. But it’s nothing a good walkthrough can’t solve :)

At risk of posting twice but, I had to add this one as well:
Kyrandia 2: The Hand of Fate
A point-and-click adventure game. It was funny, colorful, and Zanthia is still awesome :) Made by Westwood of all people. It makes some references to the first, but you could play it on its own.

King’s Quest IV: The Perils of Rosella
One of my most favorite King’s Quest games. And one of the first games I remember playing with a proper female lead.

I got into sci-fi because my dad had a giant shelf with nothing but pulp sci-fi books, mostly from the 60’s and 70’s. Most of them were not very hard sci-fi, but I loved reading through all of them as a little kid. They triggered my imagination, especially the ones that came with little maps in the back where I could follow the story’s progress. Jack Vance’s Planet of Adventure was one of my very favorites, full of… well… adventure (it delivers exactly what it says :)
Most of them were already ridiculously dated, but it was the idea of traveling through space, exploring new places with strange and exciting cultures that made them so appealing to me.
I tried to find more books in the high-school library when I got older but was disappointed to find almost nothing outside of the traditional literature like H.G. Wells. It did motivate me to get into fantasy literature like Beowulf and LOTR to fill out my reading list for English class (English is not my native tongue), anything to get out of reading “proper” literature.

Anyway, if you want to recommend science fiction to young people, keep it simple and trigger the imagination. The hard stuff can come later.

I should really play this game again some time.
Still have a lot of fond memories playing this with my brother when I was little, we played the campaign together if I remember correctly? That was a thing you could do, right? (I guess those memories are fond but not very clear :)

Two come to mind.
First is Monkey Island. It’s the first game I ever finished all by myself. The opening scene with the theme music still gives me goosebumps.
The second is Daggerfall, the first game I devoted an ungodly amount of hours to. I spend all my time exploring every nook and cranny of that world, playing the tourist, borrowing huge amounts of money in some tiny country with no intend on paying back, splurging that money on houses, boats, clothes, armor and whatever else I wanted :)

I like to go back to crpg’s like the Pathfinder or Pillars of Eternity games.
I love trying out different story paths and finding the little things I’ve missed on previous play-throughs.

It’s a great game, but very challenging for someone who hasn’t played this kind of game before (someone like me :). I found the later levels to be quite challenging and really wished I could have some way to pause the game for a moment to direct orders. My clicking skills are not that accurate to quickly pull off multiple actions.
Be prepared to get very familiar with f5 and f8 :)

Torment: Tides of Numenera
But I think I’m mostly disappointed in myself for not sticking with it. I joined the kickstarter, followed all the updates and was genuinely excited to explore the world being described.
When it finally came out I only played it for a few hours before losing all interest in it. Too much text and everyone seemed to have their life story to tell. Which is odd, because usually I love text heavy games with tons of lore.
Every so often I tell myself to give it a second chance, but never seem to be able to muster the energy to follow through.

Good to know.
I hope the servers will keep up with everyone trying to download at the same time. I got mine through GOG and remember the early access launch causing all kinds of disruptions.

Good for them.
I bought a copy, but mostly because I wanted to support a couple of indie developers with a good idea.

A lot of great games mentioned so far. I’d like to add Streets of Rogue to the list. It’s a lot fun playing it together. Especially when things don’t exactly go to plan :)

I still have to work my way through the pile of games I bought from the last three steam sales. For the first time, I don’t feel the urge to add more.