Free at Epic games until 6/15/23
https://store.epicgames.com/en-US/p/payday-2-c66369
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F.E.A.R. fan? Now at GOG for 99p and FEAR 2 at £3.09
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GRIME Free at Epic games until 7/13/23
GRIME is a fast, unforgiving Action-Adventure RPG in which you crush your foes with living weapons that mutate form and function, and then consume their remains with a black hole to strengthen your vessel as you break apart a world of anatomical intrigue.
https://store.epicgames.com/en-US/p/grime
Free On the Epic Games Store
Sale ends 7/27/2023 at 11:00 AM
https://store.epicgames.com/en-US/p/the-elder-scrolls-online
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Homeworld Remastered Collection @ Severed Steel
Free on the Epic Games Store until August 3, 2023
https://store.epicgames.com/en-US/p/homeworld-remastered-collection
https://store.epicgames.com/en-US/p/severed-steel
As an aside, regarding Homeworld Collection: I’ve been a pretty much lifelong fan of the art of the late Peter Elson, whose style was cribbed pretty much verbatom for the graphics of the homeworld series of games. Highly reccomended to take a look, to appreciate his stuff!
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Wow, if you had asked me who Peter Elson was I wouldn’t have been able to answer.
But even after a brief trawl through Science Fiction Illustrator | Peter Elson I am amazed at how many books I have read that he has illustrated (cover)… Pretty much every Harry Harrison book + so many more.
Back when I was a young teen, not long after I had read Starship Troopers for the first time I came across this image in an anthology sci-fi ‘annual’. In the opening of the book the first drop is against the ‘Skinnies’ and it describes a scene where Rico is still decending in his jump suit and has to use his ‘hand flamer’ - This is how I have always imagined the ‘armour’ in Starship Troopers to this day.
Thanks heaps for that.
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Ooooo, Home World…
Ironically, that ship is the exact same shape as the Halo CE and Halo 4/5/6 Assault Rifle…
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I played Homeworld when it came out and several years afterwards. It was my favorite RTS for a while, and the way it emphasized that space combat happens in three dimensions at once was genius.
That shape (and the Halo ships that it inspired) is what I think of when I envision capital ships in space. 
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I can also see the Sulaco.
Such an influential artist.
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I really liked that game, too, but never finished it because it just got too hard for me at some point (I like RTS games but kinda suck at them).
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Same… Same…
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I’ve never played it. Is it worth installing?
Similar to sins of a solar empire? Because i love that game
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totally different, it felt to me more like C&C in space with a 3d map, and missions, each jump you do is like a level, its also not bad for co-op
EDIT sorry MP is homeworld 2 only
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Home World has a very special place in my pantheon of games, I’ll skip the reseasons for right now. If you want to be able to progress through HW1 and to a good extent HW2 I offer the following exploit:
Salvage frigates. Build them in abundance use them to either dramatically plus up your own fleet or to simply attrit the enemy. In HW1 this was pretty much game breakingly overpowered, you an could pretty much salvage your way out of any trouble with no real tactics.
It was a bit less overpowered in HW2, but it still really breaks the “tactical” aspect of the game. They only work on capital class ships (frigates and larger) and they’ll need a fighter escort to get through to capital ships, but being able to capture 5-10 enemy ships in a given scenario really tips the scales.
It is a genre defining RTS, and a true classic. The story telling, visuals, and music alone are worth watching youtube videos of a full playthrough. The gameplay if you have any interest in RTS’s is definitely worth it. HW1 is much less refined as was the pioneer in true 3D RTS control and gameplay, HW2 really shows off the interface and gameplay at a whole different level. The story in HW1 more than makes up for what it lacked in refinement though.
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I never played either. But i booted it up late last night. @tempusmurphy hit the nail on the head. I got C&C vibes right away. And its free plus you get Homeworld 1 and 2. Also it wasn’t a massive download either, 8 gb I think total.
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It’s a very heavily story driven game. The cutscenes are heavily stylized and a masterpiece of music composition and voice acting.
The game itself is made of few missions that are both (Especially in the latter half) brutally hard and quite long/multiparty BUT you can save at any time.
As others said it’s of superior importance remembering that space is indeed 3D and that beside the number of ships, the formation they are in and who are they attacking is absolutely fundamental.
It’s a massively immersive game, especially thanks to the hundreds of flavor text uttered by pilots and ship crews alike without being overwhelming, boring or repetitive. Somehow are always appropriate and IIRC only heard when zoomed in on the units themselves.
The graphical details are equally astounding…
Some of the bigger ships have fixed weapons of unimaginable power and the effect they have on other big ships can’t be overstated…
The plasma beams hit with thunderous power and create this halo of burned hull while simultaneously piercing through the entire hull, as one would imagine to really happen, creating a small cloud of particles of destroyed armor…
It gives this powerful impression of a merciless space battle that few games ever managed ever or since.
Even losing (which happens to me a lot) is still a spectacular event…
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Everything you said, +1 
You put it very eloquently, and reminded me of a lot of little details like the radio chatter. Those details brought life to the game in a way that made you care about the individual ships/units.
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the overall sound design was pretty amazing … who can forget the jump drive sound
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Installation commenced
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