Niahak's Place

Seven Kingdoms 2: The Fryhtan Wars – Strategy (PC)
Enlight Software

Everyone’s heard of the standard RTS games – Starcraft, Warcraft, Command & Conquer – but the Seven Kingdoms games have largely escaped notice despite their quality.

Created by Enlight Software, these games portray an unlikely combination of cultures at the peak of their power in a world filled with monsters called Fryhtans. Although the game’s name claims “Seven”, there are actually a dozen unique human cultures to play as and several Fryhtan races as well.

Uncharted Waters: New Horizons – Simulation / Strategy (SNES/GEN/PC)
Koei (Eiji Fukuzawa)

Another product of the innovation from Koei that resulted in Gemfire and Aerobiz, Uncharted Waters may have been partially inspired by Pirates! from Sid Meier. Much of the interface is the same, several of the themes are the same – but Uncharted Waters improves on Pirates! in several ways.

Harvest Moon – Simulation (SNES)
Natsume

Harvest Moon is unlike nearly any other game there is. There are no enemies to fight, no evil villains, no number-crunching and little strategy is required.

This is because Harvest Moon is a farm simulation. You plow fields, plant crops, raise animals, and woo and potentially marry one of the five girls in town.

Cave Story (Doukutsu Monogatari) – Action / Adventure (PC/MAC)
Pixel Studios.

Although it’s been featured on several websites and publication as an outstanding freeware game (including, in fact, our school newspaper) this game deserves still more coverage. It has an excellent plot (thanks to a great translation by the guys at Aeon Genesis, it is great in English as well), a very large map to explore, tons of secrets… the list goes on.