The Polish gaming industry has been on a roll lately. Only in February the good Dying Light 2 came out, CD Projekt RED brought Cyberpunk 2077 to an adequate state, and the release of Shadow Warrior 3 will take place one of these days. What other remarkable projects have the Poles produced? We will tell you about this in the selection!
Note. Everyone knows that The Witcher, Cyberpunk 2077 and Dying Light are cool games developed in Poland, so these titles will not be included in the selection.
This War of Mine is one of the the most notable indie games of the last decade. Few other projects have managed to tell as intelligently about the nightmares of war. The fact is that gamers took control not of brave soldiers, but of ordinary civilians who simply dream of surviving difficult times and not dying of hunger.
The heroes live in a house battered by shells. It's dangerous to go outside, there's no food, winter is coming soon, and your mood is at its lowest. However, in order to survive, the characters will have to pull themselves together and improve their lives. They need to eat, build beds, workbenches and repair holes in the walls, prepare for frost, and they shouldn't forget about a good mood — a radio, guitar and vodka will help with this.
But what are the heroes willing to do to survive? Will they steal from other poor people and kill for a piece of meat? If you completely forget about the human element, the characters will become depressed and give up, but remaining saintly is also not easy. How can you stop yourself from stealing medicine when your friend is sick at home?
At the same time, This War of Mine is full of stories in which gamers will play as different characters and find themselves in unique situations. The addition The Little Ones, which tells about the suffering of children and their parents, was especially successful.
The creation of 11 bit studios became the perfect anti-war manifesto. The passage skillfully conveys the most important idea: the main thing is that there is no war.
What do you think of This War of Mine?
Take the pollFrostpunk is another game from 11 bit studios, which became no less a hit than This War of Mine. The project talks about a future world where looking at a thermometer and seeing minus 120 degrees is a common thing. However, all is not lost, because humanity has you.
The gamer will have to manage a city whose inhabitants simply want to survive. What infrastructure to build? How to feed and warm the people? Is it worth diluting lunch with pieces of dead comrades? Answering these questions is not so easy. One thing is clear: if the decisions turn out to be wrong, former subordinates will not hesitate to push the boss out into the cold and lock the gate.
Superhot was released by the Polish team Superhot Team. It would seem that the developers came up with a simple concept: the hero finds himself in a room full of enemies and must deal with everyone — only every shot and blow is fatal, and time only passes while moving.
As a result, each level becomes a puzzle. Who should I shoot first? How to dodge bullets? How the hell do you deal with a scoundrel who has already killed the hero a dozen times? It's fun to solve these problems.
The trick is that you can not only rely on dexterity, but also interact with the environment. Grab objects and throw them, snatch guns from the hands of enemies, arrange everything so that the enemy's shot hits another mob. Due to the fact that the levels are well thought out and the abundance of different situations is impressive, the gameplay does not tire.
The game is fully revealed if you play it in a VR device. Superhot is a must-have for owners of virtual reality devices, like Half-Life: Alyx and Beat Saber.
The main sniper title is considered to be the British Sniper Elite, but Polish developers from CI Games also produced a decent series. Especially worth praising is Sniper Ghost Warrior Contracts 2, which was released in 2021.
Each task sends the hero into a small sandbox, where he must complete a number of tasks: blow up strategic objects, obtain secret documents, or get rid of dangerous enemies. At the same time, there are many ways to achieve the goal.
Nobody forbids you to pick up an AK-47 and dash into the outpost. Or eliminate enemies using stealth. Or even deal with the soldiers using gadgets. Although it is best to sit higher and shoot the villains with a sniper rifle.
The most important targets are usually hidden in protected bases that cannot be reached. To deal with them, you need to take the ideal position, aim, calculate the distance, take note of the direction and strength of the wind, and then fire the fatal shot. Even walls will not protect the target from a tough sniper: the shooter can always first fire a scanning projectile, which will indicate the exact location of the enemy, and insert a fortification-piercing cartridge into the clip.
At times, the developers still make mistakes, turning the sniper into Rambo, but more often they set interesting tasks for the players.
Chernobylite resembles S.T.A.L.K.E.R. more than any other games. Events take place in Chernobyl. The hero will have to visit Pripyat, the Red Forest and look into the territory of the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant. The territory is full of anomalies and strange deadly creatures. The most terrible events are created not by monsters, but by ordinary people. In general, there is almost everything here that makes gamers love the creation of GSC Game World.
The main character Igor once worked at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant, but during the tragedy he lost his beloved there. Many years later, the lady who was considered dead reminded herself of herself through dreams and mysterious instructions — isn't this a reason to return to the Zone and find her?
To do this, the hero will have to assemble a team, build a cool base, craft top equipment and collect many documents that will provide answers. Creatures from another dimension, well-trained soldiers and, of course, the Black Stalker will interfere with the characters. This is a powerful villain who pursues Igor like the Tyrant from gorgeous Resident Evil 2, and completely refuses to die.
Chernobylite has a good plot, and there are plenty of other advantages: the picture is nice, crafting and leveling up the base are addictive, and the variability is sometimes surprising. You can also criticize the game (at least for running around the same locations), but the shortcomings do not prevent the creation of The Farm 51 studio from being suitability.
Bulletstorm is one of those shooters for which the tired epithet «hurricane» is ideally suited. People Can Fly has come up with so many crazy ways to deal with villains that it's amazing.
In the story, the heroes find themselves on an unfriendly planet, where everyone is trying to kill them: the army, local thugs, fauna, and so on. However, the arsenal is so rich that the enemies have no chance of victory.
The characters can kick villains into the mouths of predator flowers, grab them with a whip and pound them on the ground, slow down time, and also fire from a variety of cannons. It is curious that the authors came up with many tests to make the reprisals even more spectacular. How about missions like «shoot an enemy in the balls and then rip his head off» or «set three or more enemies on fire and then kill them while they're burning?»
The game also regularly provided wow moments when the heroes fought off a huge wheel, controlled a giant robot, or ran away from a monster the size of Godzilla. What a pity that the continuation of the great game never came out.
It is worth noting that People Can Fly has other hits in its portfolio. In 2021 they released Outriders, which performed poorly at release, but was essentially suitable action and it's not just that it has gathered 125 thousand players online.
Everyone who played Shadow Warrior 2 stopped giving the phrase «Polish shooter» a negative connotation. This time, the Flying Wild Hog studio managed to amuse gamers. The developers suggested cutting monsters with blades and chainsaws, shooting at them from various guns and listening to jokes about genitals. It's cool that you can do this in a co-op.
In addition to this, Shadow Warrior 2 looks great, surprises with its RPG component with leveling up and collecting the perfect build, and also offers entertaining boss fights. In general, there is no reason to pass up Shadow Warrior 2, especially since the third part will be released on March 1st.
In Ghostrunner, gamers will find themselves in a cyberpunk world and take control of a ninja. The hero's sword is sharpened to the extreme, and he himself is dexterous and knows how to run along walls. It's a pity that the armor cannot be called strong — as soon as the enemies shoot accurately a couple of times, the ninja will die. This concept turns Ghostrunner into a great action game, where the actions must be thought out and the attacks must be swift.
At the same time, the challenge will only grow as you progress. Soldiers with shields and powerful robots will take the place of ordinary enemies, and the hero himself will receive new gadgets and abilities. Platforming will also become more difficult, forcing you to run past laser traps, use a grappling hook, and fly on air currents.
It's no surprise that Ghostrunner has received 91 percent positive reviews on Steam.
The Medium is a horror game from the Bloober Team studio. The developers have long established themselves as masters of psychological horror, and their latest game only confirmed their status.
The main feature of The Medium is the ability of the main character: she can communicate with the dead and deftly moves between worlds. Unfortunately, not all the dead are friendly — sometimes among them there are creepy creatures ready to tear and throw all living things.
The visuals are also worth praising. The graphics and location design in horror are excellent, making it a pleasure to explore apartments, abandoned holiday homes and forests.
The Medium can be criticized for its crumpled story and lack of real horrors, and it did not become the «new Silent Hill».
They don't forget about indie in Poland either. For example, in 2020, Phobia Game Studio released an interesting pixel horror Carrion. Its peculiarity is that you will not play as a brave hero who fights creatures, but as a terrible monster.
At first, the amorphous creature is not capable of knocking down opponents in batches — even a couple of people can kill it in an open clash. Therefore, the monster will have to act carefully, deal with the soldiers one by one and gain strength. However, over time, it will turn into a death machine from which it is better to run.
Despite the old-school visuals, Carrion was liked by gamers. There's a reason 94 percent of reviews on Steam are positive.
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The selection does not include the entire list of cool Polish games. Gamedec, Lords of the Fallen, The Vanishing of Ethan Carter, Green Hell, Terminator Resistance, Iron Harvest, Darkwood — the list is almost endless.
What Polish games do you like best? Write in the comments!
Which game from the selection is the best?
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