1) Subnautica had been the best game of the year 2018, and if you intend to play this game (which I highly recommend that you do) go into it COMPLETELY blind.
Do not look up any trailers, highlights, anything! The magic of this game only happens on the first run and only if you don't know anything about the game. If you like exploring stuff, discovering mysteries and getting immersed into an oceanic world Subnautica has no rival, but like I said, its magic only happens if you don't know anything about the game. Only God and I know how many literal months of my life I have spent watching other people's blind playthroughs of this masterpiece on YT. After I have beaten the game myself (and knowing how the magic would not repeat on subsequent playthroughs) I have been craving to experience it all over again for the last 6 years. Even last week I checked YT again for a new blind playthrough so I can re-live the experience through the other player's experience, but unfortunately there are no quality playthroughs of this game anymore... either this, or YT hides them like the biggest pieces of s**t that they are...
So anyway, if you like exploring and discovering stuff, if you like feeling like a scientist and explorer, if you like underwater colour and variety, if you like conquering the unknown and getting from the bottom of the food chain (because in Subnautica you will be at the bottom of the food chain)... then there's no other game that blends curiosity, thrill, and feeling like a true conqueror like Subnautica does. I simply cannot make this game enough justice....
And since the game is so short (you can probably beat the game in under 15 hours if you only follow the story, not giving a rat's ass about exploring every corner of the map like I did and then regretted it immensely after I have beaten the game and then stared at the screen blankly)... so, as I was about to say, since this game is so short and you can finish it fast if you only follow the story (which is amazing by the way), and since Subnautica's magic only happens on the 1st playthrough I recommend you play it at your own pace and finish it only when you've done everything. This will allow you to prolong the fun for 10-30 more hours (depending on your goals and style of play), but no matter if you beat it in 15 hours or in 100 hours the important part is to take your time instead of rushing through the story. The story has no time limit, you can complete it whenever you want, but the moments of exploration and discovering new creatures, new plants, new biomes, new artifacts or whatever... those moments will be gone when you beat the game and you'll want to get back to it for a 2nd time to experience it all over again, but - like I said - the magic of Subnautica only happens on the 1st playthrough and only if you go into the game fully blind, without knowing anything and without knowing what your purpose in the game is.
There will be moments when you will be sunk into reading the lore on your PDA while gently threading the water, there will be moments of sheer panic when you hear a terrifying roar getting closer but you don't know what it is or where it comes from... there will be moments when you just want to add another room to your base, or decorate your base with new found posters and / or scenery (which Subnautica - thanks God - has plenty of)... there will be moments when you simply just want to swim with the fish while doing nothing in particular but just taking the scenery and colour of the environment in while listening to the mesmerizing soundtrack (which is one of the best in a video game)... and there will be moments when you will explore new territories and you depart so far away from your base that everything you can see around you and beneath you is pitch black abyss and only your feet threading the water and you'll feel thassalophobia and nervousness deep into your bones.... all of these moments and more, no matter how beautiful or terrifying they are, are the reason for which Subnautica has been GotY 2018.
Please note that there was also a sequel to Subnautica (called Below Zero) that has come 2 years ago I think, and which was initially supposed to be a DLC of the original Subnautica, but in the end evolved into a new Subnautica game. You can also play BZ if you want (and if you like Subnautica you WILL want to play BZ too, I guarantee you this), but play it after Subnautica... Better yet, play it few weeks AFTER you finish Subnautica because this game (again, if you DO like such games, otherwise it's pointless to even try it) will mark you emotionally so much and it will immerse you into its lore and atmosphere so much that you will feel empty and sad after you beat the game. There's a reason for which most Subnautica fans (myself included) have said numerous times that they wish they have had their Subnautica memories removed so we can experience it all over again..... Damn, now I'm sad and I want to get back to it again, but I already know the story and every little crevice of the map by heart, so it won't quench my thirst for the sensations of freedom, discovery and conquering that this game had instilled into me...
By the way, if any of you reading this and are gamers (just not streamers, I hate streamers who think they're gamers), and you intent to record yourselves playing Subnautica BLIND, and you upload the series to YT please hit me up on the forum and I will flock over to watch your entire playthrough start to finish like a zombie. I won't eat, I won't sleep, I won't shower, I won't take the trash out, I won't even feed my cats and dogs, I just want to see you enjoy the game just like I enjoyed it. But be aware that I'm very good at seeing through the bullshit, so if you only play the game to get views, likes, and other crap like that when in reality you have no interest in the game I will be able to see through this immediately and I won't even finish watching episode 1.
Also by the way, if any of you had played and enjoyed Subnautica as much as I did and you've been looking for quality playtrhoughs of this game (in the case of Subnautica quality = someone who bloody bothers scanning AND reading ALL of the notes) I highly recommend watching Volton Elda's playthough. That guy's blind playtrhough of Subnautica is truly blind and truly good (he does do justice to the game by exploring, scanning, and reading everything, and it's so immersed into the story and atmosphere of the game that - just like all of us that have enjoyed this game - he can't wait to go back to playing it, I think he even mentions at some point that he's postponed everything else just to play this game, so yeah...)
I've watched that guy's playthrough I think 5 or 6 times (start to finish that is), for over 100 hours I believe, the guy has genuine moments of WHOA, WOW, and WTF! Subnautica does pull several such moments from everyone who's a fan of exploration and survival games, but who also likes story / lore-based games...
So anyway, sorry for the long rant, but if there is one game in the entire history of video games that I wish everyone, their grandma, and their pets played it's none other than Subnautica. The immersion and sense of discovery and conquering an alien world as a random nobody that Subnautica gives is unmatched by any other game, not by garbage Witcher, not by garbage Skyrim or other abominations that I've never played but which I couldn't care less about. Those games are just aggressive, gore-y video games, but Subnautica (which has no lethal weapons, by the way, you only have a knife and that's it! You have to survive and conquer the unknown using science, your wits and the knowledge you gather, and that's it!) is not meant to be you killing everything, it's meant to be you uncovering mysteries, exploring the surrounding, surviving and escaping from an alien world...
Also, one last thing I'll say is that - should any of you play this game - make sure to save the game often (I'd say every 10-30 minutes) because there may still be some bugs (especially on consoles) that can crash the game at any time and if you don't save often you might lose a lot of progress. Luckily, in a game so immersive as Subnautica is, losing progress is not a big deal as you will be gladly going through the lost progress all over again since the world of Subnautica is so beautiful, but still, it's best to just save it
2) Aside from Subnautica, another game (or rather franchise) that's great for single player is Legend of Grimrock.
LoG is a puzzle-heavy grid-based dungeon crawler (similar to Eye of the Beholder if you remember that game from the 90s I believe... or from late-80s, I don't remember the exact year), but which also has a good story, but also great puzzles.
There are 2 LoG games, the 2nd one being the better of the 2, but - as usual - start with the 1st game in the series and if you enjoy the first LoG then the 2nd one will be even better. If you start with LoG2 directly then LoG might not seem like too much fun anymore given that the 2nd game is much improved when compared to the 1st one.
But like I said, these games are very puzzle-heavy, so if you're just a moron that only likes "pew pew I killed you" type of de-humanizing games then LoG is not for you, but if you do like stories and puzzles then LoG is arguably the best in this genre of games.
And if you do play and enjoy LoG try Vaporum next, because Vaporum is almost identical to LoG but set up in a steampunk setting instead of a mythological one (or whatever LoG's setting is, I'm not sure)...
But yeah, both Vaporum and LoG are the same type of game, so if you enjoy one of them you'll enjoy the other too, I can guarantee it as I've finished LoG 2 over 20 times on the hardest difficulty and Vaporum over 30 times on the hardest difficult... ok, Vaporum is pretty short, I'll admit. If you don't bother pixel-hunting for secrets (and you should absolutely do pixel-hunt since the stuff you find in secret areas are so worth the trouble), you will finish the game in 9-12 hours probably, so it's a very short game. With pixel-hunting you might add 2-3 more hours to the gameplay, so even with that it's still a short game, so Vaporum can be beaten multiples times a week once you've gotten the hang of it.
LoG (especially the 2nd one in the series), however will take you a lot more time to beat if you're a completitionist. I think you can easily sink 60+ into LoG2 if you decide to uncover every single one of the 71 secrets and 11 treasures, so be ready for a long playthrough.
But like I said, you do need to enjoy solving puzzles (some of them really tough and non-intuitive whose solutions you might even google since they're brutally hard if you're not into puzzle solving... I shamelessly admit that - despite of how much I enjoyed LoG2 - I still had to look some of the puzzles up in google because they had no solution in my simplistic mind
)... After the first 3-4 times, however, I already know LoG2 by heart too... just like Vaporum and just like Subnautica
3) last but definitely not least, if - through some odd chance - you've never heard of HoMM (Heroes of Might and Magic) in general, but about HoMM 3 in particular and you do enjoy TBS mythology-based games (with dragons, elves, titans, hydras, etc) then H3 is my absolute favorite in the genre and in this franchise.
H3 can be played both in single player and multiplayer and, while for most people PvP is where H3 shines, for me single player is the way to go because I suck at PvP and everyone kicks my ass
But in single player (on maps that are auto-generated but edited by myself) I can play at my own pace and take anywhere from 6-7 hours (if I'm lucky with the RNG) to up to 12 hours or more on a single game...
Also, please be aware that H3 (and the HoMM franchise in general) is very tactical and has a HUGE learning curve. For example, when I first found and played this game in 1999 it had 9 factions to choose from, and I chose one faction that I've stuck with for nearly 6 months before even trying out other factions, and even though in those 6 months I got a decent idea of how to play the game to beat the computer (not even on the hardest difficulty by the way) I still didn't know too much of the tricks that I know now, and when I played against other players I still got my ass whooped...
It took me about 1 year to be a decent PvP player and to finally learn how to beat the AI on the hardest difficulty, so be prepared to waste a huge chunk of your life understanding and mastering the game.
But again, if you do like mythology and you enjoy TBS games there's absolutely no game in the entire history of this genre that's better than H3 in my opinion. At least not games based on mythological creatures, because otherwise I think the Civilization series is also a TBS game that might be more complex than Heroes 3, but when it comes to mythology H3 tops everything...
So yeah, these are my recommendations... treat these games fair (without cheating and without looking anything up about them... ok, maybe you can look up tutorials and guides on H3, this game has no spoilers attached to it and you do need to know all tricks in order to master the game, but the other 3 games that I've mentioned should be treated fair) and you will have amazing experiences if you do enjoy these types of games, I can guarantee it
