One of the biggest surprises during the Summer Game Fest Kickoff was Geoff Keighley's reveal of Goat Simulator 3. The trailer was a parody of the long-awaited and unreleased Dead Island 2. Indeed, it was enough to fool most viewers – until the goats started causing chaos instead of the zombies.
The new Goat Simulator looks like a weird and wonderful time for people who love simulator games. But the title is a bit of a ways away, so it's understandable if people might want to try a few other fun simulator games in the meantime. Fortunately, the sim genre has experienced a bit of a renaissance while on Steam and PC.
10 Planet Coaster Lets People Create Their Own Theme Park
The developers at Frontier Developments released Planet Coaster in 2016, and have been working on it ever since. Here, the player becomes a theme park owner and designer and can change the park however they want. Because the park is fully customizable, it can be built in a completely unrealistic way if the player wants it.
However, players will also have to deal with customers. It's always a balance between ensuring the customer is happy and that the player feels like their creativity is rewarded. And even better, players can share their creations with other people around the world, meaning that players can incorporate real people into their creations.
9 Wobbledogs Asks Players To Take Care Of Genetically Altered Dogs
Unsurprisingly, a game about genetically engineered puppies will get a little ridiculous. Developed by Animal Rising, Wobbledogs makes gamers into pet owners. Here, they take care of genetically-altered and constantly mutating dogs. Though this sounds dark, Wobbledogs' intention is to be a light, stress-free game.
The dogs do change over time, but mostly the player is just there to take care of them. This entails creating giant dog houses to give them a place to sleep and relax. The crafting here is seemingly limitless, and players can even create giant mazes for their dogs to chill in.
8 The Sims 4 Brings All The Chaos Sims Games Have Been Known For Into New Settings
The Sims made simulation games into the popular genre they are today. And with Maxis' The Sims 4, released in 2014, EA had another massive hit on their hands. As ever, players are able to build their own houses and control the lives of their individual Sims characters.
Everyone's used to the chaos that comes with allowing their Sim to do whatever only to come back and find they've burned down the house, but Sims 4 offers new options. With multiple expansion packs, players can now transition their Sims anywhere from sustainable living environments to the snow-capped mountains.
7 Scrap Mechanic Sees An Alien Farmer Battling Against Out Of Control Robots
Scrap Mechanic was developed by Axolot Games and released in 2016. As the name indicates, players use their mechanical abilities to make useful items out of scrap. But where the scrap comes from is what makes this game really fun. In this world, players find themselves stranded on an alien planet with worker robots that have gone out of control.
The player must survive against these dangerous Farmbots, destroying them to create items. The game is still getting support, even now, with the developers recently adding a challenge mode update.
6 Just Cause 4 Lets Players Fly A Wingsuit Through Tornadoes While Fighting Armies
The Just Cause studio Avalanche has been a staple at Square-Enix for years, and 2018's Just Cause 4 is the latest in the company's franchise. Take on the role of Rico Rodriguez, a rogue agent who travels to the country of Solis to discover its secrets and deal with its oppressed societies.
Just Cause 4 is one of the few AAA sandbox games that gets it right. Players are equipped with an awesome wingsuit to skydive and base jump as they please. Additionally, players are able to use the game's wide variety of vehicles. Meanwhile, they'll also have to deal with extreme weather like tornadoes and storms while fighting entire armies.
5
ARK: Survival Evolved Sets Players Loose In A World Where It's Possible To Control Dinosaurs
ARK has been hanging around in the background for years. But these days, with Hollywood superstar Vin Diesel acting in trailers for its sequel, everyone else has been talking about it a bit more. From the developers over at Studio Wildcard, ARK: Survival Evolved begins with players being trapped on a strange island, freezing and alone.
From there, players will have to find a way to survive, whether finding food or building shelters. But, of course, all of that becomes more difficult when giant dinosaurs are looking to turn players into snacks. Fortunately, players can eventually gain control over even the mighty dinosaurs.
4 Raft: The Final Chapter Asks Players To Build Their Own Home On The Ocean
Raft comes from the developers at Redbeet Interactive, and was released in June 2022. As one might guess, Raft puts players in a survival adventure that begins with them being trapped on a raft. Immediately, the players must find a way to survive being trapped at sea, but the requirements change as the game goes on.
Players can build their own house on the ocean either with the help of their friends or on their own. And as they continue to play, they can discover more about the game's story and world. Civilization is left in small pockets that the player can discover while attempting to piece together what happened to everyone else.
3 Kerbal Space Program Puts Players In Charge Of An Alien Space Program
In 2015, developer Squad introduced what would become a huge hit on PC with Kerbal Space Program. In this game, players are the head of the space program for the alien race of the Kerbals. As the head of the program, the player decides what the characters work on to help them get into space.
Players can decide what kind of spaceships are built. However, not every ship will actually work. The wacky part of this game is that since everything works on semi-realistic rules of physics, the build results may fail miserably if they're not sound. Still, players can eventually escape and reach the stars, even finding other planets in this indie sandbox title.
2 House Flipper Lets Players Fix And Sell Homes To People
While it's not likely anyone will get to become a Property Brother, House Flipper can make players feel like they're the star of their own HGTV show. Empyrean and Frozen District released House Flipper originally in 2018. In the game, players buy ruined houses and find ways to fix them up for the sake of selling them for a big payoff.
However, what makes the game fun is how Empyrean is constantly adding more to the base game via some impressive expansion packs. The game offers things like Garden Flipper, Luxury Flipper, and even an HGTV DLC where players can pretend like they're on the popular network.
1 Teardown Is A Voxel-Based Heist Game
Everyone's wanted to be part of a heist at one point or another. That's why the genre works so well and continues getting films and television series. In Teardown, developer Tuxedo Labs has allowed players to create the perfect heist. In this game, everything is fully destructible, which can work both in and against the player.
So long as the player is willing to get creative, they can blow up anything to find a way out. Teardown is smart enough to offer players a sandbox mode where they can do anything they want, and a campaign mode, which ramps up in intensity from start to finish.