Let's exclude BG3, Witcher and well known classics like FO1/FO2, Ultima and so on.
Here is my list:
HammerHelm - This is an RPG and first person city-builder hybrid. Pretty unique combination, the city-building complements the RPG elements by allowing you to develop your character and deal with world events. Story elements were relatively generic. Don't let the cartoony graphics fool you, the combat is actually moderately challenging (although no where near as hard as the next game on this list).
Underrail - A post-apocalyptic CRPG, albeit everyone is living underground, clearly inspired by Fallout 1/2. You can eventually reach the "top" subway levels, but you never get to go topside (you do go pretty deep underground though). One of the expansions is set in a giant underground Sea (inspired by the Black Sea).
Cool, unique world-building, but writing isn't that great. Key characters feel like quest dispensers and/or cardboard cut-outs. Quests for the most part are somewhat generic although there are one or two really well written quests. I like how magic-style skills are implemented in a scifi manner in the game world.
Very good combat (lot's of unique playstyles), although it's very hard and it's easy to soft-lock yourself if you don't follow a build guide. I found the final boss to be tedious. Depending on certain choice that you make (you can't leave the final area once you get there, albeit its expansive), the ending can be extremely hard, to the point that I don't even know how people beat the final with choices that ramp up the difficult. Final area has a cool dynamic code system (unique code per every playthough) that actually requires some thought (if you figure it out, you get a nice support bonus in the final battle).
Space Wreck - A post-apocalyptic space RPG. Pretty compelling and unique story. It felt very immersive and kept me interested in finding out more about the world.
I like the stylized UI and general visual style. That being said, the game would benefit from more asset variety. I feel the lofi style pushes people away from the game (ignore it, it's a great experience).
Lot's of freedom to complete objectives in different ways. Has a very well fleshed out roleplaying element, but unfortunately I've only completed the game with one character. Although I could see how novel quest solutions (and story beats) open with characters with a different specialization. I am surprised it is not more popular.
Consortium - I didn't actually finish this title, only have 7 hours in it. It's an RPG/FPS hybrid, with the FPS component being terrible (and I am one of those people that thinks the combat in OG Deus Ex is fine and dislikes modern, overly polished console-style FPS combat). It's very text heavy though and you have to do a lot of reading of logs and articles. The text leverages the "show, don't tell" philosophy, it hints at things but even after ~7 hours, the core game narrative wasn't really clear (and I wanted to find out more). Even in ~7 hours that I played, I got really immersed into the world and it was clear it offered something relatively unique. I've been meaning to finish this, should probably do re-install it. :)
As you can see from the screenshot below, the visual are not that good.
For older games, I only know of the cult classics. To be honest, I don't find older (pre mid to late 90s) RPGs that interesting. They tend to be very combat focused, often with a generic fantasy setting (Might & Magic is one example that stands out though).
I've finally got started with Pathfinder: Kingmaker and it's pretty cool. I needed to rethink my approach a couple times because spellcasters seem a little weak in the early game. I like the storybook episodes, and the written components of the game in general.
Never played the Pathfinder series, they've been on my "need to check out" list for a while.
I vaguely remember the series being seen as uneven. I believe Kingmaker is the one that often recommended.
I played Kingmaker last Christmas/New Year's period. It's good but extremely uneven. Some parts are great but some parts are pretty atrocious. It's also absolutely insanely long, I think my playthrough ended up being around 230h - which is just way too much.
From what I've heard the second game - Wrath of the Righteous - is the one people say is really great. I own it and will play it at some point (maybe this Christmas as a tradition...) but frankly Kingmaker wore me out on RPGs in general and Owlcat in particular.
Wrath of the Righteous drops the kingdom management in favour of army management. It takes less time, but is by far and away less satisfying. Outside of that, Wrath is better than Kingmaker I think, but they're both excellent.
In Wrath you can literally be a lich with control of an entire city of reanimated corpses. You can reanimate important side characters as your undead servants. And that's just one of the mythic paths available. You can also be a sentient swarm of locusts. Yes really.
I know what you mean though, they're very long and hard to finish - might be all the reading. Owlcat are old school and, especially since Baldurs Gate 3, their games feel feel dated because of it.
All that epic level stuff is actually one thing that's put me off a bit. I liked the grounded nature of Kingmaker and the super high stakes god-killing style storylines never appeal to me quite as much.
Sounds like they maybe should have just removed it altogether instead of settling for something mediocre like the army management sounds like. I actually enjoyed the kingdom management part of Kingmaker, I just didn't think it fit in very well with the flow of a CRPG.
Yeah I didn't realise what I was getting myself into. We'll see if I have the stamina for it. If I give up I'll probably try The Necromancer's Tale instead.
If you do stick with it, keep in mind that the DLC "Varnhold's Lot" is meant to be played mid-campaign. The best time to play it is after finishing the main story chapter "Season of Bloom" and reading the Unfinished Letter you get in a throne room event. The DLC itself is about 7-10 hours. It's pretty tough though difficulty wise, so be warned. I enjoyed it, but I was playing with some mods like Call of the Wild so that might have made it easier.
Thanks for the tips! I definitely feel less bad about tweaking the difficulty knowing how much I've got ahead of me.
One last tip: give everyone (yes everyone) the Blind Fight feat, and give all your melees Outflank. I did even though I used mods that nerfed flanking (Proper Flanking 2), and even then it was worth it. Blind Fight not only is good against concealment but crucial against gaze attacks unless you want to juggle a bunch of buffs and counters. I suggest just picking it up on everyone around the level 10 point and not worrying about it.