This turned into a great reference for anyone looking for action games - thanks to all who posted. Here are a couple more I've played that didn't get mentioned for anyone interested, as well as a brief summary of those listed in the OP:
Ninja Gaiden - Regarded as having some of the best, albeit hardest combat, ever. Fast, varied movesets and high player mobility against aggressive enemies in fairly large numbers - with enough care and balance to make it work. The Sigma release on PC is perfectly playable.
Ninja Gaiden 2 - Same as the first, but dialled up to 11 - for better and worse. Less polished/balanced but about as exhilarating as an action game can be. The Sigma release is terrible. Either play it on Xbox 360, or install the NGS2 Black Mod on PC to mostly undo the damage.
Godhand - Shinji Mikami blowing off steam after making RE4. Made without much of a budget and close to zero creative/financial expectations, it's a 3D beat 'em up with tank controls. Somehow turned out to be one of the best in the genre from a purely gameplay point of view.
God of War (original series) - Kratos, before therapy. Combat is much faster than the reboot, with plenty of exploration and puzzle solving along the way as you set out to curb stomp the Greek pantheon.
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Dante's Inferno - Very loosely inspired by the epic poem. It's an edgier God of War in which Dante deus vults his way through hell.
Killer is Dead - Heavily stylized, combo orientated slasher from Grasshopper
Castlevania: Lords of Shadow - 3D reboot of Castlevania. Gameplay is in line with God of War, with some boss fights taking inspiration from Shadow of the Colossus. Some nice art direction.
Otogi: Myth of Demons - Early FromSoftware fever dream with combat somewhere between Onimusha and DMC
Enclave - Fun ARPG/Hack and Slash game from Starbreeze. Bit on the janky side, but not without charm.
Kingdoms of Amalur - Light-hearted, colourful semi-linear ARPG with solid hack n slash gameplay. Designed by Ken Rolston, lead designer on Morrowind and Oblivion.
Splatterhouse (2010) - Beat 'em Up / Hack n Slash reimagining of the arcade classic.
Blades of Time - Stripperiffic hack and slash with some nice environments, fluid combat, an interesting rewind mechanic and abysmal voice acting.
Lollipop Chainsaw - Stripperiffic hack and slash from Suda51 and James Gunn. Pom-poms are your primary attack. A chainsaw is your secondary. Funny, with surprisingly good combat. Getting remastered this year.
Bloodrayne 2 - Stripperiffic vampire hack and slash. Combat is surprisingly nuanced, especially on higher difficulties.
Soul Sacrifice - Not a hack n slash, but an interesting magic oriented action RPG that went largely unnoticed as a result of being a Vita exclusive. Emulatable on PC.
Afraid I've already exhausted Platinum's catalogue, but thanks for the recommendation.
RPCS3. Mileage may vary based on the game and your hardware, but in my experience it's been surprisingly painless. Made it through 3 titles without crashes, which is more than a can say for current year.
Check out their compatibility chart, and possibly recent videos on YT for particular titles. Many games with "ingame" playability play perfectly if you have a beefy enough CPU.
Damnit. I intentionally avoided "got the chop" as to avoid ambiguity.
Did the ethics department get the axe?
That wasn't really what I was looking for, but now I'm thinking it is.
Great list! I'm not partial to any generation, just looking for something preferably fast-paced, challenging and mechanically complex.
I've played through a couple of those. Onimusha was good - will have to check out the sequels. Genji looks promising as well. And Nightshade is, by all appearances, Bayonetta before Bayonetta?
Nah, I've played enough early PS action games to believe it. I'll definitely give that one a try.
Yeah man, I thought Nioh 2 was great. Then I unlocked S-rank agility and discovered it had an entire animation cancelling system, at which point it starts playing a bit like high-stakes character action. Easily one of the most compelling combat systems I've had the pleasure of mastering.
First one it is then. Thankfully emulation is pretty solid for PS1-3.
Sounds good, I'll give it a try thanks.
Got any recommendations on where I should jump into the series?
DMC I've done to death. Batman never really worked for me, not sure why.
I've been meaning to try Infamous. What's the moment to moment gameplay like? I'm usually not great at repetitive gameplay loops.
Can't say I have, but it looks promising. The only video I could find of it was from the first chapter; I assume pacing and difficulty picks up moving forward?
Depends on the combat - first prize is something relatively fast paced, but decisive and with room for strategy. Ninja Gaiden 2 being the epitome of that to me.
The stance switching looks interesting. Does it have a decent amount of depth?
Japans first diversity hire.
I'd seen BeamNG used spring-mass systems for their deformation, but given that damage was limited to certain zones in GTA V, I'd assumed they used pre-authored damage morphs & debris meshes like everyone else. Got any links, it would be an interesting read?
As for the expense, requirements dependent, you might be surprised. I played around with soft body in Unreal a bit. A really performant PBD implementation was actually quite quick to get up and running. Non-linear Gauss-Seidel solvers can be heavily parallelized on GPU through clever clustering and graph colouring. Collision remains a bit of a sticking point - I got about half-way towards good results with low resolution proxy hulls, but then Unreal went and changed physics APIs.
Good characterisation will always make undesirable traits less grating. That's what makes entertainment so effective at normalizing them.
Given that the BBC chose a flaming faggot to reboot a long running series, one which was already quite liberal in theme, I find it hard to believe this wasn't always the intention.
GTA has soft-body physics?
On the one hand, it's further looting and degradation of European culture. On the other, I can wholly believe that is, and will forever be a virgin goddess.
Each to their own. I also liked the characterisation of the Doom Guy, but that's where my appreciation of the lore/story ended. The need to expand the universe and add gravity/grandiosity is ultimately what moved the game away from being what it was good at. As a result, it went from being a short and sharp corridor shooter to including a hub, replete with upgrades and other bullshit, and a bunch of uninspired and oversized "modern" levels to sell the premise.
Definitely agree on TLoU though. Tranny killed the beloved protagonist, and with it the franchise. Didn't help turning the second most liked character into a bulldyke who wouldn't tolerate bigot sandwiches in a world of starvation, either.
Rage 2 somehow managed the worst of both worlds. It had an enjoyable enough core loop, but insisted on not giving you a chance to use it. Instead, you got inundated with fetch quests and lengthy driving sequences to promote the open world design. A large, open world filled with locations and factions devoid of personality, and made with none of the artistry of the original.
A real pity; It reminded me of Borderlands 3 in that regard.
Actually replaying it at the moment. It had everything going against it - zero budget, rushed production, tank controls in a 3d brawler and IGN being well, IGN.
Turns out an excellent core gameplay loop and an unapologetic commitment to fun is all it takes to make a cult hit that's still relevant today.
Definitely a factor - for games that need one. Doom Eternal, in my opinion, is an example of where an expanded universe, lore and story actually detracted from the game. Some would argue that the increased mechanical complexity did as well, with many favouring the simpler Doom 2016.
I think, as a designer, you're ultimately crafting an experience. It needs to be cohesive and it needs to be compelling. Anything that doesn't add to that need not apply.
A lot of nostalgia on that list. I've always had a soft spot for cheesy sword and sorcery, so Xena was a guilty pleasure. MediEval, Vampire Hunter D and Nightmare Creatures where all memorable as well. The others I'm not familiar with - will work my way through them as time permits.
I actually replayed Blade of Darkness when it landed on Steam - it's aged remarkably well. Unfortunate what became of Rune 2 though. On a similar note, did you ever try Enclave?