A mastercrafted CRPG from the minds behind Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous, it's a fantastic blend of XCOM gameplay and Owlcat's usual RPG fare with exceptional writing and a sincere love for the setting that isn't ever found outside of the 40k novels.

It has presentation that ranges from ascetic to outright ugly, the onboarding process sucks and the tutorial tells you nothing.

Push past it, though, and you'll find a Civ clone like no other. Warfare is the name of the game and the name has been embroidered with fucking gold. Proxy Studios have refined their game over the last 6 years and the result is a 4x game where each unit feels more like HOMM units than anything else, and the battles taking place on the overworld leads to some amazing campaigns.

One of the rare Diablo clones to actually bother adding anything new to the formula, Inquisitor Martyr (+Prophecy) is a tightly designed looter ARPG with exceptional class design and godly presentation. Has an actual endgame even without DLCs, and a shotgun that feels like heaven.

This and the basegame (DoW2) are still the gold standard for realtime tactics experiences. For 2010, the presentation and voice acting are out of this world, plus the gameplay features a great blend of RPG character progression and realtime cover-centric combat.

Much like Chaos Rising, just with a much grander variety of playable characters and a horde survival mode that beat Vampire Survivors by a decade.

For the longest time, this was the quintessential 40k game. It gets the appeal of Space Marines without giving itself over to quasi-fascism, and though incredibly short the melee-centric gameplay and Gears of War Horde ripoff mode are worth it. Amazing Bolter sound design too, good lord.

A pure passion project, there isn't a single aspect of this game's presentation that isn't absolutely joyful to behind. On the gameplay front, expect FTL: Faster than Light navigation with XCOM combat intermissions and great character progression.

This game and its various standalone successors (Winter Assault, Dark Crusade, Soulstorm) arguably put 40k on the map for many people. Even today, the games - RTS titles with an emphasise on scale - are some of the best in their genre, and they hold up excellently even on the visual department.

This one is a provisional add.

Gameplay is a further refinement of Fatshark's already-perfect Vermintide formula, and it's easily the most jaw-dropping game on the list, but it's rife with bugs even a year out from release and the content available leaves a lot to be desired.

It's ancient history and trying to get it run on Windows 10 might make you fall to Chaos yourself, but this is an excellent little XCOM ripoff that understands the source material infinitely better than the other Chaos Gate game.