Nope.

39) Correct

38) Medieval history...

39) Nope - see above

38) Correct! Civ might teach you some slightly odd history lessons...

36) Hey, this is still my top 50. I love this game...

Unanswered:

37 - An iconic duo take some time apart as one focuses on his family and the other on his career

36 - Advertised as having revolutionary NPC AI, which ultimately turned out to be so bad it's the basis for a meme format - this game's music over a conversation

35 - We couldn't figure out how to follow on from the last game's story, so we'll pretend you actually failed the campaign and Earth was conquered - and go from there. 

I was talking about the Civilopedia. This is an Area where the Age of Empires series is seriously lacking, as the gameplay is a major oversimplification of actual events and often veers heavily into artistic license. Then again I'm a big history buff, so the Age of Empires series didn't impress me much in that regard.

As for Colonial Marines: Even stinkers have their fans. And now that the AI has finally been fixed (seriously, all because of a typo in one word???), it's actually as good as it was advertised in that regard.

#48: One of the later games for the Neo-Geo, but also one of the best - and certainly the best of it's series

Hint #1: The run&gun series is well known for their hilarious and top-notch sprite animations.

Hint #2: In this remake of an early title of this series, you first fight through an army of soldiers, but end up fighting off an alien invasion halfway through the game.

Hint #3: The series has already been found out before, (Metal Slug), but not the correct title yet.

#41: Greetings, Warlord! Let the war begin!

Hint #1: This is an old turn-based strategy RPG, but the series got more known later on for their RTS spinoff series.

#40: A very unusual RTS in space, where you start with a small capital ship and 3 planets to govern, but the map (and thus the number of planets to govern) and fleet grows at specific points in the story when you reach a new rank.

Hint #1: You start this game with your main planet almost in ruins, with most buildings massively damaged.

#38: A PC-exclusive Pinball game with a horror theme.

#37: Bring your console-making back from the brink of death by hiring 2 kids and beat your programmers into submission in RPG-like combats.

#41: Romance of the three kingdoms?

#40: Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri?

#41: Nope, nothing in that regard. But I was sure this was pretty much the most difficult to find in this list (other than my number 1, and for the same reason), as the series is very obscure these days.

#40: I said RTS, SMAC is turn-based. That said, it's certainly a great game and thus coming at later point in this list.

41: Is this just one of the Warlords games? I remember really enjoying Warlords Battlecry II, though it doesn't make it into my top 50 anymore.

Baldur's Gate is one of my most beloved gaming series. But for 20 years the series was dormant. Black Isle studios are no longer in existance. So it seemed that was it for the series. But somehow Larian Studios got the rights to the name and a contract with D&D license holder Wizard of the Coast and now we finally have a third entry - although still in early access.

Larian Studios is known for it's Divinity series, which is strongly influenced by the Infinity engine games including Baldur's Gate. With the Divinity series Larian already modernized the formula and developed it further with more gameplay options and ideas. Now all this experience flows into the successor to the series.

The biggest change at first: to my surprise and initial confusion this game no longer employs real time with pause combat, but instead true turn-based combat. Which is fine, after I was initially confused because I expected it to follow that tradition. But generally turn-based combat is closer to the pen&paper RPG roots and makes it also much easier to control the flow of battle. The pause-based combat was in the background counted in turns anyways, and the combat was either letting them autoattack if I was more powerful, or pausing every second or so to issue new commands. Having outright a turn-based system makes it all actually feel more natural.

Another big change: if you roll some important action you actually see a 20-sided dice being rolled. This may feel not as immersive, but on the other hand you see why your action fails or succeed, instead of it just happening.

Besides these two changes and the obvious visual upgrades, a lot of the series workings are still present. The game is all about player choices. That starts with character generation in which you can detail all about your hero, from looks to skills. That goes on with combat, which offers you a lot of options, often depending on the abilities of the characters in your party. And that includes conversation options, which also often depend on your skills. And it is kinda interesting, if you for instance try to persuade someone you still throw a dice and it can fail, which influences how the conversation will go. So like in previous entries, different playthroughs can feel and go very differently.

The game starts off pretty epic and at the same time strongly rooted into D&D world setting. D&D has creatures named illithids or mind flayer, very alien creatures that float andhave tentacles on the head. They procreate by infecting the brains of intelligent species with their larvae, which enthralls the victims and makes them suspectible to the mind flayers mind control and feeds of the brain, until it turns into a fully grown illithid. The intro starts with a nautilid ship (think flying squid) attacks a city to harvest people for infection.

But on their trail comes their sworn enemies, dragon riders named githyanki, and the dragons attack the nautilid. The mind flayers jump to another plane, as the world in D&D has many different planes of existance. The plane they are entering is an evil domain, otherwise known as hell. The githyanki follow and the demons are pissed at the intruders, so a three way fight between these three factions start.

You play a character that is victim of the mind flayers, a larvae already implanted, but not yet mind-controlled. The fighting and damage to the ship frees you from the pod you are in and you can now move over a nautilid ship that is partially destroyed and place of a fierce battle. That is a very engaging start and already the stakes are set for your characters, because few people really like their brain getting eaten.

The game is still in early access and there are a few glitches I hope get fixed until the final game. And so far it only has the first chapter. But it already gives me a lot of enjoyment. If the glitches are fixed and the game gets bigger, this game might very well rise a lot in my list next year. Or the final game disappoints, in which case it may decline. But for now, for the early release it is my #39 spot, still considering it's status.

I played the game on Stadia, but it is also available for PC on Steam and GOG. Both shops are also offering the old games, if you want the comparison (and these are great games, although 20 years old).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wWHEw36gTwU&ab_channel=IGN

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o5xpbAsly48&ab_channel=GameSpot

Let's have another hint for #37:

#38: Pikmin guessed by cosmic_drift

#37
Your first task: dig out a skull.
Said skull gives you pointers what to do next.
Plant and harvest crop, make wine and beer, give sermons, mine, craft, cook and in the DLC even run a tavern, but don't forget your actual job.
Your actual job is the name of the game.

#36: Assassins Creed Odyssey guessed by Jpcc86

Yes, it is.

Maybe this helps to find out which one: You get greeted by a warrior head saying the first sentence when you start the game, and the second one when you start a scenario.

Speaking of Warlords Battlecry II, can't get it started anymore under Win10. Anybody has an idea how to solve that?