This is mostly for people who are wondering if they can run games on their craptops like mine.
Modern is like from 2010?? in my mind 2010 is still recent.
I know there are minimum requirements shown, but I Iike having some anecdotal info, maybe you do too.

FYI, I'm not very picky on graphics. I am pretty picky on fps, especially for fast paced games. bad fps gives me headaches. If you like nice visuals, don't use Intel HD GPUs. Better CPUs probably help too.

Specs:
Intel i3-6100U @ 2.3GHz
8 Gb RAM
Intel HD 520 GPU

Right now I'm playing Grim Dawn at around 40-60 fps.
Pretty much everything on low as hell except textures? Also NO shadows at all.
Also turned res down to 1280 x 720.

In my experience, shadows destroy my setup. Probably the setting that drains the most frames.
Also not having anything else running in the background.

Other newer games that ran fine (with low graphics settings most of the time)
- Divinity OS 1. Enhanced Edition.
- X-Com Enemy Unknown Complete
- Dragon Age: Origins (Probably stretching the 'new' game genre it's almost 10 years old)
- Ziggurat (Ran well enough for me to play for like 2 hours, then I got bored. Playable though)

Games that were unplayable, most probably due to stutter/low ass fps, even after tweaking.
- The Witcher 2
- Dragon's Dogma
- Shadow Warrior 2

I'll periodically update the list, maybe.

I think my laptop is even crappier than yours :-)
I've got an intel i3-M380 2.53GHz
Nvidia 310M
4 GB

Haven't run anything after 2010 apart from various indie adventures and Age of decadence (which runs fine on the lower settings).
Tried Witcher 2, doesn't work.
Dragon age: Origins does work, as does Risen.

As my laptop is running on Linux Mint, game options is considerably less.

/proc/cpuinfo says it's a 800Mhz dual core (though looking it up, says it's a 2Ghz dual core). 4Gb (2Gb initially). Newegg Ref

Games i played included Schenzen IO, and bionic dues. Couldn't really do anything more than that.

my new laptop is an i5 7200u and has newer nvidia chip with 2gb dedicated. it works for exactly what I wanted it for, playing older games, emulators and somewhat modern games. anything "big budget" worth my time can be played on my one x.

I have a recent low-end laptop (intel celeron, I believe, no discrete gpu), and Wonder Boy: The Dragon's Trap runs well on it. (Basically, if the game runs on your hardware, it will probably run well.)

Timespinner runs well on my desktop, which has no discrete gpu and with the cpu (core i5-4670) underclocked to 800MHz due to overheating issues. Owlboy also runs, but after a while the cpu overheats slightly and things slow down just a bit, though pausing the game could fix that, and the game still remains playable.

Intel Celeron with integrated graphics.

Nothing with Shader Model 2, or any graphical demand newer than that (equivalent to DirectX9.0c).

I have been able to play the entire Shandowrun series (all three, from Hairbrained Schemes), which includes some pretty good UGC. (I have to play them at 640×480 resolution, and it takes a good minute to load the game, then another minute or two to open the save game, and the whole game-playing process is an exercise in precision to minimize redraw!)

Shadowrun Returns
Shadowrun: Dragonfall
Shadowrun: Hong Kong

KotOR runs, as does the sequel (but not the Gog version; I have only been able to use my original disc version), Civilization III and Civilization IV both run fine, but become unplayable after about two dozen turns (single core processor can't handle the arithmetic load). But, I have beaten Alpha Centauri and Master of Orion and the sequel both play well. :)

Europa Universalis plays, but I haven't played it or its sequels enough to say if they become unplayable like the Civs.Hearts of Iron II works fine (and I think III, as well, though I haven't bought it).

Deus Ex is good, Vampire the Masquerade: Redemption works, nut not the sequel Bloodlines, Age of Wonders and its (first) two sequels I like, too. Divine Divinity, but not the sequels; Fallout and the first sequel run fine, but not III, or any of its expansions, or IV, obviously.

Arcanum, All the Elder Scrolls games up to Morrowind (but not Oblivion), Planescape: Torment, the Balder's Gates, Icewind Dales and Neverwinter Nights franchises all play well (lots of UGC from the community there), the first three Thiefs, System Shock and the sequel both run (but without anti-aliasing the first game is unplayable), and simpler games like FTL and Sanctuary (Black).
Septerra Core is a good JRPG.

I like Rome: Total War, too, but Gog doesn't provide it.

Point-and-click adventures tend to be fine (but not some newer ones that require better graphics), like The Longest Journey and Siberia, and the first couple of Broken Swords, too.
UFO: Aftermath is good; UFO: Aftershock won't run.

Oh, Dex, Nox, and Spellcraft all run fine, but I tend to dislike RTS. Tron, Project Eden and Torchlight are fine, but the sequel is beyond my hardware.

I just bought Splinter Cell (again) because it was fun to play. My disc version didn't like this laptop (I have completed it on a previous laptop, though), and wouldn't draw the infrared image (from wearing goggles) so I stopped playing at that point. (It might be a graphics-related problem, though the game doesn't need Shader Model 2.) If you can't see the fading heat signature of fingerprints then you can't steal the codes to hack electronic keypad operated doors later in the game.

There are quite a few games around, if you look for them, but there is no filter to help sort the titles.

edit: Gog and their hyperlink parsing requires hand-holding AGAIN
edit2: more games added.

I just bought an 8 terabyte hdd it was mighty expensive it was. You too, I thought I was the only one who absolutely hated TBS and RTS?!?

I don't hate it, I just find it too irritating to play lying down. Hence I mostly play TBS, since I can take as long as I want between turns. That said, I've been playing Deus Ex for so long that I can still play it (on the highest difficulty), since all the controls are committed to muscle memory. ^_^

A few games that run on older systems:

Some of the earlier Falcom games:
Such as
- Ys: the oath in Felghana.
- Ys: the Ark of Napishtim.
- Zwei: The Arges Adventure.

Maybe these games are too old?

Ultimate General series: should run on fairly low end systems.

If those two Ys games will run on a computer, there is a good chance that Ys Origin will, as the three games use the same engine.

I do, howeve, note that those games all predate 2010, if you go by their original Japanese release dates.

(Also, Garumin: A Monstrous Adventure is another older Falcom game that would probably run; the bug that made New Game + inaccessible in the GOG version has been fixed, so you don't have to worry about it now.)

@Dtgreene: My friend and I where talking about Garumin recently, it is nice to know that no longer has issues.


- Sunless sea
I was also running Sunless sea on my previous system fine: although I tend not to max out settings.

- Divinity: original Sin
On a different note: I ran into significant lag in Divinity Original Sin (not on maxed out settings) when I changed the difficulty level to a higher one: First play-through was on medium difficulty. Probably because of the tendency for greater combo effect attacks by the AI than it uses on settings with a lower difficulty.

If you like old school fps's, check out dusk and Ion maiden. They both run well on lower spec rigs while still playing great in my experience :)

I bet UnderRail would fit the bill: https://www.gog.com/game/underrail

Currently 60% off, which makes it a steal. Specs:

System: Windows XP SP3 / Vista / 7 / 8 / 10
Processor: 1.6Ghz
Memory: 2 GB RAM
Graphics: Graphhics: GPU that supports Shader Model 2.0 or higher
Storage: 3 GB
Other: UnderRail requires a minimum screen resolution of 1024x768 or higher

Might I suggest anything by Jeff Vogel?

(I thought this thread was about low end specs, like a 286. Like this.

I assume this wasn't aimed at me; I have to wait a couple of nanocenturies to load a spreadsheet!
Even a game like FTL takes a good minute to load. I have a TBS gaming experience just to start a game …! :o

edit: hyperlink syntax