For those of us on a tight budget, here are the top 8 best stand alone Steam games for less then $10.

8. Bullet Candy ($3.99)

“Bullet Candy is a fast paced, action packed shooter. Viewed from a top-down perspective, Bullet Candy allows for a true 360° shoot-em-up experience. With all of your enemies in view at all times it’s easy to see and, more importantly, shoot them into tiny little pieces.” – Steam Description

Bullet Candy is a very tidy Indie game, reminiscent and most likely inspired by Geometry wars. My only negative is that you are defaulted to firing all the time, although it makes the game unique I prefer choosing when I want to fire.

Although at only $3.99 it’s definitely worth a look.

Bullet Candy @ Steam

7. Geometry Wars ($3.99)

“Geometry Wars: Retro Evolved is a old school style shooter, but remixed for the 21st century with next generation graphics and deep, modern gameplay. Playing is simple: you are a geometric “ship” trapped in a grid world, facing off against waves of deadly wanderers, snakes, and repulsars. Your aim is to survive long enough to set a high score!” – Steam Description

Originally a mini-game in Project Gotham Racing now Geometry Wars has spawned its own franchise with a spin-off already released and a sequel on the way.

It’s an extremely simple game; destroy anything that moves and don’t die, yet it is done in such a smoothly stylistic manner with vibrant graphics that it keeps calling you back to play more.

And again at only $3.99 it’s a bargain.

Geometry Wars @ Steam

6. Peggle Deluxe ($9.99)

“Take your best shot with energizing arcade fun! Aim, shoot, clear the orange pegs, then sit back and cheer as 10 whimsical teachers guide you to Peggle greatness. Conquer 55 fanciful levels with 10 mystical Magic Powers, racking up bonus points and shots you’ll smile about for weeks. Face off against your friends in Duel Mode, or tackle 75 extra-tricky challenges. It’s luck and skill and joyous thrills, and amidst all this fevered action only one question remains: Can you become a Peggle Master?” – Steam Description

You either love it or hate it, it’s a deceptively simple looking game, yet trying to get the ball to bounce where you want it to leads to a highly frustrating and addictive experience.

As a bonus if you buy the Orange Box you get a HL2/TF2 version of Peggle, which contains Peggle puzzles based on scenes and characters from the Orange Box.

Peggule Deluxe @ Steam

5. Everyday Shooter ($9.99)

“Everyday Shooter is an album of games exploring the expressive power of abstract shooters. Dissolute sounds of destruction are replaced with guitar riffs harmonizing over an all-guitar soundtrack, while modulating shapes celebrate the flowing beauty of geometry.” – Steam Description

Everyday Shooter is almost worth getting just for the outstanding audio-visual experience, unlike Bullet Candy it feels more like an evolution of Geometry Wars rather then a clone. Although it plays as an overhead shooter the ‘experience’ comes across as very similar to Rez.

Everyday Shooter @ Steam

4. Deus Ex: Game of the Year Edition ($9.99)

“The year is 2052 and the world is a dangerous and chaotic place. Terrorists operate openly – killing thousands; drugs, disease and pollution kill even more. The world’s economies are close to collapse and the gap between the insanely wealthy and the desperately poor grows ever wider. Worst of all, an ages old conspiracy bent on world domination has decided that the time is right to emerge from the shadows and take control. No one believes they exist. No one but you.” – Steam Description

Deus Ex was originally released in 2000 and built on the Unreal Tournament engine as a Hybrid Action Role-playing game, and no doubt heavily inspired by the classic game System Shock, if you haven’t played it yet you’ll find it still stands up today as a decent game.

Also with Deus Ex 3 coming out in 2009 if you HAVE played it before you defiantly want to replay it again to refresh your memories.

Deus Ex @ Steam

3. Painkiller Gold Edition ($9.99)

“Painkiller is a first-person horror shooter, designed to satisfy a gamer’s hunger for intense, fast-paced action. It’s an adrenaline addict’s nightmare, where hellish monsters swarm in seemingly endless mobs.” – Steam Description

To get accepted into Heaven you have to kill 4 of Lucifer’s Generals… although there is a story in this game you’ll probably find yourself skipping it as this is a hardcore giblet fest where the whole point is to mindlessly inflict as much carnage as humanly possible.  Painkiller does feel like a throwback to the Doom era of FPS when things were still simple.

Yet although simple in game play, aka… no need to reload, crouch, find items or explore it’s still surprisingly addictive and more-ish to play, maybe just to see how much gore you can produce using the devastating weapons.

The Gold Edition also comes with the expansion pack.

Painkiller @ Steam

2. Longest Journey ($9.99)

“The Longest Journey is an amazing graphical adventure, where the player controls the protagonist, April Ryan, on her journey between parallel universes. Embark on an exciting and original journey of discovery, where you will explore, solve puzzles, meet new people, face terrifying monsters, learn, grow, and live the adventure of a lifetime!” – Steam Description

Released in the same year as Deus Ex, Longest Journey offers very high production values, a mature storyline (with noticeably mature language) and unique puzzles.  Although very linear and added to the fact that the graphics haven’t aged well (pre-rendered) you’ll find the storyline easily makes up for its shortcomings.

Also with a Metacritic score of 91 if you are yet to play it I highly recommend you grab this game as soon as possible.

Longest Journey @ Steam

1. Audio Surf ($9.99)

“Audiosurf is a music-adapting puzzle racer where you use your own music to create your own experience. The shape, the speed, and the mood of each ride is determined by the song you choose. You earn points for clustering together blocks of the same color on the highway, and compete with others on the internet for the high score on your favorite songs.” – Steam Description

Audiosurf is a very simplistic game, collect blocks and try and build a combo to your selected music. Yet it does it in such a addictive way that you’ll want to play all your songs to try and compete for the best possible score on the leaderboard.

A little warning though, if you are even the slightest bit prone to epilepsy I would stay well clear of this game.

Audio Surf @ Steam