Do you have a game you play over and over, when nothing else fits your mood? That game that is infinitely re-playable, somewhat the same every time and somewhat new and interesting?
For me it’s the games in the Orcs Must Die series. But mostly OMD 3. I play the mode called Scramble, where you have to beat 5 rounds of orcs, and they get harder and harder as you progress. There are random things to make it harder (nerfs) and you can choose 1 thing per round to make it easier (buffs). I’ve probably played that something like 300 times now since I beat the main game + DLCs a long while ago. I go into a special mental state while playing, since I know it all so well, and just zone out for about an hour each time.
Patient gamers, what’s your “I will keep playing this game for the rest of my life” fallback?
Another playthrough of BG3.
this is a smartass answer but if no video game is catching your attention, don’t play a video game. do anything else. pick up a new hobby or revisit an old one.
Yup. I like reading and working on coding projects.
That said, sometimes I get a hankering to play a game, but none of the dozens I have installed look interesting, so I’ll go play one of my favorites (EU4, C:S, Mount & Blade, etc).
I started reading casually, currently Harry Potter to see what the fuss was about.
And I guess TV shows and anime too for years, but I usually only watch these while eating.
I got a laugh from my Steam recap because I couldn’t find anything to play this summer so I got really into ice cream making. Then Satisfactory came out.
This is what I also do. I have plenty of old favourites, but if I’m really not in the mood, I don’t try to push it.
Rogue-lites are basically made to be infinitely re-playable and if I find one I like then I keep going back to it. Enter the Gungeon is a game I’ve played for years. Then there was a while this spot was taken by Slay the Spire and Balatro in turn. Now I’m back to Enter the Gungeon.
Enter the Gungeon
I had to look it up but that looks cool! Thanks for the idea.
A warning before you jump in: it’s crazy difficult. It took me about 70 hours of gameplay to be able to finish a play through…but after that it became pretty repeatable once I had learnt how to do it. This is pretty standard, but the failed runs are all fun and the gameplay is excellent and hilarious. I can give some generic starter tips if you want, things I wished I knew before having to learn the hard way (equally learning the hard way is the way rogue-lites are intended to work, so up to you).
The enemies are bullets that are holding guns and shooting bullets at you. You can unlock a gun that looks like a bullet, that shoots bullets that look like guns, that shoot their own bullets. Everything in the game is a pun.
One of my favorite artists ever, Doseone, did the soundtrack for the game!
Also see Voidigo, Blazing Beaks and of course Nuclear Throne!
Fucking love Enter the Gungeon. My favorite rougelike/roguelite
Crawl: Stone Soup. Classic rogue like. You can play it in the browser so it’s very fast to get going. Minotaur Berserker is a nice semi brainless flow.
I’m partial to Gargoyle Fighter, slam maces into everything
Yeah Gargoyles! My first ascension was Gargoyle Earth Elementist, but I think EE has been nerfed since that ascension.
I never really clicked with EE, when I felt like magic I was usually doing something like Deep elf conjurer, or sometime High Elve (rip them) and go for a sword and sorcery style I really enjoyed
Gargoyle Fighter Gang! My first and only escape (3 rune) was a gargoyle fighter dedicated to The Shining One. I relied completely on shield for defense and apparently that was weird as I got a lot of shocked comments on my lack of evade
It’s been a minute since I was last plugged into the dcss community, but that seems very standard for me. My best run was also a TSO fighter gargoyle, but something like 8 or 9 runes which was neat. Golden dragon armour, kite shield, and the awesome blessed whip courtesy of TSO is my end game objective
Dead Cells. I’ve been stuck on 3BC for years, but someday I’ll beat it! Someday…
Lighthouse is my current white whale. Going to finally check out the Cavern next time I go back.
I was trying Terraria, which has a lot of creativity possibilities. I was trying to earthwork/terraform a small world (i.e. trying to make it level from ocean to ocean), while simultaneously “voidforming” another small world (i.e. digging out every single “removable” block before Hardmode, which obviously excluded Lihzard temple blocks, Dungeon blocks and Crimson/Corruption altars; for lava, I was using the infinite bucket trick to replicate honey in order to consume lava from the Underworld; I don’t plan on reaching Hardmode for such world). I was taking blocks from the second world (the world to be voidformed) and “smuggling” them into the first world (the world to be terraformed) in order to compensate for the need for additional blocks (e.g. sand, ice, mud, etc) when biomes were generated below ocean level.
Turns out that I was doing this not exactly for fun and enjoyment, but something to “try to keep myself busy and away from bad thoughts”, and that was not really a good goal for myself. By now, it has been weeks since I last played.
Factorio, Minecraft, Stardew Valley. Also solitaire on my phone (PySolFC).
Ooc do you play pysolfc on mobile?
Hmm? Not quite sure what you’re asking, but it’s freely available here:
PySolFC (PySolFC is a collection of solitaire card games) https://f-droid.org/packages/org.lufebe16.pysolfc/
Creeper World 4, the daily map usually has a good duration. Takes your thoughts off everything else pretty well, yet is not too demanding. And you can vary your play style yourself a bit / set your own limitations, depending on how much of a challenge you want right now or how much time you want to spend.
The same although it might be cw3 or even particle fleet depending on the mood I’m in.
He’s the only developer I support on release of the game.
Helldivers 2 is great for short to medium sessions.
yeah, being able to hop in and out it’s great thing for me
I also like the lack of pressure to finish a round if you have to be drug away by life. I know they’ll likely be able to finish without me or someone will pop in after me to help.
Stellaris with the Star Trek: New Horizons mod. Currently doing a Borg run, at war with the Dominion right now, but of course, resistance is futile.
The Warhammer tide games, either Vermintide 2 or Darktide. Best melee combat in a video game, relatively short rounds, and super satisfying to just genocide some heretic/xeno hordes for the Emperor/Sigmar.
You just alerted me to the existence of Orcs Must Die 3, and I am going to check it out after absolutely loving the first 2.
I’ll have to check those out. I played Vermintide when it first came out and wasn’t very impressed. I’ll give it another go.
My son plays some Warhammer games. I should check it out.
Good news about OMD, there’s a new game due next month, Deathtrap. I’m super stoked.
I’ll play a multiplayer shooter or civilization 6
For me it is loading up Xonotic to strafe jump around and blast bots. The movement in Xonotic is hypnotic, and while I usually play in short bursts I don’t think I will ever get bored of returning over and over again to learn the nuances and creative opportunities of combat and movement in Xonotic. All it takes is the first strafe jump to put a stupid smile on my face.
Also I love open world driving games and Motortown is my jam. I do urgent taxi jobs and just let my mind relax as I drive like a complete madman. The tire grip and burnout mechanics along with the vehicle handling in general is the best I have tried in any game.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1369670/Motor_Town_Behind_The_Wheel/
Xonotic is mint can’t recommend it enough! has replaced Quake 3 for me
Balatro
Clearly, a person of culture
Modded Minecraft for sure. But there are a handful of games I keep going back to and common theme for those games that I can listen to a podcast or audiobook while I’m playing them, like Rimworld, No Man’s Sky, Stardew Valley, Skyrim.
