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?

  • DasSkelett@discuss.tchncs.de
    3·
    7 days ago

    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.

    • Rozz@lemmy.sdf.org
      2·
      3 days ago

      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.

  • zaphodb2002@sh.itjust.works
    3·
    7 days ago

    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.

  • lath@lemmy.world
    1·
    6 days ago

    I play the “What’s that black dot on the wall and is it moving?” game.

    Very fun until one actually starts moving.

  • cRazi_man@lemm.ee
    43·
    9 days ago

    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.

      • cRazi_man@lemm.ee
        17·
        8 days ago

        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.

  • yamper@lemmy.world
    384·
    8 days ago

    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.

    • Dutczar@sopuli.xyz
      1·
      6 days ago

      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.

    • sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works
      13·
      8 days ago

      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).

    • Zess@lemmy.world
      2·
      8 days ago

      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.

    • grrgyle@slrpnk.net
      2·
      8 days ago

      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.

  • Thalfon@sh.itjust.works
    17·
    9 days ago

    Crypt of the Necrodancer.

    Really fun roguelike game where you and enemies have to move to the beat of that floor’s song. I think part of the reason I still play it a lot is that it’s amenable to very short sessions. I’ve played enough that runs go fast and I either clear or die within 10 minutes.

    Over 1200 hours now almost a decade after release, and a huge chunk of that is probably sessions of under 30 mins in length.

    • grysbok@lemmy.sdf.orgEnglish
      1·
      7 days ago

      I picked up Stranded: Alien Dawn on Humble Bundle a few months back and it scratches the same itch. I know I’m going back to Rimworld soon, but S:AD has prettier graphics and similar gameplay. You can also build multi-story buildings. It’s been a good change of pace for me.

      • Arkive@lemmy.zip
        2·
        8 days ago

        Yeah Gargoyles! My first ascension was Gargoyle Earth Elementist, but I think EE has been nerfed since that ascension.

        • stormdelay@sh.itjust.works
          2·
          7 days ago

          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

      • whelk@lemm.ee
        1·
        8 days ago

        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

        • stormdelay@sh.itjust.works
          1·
          7 days ago

          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

  • ISOmorph@feddit.org
    14·
    9 days ago

    For years that game was Warframe for me. Just turn of my brain and run missions I know inside and out while watching twitch from the corner of eye on a second monitor. At some point I wanted to have more time to play other games so I stopped and didn’t find a new cozy game

    • Varyag@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
      2·
      9 days ago

      Me too. Stopped a couple years ago after I hit 2,000 hours of play time. This year I’ve played a lot of Helldivers 2 and Monster Hunter, which I have a combined total of nearly 1,800 hours again.

  • Rob Bos@lemmy.ca
    13·
    9 days ago

    The Long Dark. Something about wandering an icy wasteland scavenging, hunting, fishing, works for me.