this post was submitted on 09 Aug 2023
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The issue I have is most games aren't fun to me.
A two hour long tutorial where every 20 seconds I have to deal with text preventing me from playing? Never opening the game again.
Controls that are so complicated I need that two hour tutorial? Pass.
A decent story interrupted with 40 hours of pointless side quests? I don't have time for that.
A crafting system? Never fun.
I don't mind complicated games, I don't mind long games, I just want to be able to play the game. Compare Elden Ring to Jedi survivor. Elden Ring let's you play the game with minimal tutorials, Jedi survivor has pop-ups and walks you through things hours into the game. Just let me play and I'll play.
Have you tried Baldur's Gate 3 yet? It has a tutorial, but it's pretty minor. It mostly just puts you in simple situations first to let you figure it out yourself, and it's maybe 15m. Most of what you can do you have to figure out yourself in the game. For example, you can stack crates to get to higher locations. This is never told to you, but it's available. You're basically free to handle things however you want and the game will be OK with it. It's fantastic.
There's also no bullshit collection things or time wasters. There are side quests, but they're all pretty good so far in my experience. They aren't fluff quests. No microtransactions or anything else either. It's what games should be.
I want to pick it up, but I'm likely going to wait about a year. I'm sure there will be some sort of DLC related to character options and some major patches, so I'll just wait until it's $30 with the DLCs and play it then. I don't have the time or temperament to replay RPGs, so I'll save money and play the whole thing.
I also don't usually replay any game, because most of the time things don't really change. They have the asthetics of choice without actually making then do anything, so a replay doesn't change. BG3 though it will change a lot. Just having access to different abilities will make a difference, but there's also actual choice in many diologues and outcomes. I think I'll probably end up playing again, though likely with mods the second time.
Also: if there's a boss fight I can't get through because I can't get the timing right just detect that, and make it easier for me.
I loved the Zelda games on the different game boy variants - but never finished one as there always was that one boss I couldn't get past. And that was when I still was young and had patience to try to put effort into mastering the movements. For more modern games I'm stuck with some boss on ittle dew - great game, but probably will never touch it again for more then the 2 minutes it takes me to realize where the last save is stuck. Just opened it yesterday, was surprised about the progress, and closed it halfway into dying in the fight.
Yes! I'm on an eternal quest to find games that will just shut up and let me play.
My most recent find is Ghostrunner. Starts with the CPU doing the first kill and then you're off.
Before that it was Celeste. I now realize in both games the player dies a lot. Maybe there's a correlation between how much fun I have and how much the game allows me to die without repercussions 😅
I guess I'll need to try Elden Ring now. There's gotta be dozens of us. Anyone have more recommendations?
Roguelikes tend to be very good for this. They let you play and have complexity from emergent situations, not an overload of controls.
It's old, but if you haven't played "enter the gungeon" pick it up! Hades is fun and well written, there is a lot of text but it doesn't feel like an interruption. Honestly the other games from that studio fit that description.
If you like puzzle games, everything by zachtronics is both great and very difficult. Magnum Opus is probably the best entry point, but space chem is what I started with and it's still my true love.
I expected to hate the souls games, mostly because of how irritating the fans are ("it's so hard!", "Get good!", ect) but they are great games. They aren't nearly as hard as everyone makes them out to be. I'm 40, so I started playing games when dying meant losing all progress, so I see the death penalty of dark souls as normal. What no one talks about is how changing your weapon changes the game drastically, to the point that stats on weapons don't really matter, it's all move sets.
I also love Factorio, dwarf fortress and EUIV, but I think that's a personal failing I have to work on.
Everything else by FromSoftware, and I'll throw in rocket league as well
Elden Ring and any of the FromSoft games, Outer Wilds, Baldur's Gate 3 as of now, Prey (2017). I'd say look into Immersive Sims as a genre and I bet you'll like it. They're complex, so tutorialization isn't fully possible and you're required to use your brain and figure it out yourself.
I'd recommend Long Dark and Subnautica, they've both got crafting but it's part of the survival/exploration loop and they've both got a bunch of mods (on PC) that are really well done.
May you'll enjoy Deadlink or other Roguelikes/-lites. Many just have a short tutorial and then shut up
For years I have been buying new games for (almost) exclusively $30 or less. And I find that I never enjoy the giant sprawling games that merit a $60 price tag nearly as much.
NPC Man feels your pain: https://youtu.be/9UuZQyTWiF0