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Deeper gaming experiences

T

thejuice

Well-Known Member
I want to play more relaxing, deeper games. Today I tried to relearn the jank of Valheim and not play the stressful Real Time Strategy (RTS) Command and Conquer which can trigger anxiety and addictive behaviours.
So i built a hut in a Valheim. I did need a strong coffee just to motivate myself. It did feel good and I did feel some calm.

However there is always something inside me craving something more instant, something familiar. When I was a kid i always played instant gratification games. Racing games, Sports Games, Sonic, Command and Conquer, shooty pew pew pew games.
Anything that required patience like the Legend of Zelda or even Mario 64 i gave up on. I didnt get the more nourishing, deep gaming experiences.
I do think i might have ADHD. Or that this tech world has given me a pseudo ADHD. I had no interest in school work except very occassionally id get motiviation to do an essay or learn for an exam. Even then that was only under extreme pressure from adults.
 
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That's what I liked about the game Hearts of Iron II. I could set the tempo for how fast- or slow time went, so I could keep at a slow and more enjoyable pace. Giving much more thought to decisions that could rapidly change the disposition of the map of Europe.
 
Yeah that's what I'm getting at, I'm trying to train my brain for delayed gratification..it's painful though. Ill have a look at Minecraft. I have Stardew Valley.
 
How about some big strategy games? Turn-based strategy I mean, not RTS games (which can sometimes be more about wild clicking than anything else).

I've been really diving into them myself, and they really are very different from the instant-gratification of action games. Because you cant just slap something down and it instantly works. No, you gotta put a plan in place, get all the pieces together, THINK about it, carefully execute.

Have you ever tried a 4x game? Civilization 6 is the biggest example right now (everyone just loves it), but there's also games like Age of Wonders 4 (which is what I'm really into right now), Galactic Civilizations 4 (which isnt the same series as Civ 6), Master of Orion, Endless Legend, TONS of others. 4x games are really big/popular right now. There's a lot of space themed games, and a lot of historical themed games, people freaking love both. Sometimes a fantasy theme, like with AoW 4 or Endless Legend.

There's also grand strategy games, stuff like Crusader Kings, Hearts of Iron, or Stellaris. Those are much harder to learn though. I'd suggest playing 4x games a bit before trying these. But, these are absolutely worth the effort to learn, seriously. There's brilliant stuff here. These are really good about theme, too, immersing you into it more. As @Judge mentioned about Hearts of Iron, these technically move in real time, but are very slow paced, you can turn up or down the game speed however much you like, or pause whenever you want (and you can still give orders/commands when paused). You wont be controlling like, 50 billion little units or anything. Just like with 4x games, these arent JUST about war & combat. You can succeed through peace & diplomacy too. Or, you know, maybe a bit of sneaky chronic backstabbing, if you like. EDIT: Got Hearts of Iron confused, that one really is focused on war and such.

Or if you want more of a war-focused game, with units and formations and supply lines and all that stuff, Shadow Empire is amazing. It's much harder to learn though. Also Dominions 6, but that's probably the most confusing of all of them.

There's a ton of complexity and fun to be had with ANY of these, and you need to slow down and THINK about what you're doing. It's very much "delayed gratification" like @honeytoast said. Like, if you want to build some unit or structure or whatever, often you poke the things to do it, like "Okay I want this passenger ship" but it takes time to make, so you wont actually GET it until 7 turns later. The genre as a whole seriously forces you to slow down. Strategy and planning instead of immediate punching. Exactly part of why I'm playing it lately myself.


Or sandbox games, I'll second that recommendation too. Something like Minecraft or Terraria or whatever. You get fast paced moments in them, like fighting skeletons and whatnot, but a LOT of the experience of these is slower paced stuff. Exploring, mining, pursuing longer goals and such. Like, that minecart track through that mountain you want to make, you cant just hit a button and BAM, it's done. Gotta get all the things you need, plan out how you're going to do it, mine through it, set up the tracks, and there's creativity all the way through.

ALL of these games also tend to have a lot of mods, too, so if you're into game modding, you can customize your experience, if you'd like. You dont have to though. They're all super good without mods.


That's the sort of stuff I'd suggest. These are all wildly different from the anxiety factories that the RTS genre can be at times (yeah, they get me all anxious and agitated too, since I really hate being rushed, so I dont play those).

thejuice said:
I'm trying to train my brain for delayed gratification..it's painful though
Click to expand...

Totally worth doing though, at least I think so.

And you'll find some real fun stuff as you go, that you maybe never expected.
 
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I'd say that if you want a relaxing experience with gaming that sim games, as in simulation games not The Sims though I suppose those can be relaxing too, such as farming or other kinds of simulators. I rather enjoyed Rollercoaster Tycoon back in the day, I haven't been able to play it in a while though due to my current pc not having a disc drive since I guess you have to pay extra for a gaming PC with a disc drive.

I do have a recommendation for a relaxing, deep game, although it does show my biases.
A little Indie game called FixFox, that's got a retro style to it and where you play as a fox named Vix who is a mechanic that got sent to a planet populated only by robots in order to repair an old beacon that went down. Said planet has a strange rule that you aren't allowed to fix things, so Vix's tools are immediately confiscated and they have to resort to unorthodox tools in order to fix things for the friendly robots on the planet and make sure they're not doing it too often else they'll get caught and their "tools" will be confiscated again.

As for deep? Well depends on what exactly you mean by that, as the game I suggested does have a few intriguing mysteries to solve and the backstory is essentially "Humans screwed the planet so they had to evolve and look for other planets to colonize.", and the evolution was essentially "everyone is an animal person now because that helped with humanity's survival due to them having fur and gaming the ability to hibernate".

Or well I found the game fun and relaxing at least but then I'm biased, since ya I got the game because the main character is a fox.
 
First Person Shooter games never interested me at all and I always preferred games that involve thinking more so than fast reflexes. For a long time the only alternative was war strategy games, both real time and turn based, and I played a lot of them and liked them. I still play a lot of that type of game.

When I first heard about Minecraft I really wanted to try it but you couldn't without paying for it first. Part of the way I was brought up makes me instinctively reject the idea of buying things sight unseen. Always try before you buy. So I hunted for a similar open source game and found one - MineTest.

I got in to that game big time, really loved it. Just building stuff like computer Lego without the need to be challenged by anything. I also hate playing online, I find most people in online games just too annoying, and MineTest doesn't need to go online. It can and there's servers you can connect to, or instead you can connect to other devices within reach so you can play with your own friends and family instead of going online - wireless lan.

I even got involved with a branch of the project for a few years and had a lot of fun. I've been playing a few other games more recently but I'll definitely pick up that one again in due course. The branch or fork of the project I got involved in can now be found at:

Minetest.IO is Ready to Go

Minetest.IO
minetest.io

Lately (belatedly?) I've been playing The Elder Scrolls Skyrim. Although I've done so a few times playing the game as it's meant to be played is tedious, and although there's a lot of action as in fights it's a too slow a paced game for me. Instead I play in god mode, the fights aren't the part of the game I'm interested in. I just like exploring the game, it's huge. I've been playing it flat out for a couple of months now and I'm still discovering more and more. To me it's just an exploring game with a few puzzles to work through and a pleasant atmosphere.
 
thejuice said:
I want to play more relaxing, deeper games. Today I tried to relearn the jank of Valheim and not play the stressful Real Time Strategy (RTS) Command and Conquer which can trigger anxiety and addictive behaviours.
So i built a hut in a Valheim. I did need a strong coffee just to motivate myself. It did feel good and I did feel some calm.

However there is always something inside me craving something more instant, something familiar. When I was a kid i always played instant gratification games. Racing games, Sports Games, Sonic, Command and Conquer, shooty pew pew pew games.
Anything that required patience like the Legend of Zelda or even Mario 64 i gave up on. I didnt get the more nourishing, deep gaming experiences.
I do think i might have ADHD. Or that this tech world has given me a pseudo ADHD. I had no interest in school work except very occassionally id get motiviation to do an essay or learn for an exam. Even then that was only under extreme pressure from adults.
Click to expand...
I like Oxygen Not Included, and Rimworld.
If I get too impatient I can always activate sandbox/god mode.
If I want to push myself I play merge 3 games or Gemcraft Labyrinth.
 
Outdated said:
Lately (belatedly?) I've been playing The Elder Scrolls Skyrim. Although I've done so a few times playing the game as it's meant to be played is tedious, and although there's a lot of action as in fights it's a too slow a paced game for me. Instead I play in god mode, the fights aren't the part of the game I'm interested in. I just like exploring the game, it's huge. I've been playing it flat out for a couple of months now and I'm still discovering more and more. To me it's just an exploring game with a few puzzles to work through and a pleasant atmosphere.
Click to expand...

This is one of those games where I always had trouble grasping the appeal, and the combat is a huge part of why.

Just... so awkward, so slow, full of hitboxes and such that dont make sense and dont even work right half the time. For all that people say about this game, it really doesnt seem well made at all.
 
Misery said:
This is one of those games where I always had trouble grasping the appeal, and the combat is a huge part of why.

Just... so awkward, so slow, full of hitboxes and such that dont make sense and dont even work right half the time. For all that people say about this game, it really doesnt seem well made at all.
Click to expand...
I'm really enjoying it in god mode, I've hardly played anything else in the last couple of months. Makes me feel a bit sorry for people playing on gaming consoles instead of a computer though. At least I can use commands to get around the bugs in it.
 
Judge said:
That's what I liked about the game Hearts of Iron II. I could set the tempo for how fast- or slow time went, so I could keep at a slow and more enjoyable pace. Giving much more thought to decisions that could rapidly change the disposition of the map of Europe.
Click to expand...

I slowed the time on Command n Conquer too. I used to play on fastest for instant gratification but playing on slow actually is more enjoyable. More time for strategic thinking rather than frantic tank rushing! But still, I get anxiety.
 
thejuice said:
I remember Roller Coaster Tycoon being fun (but hard!!)
Click to expand...
I got in to that for a while about 3 years back, worked out all of it's requirements and built a tiny map that was generating $5000 a month profit. Posted it on their forums, as far as I know it's still there.
 
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