People are going to be pedantic about this one, because it’s not ALL games, but what you’re seeing is real. Game design, especially corporate design, has changed to accomplish two things:
Engagement
Accessibility
Games are designed to be playable by as many people as possible for as long as possible. Some would say this is just Western AAA games, but lots of anime games have been doing this nonsense for decades - games with 10 hours of baby’s first JRPG tutorial and 80 hours of grinding and filler. Many of them critically acclaimed games that fans would flog me for if I actually named one of them.
There are indie games that help you escape this, but many take that accessibility-first approach that requires everything to be very structured and corral you toward the right direction.
Again, I think people are going to be dismissive, but you’re right. It’s a tough world out there for someone who just wants to play a game and not be suckered into a live service engagement trap, or ladder system that hides your real MMR to keep you grinding up an imaginary points system. It’s not like the old days when you can just pick something popular, you have to discriminate and carefully judge what you buy now.
I should put “accessibility” in sarcastic quotation marks. Here, it doesn’t mean adding options or features to assist someone with different handicaps or needs. It means making the game so easy that anyone, even a toddler or game journalist, can finish it without having to learn from mistakes or think about what they’re doing.
Particularly with regard to excessive guidance. Varying degrees of “mobile game that makes you click exactly what it says for 30 minutes to prove you played the tutorial.” Those games may be the worst offenders, but less-dramatic hand holding happens in console and PC games too.
That's a sweeping generalization, there are many indie games that are hard, obtuse, hostile or all of the above. Even a walking sim's difficulty is higher than just "beating" it, just like the point of a museum is higher than going through all the rooms and saying you "went"
Death’s Door 19.5€ → 7.8€ It’s a very cozy game but still fun mechanics and adventurous. Kinda similar to Hyperpixel in feels. Spent 3 days while sick playing from the sofa, enjoyed every bit.
My play order so far as been Elden Ring -> Sekiro -> Bloodborne -> currently playing DS1 remaster.
DS1 is definitely my least favorite so far, although it's not bad. Much much slower, and the challenge is in slogging through the levels with less challenging boss fights than later entries.
Is it time to play through Max Payne again? Has the game recieved love from the modding community? I'll answer my own question by saying looky looky...
Based on your description and games played I'd say "Furi" and "Transistor". Second is made by Supergiant Games and all thier stuff is fantastic. I loved thier stories and the gameplay was unique in each.
Hades, which is also made by Supergiant, is also fantastic. It's a great intro to the roguelite genre. I've also heard that their first game, Bastion, is great too, but I haven't played it
Solasta: Crown of the Magister - Old school D&D and tactics RPG. It’s indie so has rough edges here and there, but it’s so fun, and there aren’t a ton of games that fill the void.
Dungeon of the Endless - It’s a tower defense / tactical game with great pixel art and one of the best soundtracks I’ve ever heard.
Battle Chasers: Nightwar - Excellent RPG that will remind you of old school Final Fantasy.
Tower of Time - Excellent tactical RPG
Detroit: Become Human - Cinematic narrative game about androids becoming self aware.
The Dark Anthology: Man of Medan - Cinematic narrative horror game, the first in a series of several, therefore if you enjoy there’s a lot more where that came from. (Made by the same studio that created Until Dawn.)
My Time at Portia (farming / exploring), Coral Island (farming / exploring), Monster Sanctuary (catching monsters / exploring), and Travellers Rest (manage a bar, and there's co-op) are so good.
I don't have any games to recommend but I wanted to thank people here for some actually good suggestions. I feel like I've been taken for a bit of a ride at that other place by shills in similar threads compared to this.
just grabbed god of war, disco elysium, and hellblade senuas sacrifice...
as far as recommendations go, Mass Effect legendary edition and dragon age are very enjoyable if you like RPG with a focus on lore, story and characters. Red Dead Redemption 2 is a wonder and a steal at $20. Witcher 3 for $12. Horizon Zero Dawn for $16.50
I love GOG and their anti-DRM stance but I just can't bring myself to buy games there when they don't even have a native Linux launcher. Steam, on the other hand, just works.
Dark Souls 1 is 100% worth playing. I won’t be a purist and say that you need to play it before 3, because they’re mostly standalone experiences… but you might miss a handful of references if you play 3 first.
As for how to play: if money’s not a question, buy the remaster – you’ll get a better online experience that way.
If you’re on a budget, however, you could simply Install the DSFix mod and start playing with the adaptive controller as-is. There’s unfortunately no in-game rebinding UI, but you can still do remapping using either the Xbox Accessories app or directly in the Steam overlay (requires Steam to be in Big Picture mode).
I'm giving the first another shot with DSFix because I am a cheap ass, haha. So far so good. Definitely a little different learning curve but it kept my ass up until 3am playing. Managed to get to the boss on the bridge with the mallet. He flattened me after the archers spammed me to death. Good times.
The 64GB emmc drive in the Deck uses the m.2 expansion slot, so you can pop out the emmc drive and swap in a 2230 form factor nvme drive and be gtg after reinstalling SteamOS.
I myself went from a 256GB drive to a 1TB drive, and this weekend, I'll be popping in a 2TB drive I just received in the mail.
Donut County is only $3.89. It’s a short, funny, cute puzzle game where you make everything fall in a hole. Really good.
Digimon Story Cyber Sleuth is $12.49 and a much better 80hr RPG then it has any right to be. And I never even touched the second game in the collection!
gaming
Top
This magazine is from a federated server and may be incomplete. Browse more on the original instance.