Townscaper - this is my go-to for just kind of chilling out. Just plonking down buildings and seeing what configurations they make is just so relaxing. There’s no points, no goals, no competition, not even any citizens with needs that must be fulfilled. You just build nice cities.
Slime Rancher - the slimes are cute, and just so happy to be alive. There’s something about a bright pink slime bouncing past, with a massive smile on its face as it cries “wheeeee!” that reminds me there are indeed reasons to live.
Maneater - this is a different kind of happy. A cathartic, violent, murderous happiness, as I pop inflatable unicorns, sink yachts, and launch myself at unsuspecting golfers.
The PS2 spawned a lot of games that later generations emulated. Lots of stuff after that basically consisted of sequels, spin offs and games trying to recreate the feel of that era.
Stardew Valley. It’s a cozy farm sim with lots to dig into if you want to at your own pace (it is not uncommon to play the wiki open) The same save file can be used for single player or multiplayer
(local or online).
PS3 is a strong, strong contender for reliability and repairability reasons. You could replace the CMOS battery and hard drive today. You have to jump through hoops to add funds to your wallet, but once you do the store still works for the moment. The last time I looked there were even some decent deals from a couple of publishers.
No memory cards to worry about. The physical discs were expensive enough that people took care of them and are more inclined to sellt hem than toss them: it’s still really easy to find discs on eBay, and they’re new enough and most games have been remastered so they’re usually less than $20. It’s impossible to find Sixaxis or Dualshock 3’s, but fake ones from AliExpress are super cheap and almost identical except for the almost-never-used motion controls. You can also use a lot of USB controllers, or use something like a MayFlash adapter to use just about any controller you want. I think you can pair Dualsense too, though I haven’t tried. If you have original OEM’s, I don’t remember them ever having drift problems. The only real problem with the original controllers would be battery life (you can replace them if you’re handy), USB Mini-B, and how they needed a handshake and could only charge plugged into certain devices or special power supplies (another reason to just use counterfeits).
With a fat model you have full backwards compatibility with PS1 and PS2. With the online store you can get a lot of PS1, PS2, and PSP games. Not sure if this counts, but you can do remote play with a PSP too. Some of the online multiplayer probably still works, depending on the game. It has an HDMI out and the old AV out, so you can hook it up to almost any TV with cheap and a sailable cables. You can also load up video and audio files for playback, saving wear on the disc drive. I remember briefly experimenting with using mine as a media server back in the day.
The drawbacks are few. I’m assuming no hacking or modding, so no Nintendo games. No Xbox either, though I don’t think that’s anywhere near as important. A disc drive is always just a matter of time before it fails. The fat model has PS2 compatibility, but also was less reliable, so that’s a trade-off. The digital store is not long for this world. I used to use mine for Netflix, YouTube, HBO, etc and I’m guessing those apps have probably been shut down at this point. You lose out on modern games too. The PS2 and PS5 are both good options too, but I think the PS3 has the edge. If they ever add a PS3 emulator to the PS5, or if the PS5 library grows in general, it could still overtake the PS3 in the future.
If you lean more Nintendo I think the WiiU was better than the switch until they shut the e-shop down, and might still be better if we open this up to modding and hacking. It’s just easier to work with a WiiU because Nintendo stopped caring about protecting it. It’s also better for playing DS and Wii games for example. A ton of Switch games were also released on WiiU, and the Switch’s legacy content is mostly locked behind the online subscription - how long will that be available for? Still has the disc drive issue and can’t play Sony exclusives, but a strong option.
I’m not usually an Xbox guy, but they’re usually the easiest to mod, the emulate things well, and even without modding the Series X is probably the best option for pure backwards-compatibility with a good chunk of the libraries of every Xbox generation ever. The problem is you get neither the Sony nor Nintendo exclusives. And Xbox exclusives really aren’t all that enticing to me. Maybe if you’re into HALO or Gears or Forza Xbox is a more appealing option. The best IP’s Xbox owns are often released on other consoles, like MineCraft. Which is great for the industry, but hurts Xbox’s ranking here.
You can also use a lot of USB controllers, or use something like a MayFlash adapter to use just about any controller you want.
You can do this in software too if you wanted to use something like a generic Logitech PC controller or an Xbox 360 controller. Very plug and play.
If they ever add a PS3 emulator to the PS5, or if the PS5 library grows in general, it could still overtake the PS3 in the future.
That’s something I was kind of disappointed with when it came to the PS4. I thought it might have PS3 backwards compatibility and be pretty much the perfect system for me. A lot of the games I have been playing the past couple years (on PC) were released for the PS4 like Control, Death Stranding, Dying Light, and Far Cry 4 to name few.
All that said I did phrase the question in a way that omits backwards compatibility, game costs (with the price of retro games these days it would be enough to keep me from picking anything sixth generation or below), emulation, and online play because I was more curious what generation of games people think they could play in a kind of stuck on a dessert island scenario. Ignoring all of that I feel like going with the most recent generation of Playstation would be the way I’d go. It’s moddable, online is still available, backwards compatible with a lot of PS2 games, and you don’t really need to worry about a lot of the typical wear if everything is digital.
PS5. Easy. New hardware does shit older hardware can’t. And while there are games older than PS4 I like, there aren’t anywhere near enough to choose them over actually modern shit.
And newer indies often do modernized takes on the stuff older games were limited to.
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