I replay games I’m intimately familiar with so I can just autopilot and chill.
I am more likely to watch a movie or binge a show when I’m sick than play a video game though. Sometimes I read a comic book if my eyes are OK or listen to an audiobook.
It’s a game where you place tiles to build a map and you get scored based on how well the placed tile matches the rest of the tiles. Extra score comes from additional goals which usually mean finishing a certain area.
It’s my go to game when I’m burnt out and can’t think or I’m so sick I can’t focus on anything, because the game is perfect when you’re low energy. There is no clock, there is no mental overhead of keeping track of something. The game gives you all the information you need and you can play one tile at a time. The music is calm and the tiles you place create this idyllic world that’s pleasing to the eye.
If I’m not sure about a game, I try to find a long play online somewhere. If at any point I find myself wishing I could take the controller and play that part myself, then it’s probably a game I should buy.
Start watching someone else pay the games in your backlog and see if any of them make you want to play them for yourself.
Warframe as well. And Star Trek Online, if only for the ships. Gonna go back to Neverwinter for a spell.
Might hop and jump into the Fallout series, with New Vegas coming to mind.
Even Mount and Blade has me ride from time to time.
What am I supposed to explore when I am going back the way I came? The simplest way of doing fast travel still generally requires you find POIs by actually going to their location before you can travel to them instantly.
I’ve done my exploring, now I want to sell all the shit I found and get back to finding more!
Best way of handling this is to load the environment with random events that can occur on various return trips. Sea of Thieves and Red Read Redemption 2 do this, though it doesn’t work for every game.
The other good way to handle it is a fun movement system, eg Insomniac games.
And those get pretty repetitive and aren’t rewarding enough that I wanna go through that every time. Especially RDR2’s fucking habit of spawning some kind of big animal right the fuck on top of me giving me zero chance to react and making me lose all the animal pelts I’d been collecting right as I am walking up to the motherfucker who buys 'em. 🤬
(I’ve been playing that one recently and it’s reminding me why I stopped)
I’m broke so a new game to play would hit the spot, thank you so much! I like crafting games, cozy games, and arcadey retro style games, but really I play a bit of everything.
You’re defaulting to your “comfort setting” which is a normal human thing.
Playing new games takes mental and emotional energy. There are also a lot more unknowns, which is a significant mental load. Our brains are naturally a bit aversive to this, especially if you’re feeling low-energy.
When you play the same old games you’ve enjoyed for over a decade, it’s a way for your brain to “veg out” as it were. The amount of thinking is minimal, and there’s no emotional suspense–you know exactly what’s coming.
So the answer has more to do with your mental and emotional energy levels. If your life is otherwise taxing in those areas, it’s perfectly fine to unwind with some comfort games at the end of a long day. If you find yourself feeling like this all the time, you might be dealing with depression or chronic exhaustion. And those are too complex to answer without more info.
There’s no shame in not finishing something if you got enough out of it. Maybe a little bit of guilt because you paid for it, but you can always go back and finish it later.
Maybe it’s a good idea to stop adding to the backlog knowing that you’re not as likely to finish new ones. At least until the backlog is clear. Maybe you find more comfort games in the backlog and have even less time for new ones.
I think in world fast travel points are the best way to do things. You wanna get to that city? Best take the strider. Wanna go to the town out in the middle of nowhere? Theres a bus that goes that direction. Makes it feel much better imo.
If I didn’t already have a Miyoo Flip v2 I would buy this version in a heartbeat. The love the clamshell design and portability of these things is a huge upside and I take it everywhere with me. I have been using MinUI on mine and it works great (especially quick save state and resume on open) but after reading your article I decided to change it up and move over to Knulli which has a lot more options.
bin.pol.social
Gorące