Yeah, I never looked into that series because I can’t afford it. Nevermind, since I have a backlog too…
And perhaps I’ll get heroes 4 while I’m at it. The review led me to avoid it at the time. I’ve played 1–3 so far (not playing the expansion of 2 fully because I didn’t like it and playing it regardless turned out to be painful), having never finished the base campaign of 3 let alone the expansions. I could play 4 soon after.
Cool. I could still get Baba is You at some point, and I’ve never played a Zachtronics game before.
I do know one game which 95% meets all conditions put—Heroes of Might and Magic 3’s base game without mods so far. The game has a ‘fan’ trap where they tell just about everyone that a popular mod is either the definitive or best way to play. I played that first. I later played without mods, it was many times more complex and somehow better balanced. I felt abusive because the mod, at that particular time, had a first time load screen which claimed the original makers did not know what they’re doing—and merely stating anytime that you prefer it without mods would incite open hostility from many, even when no reference was made to the horrible methods used. The game itself, however, fully utilises having practical knowledge and using it to strategise which method you’ll use against your enemies (for example counter attack, drain their armies and resources, or simply charge at them with full freedom of how to go there and to adapt) and giving you freedom with hundreds of possible strategies to play with, and the game involves the simulation of choosing any side who range between the most evil to the lesser evils all fighting each other as similarly minded factions (and doesn’t really play into the harm of civilians in the game itself). There is something really enjoyable about it even if some maps could last 10 hours at a moderate pace, and even longer if you simulate a show of force with complete map domination and capture (which can be useful when you can carry over the hero levels to the next map, which is stated beforehand).
I’m playing this currently. I’m also looking into the enjoyability of wholesome sexual content, and the enjoyability of the comedic evasion of characters from people who want to do sexual acts with them but which will only lead to trouble later. But these come later and not from games.
It is fine, I wasn’t looking for adrenaline rush thrills and more something which comes from being extremely well made. Kerbal Space Program seems like it might be close to what I’m looking for, if there are no bugs and the guardians of frustration—timers, limited resources against unlimited challenges coupled with heavy setbacks, bugs, or a combination of any of them and some other things.
I didn’t receive notifications for these—thank you for the suggestions. There have been complaints about the newer edition of Outer Worlds. Which version is fine to just get and start playing, if I decide to get it?
Was always wary of getting into the Saints Row series because I always like to start with part 1, no matter how different it is and if it was a different set of people making it. But doing this on PC is not as simple as meeting a steam purchase and I already have had plenty to play, so I was reluctant to get into yet another series with more than 2 installments. I’ll see what I feel like later. I’m fairly used to configuring games to work, but I take a lot of time with it.
I’ve already decided to check vampire survivors…
I’m extremely wary of what the state of Forza horizon 4 will be if servers go down—I usually, almost entirely rather, avoid live service and anything with needless dependencies for that reason. It seems the FH4 servers will still be on for years, but even then it is possible that when servers are taken offline, it’ll be before I play it… or play it adequately.
Example: I wanted to start Divinity Original Sin 1 in late 2021. I instead started it in 2024, and have done about a quarter of it only before leaving it alone for a bit. This happens a lot depending on what I’m occupied with in general—and doing all of the classic Divinity games, and not really liking most of them aside from Beyond Divinity which I found decent and Act 1 only of Divinity 2 (the action game) very good, also played a part in that. While there’s no matter of playing the earlier entries, I am going to get a lot busier soon so it seems to be a problem.
I enjoy stuff like pressing key combination 6–C–3–2–(A to E)–(1 to 4) to cast a spell to travel to specific areas in overworld, and combinations like C—7—4 to cast, say, a protection spell while in combat on the sorcerer’s turn, in an old school western RPG. The only things I really dislike are slow animations and needless actions which do not affect anything. With this in mind, do you think I’m likely to be troubled by the first one or not?
I can find myself as well by watching some gameplay if you cannot determine it. If you are certain though, it will make things easier—even if I decide to check myself later.
I like this detailed answer. Firstly frustration and risk/reward is the opposite of what I’m looking for, the nature is a bit different from what I’m looking to experience. The things I need are not achievement but completeness of concept. To that end even relatively tough action games with the quality of life features to reduce frustration might fit the requirement, as long as the gameplay concepts are “fully thought out”—not only is enough thought given to what you’ve put in, but the nature of each addition and how it relates to the persons playing them, what it makes them feel… along with the relation with other mechanics to make sure how they go together. Games which use frustration also use this to some extent—but frustration is the opposite of what I’m looking into. The stuff I work it makes the user feel as comfortable as possible—with thought put in to remove all frustration, while simultaneously delivering depth of concept. These two are not incompatible, but requires a lot of thought and effort to deliver. Eventually it goes into the psychological of what people like, why people like them, and what specific feeling causes you to like such a thing. Eventually you go into questions like is such a thing natural—is it something people will like without having a particular mindset, political stance, education… or will it only be enjoyable with any or some of these things and are looking for aligned art.
Then, after understanding these, it comes to making something that anyone can enjoy, as long as they’re not coming into it expecting affirmation for the things they believe in. That latter part is up to the user and it is not up to the maker to determine whether a person should like it or not—the emphasis of the maker is on not messing up the process itself, and then to let people react naturally to your work. Of course, the world has an element of malice for the sake of it, but dealing with it in an adequate manner and not be aggressive in general, especially against people who merely want to use your work and know more about it, is important. That is a place many modern makers are failing in. But that is not related to the process of making something itself.
The most important element in this process is making something which isn’t malicious—cause harm to anyone for any sort of gain, even to affirm your own thoughts—while, at the same time, pushing the levels of depth in your work till it reaches a natural state of full enjoyment. This is part of the learning process which must be completed before work is started on anything. This last part is what I’m finishing up on. At the moment, usually the deeper you go into art, the more you see things which are inclined with enjoying instances of cruelty—or so it seems many times, but it is not always the case. Understanding to the end the reasons of many things, the things I’m trying to experience, is key to delivering an even deeper work which is not embarrassed of anything, but does not take pleasure in cruelty. The reason for this is not to attract mainstream crowds—which is always going to be hit or miss—but to ensure anyone… mainstream, those who aren’t what is called ‘normal’ (I personally fit into the latter) enjoy the work completely while not feeling the slightest bit unpleasant. The showing of villainy can still be delivered while doing so, by placing importance on structure—whether you show the cruelty for most of the time, and show its resolution for a short amount… or whether you describe what the situation is and then allocate a lot of time to the detailed described resolution of a problem and how it affects the people around.
All these things are, again, to be learnt before starting anything. Understanding the things that people enjoy is most important when structuring your work well—even when you already have made a fully developed idea for a story. These are the things I’m focusing on. I cannot really explain it in detail other than saying pride and achievement are on the opposite side of these things and, as elements, do not really go into the work I want to do. I’m intimately aware of the natures of pride and achievement—mostly the negative aspect, which I’m not going to get into here because I do not consider it my problem to worry how people think, and these explanations are likely to cause debate, no matter how well intentioned either or both sides are. On the other hand, my understanding in the basic nature of enjoyment of a bit limited, and that is what I’m trying to implement when I start my work so I’m trying to change my limited understanding at the moment. Such a thing is possible by experiencing oneself—from any place, such as books, movies, games, people taking action… from anywhere.
I see. I’ve recently even seen screenshots of Zwei: An Arges Adventure when a steam user posted them. Emotional rollercoasters are not what I’m looking for but I could check omori regardless, to see for myself.
I tend to play without expansions and mods the first time. The second time, with expansions. Later, with any mod I specifically want.
The exception was Daggerfall because Arena was pretty bad with a few bugs. However with Daggerfall Unity I didn’t install additional mods. I did look for additional bug fix mods, didn’t find any. That makes sense since if an external modder makes fixes, the Daggerfall Unity maintainers would make those fixes too eventually. I need to look again though.