When I was kid, I could sit in front of TV for hours and sink a day or two away into a game and have no problem having to start the game over from the beginning. Time meant nothing to me and I wasted it like it was a near infinite resource.
Now I am a parent and ain’t got time for some of the nonsense that’s in games nowadays. I’m lucky if I have even an hour to play each night.
A good example: Forza Horizon 5 allows you to switch cars mid game without traveling back to a house. That to me is a huge time saver compared to the recent NFS games.
Contrarily, Forza Motorsport (2023) makes you do qualifications every round. While realistic, a big time sink.
That said, what are some of your favorite games that have respect for your limited time?
Totally different genre, but I liked how Celeste approached this.
If you struggle to complete it there are tons of accessibility options to make the game more approachable.
And the content necessary to finish the games story is not too much, while giving challenging -well- challenges to anyone who wants to spend more time with the game.
And you clear the game screen by screen making it possible to only play it a short bit at a time.
It’s almost a bonus that the story and soundtrack are fucking beautiful.
Recently Spider-Man 2. I platinumed that game in 26 hours I think. The story is good, combat is fun, there’s collectables and side missions but each is part of its own side story. They give you plenty of info to find almost all of the secrets too
Helldivers 2 is online coop and all missions take anywhere between 5-40 minutes. But the objectives are clearly laid out beforehand and players get to choose what optionals they do, if any. So it’s not too hard to plan your day or evening around this.
I would say Outer Wilds is very good. You have the ability to beat the game as soon as you start, but you don’t have the knowledge to beat it.
Without spoiling it as it’s a very spoiler sensitive game, you can spend as long as you want gathering all of the knowledge to beat the game, you aren’t punished for taking your time. And all the knowledge you collect is stored in the games computer as long as you save so you can play for 22 minutes if you want, or multiple hours.
I beat the game over the course of a few weeks playing for various amounts of time. Recently played the DLC too and that went the same.
I really need to get over the early learning curve and get into this game.
I’ve tried a few times and don’t know why it doesn’t engage me.
Give it another try tonight.
You have to want to explore and you have to pay attention. The gameplay is casual but the progression is not
I loved Outer Wilds but I’m surprised to see it get called out in this thread. I still recommend it but once you get like halfway through it’s very easy to spend an entire session making 0 progress and feeling like you “wasted” your night.
There is NO handholding which I personally like in games but I wouldn’t say it respects your time…though I definitely wouldn’t say it doesn’t respect your time either
If you think you’re getting lost or don’t know what to do, it’s okay to follow another lead. Sometimes the solution will come back to you. The signal scope is your friend when finding a new lead, and the ship log is your best friend for tracking it and figuring out what to do next.
I hope you enjoy it, it’s a game you can only experience once.
