Open world computer games for adults with busy lives?

October 31, 2021 9:08 AM

Looking for a good PC game that I can play in my very limited free time. Must be suitable for gaming sessions anywhere from 30 minutes to an afternoon, single-player (will not do online multi-player), preferably open world, and something that is easy to get into a "flow" state with. More inside.

After a long hiatus from video games, I bought a mid-range gaming PC earlier this year and I'm having trouble finding games that spark joy.

The games I've enjoyed the most are the original "Doom," "Quake III Arena" and the death match modes from Unreal Tournament. Also enjoyed Wolfenstein and the Quake III mod "Urban Terror" a lot back in the day. A few years ago I bought a Switch expressly to play "Breath of the Wild," which I enjoyed despite the quest / narrative of the game.

In the early 2000s I enjoyed playing a lot of Grand Theft Auto III after finishing the missions and just running through the open world and destroying things. And the old PlayStation 2 "War of the Monsters" (I think it was).

Also enjoy old old school arcade games / console games like "River Run" and "Astrosmash" but they get a bit boring / repetitive.

So what I'm looking for is probably a first-person shooter or first-person perspective game with very little ramp-up time -- e.g. I don't want to spend a bunch of time grinding to level up, or running around doing quests. I aggressively do not want cut scenes and a bunch of dialog. Some days I may have just 30 minutes to sit down and try to unwind by zapping virtual things, I don't want to waste it watching cut scenes.

Have tried to get into Skyrim, but it's far too slow and frustrating to level up. I like "Doom Eternal" but keep running into levels that are difficult / frustrating to get past. (For folks who enjoy the challenge, I salute you, but I'm looking to escape frustration, not add to it.)

Basically the perfect game for me would be something like Quake III Arena but with infinite new levels or an open world model that just let you commit mayhem indefinitely until you need to go tend to adult responsibilities again. Anything good out there I'm missing? (PC only. I do use Steam and I'm not too worried about the game cost. My PC is a Core i9 with 32GB RAM and a decent-ish NVIDIA RTX with 8GB RAM, so I should be able to meet minimum requirements for most modern games...)

posted by jzb to Computers & Internet (13 answers total)

I really enjoyed Bullets Per Minute for exactly this. It's a 90s-esque beat matching shooter, structured like a rogue like. I think it would hit the spot, particularly since you liked Doom Eternal so much!

You might also love Hades.
posted by pazazygeek at 9:14 AM on October 31, 2021

I find that I check in for "shifts" in Hardspace:Shipbreaker ( increasing difficulty in slicing and dicing spacecraft apart ), or submerge for a bit in Satisfactory ( world exploration and building processes/devices ) or Factorio ( Satisfactory, but from above, and much more of an industrial simulation rather than a pure "ooh look at that" exploration ).

For some fun shoot-em-up try Synthetik. Kill them bots and find cool weapons to boot.

All available on Steam.
posted by HannoverFist at 9:15 AM on October 31, 2021 [1 favorite]

You might like the Just Cause games(It's a pun. Why are you blowing stuff up? Just 'cause!). JC2 is in my opinion the high-point, but 3 is OK too. There are missions and quests and intentional B-movie dialog/cutscenes, and parts of the map are gated behind progressing the mission tree, but mostly it's an excuse to run/drive/fly around to blow stuff up as an overpowered protagonist. You may find the game's self-aware piss-take on American imperialism a bit too much, though. The game realizes that the premise is ridiculous/stupid/parodic and leans in, so I'm okay with it, but I could see people finding it offputting.
posted by Alterscape at 9:26 AM on October 31, 2021 [2 favorites]

Entirely different, but adjacent: Valheim? The pace is wholly your own choice.
posted by aramaic at 9:43 AM on October 31, 2021 [2 favorites]

Best answer: borderlands might be good for this - you'll have a bit of initial cutscenes and explaining to slog through when you first start (though I think you'll have that with most games) but you get to the shooting pretty fast! I feel like I never even understand the story in borderlands, so it's pretty light on info.

possibly Deep rock Galactic (I play with friends, but I think you can play alone and it's fun and not frustrating usually, though it's not open world) or maybe Gunfire Reborn?
posted by euphoria066 at 9:49 AM on October 31, 2021 [1 favorite]

There is now a cottage industry of games for millennials that liked Quake.

Doom (2016) has no plot and less frustration (which are critiques people had about Eternal). You didn't mention if you tried that. It tried to have community "snap maps."

Prodeus is the best new old-style singleplayer shooter I've tried. It's also not punishing. It has a built-in browser of community/fan made maps. So it feels infinite-ish.

Ultrakill is short, almost more like violent puzzles than combat, and nothing but punishing. It has an arena horde mode.
posted by Snijglau at 9:56 AM on October 31, 2021 [2 favorites]

If you're ok with expanding the traditional FPS experience into FPS - in a spaceship, you might enjoy the Descent series. I would consider it very similar to DOOM except in space with 6DOF. There is a backstory to it but it is really secondary to the game; very infrequent and short cut scenes. Its focus is primarily 'blow up all the enemy ships' and find the goal, repeat ad-almost-infinitum. It isn't exactly 'open world' since each 'level' takes place within the confines of an asteroid or planet with an extensive cave system, so it is somewhat linear in that respect. But it does fit the 'mindlessly shooting stuff for fun' aspect quite well. Nothing prevents you from going back and revisiting an area, looking for hard to notice nooks and hidden doors to rooms with goodies, though once you get rid of enemies in an area they normally do not respawn unless that's a specific feature of the level you're in.

I will warn - YMMV, but because of the 6DOF nature of the game and how well it is rendered, I can play it for maybe 30-60 minutes before I start to get nauseous, particularly if my computer room is dark. Taking a 5 minute break resolves it and isn't a bad idea anyway.

There used to be a whole pile of player-designed areas available back when it was a standalone game, making the playability virtually endless; I don't know how true that remains on Steam. On the other hand, I've been playing it now and then on Steam since the start of the pandemic and have yet to reach the 'end' of the game, so have not had a need to look.
posted by SquidLips at 10:11 AM on October 31, 2021 [1 favorite]

So:

More shooting, less story.

Frequent saves/ manual saves.

Not aggressively difficult.

Shows off that RTX card, but doesn't require the top of the line.

I'd suggest 'Control.'

It's third-person, and not a sandbox "open world," though. But the maps are big and it isn't on rails, but there is little to gain from free exploration. So more Doom than GTA.

It's got the supernatural/ spooky atmosphere. It has some story, but the cutscenes aren't too long or expository. Lots of stuff to shoot at, but not grind-ey - your skill counts more than the character's level/ experience/ equipment. If you've played the original two 'Max Payne' games it's more like that than 'Borderlands' that relies on drops and loot boxes. Come to think of it, 'Max Payne' is a pretty decent comparator but with much bigger maps and less brooding cut scenes.

Frequent autosaves, and rational ones (ie., it saves before boss battles instead of forcing you to redo the entire level to get to the boss). There are bosses, but they aren't too bad. You can adjust the difficulty level.

It's gorgeous, and the engine had good RTX optimization from release. Released in 2019, so patches and udpates are mature.

One thing that I didn't like is the mini-map; it doesn't convey verticality very well and some levels are pretty vertical. But, if you're used to the old school inscrutable maps from Doom/ Quake, you shouldn't have any problem with it.

My problem with it was that I wasn't playing it on the regular; so I kept losing track of where I was on the map/ objectives, and I was playing CP2027 so my muscle memory didn't "lock in" to Control. I'll probably revisit Control sooner or later.

(CP2027 is awesome, but while you can play it shoot-ey, I enjoyed the story/ exploration. The base difficulty curve makes you overpowered if you spend even a little time grinding. 'Metro Exodus' is gorgeous as all get out, but so sloooow and sneaky/ hidey and jump scare-y. And slooow. But geeze, it looks good. CP is third person, MetroEx is 1st. I'm running a RTX3070 with an older CPU.)
posted by porpoise at 11:18 AM on October 31, 2021 [2 favorites]

Seconding Just Cause. It feels like being the lead actor in an over the top action movie. There's a plot, but it exists simply to give you reasons to do crazy things.

Grand Theft Auto 5's online mode (set it to invite-only so it will just be you and NPCs) is basically what you described for GTA 3 after you've completed the missions. There are missions and businesses you can do if you want, but no plot or cut-scenes and you are free to do whatever you please. You can grind to get higher level stuff, but it's still fun right off the bat. It's almost always on sale for $15 (currently true on Epic Games, which also has a $10 off coupon making it $5).
posted by hankscorpio83 at 11:24 AM on October 31, 2021 [2 favorites]

I've enjoyed the pointless car-based destruction of BeamNG.
posted by johngoren at 11:25 AM on October 31, 2021 [3 favorites]

> I've enjoyed the pointless car-based destruction of BeamNG.

Along those lines, Burnout Paradise and the Forza Horizon games (FH5 coming out in November) are fun to goof around in. You don't have to only race - you can do stunts, jumps, etc. Those are all included in PC Game Pass, which I recommend if you don't already have a big library of backlogged games.
posted by hankscorpio83 at 11:32 AM on October 31, 2021 [3 favorites]

Bulletstorm is like if you turned a Ford F350 and the person driving it into a video game, meaning it is entirely obnoxious, but it is certainly a mindless and fun shoot-'em-up from a few years back, and likely very cheap on Steam.
posted by turbid dahlia at 6:23 PM on October 31, 2021

Red Dead Redemption2?

Most missions can be managed in well under 30 minutes. Or you can do several in a row. Or some side quests. Or just ride your horse around or go fishing or hunting or picking flowers.
posted by notyou at 9:06 PM on November 1, 2021