In Search of a Mindless Game

[CritialGaming]

Guys I need help. I'm looking for suggestions for games that will keep my hands busy while listening to podcasts or binging TV shows. The past few games I've player have required my full attention investment and I'm in the mood to play something that doesn't require all my effort.

Sekiro and AC: Odyssey namely have been huge sinks of my time lately and I just want something light and easily capable of being played while an episode of Critical Role is playing or whatever.

Thanks for the help in advance.

 

[skywolfblue]

Angry Birds, Peggle, Plague Inc., Plants vs. Zombies, etc. Cell phone games are made for just moving your fingers but not needing to be too involved.

For me, turn-based games work best when I want to multitask. I do put them on easy mode if I'm trying to multitask as I can't multitask very well. It's kinda the opposite of mindless though, that's something that cell phone games do better.

A la Chess, Solitaire, Civilization 5 or 6... I imagine that a lot of turn-based RPGs would work too.

 

[Specter Von Baren]

Hhm, the Box Box Boy series on the 3DS is good for that, I recently got a puzzle game called Hook on my Switch, there's also Gorogoa on the Switch, another puzzle game, and I found Golf Story to also be pretty good for keeping my hands busy. For a more retro style game you could get Mole Mania on the 3DS too. The Rune Factory games are also good for having something to do when you're just going through the daily activities.

 

[Yoshi178]

GTA. any of them will do.

 

[Tanis]

The Dynasty Warrior games are pretty good at mindless.

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

Anything you can run on a mobile phone will do.

 

[KingsGambit_v1legacy]

I have a handful of suggestions, all offering the entertaining, cathartic escapism without putting too much demands on you.

The first category is the ARPG/Hack n Slash type of game. Diablo 3, Path of Exile, these are quite easy to play, offering the satisfying power progression and mass demon slaying. Loot is plentiful and you do not need to min-max them to have fun unless you're competing at the top top end. You can find dozens of builds designed and shared by the community which takes the guesswork/experimentation out of the equation too.

Second is colony/farm sim. Stardew Valley, Rimworld, Starbound?.they are relaxing to play, let you flex a little creativity, can be picked up or put down for minutes or hours and will absorb as much time as you offer them.

Survival games. These games offer varying levels of complexity, but generally you spend your time scavenging food/materials, fighting enemies, managing health, hunger, sleep and base-building. Don't Starve is different than most in the genre and an utterly brilliant game. Once you have the mechanics down, it's easy to play. It's not *easy*, but easy to play. Minecraft, Starbound, there are many great suggestions for these kind.

Sim games. Elite Dangerous, Euro Truck, X4. These let you freight goods through space/Europe. Elite Dangerous is easy to lose time in. Flying tourists around, freighting goods, making money. You could also consider Cities SKylines, Hospital/Rollercoaster Tycoon, just build fun places how you want. Civilization is not really sim, but strategy, but is a very, very slow easy going game.

Last suggestions are just general mayhem simulators. Just Cause 2-4, Saints Row 3-4, Dynasty Warriors (pre-open world). Blow shit up, parachute from helicopters, etc. You could probably include most Ubiwank FarCry/AssCreed stuff here as mindless action-schlock. You don't need much brain power to play those sandbox games.

Let us know what game you opt for

 

[meiam]

Warframe, play alone and go at your own pace, there's always something to grind and you can still get reward for doing easy stuff even after you overleveld it.

Darkest of dungeon, grind a few easy dungeon, you only really need to pay attention for boss for most of the game.

Banished, once the first few hour have passed you don't have any threat, you can just slowly expand at your own pace. Same for a lot of town sims (tropico, surviving mars, anno...)

4x game if you're used to them can also do the job just fine, you might need to pause w/e you doing every 10-20 minutes to think about what your next few move will be, but after that you can mostly play on automatic.

 

[aegix drakan_v1legacy]

I....Pretty much do that every evening with just about any game. If there's any kind of important story stuff going on or I REALLY need to think, I alt-tab and pause whatever I'm listening to, but otherwise, I'm multitasking by listening to something.

I did it with Subnautica, I've done it while roaming the land in Breath of the Wild, while doing trade runs in Elite Dangerous (although I have to rewind what I'm listening to after I lose track of it in any intense dogfight), while playing Rebel Galaxy, while roaming around between towns in Outward, while hunting easy monsters in Monster Hunter, while doing a run in Risk of Rain, I REALLY need it when I do an epic length Civ game, etc etc.

I think the FEW games I've never done it with is XCOM, because I need my 110% focus on the game to process all the potential possibilities of ever mode, or stuff that's heavily atmospheric-centered like System Shock 2 or stuff that's heavily story based like Deus Ex.

Honestly, you can multitask with basically any game as long as you don't have to focus on the story, or unless it's REALLY intense and the multitask would be distracting.

 

[BrawlMan]

EDF! EDF! EDF!

 

[Squilookle]

The Just Cause games were BORN for this purpose, whether you want to just mindlessly travel around a gorgeous environment, or mindlessly blow up everything within it. Grab Just Cause 3 for best results.

That aside, the previously mentioned Subnautica or Stranded Deep might work- but I'd also recommend Raft, a little indie darling involving survival doing a few simple tasks which is oddly mesmerising. The demo is basically all you need, and you can grab that for free here

 

[Kwak]

Spintyres Mudrunner. I find it hypnotically relaxing, and you don't have to have your eyes glued to the screen every second because you're just slowly driving over muddy terrain.

 

[Meximagician]

Well, since Saint's Row and Earth Defense Force have already been mentioned... I've been playing some older games like Streets of Rage 2 and WipEout 3 while listening to the news. Online versions of traditional logic puzzles work well for me too, like Nonograms or Futoshiki.

 

[Sonmi]

Recently, when I just want to tune out, I play either Slay the Spire or Enter the Gungeon, I find that you don't have to focus all that much to do well at these games.

4Xs are also good at that, as are Grand Strategy games, which have a lot of downtime.

 

[Adam Jensen_v1legacy]

That's pretty much how I played through most of Borderlands 2. Any ARPG would do. For some reason listening to a podcast simultaniously increases the fun factor.

 

[Worgen]

I tend to play Smite, paladins, or Warframe while I listen to podcasts/youtube vids.

 

[CaitSeith]

Mindless game? I recommend the smartphone game "Best Fiends Forever". It's a silly idle game (a cookie clicker clone) that requires little to no attention for the most part.

But really for something that I can multitask I usually go with something that I played so much that I know by heart. Or just grinding or breeding in Pokemon can get pretty mindless. Heck! Even farming for humanity in Dark Souls doesn't require my full attention.

 

[Fappy]

Most theme park MMOs can basically be played on auto pilot when doing casual/grindy content.

 

[Dalisclock]

A while back I stumbled across a game called Toy Soldiers. I know it's available on steam and presumably at some point for the Xbox. Basically you have an old timey wargame playset with little plastic soldiers and you set down turrents and such tower defense style to halt incoming advances from enemy waves(which you get a little warning of). You also have the oppunrity to control the turrents directly(and this is probably most beneficial then just letting the AI do everything for you) when you're not actively building or upgrading your current ones. To make it more interesting, some levels have (radio)controllable vehicles to help you out(that you can control). Oh, and there's also some ridiculously giant bosses to face at the end of certain missions.

The original game is WW1 based but there's an sequel of sorts(included in the steam version I think) which is set in the cold war turned hot.

SO it's not completely "Turn your brain off" but there is a fair bit of mindless shooter to it considering the tower defense/horde mode nature of the game and the fact it's all obviously tiny plastic troops and vehicles on a playset dismantles the higher ramifications of setting it in something like WW1.

 

[CritialGaming]

Just and update for ya'll. House Flipper is WAY better than it has any right to me and I can't stop playing it.