Need a good venting game. Suggestions?

[Dr. Thrax]

I would say the Destroy All Humans! games, but you've gotta advance through the game to get the cool powers and weapons before you can really go on a rampage of destruction.
Though you could get the same satisfaction with Saints Row IV, cheat to unlock all powers and guns, infinite ammo and health, and blast away!

 

[OneCatch]

Anyone have any suggestions?

Seconding the person who suggested Serious Sam. You can pick up the First and Second Encounters in HD for fairly cheap, and they'll run even on integrated graphics.

Plot? No.
Levels? Yes.
Player Levelling? No. You find a weapon, it's yours. Old school armour and speed powerups and health packs.
Stupid AI? Yes - all enemies are basically set to 'charge' or 'shoot'. Or 'charge while shooting'. No cover, no AI teamwork, just hordes of them.
Cheats/mods? I've never really used them, but I'm pretty sure you can.
Endless bullets? Not quite, but you can carry a stupid amount of ammo (dozens of even the rarest ammo types), and most weapons don't even need reloading. You can carry all weapons at once.
Stealth Sections? I think not.

 

[Multi-Hobbyist]

Saints Row II - IV
GTA III, Vice City, San Andreas
Batman Arkham Asylum/City in the Endless Wave form
Halo ODST, firefight mode
Far Cry 3 Blood Dragon

 

[Dandark]

I usually enjoyed prototype for this kind of mindless fun, it was always pretty fun to be some kind of unstoppable godlike being who just rampaged around a wartorn NYC.
Other than that most games will need some kind of investment or preparation such as levelling up a new character and such, Dynasty warriors can work pretty well for just getting in and whacking some guys though.

I would also second the recommendation for Orcs must die 2. I have only played the first game but it was a lot of fun and I imagine the second one will be much the same.

 

[Eldritch Warlord]

Halo ODST, firefight mode

Halo: Reach Firefight fits the bill better I think.

 

[Alarien]

Honestly, having been in the same boat, I would suggest Left4Dead or Left4Dead2 first for some spousal coop. It's what my wife and I used for quite a while.

There are a lot of good suggestions here, with a lot of free destruction games. On that note, I would suggest any Lego property you like, as the Star Wars, LOTR, and Marvel games are all good for wanton destruction, and cute as well.

However the calming, cathartic feeling usually requires, for me, a mixture of "shoot stuff in the face" and "win the level." Accomplishing something is usually better at cooling one off. Hence, playing Left4Dead on normal or even easy difficulty can be great for just blowing off steam.

 

[Roxas1359]

I recommend Destroy All Humans 2 if possible. The DAH series allows for quite a bit of venting, and the great thing about the second game is that it has 2 player co-op for the story. If not that, then I always found that Fallout New Vegas seems to relieve my stress.

 

[Felstaff]

Nothing can quite recreate the satisfaction of venting than this:

 

[Lightknight]

Hmm, Beat Hazard really surprised me as a stress reducer. I don't even typically like those games and I'm not really a big fan of music. But the combination of the two on easy mode is remarkable.

Didn't see any responses regarding what console/system you use. PC has a lot more options than consoles do because of the range of cheats you can pull. Dynasty warrios and the Saints Row games are a nice every console option.

 

[Tahaneira]

Arkham City, Riddler's Revenge combat maps. You do have to play the game and gather Riddler trophies to unlock them, but once you do there's little that's more satisfying than dropping Batman into a room of overconfident thugs and leaving it with all their unconscious asses on the ground.

 

[Lightknight]

Anyone recommend Far Cry 3 Blood Dragon yet?

 

[TheRookie8]

Saints Row 4.

Superpowers, guns, rock music, aliens...go to town. It's the most recent one that comes to mind.

 

[Kilyle]

Gonna concur on Saints Row IV. I came in once to find my friend playing it (either that or Saints Row the Third, which IV beats out handily) and within a couple of minutes surmised without a word from him that he had had a really rough day/week and the game was helping him unwind. Before that realization, I had never considered that these "play the guy who steals cars and shoots random people with impunity" games could actually serve a (potentially) beneficial purpose.

I haven't actually played much of it (though I now own it thanks to a Steam Sale), but the game line is very sandboxy, and although there are missions to go on and characters to interact with, you are pretty much free to run around gunning down baddies, or steal a car and drive rampant through the streets. Or (eventually) a helicopter, or a tank. Or... not sure if this is in all the SR games, but I had a TON of fun with the "insurance scam" quest, where you throw yourself into traffic and try to get ragdoll-physicked for as much moolah as possible (the farther your body flies, the better). I did not expect to enjoy that quest but man, was I wrong about that.

Saints Row IV's improvement over the previous ones is in the addition of a sort of super powers. When I saw my friend playing it for the first time, I thought it was something you probably had to earn by playing through a lot of the game, but he said you get them almost immediately.


Another recommendation, not so much about shooting though: Go on Kongregate and look up Earn to Die. I was just idly browsing games one time when I felt really depressed, and came across this one and thought "Looks stupid, but why not?" Five minutes later I was mowing down zombies with my monster truck, doing no more than pressing forward and occasionally up and down for stability, and laughing my ass off. There's something to be said for dumb fun.

 

[THEMILKMAN]

My suggestion would be Vanquish, an often overlooked TPS that involves constant mayhem, chaos and lots of incredible robot destroying action - it was highly rated by critics and fans but never sold that well. It's crazy fun and very cheap nowadays. I would also recommend, as others have done, Just Cause 2, Saints Row and Bulletstorm. The Gears of War series is a great co-op experience if you enjoy playing together, as are the Halo games. Hope you both have fun!

It's always nice to see Platinum Studios getting some love and Vanquish especially is easily their most overlooked gem. All of their games (Bayonetta, Metal Gear Rising, Madworld, Anarchy Reigns) are fun as hell beat-em-ups that make you feel awesome and the soundtracks are consistently among the best in games ever.

 

[Rip Van Rabbit]

Warhammer 40k Space Marine


Very few games capture the visceral feeling of getting waist-deep in the bodies of the enemies you have chainsawed/shot/bludgeoned/blown up/vaporised and absolutely destroyed.

How do you get your health back? BY GETTING BACK INTO THE FRAY!

This game excels at making you feel like an unstoppable juggernaut.

 

[Guitarmasterx7]

I'll add another tick onto the saints row 4 recommendation. It's a lot of fun, lighthearted, and you get to brutally decimate shit with superpowers.

 

[cerebus23]

quake 2 nothing says i had a bad day at work to come home to face stomp your friend like 14 to 1 on the edge when most days that score would be far more in his favor, i wanted blood that day. the same buddy came real close to getting a match with thresh, i never played that well in my life since .

quake 2 had co op single player one on one dm was fun as heck on some maps, gg the edge, best dm map in history of gaming, tons of mods for alternate game modes, skins, models, maps. runes mod, rocket arena mod, bots were halfway decent, bfg was immensely fun in quake 2.

nothing in any game quite topped running around as the tick in quake bellowing SPOON! when you gibbed someone.

you got bored shooting stuff you could try trick jumps some real crazy difficult tricks you could preform, liek jumping off the top walk of the edge map done properly you could chain jump the whole room in like 3 jumps start to finish and end up on the far side of the room, insanely difficulty though.

q2 is also open source and free now days runs on lan.

cant hurt to give it a try in either case.

 

[KingsGambit_v1legacy]

Dynasty Warriors games for the ultimate in catharsis. Squads of enemy soldiers positively line up to feel the sharp edge of your sword, chakram or sickle and chain.

I would also add L4D2 or Payday 1/2 for another approach. The levels pacing is very good and forces the player to engage in fast paced action, damage control or sneaky sneaky.

There is no complex setup involved in any of the above, just play and have fun.

 

[Hexcel]

An oldie, but a goodie:


Explosion noise! The controls are super fluid and there's no prep time, you just jump into the action. It's a blast, especially in co-op. Also it's being released on Steam next week, so you can find it for any platform you're using.

If you're looking for more of a sandbox to play in though, I'll give a +1 to Just Cause 2 or Saint's Row.

 

[Black Reaper]

Metal Gear Rising
It is a game where you play as a Cyborg Ninja and you can cut your enemies into extremely little pieces(even bosses), attack by breakdancing, and kick helicopters