I play a lot of windowed games on my PC as I watch less engaging content like TV I’ve seen, Youtube. Lately Balatro, Peglin, a racing game called art of rally, Mini Motorways. Interested to hear other people’s preferences.
I generally want something that runs well windowed because I use a third of my ultrawide to run the video, so no shooters or “big” games usually.
None. I prefer to watch movies or TV shows that I enjoy enough that it will keep my attention.
I think there are different levels. I love the office, I’ve watched it through a few times. But sometimes after a long day I like to toss it on and just relax. It’s a comfort show. But having seen it so much, it’s easy to fiddle with a game while I watch. It’s a way to destress after work for me. It’s not that I don’t like the show, I’m just experiencing it a different way. As comfort background viewing, apposed to when I watch a show I really enjoy and am seeing for the first time.
I do this but it’s usually with a Brit murder mystery or classic movie. If I’m watching something I love like Silo or Severance then that gets my full attention.
Oh %100, there are some shows that gets my full attention. If I’m watching, for example right now, The Expanse then it’s the thing I’m doing haha.
Oh that’s a great one too!
Minecraft. I was SUPER into Minecraft for a while and digging a 5x5 tunnel for ten thousand blocks or more to connect to a distant nation isn’t something I could do without additional entertainment going on my second monitor, especially if I am just monitoring two bot accounts to make sure they don’t get stuck too often.
Playing minecraft while listening to podcasts was a special kind of zen experience for me.
Mainly JRPGs because they’re turned based and I’m grinding. Going through FFVI right now on a RG40XXV. Love that little thing.
Anything where it doesn’t matter if I get distracted at any given point, e.g. turn-based or otherwise non-time-sensitive games.
- Incremental games (Chillquarium, Pegidle, Synergism, etc.)
- Powerwash Simulator
- Geotastic (with time limit turned off)
- Slay the Spire, or other deckbuilding roguelites
- Dominion
- FTL: Faster Than Light / Multiverse
- Civilization VI
- Picross/Piczle Cross and similar games
Best I can do is listen to an audio book while playing a chill/puzzle game. I would short circuit I’d had to watch TV and play a game. I can’t even really have a conversation and play, I have to pause it.
I played it on mobile but it’s on pc as well- Slice & Dice. A really fun dice based roguelite. Liked it a little more than peglin and balatro.
Lately I’ve been playing Factorio a lot with something on my other monitor but idk if it meets your criteria as well.
Oh I was thinking of Dicey Dungeons, took me ages to remember the name. S&D looks fun
Yeah, i bounced off Dicey Dungeon too, but had a lot of fun with S&D.
The space age expansion for Factorio is huge, I feel like I’ve played it for 3 times as long as I did the base game and still not finished. I was not a fan of the bugs at first but I started to realize that they’re not really too much of an actual challenge it problem, they sorry if just serve as another pressure for developing your factory in a certain way.
I really liked the logistical side of the game Mindustry but eventually the “tower defense” aspects overwhelmed the fun of rooting materials and stuff. I wonder if it has some sort of peaceful mode though, I should look for it again.
Another thought is Dungeons of Aether, though it’s shorter than other Roguelites, a bit easier to “figure out” so it isn’t as interesting as some, and hasa lot more story elements so it might be too distracting as a passive game.
I think I have tried Slice and Dice, generally I am not great at games such as Slay the Spire and the like, but S&D was more accessible.
Factorio is great, might be worth a new run. I have never actually beaten the game, and made it furthest on peaceful mode when I did get to stages like nuclear power.
Elite Dangerous is perfect to play with a show on. I used to do window in window in VR whilst flying between sites.
So the show is picture in picture overlaid on the ship interior? Sounds great in VR
Yeah exactly. I had the show in a window floating over part of the ship inside VR. Think about where the centre console would be in a car. It was a really cool experience, flying my space ship whilst watching a program.
Smash Karts is a lot of fun, it’s pretty much online Mario Kart deathmatches! There’s also capture the flag, hat holder, and a few other games layered in too. Worth a try the next time you want to game along side a boringish video.
Edit: Here’s a link
Ok, that was a time sink. Good fun.
Sounds interesting! Looks fun with friends / online
Right now Tetris but I have been alternating between Tetris and balatro
Ftl, into the breach, Minecraft, darkest dungeon 1 and 2.
FTL… I need to get back into that again. Excellent on work laptops.
Yt + mc
The only “games” I’ll play while watching stuff are flight sims, just to help pass the time on several hour long flights.
That’s my teenage son right now on my computer. “Dad, can I leave the computer on overnight for a flight to Japan?” Yeah, he’s way into it and all the ATC stuff while having a laptop on the side for god knows what he’s playing/watching at the same time. I joke with friends that he could legit hijack a 737 and fly it from dead off to landing it across the globe. Last startup procedure he did that was “real quick” was 20 damn minutes because he skipped a few nonessential pieces of the checklist. Lol.
I really only play games that demand all of my attention. Though if I am playing something with constant down time, like being dead in Counter-Strike, I’ll watch YouTube videos on the Steam overlay until the next round.
Binding of Isaac, Brotato, or Balatro are good once you have enough experience with them to be able to play without much thought
Lately I’ve really been enjoying the bazaar. Not even sure how to describe that game. You choose one of 3 heroes and then spend your turns buying items for your board to defeat your opponents in autobattler style fights. The goal is to get to 10 Wins. It’s still in closed beta but the gameplay is in already pretty polished.
