I’m looking for PC games that I can play while listening to podcasts- games that don’t have engaging cut scenes or important dialogue, games that honestly don’t require a lot of skill or thought.
I used to be really into things like Farm Frenzy, Rescue Team, hidden object games, that kind of thing. I got heavily into MMOs and stopped downloading casual games for a decade or so.
Now it almost feels like this sort of game isn’t made anymore? Were they completely nuked by the existence of Gacha games, P2W, and anything that earns the dev a constant income stream? I’m happy to pay for a game once, but I can’t be constantly buying booster packs.
I also don’t want to play on mobile or on a console, PC Master Race here, haha.
FTL is fun and hard.
Also mindustry
FTL is such an interesting game !
My father really likes Mini Motorways. You could try something like that
He’s a big fan of sim cities and zoo tychoon and stuff too
Love me some mini motorways and mini metro!
Power wash simulator will be your best friend. No spoken dialogue, no important cutscenes, just you and a power wash gun. The only thing you’ll miss out on listening to podcasts is the admittedly very soothing sound of PSSSSHHHHHHHHHH from the washer itself.
Great suggestion. Also, if people are into it Lawn Mowing Simulator is good as well.
I second this, it’s like listening to music or a podcast while coloring a book. It’s extremely soothing!
Vampire Survivors for sure! It’s a very chill arcade game and it’s like 2-3€ when on sale.
I have a Steam collection just for that purpose, called “zone-out games”:
- Factorio
- Euro Truck Simulator
- Viscera Cleanup Detail
- Satisfactory
- Space Engineers
- Hardspace Shipbreaker
- Rift Breaker
- Monster Train
- Jupiter Hell
- Vampire Survivors
- Dorf Romantik
- DOOM (any)
- Nethack
Some advice I want to give is that “games that require a lot of skill” is only a temporary blocker. If you enjoy a hard game enough to play through it repeatedly, it can become a podcast game. Many people play Bloodborne or Binding of Isaac to audiobooks, and roguelikes are generally like this.
That in mind, I have a list of games that are valid podcast games but I haven’t built enough familiarity with them yet:
- FTL
- Binding of Isaac
- Terraria
- Risk of Rain
- Against the Storm
Factorio is awesome. To make it even more chill - I turn off enemies and increase resources. Even without enemies that game gets so complex and involved. But still mindless.
Minecraft creative mode can be very relaxing but time consuming, it takes a while to build a big project but looks awesome when completed, you can go for a small hobbit home too and give in some detail, it takes your mind off of things sometimes, especially when doing the math to even builds out.
Many roguelites could fall into this category, and are generally cheap to boot (i.e. vampire survivors).
Any other games that you recommend?
I would just look through any number of online list of “Best Swarm Survivors”. There’s dozens of different themes and tweaks from the VS formula, including boat and train varieties! I also watch the YouTube channel Never Nathaniel as he’s a pretty awesome source of both info and entertainment on the matter (as well as other games). He’s literally the only streamer I’ve watched and I couldn’t tell you why, his formula just works.
One more that is outside of the swarm survival genre, Child of Light. Though there is a fun and endearing story that irecommend, once you get through the first 20 minutes, you can kind of just not care and enjoy the simple but interesting play style of an almost-turned-based RPG.
https://classic-mahjong.com/ is free, entirely browser based, has no ads or other nonsense, and has the pleasant waterfall cascading effect when you clear all the tiles.
You might like Super Auto Pets. Not my kind of game but it’s casual and my friends loved it.
Oldschool Runescape. The perfect game for watching something on the side. Just get into a rhythm and grind away
Dorfromantik is a very chill puzzle game that runs great on Steam Deck if that’s your thing, a favourite of mine while the TV is going in the background.
If you’re into factory games I 1000% recommend Shapez, which is a shape-building game that doesn’t have the notion of grinding or currency or running out of resources. It’s immensely satisfying when you get the perfect mechanism together and you’re churning out shapes. Definitely one for mouse and keyboard though.
Definitely recommend Dorfromantik! Islanders is another super chill casual game (and also a builder) that I started and fell in love with the other day.
Thanks for the recommendation, because of your post went to look at how it looked and played. As a result, got Dorfromantik installed on the Steam Deck and already having a good time!
Brilliant! Hope you enjoy
Loop Hero might be one to check out. The game has an auto-battle mechanic, and you basically just manage the map and the base.
I’ve actually gotten back into Guild Wars 2 for the first time since its release over a decade ago, and I’m really enjoying all the new content they added. It SEEMS complicated with all the MMO-style currencies but you can honestly ignore most of them and go at your own pace because there’s so much to do but none of it is required to have fun. It’s even more casual if I’m using a low intensity character build, aka just left click in combat to win
Seconding Guild Wars 2! One of my favourite things about it is how when it comes to levelling, it supports whatever you want to do. If you literally just want to run around killing things and participating in dynamic events, you get experience for that. If you want to forego combat and just run around exploring the world and seeing what you can find, you get experience for that. If you want less freedom and would prefer a more structured story, guess what, you get experience for that. If you don’t want combat or story, and instead would prefer to be a humble craftsman… yep, you get experience for that, too. (I accidentally leveled an alt to 80 just through crafting!)
The combat is a huge selling point for Guild Wars 2 in my opinion, as it spares you the dreaded ‘hotbar bloat’ of similar MMOs by keeping it simple. Every class/profession gets 5 main skills, 1 healing skill, 3 utility skills and an ‘ultimate’ skill. On top of that, a few of them may get a few extra buttons (e.g. for directing pets or swapping stances) but that’s about it. Additionally, a lot of the content can be completed with any gear and more or less any build; you don’t have to worry about minmaxing or being optimal if you don’t want to.
Lack of hotbar boat also makes it a great game for Steam Deck!
That’s very true! I haven’t actually tried Guild Wars 2 on the Steam Deck yet myself, personally - the last time I looked, I recall that a fair few keybinds need to be set before it’s playable and that seemed a bit too overwhelming to me at the time. Have you tried it? What’s it like? c:
The back buttons are mandatory, and there’s a specific config someone made that I altered slightly for personal use, but I can’t remember the creator’s name. It was the highest used one at the time I downloaded it though. There’s definitely a small learning curve, but the reward is portable access to a great MMO!
Honestly I absolutely love the customizable nature of the Deck for individual programs, especially because I was able to pair 4 different build and equipment tabs to each of the face buttons so I can swap between all 3 elite specs for my engi main. I just wish they had official controller support with their UI like how I’ve seen FFXIV’s hotbar with multiple on-screen “pages” you can flip through easily.
I’m just about to give GW2 a go on my Deck. Thanks for this message - I’ll take any advice I can get!
New players don’t seem to realize that you can completely ignore the personal story. It just gives you something to do (and some rewards like while getting to level 80, which is really easy nowadays. I would recommend you make a few alt characters to try out different classes and see which one you like the most. Just take it slow and try whatever looks interesting and dont feel obligated to stick with one activity! No need to learn everything all at once :p
I use Shattered Pixel Dungeon for this. Nice and simple open source game without any bullshit. It’s a roguelike.
If you stick to the lower, less intense hazard difficulty levels, I find Deep Rock Galactic to be an excellent game to chill to. Can’t go wrong with badass Space Dwarven miners on a hostile alien insectoid planet. I only play with randoms via co-op, and it’s been nothing but a pleasant experience each time.
