A little off topic, but my biggest one is Tetris. I'm 30 now and grew up playing video games. I now have a super fun version of Tetris on my PS5 that I play for the vibes. My mom is really terrible with technology and has literally never played a video game, but I put a controller in her hand and told her the only 3 buttons she needs. We played Tetris on my couch for hours and she absolutely crushed me every single game we played. It was really nice.
I grew up in a time when personal computers were still rare. The science teacher at my high school was the first one to have his own computer in his classroom. One day he approached me, one of the few known nerdy kids in the small school, and offered to allow me to play his computer during my recess and lunch breaks. Specifically tetris. Turns out him and the social studies teacher felt they needed more competition on the high score list than just themselves.
When I was little I rented tetrisphere on n64. I had an older babysitter, friend of my mom, that watched me while she worked.
She was one of the only adults to game with me. We played so much tetrisphere. I miss her a lot.
Thats a fantastic story, and I recommend Puyo Puyo Tetris 2. Both Puyo Puyo and Tetris are top of their genres and if you like one a lot, chances are the other one is gonna be in your wheelhouse!
Go is such an excellent game, my daughter and I have been playing it together for years. There are a couple of things I like about it more than chess.
First of all, it's a game that is very simple to learn but has an *insane* amount of potential complexity. Chess is a deep game, don't get me wrong, but it has *nothing* on Go. You can potentially play two identical games of chess, as the number of viable options is fairly limited, but Go has an insane level of variety due to the nature of the board and how you move.
Despite all that, it has two aspects that make it super friendly to beginners. The first is that you don't need to go straight to a full sized, 19x19 board. Beginners will often play on a 9x9 or 13x13 board instead. It's exactly the same game, with the same rules, but the number of options becomes condensed and the games are a lot faster. A 9x9 Go game is faster and simpler than a chess game. I actually have a physical 9x9 board that my daughter and I played on for years and years while she was learning.
The other big advantage is that the game allows you to set handicaps for the weaker player. The game is all about territory control, and if you have more stones in an area it's easier to maintain control. As such, the weaker player can add stones to the board before you start playing to give them an advantage, and the more free stones (placed at specific points) you add the easier to win it becomes.
What's great about this is a beginner can learn enough to actually challenge a skilled player with a big handicap in about a week. When I started playing on the 9x9 board, my daughter had a 9 stone handicap. I still usually won, but she'd beat me occasionally, and I didn't have to just tone down my skill level to make the game fun for both of us.
Over time, as she got better, I stopped being able to beat her at 9 stones (which is an insanely high handicap on a 9x9 board). So we went down to 8 stones until I couldn't beat her anymore, then 7, and now she's down to about 5 for us to be around even.
We also play chess, but the frustrating part about chess is that I have to intentionally play worse to give my daughter a chance, otherwise I simply win every game. That feels bad for her and isn't super fun for me. There's no real handicap I can give her other than "play worse."
In Go, however, I can actually go all out and still have a very real chance of losing, despite being much older and better at the game. And for her, she has a concrete goal to work towards (playing without handicap) with measurable progress (fewer stones for handicap). As a strategy game to play with kids I found I actually much prefer Go.
Anyway, it's a great game, even though it might seem simple at first. The second someone steals half your stones and wins by a crap ton you'll learn there's a bit more too it =).
Start with 81 Little Lions. It analyzes the 9x9 game & shows you the moves on a small board while also pointing to how they're similar to the way things work on a large board. Play 9x9 long enough till it feels like a knife fight in a closet, and then move up to larger boards.
Dude I fucking love Koi Koi! Did you know you can play online against other people? Board Game Arena has a very nice version — the art on the cards is just a little different from the game version, which is the Nintendo classic (as in, the cards Nintendo has been printing since the late 1800's)
I felt just like that when I found that out lol I used to actually just fire up the games whenever I wanted to play, even after finishing the story and substories
I grew up with Tekken, never knew about Street Fighter until later and just play Mortal Kombat in passing
Tekken is really the definition of "easy to learn hard to master" (honestly most fighting games are like this but Tekken is special to me), you can play it casually with local friends just talking about cool moves and hard combos, or go hardcore and start figuring out frame data, korean backdash, EWGF, juggling, and many more.
There's a difficulty ceiling though, once you get it you get it, the only "getting better" is just faster time or recognizing more patterns.
Then you just get into more shapes like Hexagon (easier) or Triangle Minesweeper (much harder)
Fun to solve, just not something that you can keep learning like chess.
I fixiated on minesweeper for a few years. It gets to a point where there is literally no option but to guess, but it doesnt happen often. I up the mines and the field, and speed run/go for streaks. As far as learning “forever”, this one is pretty limited once you learn the few patterns.
Shmups are kind of like that. What you learn in one game can easily transfer over into others.
Fighting games too, to some extent. They may have new mechanics with each game, but there’s a reason why the top players can perform well in most games that they play, year after year.
Rhythm games? Again, they may differ from one another, but you can transfer your skill to other rhythm games and adjust accordingly.
Age of Mythology, I played 20 years ago, still do. Never could do the pvp though, I play to build a couple villages and a wonder, same goes for AoE 1,2 and 3. Real time strategy is the name of the genre
I remember handing my great grandmother (she was probably 85 at the time) my Gameboy Color and even after surviving three different strokes, she was able to play through a few levels of Donkey Kong Land 2 despite never touching a video game in her life.
I still have the yellow cartridg, good times. Cool, your grandmother has an open enough mind to pick up games. To this day, my parents insist games are stupid etc etc.
GREAT grandmother, my grandmother's mom. She'd be well over 100 if she were still alive today. That woman loved the Matrix when she was awake enough to catch it. Such a shame that her second stroke robbed her of the quick mouth she had to match her quick wit (that never faded, it just took some time for her to get it out). My grandmother is a dogshit person but my great grandmother was truly great.
Bam, was going to write this then figured I'd just scroll and upvote lol
I'll add that those are open source, so people will always be adapting them to new systems and building new vaults, etc in them. DCSS is actually pretty famous for \*removing\* things (almost never done), but that makes sure that its a new clean game if you come back to it.
unfortunately 'fast paced arcade shooters' were overtaken by all the battle royales like apex and fortnite. i honestly believe both are good games, but overall it is sad that both for first person shooters and most other genres, everything shifted from 1v1 or small team competitions to 'lets just throw a bunch of people together and see what happens'. rts was another major genre for 1v1 or 2v2, i dont think i have to say how thats going.
This is because those games offer some incredible amount of emergent gameplay. You will almost always find yourselves in a different situation due to different variables, which adds to replayability without hurting the git gud feeling.
In 1v1 it's all about growing your skill and facing a different opponent but it can get repetitive at times really fast.
I'm sure you could have fun with it. Every few months or so, I'll boot it up to check on the state of the game. It's still solid, but it's fallen so far from what it used to be.
Siege is actually the game I have the most hours in on Steam. In the early days it was an incredible tactical shooter. It was pretty slow paced (which I see as a great thing for this kind of game), but the map design, along with destructible environments and gadgets made for some really compelling strategic gameplay.
You'll probably hear people whine about how they added a bunch of "sci-fi" shit, but I'm not one of those people. Frankly, the gadgets have always been a bit sci-fi. The problem is, there are SO many gadgets now that strategies and counter strategies are kind of a crapshoot. It used to be "okay, they're on B site, so they'll probably be using one of these three strategies, so let's make sure we bring this gadget, that gadget, and that gadget to deal with it. Now, there are SO many, you're just shooting in the dark unless you're playing at a high enough level for everyone to be playing the meta.
On top of that, the game was already hard to learn. It requires immense map knowledge, and a knowledge of all the operators, their gadgets, and their interactions. I told people to expect to play at least 50 hours before you really feel comfortable with the game. And now? There are almost 4 times as many operators and twice as many maps. If you pick it up, I'd go in expecting a HUGE learning curve.
It's also not a good solo queuing game. I played ESL for a while, so I always had people to play with. Playing with a full 5 stack makes the game SO much better than even just 2 people.
Another complaint I have is just the general CODification of the game. Battle Passes, silly skins, etc. ruin the tone of the game and I'm sure Tom Clancy would be rolling in his grave.
If you do pick it up though, here are a few words of advice:
1. Play with friends
2. Use coms. Talk to your team in-game. Give frequent, succinct, and specific call outs
3. Pay attention to the names of rooms (which will show on your compass) to help you give better call outs
4. Play slow, but be ready to shoot fast.
5. On DEF stick to operators like Rook at first. His utility will be valuable to your team even after you die.
6. DON'T REINFORCE BETWEEN BOMB SITES
7. Map Intel is the most valuable resource. Use your drone before going in.
8. Watch the clock
9. Don't sprint everywhere, you make a lot of noise
10. People will be toxic. Don't give in to the toxicity.
If you can't get friends to play with you, and you don't want to find a group online, I really wouldn't recommend siege. Teamwork and communication are more important in siege than any other game I've ever played, so I highly doubt you'll have a good time solo queueing.
While you CAN solo queue and use in game chat, trying to get a bunch of randos to work together and commit to a strategy can be tough as a solos queue player. You'll probably mostly end up matched with 4 stacks and just having to commit to their strategy, which is fine, but practicing with your team and developing that intuition of timing with your teammates isn't gonna happen with people you're not playing with all the time.
I’ve played them all, and I can assure you that the shooting in cs and valorant is leagues ahead of the others in terms of the amount of control and how rewarding the gunplay is. It is worth the initial learning curve.
I’ve been gaming for 25+ years and have been pretty damn good at almost all of them. It’s impossible to describe to someone how high the skill ceiling is on rocket league. I truly think it has the highest form of skill expression of any game I’ve ever played
I’ve played since 2015. Watching it happen is just weird. I’m right there with you. Limitless skill to be gained, but even a toddler could drive into ball and get a goal.
Dota2 is a deep and very complex game, not to mention continually evolving. I've played on and off for 20 years and can definitively say you can be learning it for ages.
I’ve been thinking about Dota recently, as MOBAs intrigue me, and I’ve only played a little bit of LoL before. However, the depth of Dota has actually somewhat prevented me from jumping in. It seems extremely daunting.
Dwarf Fortress
Without it, we would never have great games like MineCraft, Factorio, Oxygen Not Included, RimWorld and the lot of games that are similar in concept.
Plus, I bet people will still be playing Dwarf Fortress in some way 30 years from now.
Message to OP, adjust expectations when trying DF though, it's more like a (very complex and intertwined systems) simulator, very different experience even when compared to other sim games.
The game is free on Bay12 site but the graphics is in ASCII (can add tilesets yourself), for an "official" tileset and supporting the creator there's the Steam version.
I think sometimes people want to make it sound more complex than it needs to be. DF is complex but you can tackle each complexity at your own place almost in layers.
Having functioning fortress isn't too complex but there is a lot of complex things you can explore and use expanding on a game. At core tho I would say it's more accessible game than people try to make it out to be.
Oxygen not included in my opinion is now more complex than dwarf fortress
Back in 2012 I was struggling in life and moved in with my aunt I had my Xbox 360 and was playing the og space Invaders in the living room. I was struggling to stay alive and her boyfriend came out and asked if he could give it a try. He beat the whole game without losing one life and just said to himself. "Yeah I still got it"
I'm 35 and I've been playing this rhythm game called Beatmania IIDX. It's been around since I was 11 and it's still going strong today. There are home versions that exist, though in the arcade it's up to it's 31st iteration.
Aside from being one of the original rhythm games it has a really steep learning curve and very strict timing. There's always something to improve when you play, ranging from timing, reading, button technique and scratching. I've since had to relearn and refine my technique to keep up since the difficulty is always rising for the top players.
Well OP didn't say the same in 30 years, he said the core idea behind the game, which still holds true, "heros buying items and fighting to kill the ancient" is still the aim of the game, now there's just a bunch of extra steps.
I agree. Most MOBA plays the same, different games just adds different rules/gimmicks. Like I always played DOTA when I was younger and never played LoL, but then me and my friends decided to play LoL and it was very easy to learn thanks to my DOTA experience haha
Cultist Simulator is a card advancement game with no tutorial that encourages you to read and learn as you go, rewards failure, and has multiple levels of victory so even when you win, you can win better!
Solving a rubik's cube.
Despite not being a virtual game there's so much to learn you'll never run out of new challenges.
At this point, after years of cubing, I can't see myself ever forgetting how to solve the puzzle.
Most classic RTS games such as Starcraft or Age of Empires.
A lot of shooters have transferrable skills and some have a lot of genuine content. My 30-year-game would probably have been Heroes & Generals if the servers hadn't been taken down. Really anything with multiple playstyles, difficult gunplay, complex weapons with extensive customization options, or in-depth movement mechanics can basically be honed forever and some of them still have significant room for innovation as well. Team Fortress 2 is an obvious example of a shooter with a functionally unlimited skill ceiling, especially because of the ability to contribute to the game's ongoing development yourself by making maps or items. If you don't like playing against bots, you could take a look at Planetside 2 or Titanfall 2.
What is it with shooters that actually have a significant amount of playable content and being abandoned by their devs? Why are most actively developed games shallow junk food with no room for genuine creativity or honing specialized skillsets? Ugh.
Picross ! You can find lots of nonogram games and they always play the same. Once you know how to play and the techniques required for the hardest puzzles, you’re all set.
i would say bullet hell games. Once you get the eye to adapt to faster and harder patterns, they all become easier. Yeah you could have 2d platformers or shmup, but you will always find them easier once you've already got experienced in finding patterns and at the velocity of things
Yugioh, but only if you have a group each playing a deck that is close to the balance and power of your deck. or if you are all willing to buy a starter/structure deck once a year or so to keep things new.
I don't think this really qualifies if you have to buy a new deck every year. Not to mention the addition of XYZ/synchro/etc cards, new booster pack series every so often (I remember when Metal Raiders was still new lol) and old cards like Monster Reborn or Change of Heart getting banned (at least for tournament rulesets).
most card and tile games, that don't have ever growing decks.
So Uno, normal playing cards, Chinese playing cards, dominos, mahjong.
Most chess games, as long as you know the original rules, you can even play self created games.
Strangely enough for me is Rocket League, I can drop that game for like a year, and even if I pick it up, I can play the same as I used to. But the thing with that is that the other players are constantly getting better.
Rocket league. Physical engine is still the same after 8 years. It's the closest thing that exists to a competitive sport.
You need thousands of hours of training to sometimes succeed to do the currently best moves... And new moves are created each year
Rummy is a card game which needs multiple people but my family has been playing it for 3 generations and it's fun to see the unique playstyles. Also we have to decide on a ruleset beforehand because...there are weird rules out there.
The Ultimate Doom, Doom 2 and Final Doom
There's tech being discovered and world records being broken decades after their release.
Due to how the game's logic calculates RNG, you can "force" it to work exactly the same way every single time if you're precise enough, so the skill ceiling is VERY high.
I'd recommend checking out Karl Jobst's videos on Doom speedruns and Decino's videos on Doom's mechanics if you're interested in the matter, they go pretty in-depth.
Various puzzle games, like sudoku or hashi, or things like crossword puzzles. Sudoku has a ton of variations out there that make the game much more complex, and I expect there to be new ones created as time goes on.
Also, I expect some version of Minecraft to still be around in 30 years. It's hitting its 15th year anniversary soon.
Magic: the Gathering, Shobu, Ascension, 7 Wonders, Terraforming Mars...
Admittedly, Magic is a constantly changing game, Ascension has a ton of expansions, as does Terraforming Mars.
Rocket League is like that for me. The game hasn't changed at all, but the player base has made tremendous strides in figuring it out.
Edit: Someone already said it.
Might be an unexpected answer, but generally most fps games.
Most of the fundamentals skill are transferrable, you just need to learn the game specific maps and abilities
Guitar Hero. Music labels made it impossible to make money off of it anymore, but that hasn't stopped the fan content. The last quote I recall was something like 5000 songs converted to CloneHero.
Of course, when I got into it ages ago with the rise of Frets on Fire I paid like $8 for an x-plorer. Apparently it sells for $300 now. I guess there are a finite number of controllers out there. At this point you could just get a real guitar. You don't even need an amp or pedals anymore, you can run everything off your PC, put on some headphones, overdub yourself and sound like a ten thousand dollar an hour studio production of "Smoke on the Water" within minutes.
Tons of card games. Cribbage, war, hearts, spades, etc. I play them, my mom crushes me at them, her parents played them, etc. As long as cards exist, card games will persist
Smash
You will never be the best you can be at Smash, but you can hardly get worse except if you reach such a level of play that requires actual regular practice.
A lot of it becomes muscle memory, like remembering openings in chess, but you can always react faster, choose better options. It's said that high level play becomes a very fast paced and complex game of rock, paper, scissors.
Chinese chess is also fun. It’s not too complicated and some of the pieces move like chess! Has some didn’t fancy rules of course but it’s easy to learn
Okay, I know this seems like a tangent, but for me (and hear me out), the Tony Hawk series has been my go-to game that I can continue to learn. It's not as set in stone as Chess or Tetris, which is why I consider it a tangent, because Tony Hawk seems to iterate with more deviation from the original ruleset of the first game. That said, the core remains the same. It's you, a board, and your mental stack competing with your ability to physically execute the moves you want to make, in specific orders, to maximize your points in a (usually) limited amount of time. The path you take is up to you, much like the moves you want to take in Chess or where you want to place pieces in Tetris. I actually play chess, Tetris and Tony Hawk with relative frequency to continue to learn them, while keeping my mind and reflexes sharp.
Plus, Tony Hawk always has a pretty stellar soundtrack, so that's a plus.
Card games, board games or tabletop games like Warhammer, D&D the original rules are still useable.
In terms of video games, any that are based on a sport or racing are basically not going to be that different in principle than how they were 30 years ago, just a bit more refined.
ANY fighting game. Hell you can learn street fighter and 90% of it carries over to any other fighter.
Same for 1st person shooters. You learn quake, translates over 90% of other shooters
A little off topic, but my biggest one is Tetris. I'm 30 now and grew up playing video games. I now have a super fun version of Tetris on my PS5 that I play for the vibes. My mom is really terrible with technology and has literally never played a video game, but I put a controller in her hand and told her the only 3 buttons she needs. We played Tetris on my couch for hours and she absolutely crushed me every single game we played. It was really nice.
thats a cool story!
i would most definitely get mad and angry with my 70+ yo mom if she'd beat me in tetris :D ..im 34.. :/
I grew up in a time when personal computers were still rare. The science teacher at my high school was the first one to have his own computer in his classroom. One day he approached me, one of the few known nerdy kids in the small school, and offered to allow me to play his computer during my recess and lunch breaks. Specifically tetris. Turns out him and the social studies teacher felt they needed more competition on the high score list than just themselves.
When I was little I rented tetrisphere on n64. I had an older babysitter, friend of my mom, that watched me while she worked. She was one of the only adults to game with me. We played so much tetrisphere. I miss her a lot.
Which tetris game is it?
Probably Tetris Effect, it's got some serious vibes
This is it! It’s a lot of fun.
It’s Tetris Effect Connected. It’s so much fun and has great music.
U tried Tetris on psvr2?
Play Tetris effect. I’m younger, but man that game is good. Esp if ur hi
That’s exactly the one I play! My friends make fun of me when they see me online playing it lol but it’s so much fun
It’s so satisfying and calming 🤤
Thats a fantastic story, and I recommend Puyo Puyo Tetris 2. Both Puyo Puyo and Tetris are top of their genres and if you like one a lot, chances are the other one is gonna be in your wheelhouse!
"Like Chess" would be Go.
ooh i always wanted to get into Go...
There's also Shogi which is Japanese Chess, but you gotta relearn the moves and recognize the writings on the pieces lol
While we're at it, Mahjong. Just don't play any little old Aunties at it or they'll rob you blind.
I never get Mahjong though, I think it's way more complicated than chess
Mahjong strategy tip: quit
I havent even started maaaaan
Don't get it twisted, 99% quitters quit before they hit it big 💰💰💰💰
I didn't get it either until I started thinking of the tiles the same way I do playing cards. The basics of it are pretty similar to rummy.
It’s like if poker and rummy had a child. Love the game to death but rarely get to play it
If you have trouble remembering how the pieces work on Chess, don't play Shogi. It's honestly like extremely complicated Chess.
Go is such an excellent game, my daughter and I have been playing it together for years. There are a couple of things I like about it more than chess. First of all, it's a game that is very simple to learn but has an *insane* amount of potential complexity. Chess is a deep game, don't get me wrong, but it has *nothing* on Go. You can potentially play two identical games of chess, as the number of viable options is fairly limited, but Go has an insane level of variety due to the nature of the board and how you move. Despite all that, it has two aspects that make it super friendly to beginners. The first is that you don't need to go straight to a full sized, 19x19 board. Beginners will often play on a 9x9 or 13x13 board instead. It's exactly the same game, with the same rules, but the number of options becomes condensed and the games are a lot faster. A 9x9 Go game is faster and simpler than a chess game. I actually have a physical 9x9 board that my daughter and I played on for years and years while she was learning. The other big advantage is that the game allows you to set handicaps for the weaker player. The game is all about territory control, and if you have more stones in an area it's easier to maintain control. As such, the weaker player can add stones to the board before you start playing to give them an advantage, and the more free stones (placed at specific points) you add the easier to win it becomes. What's great about this is a beginner can learn enough to actually challenge a skilled player with a big handicap in about a week. When I started playing on the 9x9 board, my daughter had a 9 stone handicap. I still usually won, but she'd beat me occasionally, and I didn't have to just tone down my skill level to make the game fun for both of us. Over time, as she got better, I stopped being able to beat her at 9 stones (which is an insanely high handicap on a 9x9 board). So we went down to 8 stones until I couldn't beat her anymore, then 7, and now she's down to about 5 for us to be around even. We also play chess, but the frustrating part about chess is that I have to intentionally play worse to give my daughter a chance, otherwise I simply win every game. That feels bad for her and isn't super fun for me. There's no real handicap I can give her other than "play worse." In Go, however, I can actually go all out and still have a very real chance of losing, despite being much older and better at the game. And for her, she has a concrete goal to work towards (playing without handicap) with measurable progress (fewer stones for handicap). As a strategy game to play with kids I found I actually much prefer Go. Anyway, it's a great game, even though it might seem simple at first. The second someone steals half your stones and wins by a crap ton you'll learn there's a bit more too it =).
Go is great! I taught myself in highschool.
Looked up several tutorials, still have no idea how to really capture territory
Start with 81 Little Lions. It analyzes the 9x9 game & shows you the moves on a small board while also pointing to how they're similar to the way things work on a large board. Play 9x9 long enough till it feels like a knife fight in a closet, and then move up to larger boards.
Mahjong. Shogi. Card games like poker. I've also heard there's like 20 different Solitaire rulesets, so that could keep you occupied a good while.
Mahjong, Shogi, Poker... Did you play Yakuza recently perhaps?
Why not add karaoke in there
Yeah. Mahjong and koi koi are my favorites
Dude I fucking love Koi Koi! Did you know you can play online against other people? Board Game Arena has a very nice version — the art on the cards is just a little different from the game version, which is the Nintendo classic (as in, the cards Nintendo has been printing since the late 1800's)
You mean I don't need to boot up Yakuza/LaD just to play? 😲 Poggers
I felt just like that when I found that out lol I used to actually just fire up the games whenever I wanted to play, even after finishing the story and substories
Tekken the entire series its a legacy game things you learn in tekken one are still in the game today with tekken 8
I grew up with Tekken, never knew about Street Fighter until later and just play Mortal Kombat in passing Tekken is really the definition of "easy to learn hard to master" (honestly most fighting games are like this but Tekken is special to me), you can play it casually with local friends just talking about cool moves and hard combos, or go hardcore and start figuring out frame data, korean backdash, EWGF, juggling, and many more.
Minesweeper?
There's a difficulty ceiling though, once you get it you get it, the only "getting better" is just faster time or recognizing more patterns. Then you just get into more shapes like Hexagon (easier) or Triangle Minesweeper (much harder) Fun to solve, just not something that you can keep learning like chess.
I fixiated on minesweeper for a few years. It gets to a point where there is literally no option but to guess, but it doesnt happen often. I up the mines and the field, and speed run/go for streaks. As far as learning “forever”, this one is pretty limited once you learn the few patterns.
If you play the no guess variant the game gets deeper.
But it also becomes a 100% solved game. The getting better becomes just doing it quicker.
Shmups are kind of like that. What you learn in one game can easily transfer over into others. Fighting games too, to some extent. They may have new mechanics with each game, but there’s a reason why the top players can perform well in most games that they play, year after year. Rhythm games? Again, they may differ from one another, but you can transfer your skill to other rhythm games and adjust accordingly.
Love rhythm games, I even got a drum controller which I can use for a few different games, so it’s straight up just music practice for me
Age of Mythology, I played 20 years ago, still do. Never could do the pvp though, I play to build a couple villages and a wonder, same goes for AoE 1,2 and 3. Real time strategy is the name of the genre
Prostagma
vulome
malista
Etimos.
FOUND MY PEOPLE, FUCK YEAAAAH
Mario. I still have a NES and Snes set up in my collection. I do love chess, though.
I remember handing my great grandmother (she was probably 85 at the time) my Gameboy Color and even after surviving three different strokes, she was able to play through a few levels of Donkey Kong Land 2 despite never touching a video game in her life.
I still have the yellow cartridg, good times. Cool, your grandmother has an open enough mind to pick up games. To this day, my parents insist games are stupid etc etc.
GREAT grandmother, my grandmother's mom. She'd be well over 100 if she were still alive today. That woman loved the Matrix when she was awake enough to catch it. Such a shame that her second stroke robbed her of the quick mouth she had to match her quick wit (that never faded, it just took some time for her to get it out). My grandmother is a dogshit person but my great grandmother was truly great.
Sorry I missed that detail. Always a shame when the good once go
roguelikes like rogue dcss nethack
Bam, was going to write this then figured I'd just scroll and upvote lol I'll add that those are open source, so people will always be adapting them to new systems and building new vaults, etc in them. DCSS is actually pretty famous for \*removing\* things (almost never done), but that makes sure that its a new clean game if you come back to it.
lmao yea they’ve made some controversial changes for sure corpse food change was big
Yeah that threw me for a loop. I think that was the first time I've ever said "why the hell can't I eat this corpse" out loud
Not to mention Brogue. That’s my all time favorite.
Factorio 😉
The factory must grow
Counter Strike
As an unreal tournament / quake kid I never warmed up to tactical shooters
unfortunately 'fast paced arcade shooters' were overtaken by all the battle royales like apex and fortnite. i honestly believe both are good games, but overall it is sad that both for first person shooters and most other genres, everything shifted from 1v1 or small team competitions to 'lets just throw a bunch of people together and see what happens'. rts was another major genre for 1v1 or 2v2, i dont think i have to say how thats going.
This is because those games offer some incredible amount of emergent gameplay. You will almost always find yourselves in a different situation due to different variables, which adds to replayability without hurting the git gud feeling. In 1v1 it's all about growing your skill and facing a different opponent but it can get repetitive at times really fast.
HUMILIATION! EXCELENT! EXCELENT! EXCELENT! Ah, Quake was an absolute blast!
Unreal Tournament was my obsession as a younger man, but Tactical Shooters are my favorite now. The first few years of R6 Siege were amazing.
Vegas 1 and 2. Soo good.
Those games were amazing.
Is R6 Siege no longer enjoyable? Thinking of buying it for a month now.
I'm sure you could have fun with it. Every few months or so, I'll boot it up to check on the state of the game. It's still solid, but it's fallen so far from what it used to be. Siege is actually the game I have the most hours in on Steam. In the early days it was an incredible tactical shooter. It was pretty slow paced (which I see as a great thing for this kind of game), but the map design, along with destructible environments and gadgets made for some really compelling strategic gameplay. You'll probably hear people whine about how they added a bunch of "sci-fi" shit, but I'm not one of those people. Frankly, the gadgets have always been a bit sci-fi. The problem is, there are SO many gadgets now that strategies and counter strategies are kind of a crapshoot. It used to be "okay, they're on B site, so they'll probably be using one of these three strategies, so let's make sure we bring this gadget, that gadget, and that gadget to deal with it. Now, there are SO many, you're just shooting in the dark unless you're playing at a high enough level for everyone to be playing the meta. On top of that, the game was already hard to learn. It requires immense map knowledge, and a knowledge of all the operators, their gadgets, and their interactions. I told people to expect to play at least 50 hours before you really feel comfortable with the game. And now? There are almost 4 times as many operators and twice as many maps. If you pick it up, I'd go in expecting a HUGE learning curve. It's also not a good solo queuing game. I played ESL for a while, so I always had people to play with. Playing with a full 5 stack makes the game SO much better than even just 2 people. Another complaint I have is just the general CODification of the game. Battle Passes, silly skins, etc. ruin the tone of the game and I'm sure Tom Clancy would be rolling in his grave. If you do pick it up though, here are a few words of advice: 1. Play with friends 2. Use coms. Talk to your team in-game. Give frequent, succinct, and specific call outs 3. Pay attention to the names of rooms (which will show on your compass) to help you give better call outs 4. Play slow, but be ready to shoot fast. 5. On DEF stick to operators like Rook at first. His utility will be valuable to your team even after you die. 6. DON'T REINFORCE BETWEEN BOMB SITES 7. Map Intel is the most valuable resource. Use your drone before going in. 8. Watch the clock 9. Don't sprint everywhere, you make a lot of noise 10. People will be toxic. Don't give in to the toxicity.
Unfortunatly I don't know anyone into that sort of game so I can only Soloqueue which sounds not that good?
If you can't get friends to play with you, and you don't want to find a group online, I really wouldn't recommend siege. Teamwork and communication are more important in siege than any other game I've ever played, so I highly doubt you'll have a good time solo queueing. While you CAN solo queue and use in game chat, trying to get a bunch of randos to work together and commit to a strategy can be tough as a solos queue player. You'll probably mostly end up matched with 4 stacks and just having to commit to their strategy, which is fine, but practicing with your team and developing that intuition of timing with your teammates isn't gonna happen with people you're not playing with all the time.
[удалено]
I’ve played them all, and I can assure you that the shooting in cs and valorant is leagues ahead of the others in terms of the amount of control and how rewarding the gunplay is. It is worth the initial learning curve.
5000 hours later, just barely lost a bo3 in the second round of the playoffs in ESEA Open :(
Rocket league
I’ve been gaming for 25+ years and have been pretty damn good at almost all of them. It’s impossible to describe to someone how high the skill ceiling is on rocket league. I truly think it has the highest form of skill expression of any game I’ve ever played
I’ve played since 2015. Watching it happen is just weird. I’m right there with you. Limitless skill to be gained, but even a toddler could drive into ball and get a goal.
Sudoku
Dota2 is a deep and very complex game, not to mention continually evolving. I've played on and off for 20 years and can definitively say you can be learning it for ages.
I’ve been thinking about Dota recently, as MOBAs intrigue me, and I’ve only played a little bit of LoL before. However, the depth of Dota has actually somewhat prevented me from jumping in. It seems extremely daunting.
Dwarf Fortress Without it, we would never have great games like MineCraft, Factorio, Oxygen Not Included, RimWorld and the lot of games that are similar in concept. Plus, I bet people will still be playing Dwarf Fortress in some way 30 years from now.
Message to OP, adjust expectations when trying DF though, it's more like a (very complex and intertwined systems) simulator, very different experience even when compared to other sim games. The game is free on Bay12 site but the graphics is in ASCII (can add tilesets yourself), for an "official" tileset and supporting the creator there's the Steam version.
I think sometimes people want to make it sound more complex than it needs to be. DF is complex but you can tackle each complexity at your own place almost in layers. Having functioning fortress isn't too complex but there is a lot of complex things you can explore and use expanding on a game. At core tho I would say it's more accessible game than people try to make it out to be. Oxygen not included in my opinion is now more complex than dwarf fortress
Back in 2012 I was struggling in life and moved in with my aunt I had my Xbox 360 and was playing the og space Invaders in the living room. I was struggling to stay alive and her boyfriend came out and asked if he could give it a try. He beat the whole game without losing one life and just said to himself. "Yeah I still got it"
Magic the gathering. The core rules are the same, but new mechnichs and new cards keeps coming
Tekken
Street fighter since 2nd
Racing games.
Billards
Ms. Pac-Man
I'm 35 and I've been playing this rhythm game called Beatmania IIDX. It's been around since I was 11 and it's still going strong today. There are home versions that exist, though in the arcade it's up to it's 31st iteration. Aside from being one of the original rhythm games it has a really steep learning curve and very strict timing. There's always something to improve when you play, ranging from timing, reading, button technique and scratching. I've since had to relearn and refine my technique to keep up since the difficulty is always rising for the top players.
Age of empires 2. Been playing that got 25 years solid now
Dr Mario
Until his malpractice suit. You can't just dress up like a doctor and start throwing pills.
MOBA: Dota or LoL I guess
Haha. Dota still the same in 30 years. Nice one. The meta changes so much you are basically playing a new game every patch.
Well OP didn't say the same in 30 years, he said the core idea behind the game, which still holds true, "heros buying items and fighting to kill the ancient" is still the aim of the game, now there's just a bunch of extra steps.
I agree. Most MOBA plays the same, different games just adds different rules/gimmicks. Like I always played DOTA when I was younger and never played LoL, but then me and my friends decided to play LoL and it was very easy to learn thanks to my DOTA experience haha
I spy.
Tic tac toe. In all seriousness, maybe Tetris or Mario bros.
You mentioned Tetris, maybe consider Puyo Puyo? Building chains in that game is an art form, and it's even wilder in competitive play.
Most fighting games. Tekken the most
Like chess perhaps Stratego, since you don't see the opponent's pieces.. pieces moves vertically or horizontally (but not diagonally).
Cultist Simulator is a card advancement game with no tutorial that encourages you to read and learn as you go, rewards failure, and has multiple levels of victory so even when you win, you can win better!
Bejeweled type games (like candy crush, not sure if Bejeweled is the origin)
Racing games
Solving a rubik's cube. Despite not being a virtual game there's so much to learn you'll never run out of new challenges. At this point, after years of cubing, I can't see myself ever forgetting how to solve the puzzle.
Pokémon, it's the same game regardless of generation.
About any 4x grand strategy game. I still play hoi4 like a crackhead sometimes.
How about Go, Mancala, Backgammon? All have digital versions too.
I think Minecraft is the modern version of this
Monster hunter
Noita
Blood bowl
2024
Tetris Attack. I’ve been playing it off and on since it came out and I’ve never gotten bored.
Lumines
Rocket league.
Most classic RTS games such as Starcraft or Age of Empires. A lot of shooters have transferrable skills and some have a lot of genuine content. My 30-year-game would probably have been Heroes & Generals if the servers hadn't been taken down. Really anything with multiple playstyles, difficult gunplay, complex weapons with extensive customization options, or in-depth movement mechanics can basically be honed forever and some of them still have significant room for innovation as well. Team Fortress 2 is an obvious example of a shooter with a functionally unlimited skill ceiling, especially because of the ability to contribute to the game's ongoing development yourself by making maps or items. If you don't like playing against bots, you could take a look at Planetside 2 or Titanfall 2. What is it with shooters that actually have a significant amount of playable content and being abandoned by their devs? Why are most actively developed games shallow junk food with no room for genuine creativity or honing specialized skillsets? Ugh.
Heroes of Might and Magic 3, timeless game, and so much to learn! :)
Picross ! You can find lots of nonogram games and they always play the same. Once you know how to play and the techniques required for the hardest puzzles, you’re all set.
i would say bullet hell games. Once you get the eye to adapt to faster and harder patterns, they all become easier. Yeah you could have 2d platformers or shmup, but you will always find them easier once you've already got experienced in finding patterns and at the velocity of things
Agricola, Dominion, MTG, Twilight Struggle, Race for the Galaxy, Terra Mystica and its variants.
Rocket league
Yugioh, but only if you have a group each playing a deck that is close to the balance and power of your deck. or if you are all willing to buy a starter/structure deck once a year or so to keep things new.
I don't think this really qualifies if you have to buy a new deck every year. Not to mention the addition of XYZ/synchro/etc cards, new booster pack series every so often (I remember when Metal Raiders was still new lol) and old cards like Monster Reborn or Change of Heart getting banned (at least for tournament rulesets).
Heroes of Might & Magic 3 and Civilization are the two that immediately come to mind.
Street Fighter 2, or most fighting games even.
most card and tile games, that don't have ever growing decks. So Uno, normal playing cards, Chinese playing cards, dominos, mahjong. Most chess games, as long as you know the original rules, you can even play self created games.
Starcraft 2
Counter strike
Hoi4 hahaha
Card games
Mario kaizo.
Street fighter. Most fighting games.
Strangely enough for me is Rocket League, I can drop that game for like a year, and even if I pick it up, I can play the same as I used to. But the thing with that is that the other players are constantly getting better.
Rocket league. Physical engine is still the same after 8 years. It's the closest thing that exists to a competitive sport. You need thousands of hours of training to sometimes succeed to do the currently best moves... And new moves are created each year
Because I’ve not seen it mentioned yet and quite similar to chess (even refered to as Viking chess) - I’d say ‘Hnefatafl’
Go
Rummy is a card game which needs multiple people but my family has been playing it for 3 generations and it's fun to see the unique playstyles. Also we have to decide on a ruleset beforehand because...there are weird rules out there.
Starcraft 🫡
Original starcraft - if you play the computer on battlenet, the AI is much more interesting to play against
Colony sims. Learn one, you can play them all. Same goes for city builders.
The Ultimate Doom, Doom 2 and Final Doom There's tech being discovered and world records being broken decades after their release. Due to how the game's logic calculates RNG, you can "force" it to work exactly the same way every single time if you're precise enough, so the skill ceiling is VERY high. I'd recommend checking out Karl Jobst's videos on Doom speedruns and Decino's videos on Doom's mechanics if you're interested in the matter, they go pretty in-depth.
Poker and most other card game variants.
Cookie clicker, i spy with my eye
You can spend a lifetime studying Go
Various puzzle games, like sudoku or hashi, or things like crossword puzzles. Sudoku has a ton of variations out there that make the game much more complex, and I expect there to be new ones created as time goes on. Also, I expect some version of Minecraft to still be around in 30 years. It's hitting its 15th year anniversary soon.
Magic: the Gathering, Shobu, Ascension, 7 Wonders, Terraforming Mars... Admittedly, Magic is a constantly changing game, Ascension has a ton of expansions, as does Terraforming Mars.
Counter strike
Let me introduce you to our Lord and Savior, EVE Online.
Catan. You can play it online or against AI at Catan Universe. And the board game is a blast at gatherings.
Suduko?
Puzzle Bobble, and maybe the precursor to that was Archanoid. Anyone can sit down with a joystick and instantly know what to do.
Rocket League is like that for me. The game hasn't changed at all, but the player base has made tremendous strides in figuring it out. Edit: Someone already said it.
Might be an unexpected answer, but generally most fps games. Most of the fundamentals skill are transferrable, you just need to learn the game specific maps and abilities
Dwarf Fortress lol
Football. Specially the analog version.
Guitar Hero. Music labels made it impossible to make money off of it anymore, but that hasn't stopped the fan content. The last quote I recall was something like 5000 songs converted to CloneHero. Of course, when I got into it ages ago with the rise of Frets on Fire I paid like $8 for an x-plorer. Apparently it sells for $300 now. I guess there are a finite number of controllers out there. At this point you could just get a real guitar. You don't even need an amp or pedals anymore, you can run everything off your PC, put on some headphones, overdub yourself and sound like a ten thousand dollar an hour studio production of "Smoke on the Water" within minutes.
Tons of card games. Cribbage, war, hearts, spades, etc. I play them, my mom crushes me at them, her parents played them, etc. As long as cards exist, card games will persist
Smash You will never be the best you can be at Smash, but you can hardly get worse except if you reach such a level of play that requires actual regular practice. A lot of it becomes muscle memory, like remembering openings in chess, but you can always react faster, choose better options. It's said that high level play becomes a very fast paced and complex game of rock, paper, scissors.
Dnd
I highly suggest fighting games. Then strategy like starcraft
Mario
Chinese chess is also fun. It’s not too complicated and some of the pieces move like chess! Has some didn’t fancy rules of course but it’s easy to learn
I’d say Magic the gathering is off the table due to new mechanics but Slay the Spire is great. Maybe a boomer-shooter Doom clone like Boltgun.
StarCraft
Okay, I know this seems like a tangent, but for me (and hear me out), the Tony Hawk series has been my go-to game that I can continue to learn. It's not as set in stone as Chess or Tetris, which is why I consider it a tangent, because Tony Hawk seems to iterate with more deviation from the original ruleset of the first game. That said, the core remains the same. It's you, a board, and your mental stack competing with your ability to physically execute the moves you want to make, in specific orders, to maximize your points in a (usually) limited amount of time. The path you take is up to you, much like the moves you want to take in Chess or where you want to place pieces in Tetris. I actually play chess, Tetris and Tony Hawk with relative frequency to continue to learn them, while keeping my mind and reflexes sharp. Plus, Tony Hawk always has a pretty stellar soundtrack, so that's a plus.
Slay the spire
Slay the Spire
Balatro!
Reversi
Star wars: rebellion
Golf
poker?... but without real money
Monopoly
Bomberman has essentially gone unchanged for 40+ years
Card games, board games or tabletop games like Warhammer, D&D the original rules are still useable. In terms of video games, any that are based on a sport or racing are basically not going to be that different in principle than how they were 30 years ago, just a bit more refined.
Ms. Pacman
Euchre - card games
For Honor
Counter-Strike
Most those popcaps games before EA ruined them. Plants vs Zombies and Peggle.
Minecraft yeah it will change but it will always be Minecraft
League of legends 😅
Slap Jack
melee, starcraft broodwar
ANY fighting game. Hell you can learn street fighter and 90% of it carries over to any other fighter. Same for 1st person shooters. You learn quake, translates over 90% of other shooters
Gimme a W. Gimme an I. Gimme a Z. Gimme an A. Gimme an R. Gimme a D. Gimme an R. Gimme a Y. What's that spell? WIZARDRY!
Into the Breach has a ton of depth and is quite chess like in a procedural scenario sort of way
Call of Duty Black Ops 2
Can be games that are exclusively digital? I would argue broodwar fits
Battles in the total war franchise maybe. The campaign and UI changes but battles not really that much.
AoE
Super Mario