Trackmania 2020. Great example of a game that is simple in concept but super deep in skills that you can both play super casually at your own pace or super competitively. Plus there is a great community and endless content to play.
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The only two games I have that I've put more than 1000 hours in are Factorio and Rimworld. I'd highly recommend both.
Warframe. Inching closer to 3.000h currently.
It does come in waves, but every once in a while I go all in again and lose myself in the infinite things you can do.
Elite Dangerous is my go-to lately.
It's different to most other games by not being goal-oriented, except for the goals you set for yourself. No main quest line dictating progress. No mandatory tasks. No win condition. Instead, it drops you into a simulation of our entire galaxy roughly 1300 years in the future, where humanity has mastered hyperspace travel and spread through hundreds of star systems.
I like that it offers a variety of activities to fit whatever mood I might be in on a given day. I can hunt pirates, mine asteroids, engage in a bit of piracy myself, find and collect bio samples, infiltrate rival settlements, venture into vast unexplored areas of space, discover Earth-like worlds that nobody has ever encountered before, defend humanity against hostile forces, photograph beautiful stellar phenomena, rescue stranded survivors, customize and finely tune my ship to perform beyond its original specs, team up with friends, pledge to a political power and expand their influence, or chill out as a space trucker and haul cargo to earn enough money for my next upgrade. It can occupy all my attention, or just be relaxing entertainment while I listen to music or an audiobook.
It's an MMO in the sense of having a large game world (galaxy) shared by all players in real time, but PvP is optional. One mode exposes you to other players, while another limits you to NPC encounters. You can switch between them at will.
One warning: A space ship has more than a few controls to learn, and they're better suited to a game controller or HOTAS than a keyboard and mouse. I use button combinations for almost everything beyond basic flight controls, since there aren't enough buttons on a controller for everything.
I'm amazed nobody has mentioned Kerbal Space Program (first one). That and TF2 are my most played
Team Fortress 2
I don't think I've ever played a game more than 200 or 300 hours.
I think Destiny is the only game I ever put over 2,000 hours into, but Factorio might take the crown soon - 1800 and counting.
Rocket League
Monster Hunter. The first one I played, MH4U back in the 3DS days, I put 1,000 hours into. That was nearly 10 years ago, and I'm still playing the franchise to this day. Currently finally going through the Sunbreak expansion of Monster Hunter Rise on the PC, and noticing a marked improvement in my mental health over playing other games.
L4D2. built a new computer for that game specifically after loving L4D. super fun arcade shooter that will never be uninstalled from my computer.
Dark Age of Camelot
Oh man, blast from the past.
That was my jam, way, way, way, way back when ;)
Was a RR10 Enchanter and RR10 Blademaster, plus a TL for both classes. I think my account is still lifetime comped.
Put wayyyy too much time into that :P
Factorio, it's fun from the first minute but you'll still be learning new things after 1000 hours.
Me: Ooooooohhhh, ok. I know how logistic networks work.
2 hrs later
Me: wtf? Production stopped. Why does this one belt have 5 different materials. Oh....idk how chests work. That's OK I'll simplify it until it works.
suns up and birds chirping
Me: ok, ok. So it's working, but i dont know why.
800 hrs in and I still underestimate the space I need. Best 30 bucks I've ever spent.
Not a favourite anymore but still beats my second most played games by a factor of 4... Warframe was fun at the beginning and really clicked at about 200hrs. I left after about 2200hrs because I burned out but it still has a place in my heart.
Project Zomboid, Rimworl, Dwarf Fortress, Stellaris, Starsector...
You really like simulators?
There was a moment in my life when I thought that perhaps I was outgrowing games... that they were just not really designed for the entertainment of adult human beings in a way that could satisfy me. Not one of my old stand-bys could, as you said, "scratch the itch" or provide "the same enjoyment that it used to." I found myself spending more time with films and books.
Then I got into FromSoft games and indie titles, and within a year I realized games still held incredible experiences for me. I hadn't outgrown games. I had only outgrown the bland slop represented by most AAA releases, and especially by online multiplayer releases. Personally, I'd recommend giving up on looking for a new 1000+ hour obsession. Instead I'd recommend seeking a broad array of 10-100 hour loves. If you haven't already tried them, for me a love of gaming was saved primarily by: Dark Souls, FTL, Spelunky, and Hollow Knight.
There was a moment in my life when I thought that perhaps I was outgrowing games
My exact thought earlier this year, honestly. I'm right there with you
Personally, I'd recommend giving up on looking for a new 1000+ hour obsession. Instead I'd recommend seeking a broad array of 10-100 hour loves.
This is exactly what I've been doing for the past 6 months. I've discovered some pretty crazy and amazing titles. Played Everything from BG3 to No Man's sky, lots of indie titles my favorites being Boomer shooters and new up and coming titles. I tried Stardew Valley for the first time since everyone seems to be raving about that one, and a couple similar ones like my time at Sand Rock, Valheim was awesome. Guess I feel like I'm running out of stuff to play lately
If you still haven't tried anything FromSoft has made in the past decade, please do.
I've played dark souls remastered.... It's hard as hell man. Haven't tried Ellen ring yet but it's on my list
Sims 2 Skyrim Stalker franchise (including mods) Doom 2 Vrchat Arma franchise Halo franchise World of warcraft .... I may have a problem.
If you're a Destiny refugee, the most obvious answer is Warframe, which just keeps on getting better and better.
Does it have multiplayer or is it single player only? Destiny 2 was only really playable because I had a community/clan that I played with actively for the social aspect of it. Horribly boring playing it solo
There are a few sections restricted to solo only, but it's not the default, the matchmaking is pretty quick for a random group and there's a variety of people always looking to form groups for different tasks. One word of warning, people move fast, until you get parkour down, you might just end up running from the start to end of a level if you join groups, they'll have completed the objectives and be waiting for you to extract.
Clans exist, and each have their own space station called a dojo that's customized by them (cost is based on size of the clan, as a solo I was able to build up and level a clan on my own).
You'll almost always end up doing missions with other people other than when you intentionally want to do certain tasks solo.
A lot of the game is built around guilds and player to player interactions.
PvP sucks and it's almost all PvE content vs Destiny though.
Warframe is a bit similar to Destiny in that it's built around multiplayer, but most of the main content can be solo'd if you wanted. But that said, the Warframe community is still thriving, so it should be pretty easy to find a group to play with if you want to avoid the in-game matchmaking.
Final Fantasy XI. I'm almost exactly 1,000 hours into it, and only halfway through the storyline. I haven't even touched end-game content. I'm playing on a free private server called HorizonXI that is well-populated and feels more like the game when it came out versus the modern day solo experience.
If it clicks with you Monster Hunter (World+Iceborne’s a good starting point) can easily eat up hundreds of hours of your time grinding and doing endgame content, especially if you have a group to play with.
I've been playing Tf2 for over 1.5k hours now. I recommend you to try it out There's a reason why that game from 2007 is still not dead.
The best war themed hat simulator out there
No Man's Sky. A foot deep but a mile wide.
Slay the Spire
I have one game with 1000+ hours and that is Squad. It's the only online game I play anymore as it is the only game that has teamwork/communication (it takes be back to Battlefield 2 days) and none of the shit like battle passes etc.
My gaming habits are just playing lots and never finishing anything... but I have fun still.
Play DayZ! so I can force feed you rotting bananas after I break your legs with the wrench so you can't get away! 😈
I can't get into that game, but other people's videos on YouTube are entertaining.
Tbh you kinda have to be a professional asshole to really enjoy the game solo. When I'm playing with friends I tend to have more fun because it's a lot of base building and clan wars and stuff like that. But when I play by myself I'm really just being a monster to other players. This also applies to rust as well but I don't play that anymore because they discontinued Linux support. Mmm long pig
oh man, i stopped playing rust due to the toxic atmosphere, it's disgusting. used to run a few servers and it turned into a shitshow. didn't even know it was available on linux actually.
I was probably one of your players 😶
X4 Foundations... This sucks people life: you start a game when the sun goes to sleep, one second later the sun wake up 😅
Mine are:
Any Fallout or Elder Scrolls
Diablo 2 or 3
Stardew Valley
Borderlands 2
And I never consider it a real game, but I do sink the most hours in Hearthstone. I've been playing it almost daily for the past ten years.
Path of Exile.
I'd say I'm a fairly mid-tier player, get better with each season I play, the breadth of mechanics and depth of complexity is mind breaking. I've only played like 2000 hours though, I'll get it all figured out eventually... Right?
Stellaris
Regarding the question itself, Starbound and Minecraft. Maybe Final Fantasy XII if I was to play it multiple times, as I take at the very least 100+ hours to finished it, and 250+ if I'm not in a hurry.
But regarding gaming fatigue, perhaps it could be a symptom of playing too much of only a handful of game styles? If you wouldn't mind, may I suggest to check some smaller games in length and scope, specially indies? Those tend to be rather diverse in their scopes and executions.
XII is so much fun to explore. I didn't even beat it on the original PS2 version because I kept getting distracted.
Although my personal favorite to replay is VIII because there are multiple different ways to build your magic up (to actually get stronger).
lol the problem with Destiny is they turned it into a treadmill and stopped putting the work into character and level design.
Elden Ring can easily take more than 100 hours on your first playthrough, and different builds significantly change your play style.
BG3, similar deal. Subsequent playthroughs are probably going to be accelerated, but there are a bunch of different story choices you can make that feel different, the party members have their own story lines, there's a special custom character called Dark Urge that's intended for a later playthrough that has it's own twist, and you can change the strategy of encounters a lot with different party constructions.
Rimworld calls itself a story generator because you're going to fail and have people die and whatever, but every game plays out different, there are a good couple scenarios, and there's expansions and mods you can add on top of that for variety.
Just the first couple that come to mind. I'm not near 1000 hours on any of them, but they all have a lot of content.
Huh, there's only like, 4 of these games for me total. TF2's still a bot-blighted hellscape as far as I know, my skyrim install is broken and the process of fixing it or just re-installing it will require a few days off, WoW is dead to me, and I don't really play warframe any more... so I guess Warframe wins by doing absolutely nothing!
Why do they have to be 1000 hours? If you’re getting gaming fatigue you’re not going to fix that by sticking to the same genres you always play. Go onto Steam/gog/eshop/etc during the Black Friday sales next week and buy a big pile of 40 hour games for $3 each
(Mine is FFXIV, to answer your question)