I’m a non-gamer looking for recommendations please. I saw the Quake II refresh and it makes me want to explore/roam some 3D environments again. But I’m really not into the intensity of any of the shooting games.
Tomb Raider was fun but I found combat hard to control.
Half-Life had great environments but too much shooting for me.
Portal was great fun but I eventually found it repetitive.
Beyond a Steel Sky is one of my favorites although the pace of exploration is a bit slower than others.
I’m tempted to give a game like Myst a try but the puzzles sound a bit too involved for me. Basically something without much stress or excessive friction against exploration of the environment. Thanks
I’m on Linux and macOS.
I have not played it, but people rave about The Outer Wilds and it sounds like it fits your needs.
It’s not at all my thing, but search the term “walking simulator” to find stuff like that.
Have you tried some of the games you’re talking about on the “story” difficulty modes? Most have moved to calling it something like that instead of “easy”, and I’m at the opposite extreme, but a lot of them are designed to let you experience the world and story without the pressures of combat.
If you have access to a switch, Mario Odyssey or Kirby and the Forgotten Land have some “combat” but you can skip a lot of it, and they’re made to be beatable by kids. Other 3D platformers exist in similar veins as well.
Just watched a review of this, looks really nice. Walking simulator is new to me too and very useful. Thank you!
Firewatch
Well-made story-focused, no combat whatsoever. Very few puzzles, almost exclusively about exploring.What Remains of Edith Finch
More “puzzley”, but lets you discover things at your own pace.Both look very good, thank you!
I don’t see Thief mentioned yet. It’s old but it was called a “first person sneaker” by some reviewer back in the day.
I’m seeing something on Steam that looks like it but with a 2/2014 release date, which seems newer that I remember. Apparently there’s a bunch of DLC too, so you might consider buy a bundle.
I was curious so I looked and you’re remembering one of the first three games (‘98-‘04) the one on Steam is the 4th game in the series. The originals were pretty neat back then and are still available at gog.com and probably other places as well.
Thanks. I think I found it here: https://www.gog.com/en/game/thief_gold
Interesting. Thanks.
Thanks. This has the advantage of running well on under specced hardware too.
Right off the top of my head is Abzu. Not a hard game, simple puzzles, but really nicely crafted environments and experience. It’s a bit short but it was well worth the experience. It’s quite an old game by now so probably not hard to get it on sale.
I watched a review and it looks great, thanks!
You’re welcome; someone else mentioned Firewatch, that’s definitely a good pick too!
I really enjoyed The Planet Crafter! It’s a crafting game bringing a barren world to fully lush environment. Lakes will form, grasses start to grow. It’s very peaceful and visually appealing.
Thank you. I’ve just watched a review and it does look interesting.
Gone Home is pretty neat. I usually need secondary gameplay loop to placate my short attention span but this one gripped me through presentation and atmosphere alone.
Thank you, that does look good and nicely paced.
Seems like you want something like a walking simulator, maybe a point and click game?
There’s Journey, I’ve never personally played it but from what I gather it’s mostly walking, jumping and exploring.
Have you also tried Minecraft? You can play on peaceful, so no combat at all, you’d be mostly exploring.
Maybe Subnautica? There’s a creative mode, you don’t need to worry about survival and dying, you can build indefinitely.
Journey looks really special, thank you for the tip! I’ve played plenty of Minecraft many years ago - I should have mentioned that in my post. I even ran a server for my family for a while. I’m just looking at Subnautica now to see what the creative mode is like, thank you!
Myst and riven will lock your exploration behind puzzles. Outer wilds is a good bet!
Thanks, I wondered about that. Outer wilds it is :) They didn’t release for linux or Mac unfortunately, but I see that people are having success running it with the WINE translation layer.
