I’m pretty sure that’s exactly the kind of game he’d hate. Very fiddly, lots of twitch-based combat, many screens, inventory management… Almost everything he said he wanted to avoid.
I don’t find it very twitchy at all. The controls are not nearly as complicated as something like WWE 2K19. There is lots of inventory management…if you want to mess with it, but it is largely skippable. Sell everything that you loot, go out hunting again. Crafting is optional…though I hear at end game, enchanting is important.
Just bought this lol I figure for $2 it’s worth a try. If you liked this, I’d also recommend The Flame in the Flood. Another great survival, exploration, boat game 
On a similar note, if we’re talking Steam games that are ‘combat free’, I’ve got to recommend The Talos Principle, The Witness and the ever classic Portal (and Portal 2). They’re all very similar games that are focused on exploring and puzzle solving. Though Portal is more story driven but very entertaining. If you enjoy Rime, you’ll really enjoy these.
And
I will second this recommendation.
Plus, the games have the added bonus of being able to explore the levels in sandbox mode once you have completed the main objectives. I love exploring at my own pace and finding all the hidden items and getting 100% game completion.
This gets into why I brought up the third Mafia: inventory management there is almost non-existent. Weapons are upgradeable but as an entire class (e.g.: pistols, rifles, etc.) rather than individually. Combat almost entirely depends on stealth and tricks rather than reflexes, especially after throwing knives are obtained.
Always go after any sentries first so they can’t call in reinforcements. And drop mines at entrances just in case…
All right…this will (probably) be the last one.
Rime is in the trash. No, it didn’t take long. It’s the part with the big flying terror that snatches you after a few seconds if you’re not under cover and kicks you back to the last save point. Now, I could go into a very long tirade about the utter insanity of putting such a high-danger, high-stress hazard where you have SECONDS, SECONDS I TELL YOU to react or die in a game that seemed to be about exploration and wonder up to that point (the time-of-day puzzles were ingenious), but I’m not really up to it. So I’ll just point out that you don’t even get any indication of where go at that point. You hide beneath the panels, then you’re jumping across then, then at some point there’s a panel that doesn’t go down, and…what? What? WHAAAAAT?? No idea how to proceed, and then at some point I get snagged again, start all over. Geez. Now, it wasn’t perfect up to this point; there were definitely things that I think were carelessly designed or counterintuitive (the sun-moon puzzle, for one), but at no point did I find it horribly broken. Until that flying monstrosity showed up, and I’m pretty sure the programmers lost their minds and ramped that part up to a zillion. I said “pretty sure” because for all I could know it could be a bug, or a glitch, or something that didn’t render properly, or a big hint that got wrecked for whatever reason.
And that’s what made my search for a decent PS4 game so hard. I don’t truck in “yeah but”. If it has one outrageously difficult, or horribly designed, or ridiculously counterintuitive part, I can’t tolerate it. Hell, I tossed Assassin’s Creed Revelations due to those execrable first-person jumping levels, and they’re not even part of the main game. I’m aware that console players (aside from “filthy casuals” like the Forza 7 buffoons) have reached an insanely high level (just looking at what the best Tekken or Guitar Hero players have accomplished is jaw-dropping), and it’s only gotten higher now that there’s such a big emphasis on community and multiplayer. They’re made of iron. They can take everything and ask for seconds. I can’t. There are just too many other entertainment options, too many things demanding my time, too many other pursuits that’d be improving my health, to waste another minute on Demon Bird Food Simulator.
Quick recap of what I still got:
Carnival Games: Meh. If I want to mash buttons and toss stuff wildly all over the place for three minutes, there are worse things. Trophies range from ridiculous to insane. Really umimpressive for an 8th-gen console, and definitely not worth $40 new. I remember things like Pac-Man Fever and the Wii omnibus games that didn’t have as crisp graphics but still managed to be WAY more fun.
Atari Classics: Somewhat less meh. Still needs a dial controller. They do still hold up, though I’m glad I get that many. At $20 definitely a better deal than Carnival Games.
Divinity Original Sin: Okay, here’s the thing. If it’s not possible to take damage (and I can’t imagine any company being so bold these days), the huge number of options and limited resources are minor concerns. Go forth and kick butt and don’t worry about your toys. But because it is possible to take damage, things like weapons, armor, healing, supplies, protection etc. now make all the difference in the word. So far I’ve nixed three games on the first game because I found out I was horribly lacking in some department, and I’ve barely made any headway at all in the second. And I’m playing on the easiest easiest difficulty every single time. (Storyteller, you were completely wrong about not being able to die in 2 in Story Mode, and I’m not happy that I spent $53 to find that out.) Also, I’ve found that if you lack certain items or skills, you can get really screwed in a hurry (lockpicking and a good solid bow, in particular). Maybe I’ll find something good here, but these are not games I’m convinced to spend any great amount of time on.
Brothers - A Tale of Two Sons: Never mentioned this before, mainly because there’s not a whole lot to talk about. This is a good one. Not fantastic, and the lead designer made it clear that he’s more a movie person than a game person, but it works great for what it is, a simple, mostly linear journey where the best part is being able to find new places and see wonderful sights. The dual mechanic was a great concept and is something I’d like to see in more games. Much like the Peanuts game, not a whole lot of reason to keep going after you’ve accomplished everything, but I got it for like $7, so it’s no biggie. No regrets!
Little Big Planet 3: Got this one yesterday, and thus far it’s been…as expected. The slip-'n-slide is largely gone, but midair control is still syrupy, making it really hard to get some items. Still, I’m not hellbent on getting everything, so whatever. This one has the potential to be pretty good, and if it does go off a cliff at some point, you don’t need to hear it from me.
Subnautica: Okay, here’s where I’m at with this. This has what I call the Minecraft Problem. It’s possible to be safe and get things done provided you stay safely within the cocoon of Creative. You always have whatever you need and even the most powerful enemies are no threat. But if you want to do anything meaningful, if you want to get into the story, get things done, find out why you’re in this watery hellhole in the first place, that means stepping outside the cocoon, taking risks, learning tasks to do things that came so easily before. You’ll recall what happened when I did that in Minecraft, right? A witch threw a potion at me, and I had to either get rid of the game or spend some quality time in the nearest ICU. I mean, I get that there’s not much point to pay $30 for a game that you can literally win inside of a minute, but how far outside the cocoon am I really willing to step? Even the “Casual” (ha!) level requires oxygen, and lest you forget, the entire surface of the planet is covered with water. Also, I really, really do not like that there’s no effective weapon for taking down big enemies. I’ll stay in Creative for now, but I’m going to be fighting the temptation to say the heck with it, rocket off, and never return for a long time.
Seriously, thanks for all your suggestions, and this has been an interesting discussion. I don’t like that I’ve squandered so much money on this hobby over the years, but I’m not going to be resentful over it…heck, probably would’ve blown it on comic books or jackets or model airplanes or car accessories. I got a PS4 library that should last for a while, and that’s good for what it is.
Well, regarding the Story mode thing, I’m puzzled, because in story mode as I have experienced it you can’t die - your characters can be “killed” but you have unlimited resurrection ability so you can just keep rolling no matter what happens.
For the rest, your experience is your experience; I’m sorry you haven’t enjoyed it. I’m playing on the hardest difficulty level with no lockpicking at all, and so far I haven’t encountered a single significant roadblock; obviously there are a few chests I can’t open but I haven’t had a problem advancing. Is there a particular place you’ve found lockpicking to be mandatory? Where were you having trouble advancing difficulty-wise? I’m genuinely curious, but feel free to ignore me if you don’t care to spend any more time on this.
My rebate offer for Trails of Cold Steel still stands. If you can find a way to not enjoy that game, I will buy it off you.
But yeah, it doesn’t release on PS4 for another three weeks.
I wish you’d stuck with Rime all the way through. I would have liked to hear what you thought of the ending. Well anyway, if the “death from above” bit in Rime is a problem, then it’s a problem and you aren’t going to want to try Unfinished Swan either, or Journey. Or a lot of games. Game designers just love that whole terror-dactyl vibe. I’d still recommend Submerged as it is simply tootling around a ruined city. Also, have you seen Gorogoa?
Maybe you’d like Walden; I haven’t played it though.
I picked up Rime for the Switch* last Saturday and I thought it was gorgeous but the puzzling was shallow. Storywise, I thought it was risky to try to tackle as weighty a topic as they did but I thought it worked. I’m a pretty sappy guy though.
Gorogoa is very pretty, no time limits, no swooping birds, just quiet contemplative puzzles. Pretty short though.
*Yes, yes, I should have gotten the PC version. I know better now.
Wow…I can’t remember a last time a video game discussion was so…empathetic. (Can’t remember the last time I used the word “empathetic” on this board either. :))
storyteller - See, the thing about Divinity is that there is a ton of stuff, and since more or less everything is a nonrenewable resource, I don’t want to risk missing out on anything. One thing I learned very quickly is that if you’re underequipped, underpowered, or underskilled, or otherwise take on a battle before you are absolutely ready, you WILL get creamed in very short order regardless of difficulty. Now it’s possible that a lot of stuff is junk or otherwise not essential, but how do I know? And how do I know that a seemingly harmless decision or conversation option I make now won’t bite me 10 missions down the line? I went in with the expectation that I could just wade in, go nuts, and learn by doing, and now I’ve gotten killed once and nearly killed a second time and I have a hundred questions and a thousand anxieties. Maybe it’s unfounded, maybe it’s possible to progress without a whole lot of skill on Story Mode, but it’d have been nice to know that going in.
Okay, something that will help…how does this “unlimited resurrection” work? Do I need a certain NPC helper? A certain skill? Do I have to be past a certain point in the game? GameFAQs isn’t much help, unfortunately.
Airk - You’re serious about this, aren’t you? 
Okay, here’s the deal. To get a physical copy (which I’ll need if I’ll be able to sell it to anybody), I’ll have to go to a place that has a physical copy. Probably Sam’s Club, with Best Buy as as second choice. At the time of release, it’s probably going to be pretty expensive. Now, on one hand, I understand that programmers need to eat like everyone else and selling full-priced games is pretty much they’re only crack at making a decent living. On the other hand, imagine blowing $20 on garbage like Rime or Project Diva X; now imagine blowing three times as much. Please note that I’ve never so much as touched any kind of JRPG in my life and have recently undergone an extremely harsh baptism of fire with Divinity, so I’m not exactly champing at the bit.
I’ll PM you if I want to take you up on your offer. Paypal preferred, and I’ll provide my e-mail address. You can also send me a cashier’s check, but I think that’s more trouble than it’s worth. You’re going to have to take my word on the price, as I have no means of scanning a receipt into my computer.
pmwgreen - Know what’s not only my favorite XBox 360 game ever, but the only one I actually remember enjoying playing? Don King Presents Prizefighter, which had the most cliched, hackneyed, utterly predicable story imaginable. Seriously, it could be summed up as “every low budget boxing movie ever”. I loved Super Mario Bros. 2 before I learned that the events took place within a dream and I loved it after. A subpar or outright terrible story isn’t going to ruin a good game for me, and a visionary, masterfully-written story isn’t going to save a bad one. I can’t remember a time an ending really knocked my socks off, though a few PS2 games did come close.
As far as giant airborne stumbling blocks go…well, going back to Don King Presents Prizefighter, going through career mode on the hardest level is required for a bunch of stuff, so I did, and I got destroyed so many times the ICU named a life-threatening injury after me. But that was…okay, “fine” is a little too strong, but at least tolerable…because the game got a little easier after each loss. I was taking a pretty big leap of faith with this, and it turned out the programmers had some decency after all. There was a always a safety valve, a bone tossed my way, light at the end of the tunnel. Contrast that to Rime, where if you don’t know exactly where to run and exactly which buttons to press and when within roughly five seconds, snatch, kicked back, no reprieve. Myst used to be like that, which got frustrating, which is why later versions had built-in hints. No such luck here; it’s all about the immersion now, which means that utterly impossible now, utterly impossible always. I can’t accept that. I don’t care if it’s a monster bird, a slowly advancing wall, or a plain board with a bunch of marbles on it. No hope, no more.
From what I’ve been able to find out about Submerged, it’s essentially has maybe a third of the exploration aspect of Assassin’s Creed 4 and also lacks any of the other cool stuff in the game. Let me be clear: I am not against danger or combat. I am against getting walloped over and over and over and being utterly powerless to do anything about it (which is I didn’t mentioned fighting games and will continue to not mention them). Assassin’s Creed lost me when Ubisoft decided to make combat 200 times harder, and I think that’s a shame; it should not be a choice between absolute pacifism and constant nerve-racking death matches. That said, if I have to make that choice, I’m absolutely going for the former. I’m not going out of my way to get this, but I’ll definitely give it a shot once I’ve had enough with Subnautica (which I imagine may not take very long).
Inner Stickler - Gorogoa does look incredibly pretty, and as a general rule I want to support truly creative endeavors, as it’s our only chance of breaking out of the terrible monotony which was why I made this thread in the first place. It reminds me of a well-made mobile game, of all things. Thanks, this looks like a must-have!
Subnautica, dammit…what was I thinking?? How did I look at this unbelievably hostile, dangerous, treacherous world and think that it would somehow become GOOD? I can’t hunt, I can’t salvage, I can’t build things were I want, hell, half the time I can barely see. And when I want to just blast off and never return, hell, I can’t even do that because of some Quarantine-whatever-whatever-something. And yes, I know it’s all in the Wiki. Literally EVERYTHING is in the Wiki, ever task, every location, everything. I’ve never seen a game in my life where I was so utterly shackled, unable to get anything at all done. And that’s not even getting into the constant danger the moment I step out of Creative, which, trust me, is a once-in-a-lifetime thing. This game gave me a damn headache, and it’s not like I don’t have enough as it is.
[Deep, deep sigh]…give a brainless beat-'em-up any day. Final Fight 2 kept me going for countless hours. 
Will pick up Submerged, but maybe in a month or two…
I hope you find something. Do you have RedBox in your area? You can rent games as a try before you buy method. Sadly, the only one I see listed is Fallout 4, still a very good game. How’s your PC? Gorogoa is really better on a PC than a PS4, as the game controller makes a lousy mouse. Also you can return games on Steam if you haven’t played more than two hours. Plus, plus, if you have a friend with a steam account they can share games with you to try them out.
Thanks, pal. Haven’t used my Steam account in a while, but I’ll give it another shot. Will definitely get Gorogoa; it looks magnificent.
It’s a great game, halfway between art and entertainment. The puzzles are clever and it tells a thoughtful story without any words. My only complaint is that it’s pretty short but it packs a lot into the limited time it takes. I wish there were more games like it, but then again if there were then it wouldn’t be so unique, so it might be better that way.
Thoroughly. I’ve played the game through twice, on PS3 and PC, and I could do worse than to have a copy on PS4 in case there is some sort of save import to the third game when it comes out later this year. Plus it looks like it comes with some goofy extras.
This is legit. (Though there are lots of places on the internet which will ship you a physical copy.)
Yep. Though I like to think of this as a risk free situation. 
Also, I regard JRPGs as a completely different genre from Western games like Divinity.
Haha, yeah, Paypal, thanks. I’ll pay up to $50 plus tax, because that’s the price both Amazon and Best Buy list right now. If you somehow manage to pay more than that, you done screwed up. 
I know you said you don’t like turn based games but I want to recommend one to you based on your original post. I want to recommend Disgaea 5 complete.
It is a turn base strategy rpg game and it’s appeal is character creation and improvement. It struck me that you would enjoy this based on how you enjoyed building up your wrestling tournaments.
It does have several systems that add complexity but they are really optional and they can be ignored until you want to build on them.
The story line isn’t the deepest but it’s fun. It can be finished fairly early and is only challenging if you don’t grind. Grinding though is what the game is about so if you don’t enjoy the game loop it will not suit you. Every action you do though strengthens your characters and often in several ways. Just swinging a weapon directly strengthens 3 different skills. You’re never not improving or not improving your situation in noticeable ways.
Which brings me to the thing you mentioned that I think you’d like here: cheats. This game revels in cheating. It’s not what you do to break the game, it’s a game mechanic you unlock and use to further improve your team. It’s called the cheat shop.
With cheats and the ability to choose where to battle you are only ever over matched when you choose to be and you don’t lose much progress if you do lose a battle with the game autosaving right before the battles.
It’s meta game is like the Diablo series. The game is finished early if that’s all you want but the vast majority of your time will be after that improving your character and fighting post game bad guys.
The game is all about grinding. The game play cycle is incredibly fun to me. I don’t normally enjoy grinding but I can pick this up at any time, play 10 minutes or so and feel like I’ve had fun and accomplished something and I don’t find many games like that even though I’ve played many that should have. The variety keeps it fresh. There are a slew of characters with a slew of skills and traits and you’re never doing the same thing over and over unless you want to and when you want to you can actually complete levels in under 30 seconds. Yay cheat shop.
The earlier Disgaea games are fun but they are way too grindy for me but they have concentrated on QoL improvements so its removed much of the annoying bits.
He didn’t say he didn’t like turn based games. He said he didn’t like turn based games with tons of numbers and lots of randomness.
Disgaia definitely has tons of numbers, but I don’t remember it being very random, so it MIGHT suit, but I am skeptical. (Partly because I didn’t like it.)
Mmmmmm…it’s looking like a pretty steep learning curve, and I’ve never had any luck whatsoever with highly tactical games (which is the main reason I’m struggling so much with Divinity). And the kind of “cheats” I’m looking for aren’t some expensive tool that gives some minor edge. When I said Codebreaker, I meant the friggin’ Codebreaker, an utterly shameless disk which granted massive boons such as infinite ammo and all abilities unlocked just like that, which, in many cases, made it completely impossible to lose. I can’t even begin to list the PS2 games that would’ve been nearly unplayable or complete nightmares without this tool…the entire Dynasty Warriors series, Time Crisis 2 and 3, pretty much all the fighting games, Contra: Shattered Soldier, Silpheed, Gran Turismo 3, Smackdown vs. Raw 2006, Black And Bruised…it just goes on and on. Also, I find the whole “anime” aesthetic in video games a real turnoff. Heavy-handed and loaded, and over the course of several hours it just gets incredibly wearisome.
But no harm in watching some videos, and who knows, if I can’t ever find a decent dial controller for Atari Flashback Classics, I might consider picking it up cheap. Really, really cheap.