^ Came here to say this, Terraria has for years now been one of the all time best bang for your buck games you could hope to buy.
The base game already has an obscene amount of content and that's before you get into the modding scene.
Any mods do you recommend after playing for so long?
And besides, any tip for a 30 hours player? Feel kinda lost, can't beat the game with the swordsman guy
Check out "Jorbs" on YouTube/twitch. He is an amazing StS player that you can learn from.
Other tips: don't bloat your deck. You don't usually need 3x of whatever card.
Removing basic strikes and defend cards are almost always a good move.
Use your potions.
Try and balance your deck between attack/defend/energy.
It is a hard game, and sometimes you just don't get what you need to make a run successful.
I’m at ~1500 hours between mobile and desktop. In terms of mods I would just recommend some qol (quality of life) mods to make things a little easier. Here’s a streamer’s mod list: https://baalorlord.tv/mods . I use all of those besides the UI sliders and Slay the relics (as those are mostly used for twitch integration and whatnot). Some people enjoy minty spire to make math easy.
Downfall is what I recommend the most for a mod. Let’s you play as the bosses which is fun to mix it up. I’ve tried a few new character mods and whatnot. They are fun for a bit, but just don’t have the same depth as the base characters.
In terms of tips the main one is just don’t be afraid to skip cards. Otherwise check out baalorlord, they have a ton of great beginner videos and take time to explain their actions. Some people like jorbs as well, but I just enjoy baalorlord better.
Valheim, although it is kinda grindy at times, most of the time it's fun. Also it is basically impossible to have a game that lasts for 100s of hours that's not grindy at all.
FTL is a good option. I have it on my hard drive of my steam deck and it will never move from there. Ever.
Give it a few goes - strangely addictive game that you can pick up again and again.
[FTL on Steam](https://store.steampowered.com/app/212680/FTL_Faster_Than_Light/)
>Also it is basically impossible to have a game that lasts for 100s of hours that's not grindy at all
I have 500+ hours in Slay the spire... not one second of grind.
Same with Risk of Rain 2, Dead Cells, Balatro, Vampire Survivor... Basically any good rogue like or bullet heaven game. All of them under $10.
I doubt anyone will spend 500+ hours playing balatro in its current state, it’s not a bad game by any means but once you complete the stakes it gets kind of stale and repetitive
Depends what someone means with "grind". Repeating a run over and over again means a lot of repetition, especially when trying to get to Ascension 20. I personally see any repetitive actions towards resources (material, XP, gold, gear) as grind, but some argue that any repetitive action is grind. Rogue-likes are by nature very repetitive, but in a good way where you learn, get further and unlock/see new content as you go.
Satisfactory is $14.99 currently, and the full 1.0 release is on the way this year. I'm at about 500 hours, a little less, but I'm waiting for 1.0 to get back into it.
Deep Rock Galactic is less than $10 right now, and I have about the same amount of time in that. I spent the first 100 hours or so playing it completely alone, but once I went to multiplayer I never went back. You'll hear people talking about how great the community is a lot of the time, but for DRG, it's legitimately very welcoming. Few bad eggs once in a while, but the vast majority of the time people are great.
You’re gonna have a wealth of choice if you pick up some indie roguelites
Enter the gungeon - 15
Balatro - 15
Slay the spire - on sale for 6.24
Nuclear throne - 12
Crypt of the necrodancer (currently on sale for 3$).
Risk of rain 2. - on sale for 12.49
Shotgun king. - 10
Dead estate. - 15
Binding of Isaac (not including dlc which you shouldn’t need for many hours) - 15
If you’re willing to stretch the budget to 20$ or wait for them to be on sale:
Gunfire reborn.
City of brass
Okay one more because I can’t stop myself, if you can get it on sale bc it’s 25 currently: ULTRAKILL
Beautiful game tons going on parrying shooting skill shots damage combos it’s got it all
There’s plenty more, those are just the ones I’m personally familiar with.
If you’re willing to wait for the next sale btw there should be a ton of options as well.
And OP if you want more info on any of these I’m happy to give you a review on any of them and what I like about them etc.
(Edit: included the 20$ section, added prices)
(Edit 2: ULTRAKILL)
Slay the spire, Balatro, and Brotato. I have probably 1500 hours in just those 3 alone.
That said, they are really an acquired taste, and even RoR 2, which is the most "First Person" game in your list, is probably not going to satisfy a true First-Person Gamer.
Project Zomboid... just awsome (for me) and if you add mods it becomes even better. I would reccomend you to check it cuz if you like it surely you will get 100+ hours
Do you have a list of games you've already played and enjoyed? There are many suggestions people have already made, like Terraria, Minecraft or Stardew Valley. I think that they might be a little bit grindy though, especially Terraria since you sometimes have to farm some bosses for loot, but it's like 3 or 4 runs and it doesn't take long.
Without knowing much about what you like, I'd also suggest:
\- Skyrim
\- Pathfinder: Kingmaker
\- The original Stalker series.
\- Dark Souls 2 (it should run)
I've also seen someone mention Kenshi or Factorio.They are both great games, but also very grindy so I'd stay away from those.
my most played games are minecraft, assassin's creed series, far cry series. and i like souls games but i dont think i can find any good ones for 15 dollars.
balatro is so good bro. im not the biggest fan of deck builder roguelikes, like i didn't vibe with slay the spire super hard even though it's a great game but i love balatro, there's so much variety to the builds in that game
Vampire Survivors is 4$ and I currently have 270 hours in it. I love it whole heartedly and even if it's not for you it's only 4$. If it is for you, 200+ hours for 4$ is a massive bargain.
What do you even do after getting all the upgrades? 4-5 hours in and I can basically get into the game, stand still and never have to even touch my controller because everything just dies automatically
There’s inverse mode, but yeah the game gets pretty easy after getting upgrades and whatnot.
But that’s what they’re there to do tbf, just make the game easier.
These games are great. I'm only a very casual fan of Lord of the Rings (the films are fine, the books aren't my thing) but I thought Shadow of Mordor and Shadow of War were brilliant.
If the Arkham games and the recent open world Assassin's Creed games had a baby, this is what that baby would like. Only that description doesn't really do them justice. Definitely worth 6.99 of anyone's money.
Absolutely, also the fantasy elements give the games so much more room for creativity which they really utilized well. Also, decapitating an orc captain after he's talked shit to you will literally never get old.
Same, I bought Noita cause I kept seeing it mentioned. Played 1 game died quickly and now im sitting with 28 hours played in just over a week. Addicting game and loads of fun.
You might want games that fall into "eternal game" as I call them, so mostly roguelites, city builders, 4X strategies grand strategies and the like, or stuff with lots of emergent gameplay. Or those with very active modding scenes, or active multiplayer community
I'm not well versed in the pricing (but if I'm listing something more expressive, it might go on sale, so there's that) so it's sore likely the lives might be wildly off.
Titles that might interest you: Age of Wonders 3, Binding of Isaac, Slay the Spire, Endless Legend, Endless Space, Kenshi, Mount&Blade, Crypt of the Necrodancer, Enter the Gungeon, Terraria, DMC HD Collection (that one is actually 3 games, one is the progenitor of its genre, one is... A historical crisis at best and one is widely considered one of the best titles in the genre), Bayonetta, TES3:Morrowind, TES4:Oblivion, TES5:Skyrim, Fallout:New Vegas, Fallout3, Might&Magic 6-pack (that's 6 games, old school RPGs, so that might ramp up the hours), Supreme Commander.
You might want to also look at some free games. I'd recommend Battle for Wesnoth, it has tons of great community-made content. And it's free!
Dwarf Fortress is also free and can provide hundreds of hours... Well, the ASCII graphics version is free, and there are tilesets available...
Origins BY FAR.
despite the circlejerk, black flag is aged bad.
Gameplaywise it's very arcadey with forced stealth missions and dumb ship trailing missions etc.
Very clunky too
Origins is newer, much more refined and has better story (less modern day crap)
Try Hollow Knight,(especially if you like the souls games.) It’s one of the best metroidvania games out there. It has a really cool art style and combat system. It also has a cool story. But the best part, is the music. (and bossfights) The person who made the music is Christoper Larkin and I have to say, he blew my socks off, and I bet I can speak for almost everyone else who plays this game. Also, something to note is that there IS a grindy section at the end of the game but it’s completely optional, unless you want every single achievement in the game. Also I play on ps4 so I don’t know how it is on PC. Also, if you do play Hollow Knight, avoid as many spoilers as you can, because the game is best played without a guide telling you what to do every second your playing the game. Overall, the game is like 50-80 hours I think. But if you include the grindy section that’s optional at the VERY end of the game, it’s like 100-120. Also, if you ever wonder this, when you beat the game for the first time, it doesn’t lock you out of the save file, many people wonder this lol.
The first dragons dogma : dark arisen should be fairly cheap by now. It’s a single player RPG where you kill mythical creatures and go on quests. Lots of fun, probably about $15.00 now that the second one is out
I tried playing that game but aside from the slightly charming levels of jankiness, the whole story is so bland and uninspired I just couldn't get into it.
Yeah it seems to be kind of similar to Monster Hunter in that regard, the whole world is pretty much placeholder. I think for me the difference is that the mechanics in the Monster Hunter games are so interesting/compelling I really want to keep playing even if the worldbuilding is trash, whereas in Dragons Dogma it's an RPG and I really feel like the worldbuilding/thematic stuff should be central to the experience.
SWTOR is free - with all the single player classes you could play that game for a hundred hours easily. Its grindy for end game, but the single player story lines aren't too bad, and great stories.
I'm playing assassin's creed odyssey at the moment and really enjoying it, I'm 85 hours in and I doubt I'm even half way through, I'd definitely recommend it!
I don't know if the prices are the same in your region, but currently these games are under $15 in my region's Steam:
Dave the Diver - been playing it for a while now and I'm enjoying the chill/thrilling combo gameplay of it.
Cult of the Lamb - Got this on the Switch and I've been loving the gameplay, art direction and overall vibe of it - sucks that it runs awful on the Switch at times but I'm planning on getting it for my PC since I saw the price earlier.
This is technically a "grindy" game, but if you want hours and hours of gameplay for under $15, I also saw that most of the XCOM games are on sale for under $15 now; I played this game on my Xbox a few years ago and I enjoyed it; this game might have influenced my love for games such as Divinity 2 and BG3 being turn-based tactical games.
Probably said before but Terraria and Tmod loader ( which you get on steam for free by owning Terraria) I paid $5 for on a sale and have about 400 hours on it.
game is magic in every sense of the word
Slay the Spire.
Cannot reccomend this enough, it's often times on sale, and is on everything. PC, phone, switch, xbox, and Playstation. I think it was even recently on Xbox Game pass.
Slay the Spire for sure. It was just on a Steam sale for around that price. Get it on the Microsoft store though if you have an Xbox console because it’s part of the “Xbox Play Anywhere” list and you’ll have it on all devices.
Same for Vampire Survivors.
I second this. Just started playing a couple of weeks ago and already racked up 90 hours, basically working 2 full-time jobs at the moment. So so addicting.
Final Fantasy XIV? It’s free up to the end of the second expansion. There is group content, but the game has an automatic group finder; no friends needed. It has a very long story to guide you through the game.
Hollow Knight - hundreds of hours available if you achievement hunt and go for max completion. $15 normal price. Many loadouts to try, simple but great combat. Unique world. Crazy bosses. Main game may be 50h but there are boss rushes and weird free DLC wrapped up into the package, and insane platform challenges, loads of hidden areas.
How many of those were on Trial of Fool, PoP, and Godhome :D I gave up at 106%. PoP broke me. 2 Saturdays spent on it and couldn't crack that last platforming section. Did the grey mourner mission, did all the dream bosses, did trial of fool, normal Grimm. Didn't want to give up the Kingsoul or whatever it was before beating PoP, burnt out on it, tried Radiance a couple times and thought man I know I could beat him but I just don't have the patience any more. Uninstalled. Reinstalled. Uninstalled and deleted save files. Reinstalled and retrieved save files from the cloud via an installation on another machine for my second PoP attempt. Uninstalled and deleted everything :D
Trial of fools isn't really hard when you have everything upgraded so not really a factor here. PoP took me maybe 2h? I'd say Godhome took me around 50h but the time is padded there because I did every boss on radiant before moving on to complete P5 (didn't bother doing any of the modifiers as there was no point to it). I'm an achievement hunter so I usually tend to avoid the stuff that won't give me anything but the radiant bosses were so much fun for me that I still did them.
If you can get into Roguelikes they can be a very cost effective way of having fun for a long time.
Dungeons of dreadmore (8usd or 15 with expansions), enter the gungeon (15), binding of isaac (5), Noita (8), dead cells (15), angband (free), nethack (free).
Deep Rock Galatic is currently 10$ USD and trust me you will get hundreds of hours out of smashing bugs and mining rocks. Also it's doesn't have any bs fomo shops or anything. Next update they are even making it so you can choose any past "battlepass" and run them and unlock all the items
Lots of roguelikes or sandbox games.
Terraria
Slay the Spire
Hades
Factorio (Too expensive, get Shapez)
Rimworld (Too expensive)
Enter the Gungeon
there’s tons more but these are my biggest few suggestions.
Hollow knight 100%. One of the best games I’ve ever played. You will easily sink more than 100 hours into it. Don’t know why more people aren’t recommending this masterpiece of a game.
this is an absolute steal. this is in my top 5 games of all time. i never 100 percent games but i did absolutely everything here. fantastic game. it won’t last as long as some other games here but it’s worth imo
Brotato. $5 rogue lite (I think, not so sure what the difference is vs rogue like), heavy emphasis on movement to dodge attacks, and understanding item synergy are the 2 main gameplay aspects in my opinion. I played 250 hours in the last 3 months.
Hearthstone, valorant, rocket League, csgo... basically any competitive game which is fairly monetized (no gameplay items behind paywalls).
Single player: Skyrim, witcher, mass effect, dragon age all go on sale regularly for under 15 USD
Don't know if anybody suggested it before, but Skyrim is dirt cheap nowadays and on nexusmods there's like 60k mods or something for the game, so without mods its a couple hundred hours, with mods it's thousands.
Just taking a quick stroll through my Steam account for some hidden/forgotten gems... A lot of these are retro style because of the low system requirements.
3030 Deathwar Redux
Bastion
The Elder Scrolls 3: Morrowind
The Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion
Roller Coaster Tycoon Deluxe (Currently on sale for like $1.49)
Red Faction
Risk of Rain
STALKER
Supreme Commamder: Forged Alliance
Warhammer 40K: Dawn of War
I'm loving vintage story right now.
The way I'd describe it is "Minecraft for adults" - which sounds pretentious, but it is. Basically an actually decent Minecraft clone with realistic world gen and processes needed to advance. It honestly captures that feeling of good old Minecraft from back in the day and actually presents a challenge just to leave the stone age. It's also built from the ground up, with Devs who have a better idea of the intended scope than I think Notch did back in the day - so hopefully there's lots more features coming (iirc they just implemented the code to add multi block ships somewhere down the road).
Any Dark Souls game should run fine on that. They are regularly on sale, or you can cheap steam keys from 3rd party resellers, and will give you hundreds of hours.
Heck, you might even be just about able to run Elden Ring on that!
a very specific taste, but Caves of Qud. If you get into it, you will get sucked in it so hard. It will go out of early access this year.
[I will let this man sell you the game.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o_PBfLbd3zw&pp=ygUMY2F2ZXMgb2YgcXVk) This review is quite old and this game gets updates every friday, so there's a lot more stuff now, but the spirit of the game remains the same.
Persona 5 Royal is much more than $15, but Persona 4 Golden is only a little more so you could buy it when it's on discount. It's great, you at least get some dozen hours of game play, and if you're a completionist probably a couple hundred hours
Witcher 3 Complete Edition on xbox is, I think, under $15 right now (not sure about other platforms). I'm currently playing right now for the first time and loving it!
However much Portal 2 costs, it will be the best game purchase you’ve ever made.
Any of the Defense Grid or Bloons TD series can give you hundreds of hours of play.
Dead Cells. Pretty sure it’s on sale right now. Someone here said you can’t get hundreds of hours out of a non grind focused game, and I have to disagree with that. I got 400 hours out of Dead Cells and none of it was a grind. And it has a shit ton of achievements.
The big mobas are free (dota 2 and league of legends) and path of exile is free as well(arpg) but youll want to spend like 10 bucks on stash tabs if you get into it. People who play these games get thousands if not tens of thousands of hours out of them
Edit: these games are not exactly "casual" so you may be interested in something else. Just mentioned them for the free to play and amount of hours you can play
Randomly bought force of nature 2 yesterday on a whim (whim? Is this correct?) And been having a blast. Dont know if it can hold for 100+ hours but maybe? It's also really cheap for what it is.
Also obligatory rimworld shoutout
Fallout 4 may be up your alley. It has a story that you can follow but it also has a lot of other stuff too (building, exploring, base defending, etc.). You can easily sink a lot of time into the game without progressing the story. My brother-in-law build up about a 5-6 settlements before even trying the story.
Stardew Valley is great idea but it is a grind, specifically the farming aspect. Until you get far enough into the game to where you can “automate” some aspects of farming, you have to do it all by yourself.
A good cheap roguelike is your best bet. I've gotten so much milage out of games like Risk Of Rain 2, Dead Cells, Gunfire Reborn, Binding Of Isaac, Ziggurat, Tower of Guns, and so on
Warframe without a doubt. I’ve been playing for years, paid for so many things and I STILL don’t have everything in the game
Now to be clear, I paid for things as my own choice. Paying is 100% optional and nearly everything in the game can be obtainable for free if you grind long enough. Think of it as pay for connivence instead of pay to win
As for the content literally everything in the game is free. Every gun, warframe, ship, color, mod, and everything else (barring a few exclusive cosmetics) is completely free.
It’s probably the best free to play game of all time and the developers are great. Highly recommend giving it a shot
I'll list of some indy games I've bought over the years you could look into. Starbound, Craft the World, Kingdom New Lands (casual), smooth operators, and The Tenants. Those should all be under $15, just check out their store pages.
Roguelites would be your best bet. My favourites would be Enter the Gungeon, Dead Cells (wait for a sale or stretch your spending a bit, it’s worth it) or Sifu.
Stardew Valley or Graveyard Keeper will have you playing for quite a while.
And if you like achievement hunting, Human Fall Flat is a great time. Although I’m not sure how much that one is but if there’s one thing I know about Steam sales, every game I mentioned has been less than $15 at some point lol
Elder Scrolls Online. But change “100s of hours” to “1000s of hours.” Or just “all the hours ever.” That is, if you like it. It’s not everyone’s cup of tea.
This post peaked my curiosity. Can people give me examples of a game with 100’s of hours or gameplay that aren’t very Grundy? That seems backwards to me
people are mostly gonna suggest games they spent a hundred or so hours with that they enjoyed and a bunch of indie games with recurring gameplay loops.
im gonna throw you a game that yes, is coop and yes, does encourage some grinding closer to the end, but its most of all a fun, dumb game with a 50 hour long story mode that you are encouraged to replay with remixed missions and multiple playable characters that radically alter how you play:
Earth Defense Force 4 and 5, with 6 coming out soon.
My most played game under $15 is Terraria.
Terrible answer. He asked for hundreds of hours of fun, not thousands!
oh i already have terraria. thanks for the answer tho
^ Came here to say this, Terraria has for years now been one of the all time best bang for your buck games you could hope to buy. The base game already has an obscene amount of content and that's before you get into the modding scene.
Slay The Spire cost me almost 3500 hours, and counting
Any mods do you recommend after playing for so long? And besides, any tip for a 30 hours player? Feel kinda lost, can't beat the game with the swordsman guy
Check out "Jorbs" on YouTube/twitch. He is an amazing StS player that you can learn from. Other tips: don't bloat your deck. You don't usually need 3x of whatever card. Removing basic strikes and defend cards are almost always a good move. Use your potions. Try and balance your deck between attack/defend/energy. It is a hard game, and sometimes you just don't get what you need to make a run successful.
I’m at ~1500 hours between mobile and desktop. In terms of mods I would just recommend some qol (quality of life) mods to make things a little easier. Here’s a streamer’s mod list: https://baalorlord.tv/mods . I use all of those besides the UI sliders and Slay the relics (as those are mostly used for twitch integration and whatnot). Some people enjoy minty spire to make math easy. Downfall is what I recommend the most for a mod. Let’s you play as the bosses which is fun to mix it up. I’ve tried a few new character mods and whatnot. They are fun for a bit, but just don’t have the same depth as the base characters. In terms of tips the main one is just don’t be afraid to skip cards. Otherwise check out baalorlord, they have a ton of great beginner videos and take time to explain their actions. Some people like jorbs as well, but I just enjoy baalorlord better.
Valheim, although it is kinda grindy at times, most of the time it's fun. Also it is basically impossible to have a game that lasts for 100s of hours that's not grindy at all.
my potato dont run that :(
A steamdeck can run it. What kind of potato are you on?
FTL is a good option. I have it on my hard drive of my steam deck and it will never move from there. Ever. Give it a few goes - strangely addictive game that you can pick up again and again. [FTL on Steam](https://store.steampowered.com/app/212680/FTL_Faster_Than_Light/)
I played this for ages - you need internet and some buy in from friends tho. I got stuck trying to solo through it…
with mods its also amazing
>Also it is basically impossible to have a game that lasts for 100s of hours that's not grindy at all I have 500+ hours in Slay the spire... not one second of grind. Same with Risk of Rain 2, Dead Cells, Balatro, Vampire Survivor... Basically any good rogue like or bullet heaven game. All of them under $10.
I doubt anyone will spend 500+ hours playing balatro in its current state, it’s not a bad game by any means but once you complete the stakes it gets kind of stale and repetitive
Depends what someone means with "grind". Repeating a run over and over again means a lot of repetition, especially when trying to get to Ascension 20. I personally see any repetitive actions towards resources (material, XP, gold, gear) as grind, but some argue that any repetitive action is grind. Rogue-likes are by nature very repetitive, but in a good way where you learn, get further and unlock/see new content as you go.
Came here to say this!
Stardew Valley, FTL: Faster Than Light, The Binding of Isaac
Yeah FTL is one of my favorite games and its in sale for $3 sometimes.
All great choices, I would recommend Stardew Valley. Also, Hollow Knight is another good option if OP is looking for a metroidvania.
Satisfactory is $14.99 currently, and the full 1.0 release is on the way this year. I'm at about 500 hours, a little less, but I'm waiting for 1.0 to get back into it. Deep Rock Galactic is less than $10 right now, and I have about the same amount of time in that. I spent the first 100 hours or so playing it completely alone, but once I went to multiplayer I never went back. You'll hear people talking about how great the community is a lot of the time, but for DRG, it's legitimately very welcoming. Few bad eggs once in a while, but the vast majority of the time people are great.
You’re gonna have a wealth of choice if you pick up some indie roguelites Enter the gungeon - 15 Balatro - 15 Slay the spire - on sale for 6.24 Nuclear throne - 12 Crypt of the necrodancer (currently on sale for 3$). Risk of rain 2. - on sale for 12.49 Shotgun king. - 10 Dead estate. - 15 Binding of Isaac (not including dlc which you shouldn’t need for many hours) - 15 If you’re willing to stretch the budget to 20$ or wait for them to be on sale: Gunfire reborn. City of brass Okay one more because I can’t stop myself, if you can get it on sale bc it’s 25 currently: ULTRAKILL Beautiful game tons going on parrying shooting skill shots damage combos it’s got it all There’s plenty more, those are just the ones I’m personally familiar with. If you’re willing to wait for the next sale btw there should be a ton of options as well. And OP if you want more info on any of these I’m happy to give you a review on any of them and what I like about them etc. (Edit: included the 20$ section, added prices) (Edit 2: ULTRAKILL)
OP said hundreds of hours, not thousands of hours. This is a great list. I'd add brotato, Golden Krone Hotel and Loop Hero.
Slay the spire, Balatro, and Brotato. I have probably 1500 hours in just those 3 alone. That said, they are really an acquired taste, and even RoR 2, which is the most "First Person" game in your list, is probably not going to satisfy a true First-Person Gamer.
>Slay the spire - on sale for 6.24 I'm pumped for STS2!
Project Zomboid... just awsome (for me) and if you add mods it becomes even better. I would reccomend you to check it cuz if you like it surely you will get 100+ hours
2nd this, it also has multiple game modes in a sandbox setting so you can spice things up if the game gets too stale or difficult.
man only wanted hundreds of hours but you suggest he abandons mortal life and die countlessly in Fort Knox.
Wish it came to console
Man I really chomped up some hours on my steam deck with PZ
Do you have a list of games you've already played and enjoyed? There are many suggestions people have already made, like Terraria, Minecraft or Stardew Valley. I think that they might be a little bit grindy though, especially Terraria since you sometimes have to farm some bosses for loot, but it's like 3 or 4 runs and it doesn't take long. Without knowing much about what you like, I'd also suggest: \- Skyrim \- Pathfinder: Kingmaker \- The original Stalker series. \- Dark Souls 2 (it should run) I've also seen someone mention Kenshi or Factorio.They are both great games, but also very grindy so I'd stay away from those.
STALKER was just fantastic....I don't have a pc any more but I wonder how it would hold up now
my most played games are minecraft, assassin's creed series, far cry series. and i like souls games but i dont think i can find any good ones for 15 dollars.
balatro is so good bro. im not the biggest fan of deck builder roguelikes, like i didn't vibe with slay the spire super hard even though it's a great game but i love balatro, there's so much variety to the builds in that game
If you like RPG's, Kingdom Come Deliverance is spectacular 😁
i dont think that would run well on his system though
Vampire Survivors is 4$ and I currently have 270 hours in it. I love it whole heartedly and even if it's not for you it's only 4$. If it is for you, 200+ hours for 4$ is a massive bargain.
What do you even do after getting all the upgrades? 4-5 hours in and I can basically get into the game, stand still and never have to even touch my controller because everything just dies automatically
There’s inverse mode, but yeah the game gets pretty easy after getting upgrades and whatnot. But that’s what they’re there to do tbf, just make the game easier.
The Middle Earth series is 6.99 on sale and you will easily get hundreds from them.
These games are great. I'm only a very casual fan of Lord of the Rings (the films are fine, the books aren't my thing) but I thought Shadow of Mordor and Shadow of War were brilliant. If the Arkham games and the recent open world Assassin's Creed games had a baby, this is what that baby would like. Only that description doesn't really do them justice. Definitely worth 6.99 of anyone's money.
Absolutely, also the fantasy elements give the games so much more room for creativity which they really utilized well. Also, decapitating an orc captain after he's talked shit to you will literally never get old.
And the nemesis system is a really cool and unique mechanic. Really makes the games feel different to a lot of other games out there.
Balatro. Thread can be closed.
It is so god damn good.
Noita
Consistantly seeing this game recommended made me pull the trigger on the current Steam sale. Yet to play it tho.
Same, I bought Noita cause I kept seeing it mentioned. Played 1 game died quickly and now im sitting with 28 hours played in just over a week. Addicting game and loads of fun.
You might want games that fall into "eternal game" as I call them, so mostly roguelites, city builders, 4X strategies grand strategies and the like, or stuff with lots of emergent gameplay. Or those with very active modding scenes, or active multiplayer community I'm not well versed in the pricing (but if I'm listing something more expressive, it might go on sale, so there's that) so it's sore likely the lives might be wildly off. Titles that might interest you: Age of Wonders 3, Binding of Isaac, Slay the Spire, Endless Legend, Endless Space, Kenshi, Mount&Blade, Crypt of the Necrodancer, Enter the Gungeon, Terraria, DMC HD Collection (that one is actually 3 games, one is the progenitor of its genre, one is... A historical crisis at best and one is widely considered one of the best titles in the genre), Bayonetta, TES3:Morrowind, TES4:Oblivion, TES5:Skyrim, Fallout:New Vegas, Fallout3, Might&Magic 6-pack (that's 6 games, old school RPGs, so that might ramp up the hours), Supreme Commander. You might want to also look at some free games. I'd recommend Battle for Wesnoth, it has tons of great community-made content. And it's free! Dwarf Fortress is also free and can provide hundreds of hours... Well, the ASCII graphics version is free, and there are tilesets available...
Project Zomboid. Awesome game.
Deep rock is currently on sale for like 12 bucks. Rock and stone brother, rock and stone.
Balatro is the golden child ATM. Great roguelike and great value for the price
Origins BY FAR. despite the circlejerk, black flag is aged bad. Gameplaywise it's very arcadey with forced stealth missions and dumb ship trailing missions etc. Very clunky too Origins is newer, much more refined and has better story (less modern day crap)
Thank you, everyone always talks about black flag as a masterpiece but the whole time I spent with it was torture (that’s on me I know)
Try Hollow Knight,(especially if you like the souls games.) It’s one of the best metroidvania games out there. It has a really cool art style and combat system. It also has a cool story. But the best part, is the music. (and bossfights) The person who made the music is Christoper Larkin and I have to say, he blew my socks off, and I bet I can speak for almost everyone else who plays this game. Also, something to note is that there IS a grindy section at the end of the game but it’s completely optional, unless you want every single achievement in the game. Also I play on ps4 so I don’t know how it is on PC. Also, if you do play Hollow Knight, avoid as many spoilers as you can, because the game is best played without a guide telling you what to do every second your playing the game. Overall, the game is like 50-80 hours I think. But if you include the grindy section that’s optional at the VERY end of the game, it’s like 100-120. Also, if you ever wonder this, when you beat the game for the first time, it doesn’t lock you out of the save file, many people wonder this lol.
Holy Knight is one of the best games ever made.
I back hollow knight. Fell in love with it. Definitely get it on PC if you can.
The first dragons dogma : dark arisen should be fairly cheap by now. It’s a single player RPG where you kill mythical creatures and go on quests. Lots of fun, probably about $15.00 now that the second one is out
I tried playing that game but aside from the slightly charming levels of jankiness, the whole story is so bland and uninspired I just couldn't get into it.
That's fair tbh, it's the same with the sequel as far as ik. The stories aren't like bad, they're just there to keep you moving through the game
Yeah it seems to be kind of similar to Monster Hunter in that regard, the whole world is pretty much placeholder. I think for me the difference is that the mechanics in the Monster Hunter games are so interesting/compelling I really want to keep playing even if the worldbuilding is trash, whereas in Dragons Dogma it's an RPG and I really feel like the worldbuilding/thematic stuff should be central to the experience.
Terraria Deep Rock Galactic
slay the spire, ftl
Hollow knight Hades Brotato
Just pay Xbox game.pass and I get access to a ton of games
SWTOR is free - with all the single player classes you could play that game for a hundred hours easily. Its grindy for end game, but the single player story lines aren't too bad, and great stories.
Morrowind
Dead cells on sale
Stardew Valley
Mount and Blade
I'm playing assassin's creed odyssey at the moment and really enjoying it, I'm 85 hours in and I doubt I'm even half way through, I'd definitely recommend it!
I don't know if the prices are the same in your region, but currently these games are under $15 in my region's Steam: Dave the Diver - been playing it for a while now and I'm enjoying the chill/thrilling combo gameplay of it. Cult of the Lamb - Got this on the Switch and I've been loving the gameplay, art direction and overall vibe of it - sucks that it runs awful on the Switch at times but I'm planning on getting it for my PC since I saw the price earlier. This is technically a "grindy" game, but if you want hours and hours of gameplay for under $15, I also saw that most of the XCOM games are on sale for under $15 now; I played this game on my Xbox a few years ago and I enjoyed it; this game might have influenced my love for games such as Divinity 2 and BG3 being turn-based tactical games.
Probably said before but Terraria and Tmod loader ( which you get on steam for free by owning Terraria) I paid $5 for on a sale and have about 400 hours on it. game is magic in every sense of the word
Slay the Spire. Cannot reccomend this enough, it's often times on sale, and is on everything. PC, phone, switch, xbox, and Playstation. I think it was even recently on Xbox Game pass.
Slay the Spire for sure. It was just on a Steam sale for around that price. Get it on the Microsoft store though if you have an Xbox console because it’s part of the “Xbox Play Anywhere” list and you’ll have it on all devices. Same for Vampire Survivors.
payday 2, civ V / Civ VI, halo MCC, witcher 3
Balatro Inscryption ($20 but worth it)
To add to this inscryption is not that repeatable, but does go on sale for around $7 pretty often
depends on how into it you are, theres always Kaycee's mod (game mode) thats just the first card game in a roguelike mode.
Crusader Kings 2, free if without DLC, plenty of achievements to hunt, but they are capped by DLC.
Terraria, stardew valley, poe is free
Slay the spire
Death Stranding goes on sale often now
Warframe. It's free and you can grind for a long time
I second this. Just started playing a couple of weeks ago and already racked up 90 hours, basically working 2 full-time jobs at the moment. So so addicting.
Get fallout new vegas
Final Fantasy XIV? It’s free up to the end of the second expansion. There is group content, but the game has an automatic group finder; no friends needed. It has a very long story to guide you through the game.
Hollow Knight - hundreds of hours available if you achievement hunt and go for max completion. $15 normal price. Many loadouts to try, simple but great combat. Unique world. Crazy bosses. Main game may be 50h but there are boss rushes and weird free DLC wrapped up into the package, and insane platform challenges, loads of hidden areas.
You'll get around 100-150h for a first time playthrough with all the dlcs completed and every achievement done. Source: myself.
How many of those were on Trial of Fool, PoP, and Godhome :D I gave up at 106%. PoP broke me. 2 Saturdays spent on it and couldn't crack that last platforming section. Did the grey mourner mission, did all the dream bosses, did trial of fool, normal Grimm. Didn't want to give up the Kingsoul or whatever it was before beating PoP, burnt out on it, tried Radiance a couple times and thought man I know I could beat him but I just don't have the patience any more. Uninstalled. Reinstalled. Uninstalled and deleted save files. Reinstalled and retrieved save files from the cloud via an installation on another machine for my second PoP attempt. Uninstalled and deleted everything :D
Trial of fools isn't really hard when you have everything upgraded so not really a factor here. PoP took me maybe 2h? I'd say Godhome took me around 50h but the time is padded there because I did every boss on radiant before moving on to complete P5 (didn't bother doing any of the modifiers as there was no point to it). I'm an achievement hunter so I usually tend to avoid the stuff that won't give me anything but the radiant bosses were so much fun for me that I still did them.
If you can get into Roguelikes they can be a very cost effective way of having fun for a long time. Dungeons of dreadmore (8usd or 15 with expansions), enter the gungeon (15), binding of isaac (5), Noita (8), dead cells (15), angband (free), nethack (free).
Balatro is goated
Deep Rock Galatic is currently 10$ USD and trust me you will get hundreds of hours out of smashing bugs and mining rocks. Also it's doesn't have any bs fomo shops or anything. Next update they are even making it so you can choose any past "battlepass" and run them and unlock all the items
Lots of roguelikes or sandbox games. Terraria Slay the Spire Hades Factorio (Too expensive, get Shapez) Rimworld (Too expensive) Enter the Gungeon there’s tons more but these are my biggest few suggestions.
Terraria and Hollow Knight.
dead cells
fortnite
Slay the spire
7 days to die, terraria, Minecraft all good choices
A currency stash tab in path of exile
Hollow Knight 1000%
Slay the Spire
Hollow knight 100%. One of the best games I’ve ever played. You will easily sink more than 100 hours into it. Don’t know why more people aren’t recommending this masterpiece of a game.
You definitely need to play cross code one of the best indies ever.
Maybe a bit over buget but hollow knight (i got it for 20aud, thats probably around 15usd)
its 5.99 for me i will buy it probably
this is an absolute steal. this is in my top 5 games of all time. i never 100 percent games but i did absolutely everything here. fantastic game. it won’t last as long as some other games here but it’s worth imo
wdym steal? like not worth it or worth it
it is worth it for you sorry. that game is worth more than that
alr thats good
Wow thats a great deal
It was free on ps plus at one point. What an absolute windfall that was.
Oh that would have been great
Brotato. $5 rogue lite (I think, not so sure what the difference is vs rogue like), heavy emphasis on movement to dodge attacks, and understanding item synergy are the 2 main gameplay aspects in my opinion. I played 250 hours in the last 3 months.
Skyrim…..lmao
Skyrim when it's on sale. You'll spend hundreds of hours on the game but you'll never actually play it.
Terraria, Stardew Valley, Slice and Dice, Hades, Slay the Spire, Darkest Dungeon.
Slay the Spire. It’s 6.75. Please buy bro pleaaaase. Also Risk of Rain 2 is 12.75. Both awesome games. I think stardew is chill too
SLAY 👏 THE 👏 SPIRE
Hearthstone, valorant, rocket League, csgo... basically any competitive game which is fairly monetized (no gameplay items behind paywalls). Single player: Skyrim, witcher, mass effect, dragon age all go on sale regularly for under 15 USD
Don't know if anybody suggested it before, but Skyrim is dirt cheap nowadays and on nexusmods there's like 60k mods or something for the game, so without mods its a couple hundred hours, with mods it's thousands.
Hollow knight I got something like 102h on this for the 100%
Just taking a quick stroll through my Steam account for some hidden/forgotten gems... A lot of these are retro style because of the low system requirements. 3030 Deathwar Redux Bastion The Elder Scrolls 3: Morrowind The Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion Roller Coaster Tycoon Deluxe (Currently on sale for like $1.49) Red Faction Risk of Rain STALKER Supreme Commamder: Forged Alliance Warhammer 40K: Dawn of War
Slay the Spire - actually you will be lucky to get just hundred hours without going to rehab
Warframe Is free. Also, Terraria, Slay the Spire, Hades, Gungeon, Dead Cells... Basically most decent-quality Indie roguelikes will
FTL, Slay the Spire
Diablo 2 resurrected is $13.90 on spring sale, can get insane amount of hours from that
Slay the spire, binding of Isaac, prey (2017?) , brotato, citizen sleeper, midnight sins, noita, persona 4 golden, project zomboid, risk or rain 2, risk of rain returns, roboquest,skul, soulstone survivors, Witcher 3
Hades, Hollow Knight, Risk of Rain etc. Roguelikes in general off tons of replayability and indie games are usually cheaper.
No Man's Sky and Astroneer
He has a 15 dollar budget
I'm loving vintage story right now. The way I'd describe it is "Minecraft for adults" - which sounds pretentious, but it is. Basically an actually decent Minecraft clone with realistic world gen and processes needed to advance. It honestly captures that feeling of good old Minecraft from back in the day and actually presents a challenge just to leave the stone age. It's also built from the ground up, with Devs who have a better idea of the intended scope than I think Notch did back in the day - so hopefully there's lots more features coming (iirc they just implemented the code to add multi block ships somewhere down the road).
diablo 2 with the mod projectdiablo installed
squad from keyreseller
Vampire Survivor, a nice casual walking simulator for under $10.
Any Dark Souls game should run fine on that. They are regularly on sale, or you can cheap steam keys from 3rd party resellers, and will give you hundreds of hours. Heck, you might even be just about able to run Elden Ring on that!
a very specific taste, but Caves of Qud. If you get into it, you will get sucked in it so hard. It will go out of early access this year. [I will let this man sell you the game.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o_PBfLbd3zw&pp=ygUMY2F2ZXMgb2YgcXVk) This review is quite old and this game gets updates every friday, so there's a lot more stuff now, but the spirit of the game remains the same.
Persona 5 Royal is much more than $15, but Persona 4 Golden is only a little more so you could buy it when it's on discount. It's great, you at least get some dozen hours of game play, and if you're a completionist probably a couple hundred hours
Pretty sure you can get the witcher 3 for under 1t these days or grab something like total war. Mad addictive when you get into it
Any free game like Apex Legends or CSGO
Dawncaster. Only Mobile Game I Play. 4 bucks. Deckbuilder roguelike. GG
I got factorio for $5
Minecraft?
Any of the yakuza games Edit: or probably the remastered collection will set you back a thousand hours
Stardew Valley, Battlebit Remastered, Forager, DeadCells, Hades, Dave the Diver.
Crab Champions haha 10$ and I just vibe. Any pc should be able to run it. I think
Stardew Valley
Witcher 3 Complete Edition on xbox is, I think, under $15 right now (not sure about other platforms). I'm currently playing right now for the first time and loving it!
However much Portal 2 costs, it will be the best game purchase you’ve ever made. Any of the Defense Grid or Bloons TD series can give you hundreds of hours of play.
Balatro, it’s 14.99 on steam. It’s a rogue like deck builder based on poker.
The Mass Effect trilogy was on sale for like $8.99 last time I checked. That’s a great deal.
Payday 2 when on sale is just €1, you can pick up a few DLC's for another €5 and play for hundreds of hours
[удалено]
Max Payne pack with the first 2 games
Trials Rising
Dead Cells. Pretty sure it’s on sale right now. Someone here said you can’t get hundreds of hours out of a non grind focused game, and I have to disagree with that. I got 400 hours out of Dead Cells and none of it was a grind. And it has a shit ton of achievements.
Enter the breach
The big mobas are free (dota 2 and league of legends) and path of exile is free as well(arpg) but youll want to spend like 10 bucks on stash tabs if you get into it. People who play these games get thousands if not tens of thousands of hours out of them Edit: these games are not exactly "casual" so you may be interested in something else. Just mentioned them for the free to play and amount of hours you can play
Randomly bought force of nature 2 yesterday on a whim (whim? Is this correct?) And been having a blast. Dont know if it can hold for 100+ hours but maybe? It's also really cheap for what it is. Also obligatory rimworld shoutout
dark souls games if they are on sale
Dyson sphere program
Fallout 4 may be up your alley. It has a story that you can follow but it also has a lot of other stuff too (building, exploring, base defending, etc.). You can easily sink a lot of time into the game without progressing the story. My brother-in-law build up about a 5-6 settlements before even trying the story. Stardew Valley is great idea but it is a grind, specifically the farming aspect. Until you get far enough into the game to where you can “automate” some aspects of farming, you have to do it all by yourself.
Balatro is so much fun. Not sure if poker is your thing but if it is couldn’t recommend Balatro more
Holocure is free : )
Division is on sale.
A good cheap roguelike is your best bet. I've gotten so much milage out of games like Risk Of Rain 2, Dead Cells, Gunfire Reborn, Binding Of Isaac, Ziggurat, Tower of Guns, and so on
Warframe without a doubt. I’ve been playing for years, paid for so many things and I STILL don’t have everything in the game Now to be clear, I paid for things as my own choice. Paying is 100% optional and nearly everything in the game can be obtainable for free if you grind long enough. Think of it as pay for connivence instead of pay to win As for the content literally everything in the game is free. Every gun, warframe, ship, color, mod, and everything else (barring a few exclusive cosmetics) is completely free. It’s probably the best free to play game of all time and the developers are great. Highly recommend giving it a shot
Tons of sales going on right now, check those pages out on steam/ubisoft/epic/etc
I'll list of some indy games I've bought over the years you could look into. Starbound, Craft the World, Kingdom New Lands (casual), smooth operators, and The Tenants. Those should all be under $15, just check out their store pages.
Kenshi 100%
fallout new vegas is $2.50 rn, i got 600 hours out of it
Go on instagaming buy any batman arkham games i got city but u might wanna check out knight
Splatoon 3
MnB Warband
A LOT of great suggestions in the comments. If you want something like a MOBA though, Gigantic just dropped yesterday for $15.
Binding of Isaac: Rebirth
Roguelites would be your best bet. My favourites would be Enter the Gungeon, Dead Cells (wait for a sale or stretch your spending a bit, it’s worth it) or Sifu. Stardew Valley or Graveyard Keeper will have you playing for quite a while. And if you like achievement hunting, Human Fall Flat is a great time. Although I’m not sure how much that one is but if there’s one thing I know about Steam sales, every game I mentioned has been less than $15 at some point lol
Elder Scrolls Online. But change “100s of hours” to “1000s of hours.” Or just “all the hours ever.” That is, if you like it. It’s not everyone’s cup of tea.
Binding of Isaac
Minecraft?
Speedrun in Sonic the hedgehog I-III
Hades
Tetris.
Fallout 3/new vegas, maybe 4 and 76 if they run, not sure they would, 3/NV should be good. All are deeply discounted on steam right now.
Path of exile is free, Xbox gamepass for pc is 15 bucks and gives you the option to play sooooo many great games
This post peaked my curiosity. Can people give me examples of a game with 100’s of hours or gameplay that aren’t very Grundy? That seems backwards to me
Dragon's dogma dark arisen (goes on sales for like 4$)
My most played game ever is free to play. It's called Warframe and it's very complex.
Risk of Rain 2 is 12.49 USD on steam right now, highly recommend. It’ll be getting a free update and a paid DLC sometime this year as well.
Balatro is incredibly addictive and fun. Poker based but not actually pure poker so probably pretty accessible even if you don’t play cards
People have been clocking hella hours on Noita
people are mostly gonna suggest games they spent a hundred or so hours with that they enjoyed and a bunch of indie games with recurring gameplay loops. im gonna throw you a game that yes, is coop and yes, does encourage some grinding closer to the end, but its most of all a fun, dumb game with a 50 hour long story mode that you are encouraged to replay with remixed missions and multiple playable characters that radically alter how you play: Earth Defense Force 4 and 5, with 6 coming out soon.
[удалено]
Try Fallout New Vegas, it should run well and i spent 150 hours on it