Good Gaming For 'casual' Times (short Playtime, Relaxing)?

[skeezix]

<long ramble, sorry; sleep deprived badly >

This whole being a dad and moving to a new house and other things is taking its toll on me and I'm sure others have been in the 'way too busy and sort of spun out feeling' mood, so I'm looking for one small help.. good old gaming, and who better to consult with than my friends here in the forum?

While I always said the best game was game and not-game coding, I have to pick my projects carefully (and waiting for the Pandora due to time constraints (ahh, it used to be so easy to code 18 hours a day .. but right now I feel the itch for actual fun and 'relaxing' gaming in the late hours.

ie: I traditionally have been pretty hard core in terms of coding and gaming, but of late time is tight. Playing CoD4, or firing up a shooter on my gp2x or wahtever.. always good, but a little stressful if you mean to do it in short time. Playing Raiden in 20 mins just sucks I'm sort of looking for games that are simple, fun, relaxing, that can be compartmentalized into short bursts. ie: If I have 30 mins before bed, play a round of something.

My usual fodder is shooters, but I have found action games aren't appropriate for bursts.. who wants to stop a manic game in the middle? Likewise, PC games tend to take a lot of time (AoC, WoW etc.)

TF2 and episodic games like HL2/etc do sort of work, but just can't drop them.

I've always been a huuuge Civ fan, but naturally Civ games take 4-8 hours to get anywhere

My wife is hooked on DS (Picrosse and other puzzlers) and Dance Dance Reovlutnion for exercise, so shes all set. DS Civ may work when it comes out, dunno, but I don't have a DS (she took it

Once I get a pandora dev kit I'll be good, since I'll be coding

But for now .. on Gp2x (or PSP, or PC) what sort of options might I have for 'relaxing' and 'short playtimes' games?

ie: Advance Wars and related (such as Field Commander on PSP?) might work, though I've not tried them under GBA emulation (or FFT and so on.)

Wargames in general may work, though they take a long time to get anywhere. (Pandora will help .. using a UMPC is still too bulky.. but Pandora with DOSBox will make life good; Masgter of Magic here I come!)

ScummVM might be my solution, as it works really well on F100 and F200 machines, and with MIDI emulation sounds pretty good; pretty chilling way to kill some time. Sam and Max maybe..

But I'm so totally sleep deprived by being a poppa that I can't recall long lists of games today. Anyone have good ideas?

jeff

 

[zacaj]

Friq!

 

[Orkie]

Puzzle Bobble!

 

[Alex.]

Friq!

Seconded, that's such an awesome game

 

[trooper]

Puzznic on Nes ot PCEngine.

Trooper

 

[Guyfawkes]

Your wife has good taste, I would check out picross on the DS, it is perfect if you have a few spare minutes as you can always save or simply close the DS lid to go into standby if you will be playing a while later. There are two versions on the GP2X if you want to try them http://archive.gp2x.de/cgi-bin/cfiles.cgi?0,0,0,0,25,1646 and http://archive.gp2x.de/cgi-bin/cfiles.cgi?0,0,0,0,25,896.

Incidentally I am coding my own version for the Pandora so maybe you will get the chance to try it on that. I will be posting a WIP update on my homepage sometime soon.

 

[Tobriand]

And, of course, for a GP2x version, there's always Ghostpix...

SqDef is fantastic, and fits into fairly short bursts. And because of the interludes between levels, Tyrian works quite well as a short-burst shooter.

You might also want to look into Military Madness on PCE, which is one of the better turn-based military games. It actually takes account of ground levels and suchlike. Levels do tend to take about an hour to play through through, if I recall correctly.

Scumm's a great idea, of course.

Also, Wind and Water. One level takes 2-20 minutes, typically around 5, and it's a brilliantly awesome game

 

[dcpmark]

Puzzle Bobble!

Just what I was thinking. Also known as Bust a Move.

 

[WhiteFalcon]

Skeezix: As my GP2X is reduced to about one or two short sessions per week, I presently usually make a small progress in Metal Mutant in OutcaST (no flattering ) or in Cave Story. An adventure game might be a good option too, even for 20 minutes.

 

[lubidog]

Anyone enjoying Picross should get this game Illust Logic

It's what Picross should have been and is stupidly exciting! In fact there are lots of these Hudson puzzle games that are just wonderful! Slitherlink for example.

 

[Gruntfuggly]

SqDef sounds absolutely perfect for what you want...

and I have to agree - Friq is brilliant for a 1 - 5 minute game...

 

[skeezix]

Skeezix: As my GP2X is reduced to about one or two short sessions per week, I presently usually make a small progress in Metal Mutant in OutcaST (no flattering ) or in Cave Story. An adventure game might be a good option too, even for 20 minutes.

Ahh W-F, been awhile you ST nerd

I actually have been using OutCaST (duh) for Civ 1 and Phantasie 2 on and off; save states ftw

I should've posted a bit more coherently, but no sleep that night. (My daughter is 15 mo old now, and an amazingly wonderful girl .. but she doesn't sleep much )

Let me catch up here

jeff

 

[JeanLouSchmidt]

I personally love Atari 2600 games for short playtime, try Space invaders, Galaxian, Joust, Klax and so many more.

And for good puzzle games, to me the best are :

Super Puzzle Fighters (cps2)
Puyo puyo (Sega genesis)
Wind&Water (gp2x)
Bust a Move 4 (almost on all plat form !!)
Money puzzle exchanger (neogeo)
Magical Drop II & III (neogeo)

 

[___]

I would recommend block dude and sokoban. those are nice games and very relaxing.

 

[Pickle]

Ive been using sqdef as my relaxer game. Boomshine is another that just came to mind, especially with that music, almost puts you to sleep just playing it.

 

[Gruntfuggly]

Yeh - Boomshine is good for a 5 minute release, although I struggle to play it anymore due to the complete randomness of the gameplay. It might aswell be a screen saver...

Extender is good too...

 

[WhiteFalcon]

Skeezix: As my GP2X is reduced to about one or two short sessions per week, I presently usually make a small progress in Metal Mutant in OutcaST (no flattering ) or in Cave Story. An adventure game might be a good option too, even for 20 minutes.

Ahh W-F, been awhile you ST nerd

I actually have been using OutCaST (duh) for Civ 1 and Phantasie 2 on and off; save states ftw

I should've posted a bit more coherently, but no sleep that night. (My daughter is 15 mo old now, and an amazingly wonderful girl .. but she doesn't sleep much )

Let me catch up here

jeff


Glad to see you are doing fine and enjoying the fatherhood

Do you think you will ever get back to OutCaST in the "lets-make-the-already-good-better" way? There might still be some improvements made to the GUI, regarding scrolling and savestate management?

 

[Orkie]

Yeh - Boomshine is good for a 5 minute release, although I struggle to play it anymore due to the complete randomness of the gameplay. It might aswell be a screen saver...

Shame the developer got banned just for taking part in a debate...

 

[skeezix]

Skeezix: As my GP2X is reduced to about one or two short sessions per week, I presently usually make a small progress in Metal Mutant in OutcaST (no flattering ) or in Cave Story. An adventure game might be a good option too, even for 20 minutes.

Ahh W-F, been awhile you ST nerd

I actually have been using OutCaST (duh) for Civ 1 and Phantasie 2 on and off; save states ftw

I should've posted a bit more coherently, but no sleep that night. (My daughter is 15 mo old now, and an amazingly wonderful girl .. but she doesn't sleep much )

Let me catch up here

jeff


Glad to see you are doing fine and enjoying the fatherhood

Do you think you will ever get back to OutCaST in the "lets-make-the-already-good-better" way? There might still be some improvements made to the GUI, regarding scrolling and savestate management?


I'm over-allocated right now (thats a nice way of saying it right? I'm totally wiped these days , so trying to cut down on my obligations and get the new house under control. (Why did we buy a place with a giant yard? Oh yah for my daughter.. but _damn_, its a tonne of work

As such I'm totally going to go nutty on OutCaST for Pandora, but I'm not sure I'll have much time for gp2x versions anymore. I'm working on BattleJewels improvements right now for F100 and F200.

For Pandora I'm also going to mix in STonX as I always loved that emu, and it does a few things I never did in the Castaway (OutCaST) codebase, so I might merge them, or do some crazy stuff. Should be good times

jeff

 

[lubidog]

Yeh - Boomshine is good for a 5 minute release, although I struggle to play it anymore due to the complete randomness of the gameplay. It might aswell be a screen saver...

Shame the developer got banned just for taking part in a debate...


O/T

Nope, he acted like a know-it-all arse and was rude to a mod.

But he should be asked back now. This is just a forum after all...