What games do you play when you want to escape from reality?
It’s Time To Get Away
Some stuff happened here in America this week that caught a lot of people by surprise. Part of the country is ecstatic, and the rest of us are working out some emotional trauma. For those of us in the latter camp, escaping into the virtual worlds of your favorite games seems like a pretty good idea right now, and over in this week’s What Are You Playing This Weekend? thread, several commenters talked about which games they’re using to cope. Lindsayfunke is heading into the wasteland:
In times of trouble, when I really, really, need to disassociate from reality, nothing quite hits the spot like a Bethesda RPG. Thankfully, I had recently restarted Fallout: New Vegas, so I’ll be able to zone the fuck out for a few weeks at least. It’s not my first run, but I find I’m appreciating the game much more this time, warts and all. Last time I played was right after finishing Fallout 3 and Mass Effect. As excited as I was, I felt obligated to play New Vegas, and my initial run reflected that. I rushed through things, arbitrarily chose a faction, and despite enjoying the game as a whole, I don’t think it ever really clicked for me. All the factions and quests were just a means to an end: finishing the game. And frankly, I spent an embarrassing amount of time skipping through dialogue.
This time couldn’t be more different. I’m taking my time to get to know the factions and companions, and because of that, the game has really opened up. Last time, I think I got Boone as a companion toward the end, and that was only after seeing how many people seemingly adored him. However, due to my weird play style this time (skipping the tutorial quests and wandering the wasteland), I met Cass within my first hour of play. At this point, I still haven’t completed her companion quest, but I’ve found having a companion dramatically changes the feel of the game. On one hand, it’s much easier and less stressful, but on the other, why do I need more stress in my life right now? A moldy brick of racist Velveeta is going to be our “president” in a few months. What I’m saying is, I appreciate the respite.
Fluka took a trip through Titanfall 2:
As a very tiny comfort, I managed to play and finish one very distracting and enjoyable game indeed: the Titanfall 2 singleplayer. It’s really really good. Like, “I can’t play before bedtime because I’m jittery afterward” good (even before I got…other insomnia this week). It’s only about five hours long, and the writing is fairly workmanlike, but the level design, gameplay and movement could not be better. Every single level has some kind of interesting twist and creative innovation that gets abandoned before anything gets stale. It’s hard to describe the best mission of the game, Effect And Cause, without spoiling it, but I haven’t felt so exhilarated by moving through a game space since Portal 2. That’s not hyperbole; this game is literally breathtaking sometimes. And you get a robo-bro. I heart u, robo-bro.
Pktmann reached for a favorite scary game to forget about some other scary things:
Hopefully, I’ll be finishing Chris’ mission in the Resident Evil remaster. I just got to the catacombs, so it shouldn’t take more than another hour, roughly, to finish up with the best ending. Then it’s on to Resident Evil 2. I don’t think I mentioned it last week when gushing about the remaster, which I’d never played before, but not only do I now (begrudgingly at first) agree that it surpasses the original, it may have even overtaken Resident Evil 4 as my favorite game in the series. And since Resident Evil 4 has always been one of my top five games of all time…yeah. I really love the remaster.
And I just want to say these games are like comfort food to me. Resident Evil is probably my favorite game series of all time. I love the characters and the kooky world and lore. I love the atmosphere that’s a good balance of creepy and wacky. I love that on one playthrough you can go slowly and carefully, on the next you can plan out a route to get you through as fast as possible, and (if you get the proper weapons unlocked) on the next you can just blast everything away and forget caution and planning. And no matter how you play it, it never feels like you’re playing it wrong. When I play these games, I just feel like they were made for me. And that’s provided me a lot of comfort during this scary, sad week.
Jakeoit is looking to the pressures of teamwork: