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Ask HN: What video games do you play during the day?

by twelvenmonkeys on 5/30/22, 1:29 PM with 66 comments

Sometimes I need a quick break like 5 minutes on a game, or a walk outside.

What games do you play to pass the time while waiting for code to compile / graphics rendering?

I'm trying to find nice quick pick-up-and-play games similar to Stardew Valley / Screeps / Factorio.

What does HN play?

  • by dstick on 5/30/22, 1:48 PM

    Factorio, for 5 minutes? HahahHAHAHAmuhabahHaAha

    I’m envious of your discipline ;-)

  • by cruano on 5/30/22, 1:37 PM

    I had a friend that used to take mid-day breaks to play CS:GO.

    The weird part is that it seemed to work wonders, I guess there's something about getting shot at that really gets your energy levels going

  • by tjbiddle on 5/30/22, 2:05 PM

    Quick minute or two: Wordle (Or a copy of it, that I can play more than one game a day)

    On-Going in the background: Old School Runescape - I have 3 monitors, so I keep it on half of one while I work. There are many activities that are a "grind" and are pretty AFK, so it's just a click every few minutes or so.

  • by behohippy on 5/30/22, 1:43 PM

    Give Rimworld a try. It's easy to get a few things done every break and pausing fits in naturally. You can even almost get away with backgrounding it where you set up a bunch of stuff to be done, and let the pawns do their own thing.

  • by MattRix on 5/30/22, 2:06 PM

    Based on the games you listed, I think you’d enjoy https://shapez.io

    It’s essentially minimalist Factorio with a lot of neat ideas of its own. You can play it in your browser or on Steam.

    Another classic browser game is TagPro. 3v3 physics-based capture the flag with a surprisingly high skill ceiling. https://tagpro.gg

  • by nfbyte on 5/30/22, 1:54 PM

    Mindustry. It's like Factorio + tower defense. There is a basic campaign and sandbox mode with multiplayer as well. It has in-game visual programming (logic) with which you can do crazy things like play Chess: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hoeS3S9S9Dk, and it also has a JavaScript API for mods.

  • by pyrryh on 5/30/22, 2:07 PM

    https://play-cs.com/en/servers

    Been quite surprised to find fully functional CS 1.6 in a browser, but that's it. Heard that the latency is worse compared to the game client, haven't checked that myself because I don't want to bother buying or pirating the original version. Main use case: playing at work when you can't install random binaries but can visit websites (this use case isn't mine but I've been asking players there and they responded in this way).

  • by BlasDeLezo on 5/30/22, 3:05 PM

    I've got a couple Teenage Engineering Pocket Operators laying around and from time to time I play with them. Also I love simple online games like ISS Docking Sim, 3D Bosconian or ASCIIcker. https://iss-sim.spacex.com/ http://nolannicholson.com/bosco-3d/ http://asciicker.com/y6/

  • by marcelluspye on 5/30/22, 1:50 PM

    Chess. Any time I have a couple minutes I manage to squeeze in a blitz game.

  • by rwky on 5/30/22, 2:06 PM

    Seedship us fun and works offline too so good for planes/trains etc. https://johnayliff.itch.io/seedship

  • by moritonal on 5/30/22, 4:57 PM

    Noita. Brutalist one-shot game with very creative and emergant gameplay. Games can last from 5 seconds to 7 hours, and you can save and exit at any point.

  • by kgwxd on 5/30/22, 1:57 PM

    Rocket League. 5 minute matches.

  • by petrochenkov on 5/30/22, 1:47 PM

    Elastomania. You can spend an arbitrarily small amount of time on it, like a 1 or 2 minutes. It also turns off the brain well.

  • by jordanmorgan10 on 5/30/22, 1:40 PM

    I like to play something that makes me feel like I did something, so I lean on games like Halo where I can play a match. My favorite games are role playing games, but I reserve those for vacations and breaks because I don't feel like I can get anything meaningfully done in about 10 minutes.

  • by badsectoracula on 5/30/22, 2:07 PM

    Usually some singleplayer FPS with (practically) zero pauses for cutscenes/story/etc with quicksave+quickload so i can run it, play for 5 minutes, save, exit and pick it up at any time without having to wonder where i am or what is going on with the story. Pretty much always this is games i've already played at the past at least once. Recently it is Unreal 1 or Doom 3.

    Also whenever i listen to some podcast (or video with just people talking) i like to boot up such a game (i often play Doom 3 BFG Edition since it supports gamepad and i can relax on my chair instead of hunching over the keyboard and mouse - i also use RBDoom3 sourceport which allows skipping cutscenes, etc and works natively on Linux) with the game's audio volume to barely audible.

  • by wsc981 on 5/30/22, 1:51 PM

    I played some Warband: Mount & Blade recently. I think many tasks in this game can be done in-between real-life stuff.

    But last weekend I also bought Lands of Lore: The Throne of Chaos on GOG. And I think if you can control yourself, you can also play short times in-between real-life tasks.

    The pixel art looks really good and I like how Westwood added specific graphics and animations to support parts of the story. The music adds a nice atmosphere and voice acting is pretty good to great (Patrick Stewart does part of the voice acting).

    A review here: https://retrofreakreviews.com/2020/06/12/lands-of-lore-the-t...

  • by nomilk on 5/30/22, 2:00 PM

    I play a couple of games of bullet chess (1 minute games) on Lichess app. From a locked phone to the start of a game is 11.5 seconds (yeah, timed it). After a game you can start a new one in a few seconds.

  • by geocrasher on 5/30/22, 3:27 PM

    What do I play? My guitar.

    Yep. WFH. I have a 6 string guitar next to me at all times. I'm not a terribly great player but I enjoy it and it relaxes me and gets some creative juices going. It's wonderful :)

  • by jamesjolliffe on 5/30/22, 2:53 PM

    Street Fighter 3: 3rd Strike on Fightcade.

    App loads instantly unlike most modern games, and if you're in the US, you can quickly find a match. You can challenge anyone in chat room to a quick first-to-3 or first-to-5 which will take 5-10 minutes. It's a great adrenaline rush that totally takes my mind off coding b/c it's so fast paced and PvP. Then back to work.

    Easy to get into for beginners, but the mechanics are incredibly deep and people have been mapping the engine out for 20 years, so there is so much to learn if you choose to.

  • by wanda on 5/30/22, 1:56 PM

    I tend to avoid video games until I'm on proper vacation time. For diversion between programming boring stuff I tend to do some graphic design stuff or occasionally I'll go on StackOverflow and answer some Perl/JavaScript questions.

    During vacation time I'll typically play one of the Fire Emblems or Halo (3, Reach or Infinite).

    Last vacation I quite enjoyed Dirt Rally, nothing quite like nailing a stage at speed in Lancia 037. I don't care for driving games usually but these games are fun even just on a gamepad.

  • by DrPhish on 5/30/22, 2:18 PM

    Generally either one sector of FTL or a song or two in rocksmith. I tried dwarf fortress but had trouble keeping in a reasonable time bound

  • by noufalibrahim on 5/30/22, 1:49 PM

    I have mame installed and the roms for some SNK games. I have a few saved states (boss battles) and I usually just play those and quit.

  • by voidfunc on 5/30/22, 1:57 PM

    Minecraft Creative

    More often these days I just go lie down for 20 minutes since im right at home.

  • by 0des on 5/30/22, 2:00 PM

    I play a game called "where's my lighter" where I've lost my lighter and none of the sleeping pets will get off my lap while I try to escape. Its frustrating but rewarding.

  • by foohoo on 5/30/22, 1:40 PM

    For something really quick and just in the browser I jump into a round on https://krunker.io/

  • by nikivi on 5/30/22, 3:05 PM

    I play Wild Rift (https://wildrift.leagueoflegends.com) or Chess on iPad.

  • by agentultra on 5/30/22, 1:59 PM

    If you have VR, beat sabre.

    Sometimes I'll take a stab at Getting Over It with Bennett Foddy or play a few rounds rounds of NES Tetris.

    Weather permitting I'll prefer going outside.

  • by acqbu on 5/30/22, 1:32 PM

    I like playing tetris and subway surfers to pass the time

  • by freedom2099 on 5/30/22, 8:57 PM

    I don’t play any “quick” games… I like story heavy RPGs. And I don’t play for less than 40m/1h (so if I don’t have the time I don’t even start).

  • by seanalltogether on 5/30/22, 1:46 PM

    Hearthstone has been my goto for "I want to play something for 15 minutes with little commitment" for the past 8 years now.

  • by davidkuennen on 5/30/22, 1:54 PM

    League of Legends / Team fight Tactics.

    Love that you can do a short game for 20 min and then quit or do more. Perfect to clear your head.

  • by karmakaze on 5/30/22, 8:02 PM

    StarCraft II ladder games as Protoss. It's volatile enough that each game usually over in 5-15 minutes, especially PvP.

  • by massysett on 5/30/22, 1:43 PM

    I use the chess.com app and solve puzzles. Lichess has free puzzles but I think the ones on chess.com are better.

  • by zorbash on 5/30/22, 2:11 PM

    Hades on Nintendo Switch. Each zone can take 5 minutes to complete making it perfect for a break.

  • by steanne on 5/30/22, 7:57 PM

  • by votiv on 5/30/22, 3:49 PM

  • by pmarreck on 5/30/22, 2:07 PM

    on my windows/linux machines, Overwatch rounds are nice and short.

    on my mac? mame, with certain roms and savestates. can't beat the combination of the simplicity of the old classics plus the ability to freeze and duplicate state at any point.

  • by partiallogic on 5/30/22, 1:50 PM

    Skater XL on a Steam Deck

  • by hickimsedenolan on 5/30/22, 2:09 PM

    These days, I tend to play death-match in Counter Strike 1.6.

  • by nicolas_ on 5/30/22, 8:03 PM

    Wildrift (League of Legends on mobile) / Fortnite

  • by ruwbox on 5/30/22, 1:52 PM

    Deep Rock Galactic!

  • by justin_oaks on 5/30/22, 2:39 PM

    Steam games with decent replay value, but short rounds of gameplay:

    One Finger Death Punch

    One Finger Death Punch 2

    Downwell

    Superflight

    Shattered

    Race the Sun

    Super Crate Box

  • by laylomo2 on 5/30/22, 1:49 PM

    Splatoon matches are between 3 abs 5 mins.

  • by jmclnx on 5/30/22, 1:56 PM

    probably not what you are looking for, but here goes. Usually one of these: xpat2, xgammon, rogue or nethack

  • by haunter on 5/30/22, 3:17 PM

    Mahjong Soul to play some riichi mahjong

  • by nunez on 5/30/22, 3:12 PM

    i still like wordle and similar type games (quordle, waffle). i do not like video games though.

  • by sys_64738 on 5/30/22, 8:07 PM

    Tetris while using Emacs.

  • by voisin on 5/30/22, 2:04 PM

    Bloons Tower Defence

  • by jpn on 5/30/22, 11:05 PM

    Into the Breach

  • by haris1 on 5/30/22, 5:54 PM

    Thanks for post

  • by fred967 on 5/30/22, 2:56 PM

    Train Valley 2

  • by danamit on 5/30/22, 1:57 PM

    Master Duel,

  • by jdalgetty on 5/30/22, 1:56 PM

    Elden Ring!