Asklemmy

Ignoring digital releases of card games, which I've loved since I was a kid, it has to be Valheim. I would spend hours and hours making structures like castles and villages, with their own defense mechanisms against monster invasions. It's a wonderful indie game, very pretty for only taking 1GB in storage.

Monster hunter world. I bought it to have a replacement for genshin and it worked a little too well. It just feels different from any other game for how many things it does so well: from enemies to armor design to music to mechanics to weapon variety, everything is amazing.

Runescape/Old school runescape

Been playing since 2009. Sure I've taken breaks, sometimes multiple years, but I always return.

The old saying is true, "You never quit runescape, you just take breaks"

Ingress. I was obsessed with it. Couldn't stop playing.

Completely hooked on: Baldur's Gate 3.

Completely hooked on in the past tense and stopped playing: Overwatch.

Kerbal Space Program, Shadow Empire and Baldur's Gate 3.

SimCity 3K - played it for YEARS, was involved heavily into the modding communities and basically thought of nothing else.

Even after pouring thousands of hours into the game, I don't feel like it was wasted time.

Kenshi, and I still am. Before that it was Stellaris. Singleplayer sandbox with modding is basically what does it for me.

Team Fortress 2, for more than 8 years

Ghost of Tsushima is so good it almost makes me want to buy my own ps5, but I think I'll stick to borrowing my gf's.

Doom Eternal

Commandos 3: Destination Berlin The gameplay was so good and I kept imagining about the missions all the time.

Project Zomboid.

It's bleak and definitely isn't for everyone but I really get sucked into it. The permadeath aspect usually turns me off a game but in this case it completely breaks me of my habit of save scumming. Every zombie encounter is tense, a single mistake can leave you infected. Sometimes there are long quiet periods where I just survive holed up somewhere safe, reading books, exercising or sorting/building. Other times it's extremely intense trying to drive through town with a horde on my tail trying to lure them away and double back so I can loot an area.

I find myself looking up the world map at work and planning a route towards a new area or trying to find a suitable spot for a base that meets my survival needs.

Elderborn. In its own words, a METAL AF SLASHER. Kind of like a first person souls-like. rolled straight out of beating it into a new game+

Space Engineers. I played that shit for at least one ten hour session and a bunch of six your sessions.

Then I got to a certain point in the game and there was just … no goal. And I sorta lost all my steam.

Technically I still have the goal of “kill as many drones as possible in the never surrender thing”, but I’m focusing on work which I neglected while playing.

Cross Code for me. Ended up putting like 60 hours into it in about 3 weeks while in university and working part time. I could not put it down.

Cyberpunk 2077 when it was released. And then panam made me cry ( ._.) And that scene inside the robo is burnt into my brain xD

I kinda didnt even realise alot of the bugs, cause I really enjoyed the story. I remember seeing the trees through the walls but the immersion/ my imagination was strong enough to mask them .D

I know I was super late to the party, but I'm genuinely surprised that nobody has said Skyrim, yet.

Before that, Subnautica (both of them).

But I've probably spent as much time in Skyrim as both Subnautica games combined.

Stardew Valley

I think there are two answers to this.

The most recent game I was completely captivated by and just obsessed with was Subnautica. I was deep into it in 2022.

The most recent one I spent a long time playing is Satisfactory, I started my most recent run in mid-December and completed it a week or two ago. Satisfactory didn't quite grab me the way Subnautica did in terms of loving this world, but I get into it. I had a goal of 100% full clearing it including buying all the trophies before it was out of early access, so I did.

Tales of Berseria. I loved the 40 hours I spent with Velvet and friends, but that ending really upset me and I couldn't stop thinking about it after.

GTA 4 modded the new dxvk update made it run amazingly on PC

SIFU, the "git gud" gameplay really makes me dream about being a kung fu master lol.

The gameplay is so damn fun that I actually don't mind getting my ass beaten... That much.

Modded minecraft

Currently obsessed with BG3 and getting back into Hyper Light Drifter. It just feels too satisfying to go sicko mode on a room full of assholes and then grumpily stick my sword in the ground.

majormud

spent forever writing scripts to do all the farming. i kinda miss it, but its no fun without other users and no one else would ever want to play it again

The last game that truly gave me the feeling you described is Lies of P. It was my favourite game of 2023 and the 60 or so hours I put into beating it were very well spent.