I’m an RPG fanatic. In practice, that means getting absorbed entirely into a game world, becoming emotionally invested, and taking on the lives of the characters as my own for 80+ hours. Recently, however, after a particularly fantastic jaunt around Hawaii and Japan in Yakuza Like A Dragon: Infinite Wealth, I was ready for a break. A palate cleanser, if you will. And that meant not jumping into the Oblivion remaster or Final Fantasy VII Rebirth immediately.
Some examples of quick gaming fixes include:
– Shorter games with stories or gameplay loops that last under 20 hours
– Team-based PVP shooters
– Team-based survival games
– Collectible card games that pit opponents against each other.
These games are easy to pick up and drop once you’ve had that fix: that immediate shot of dopamine that comes from winning a quick game (either alone or with friends), or from completing a well-rounded, contained story in a short time.
So, here’s what I’ve been playing recently before I dive back in with Cloud and Aerith for what I’m sure will be a happy ending for everyone involved.
Tiny Life
A pixel version of The Sims? I’ll give it a shot!
I’d been eyeing this life sim up ever since I got it in a Humble Bundle last Christmas. It’s still in early access, and I liked the idea of stripping back what now seems an overcomplicated concept. The Sims 4 has so many expansion packs and add-ons that I’m often overwhelmed with the options, but underwhelmed by the dulled down gameplay.
Tiny Life seems somewhat reminiscent of The Sims 2 difficulty but without the whimsy (or bat-shit craziness). For me, this wasn’t a bad thing: the difficulty meant I was locked in. It’s necessary to really pay attention to what your Tinies are doing, as time goes quick. They’re often inclined to stop reading a skill book or tinker on an object to race to the opposite end of town, chasing a Tiny who refused to listen to their Funny Joke About Work.
I really liked how the emotions affected my Tinies…until I didn’t. I also learned far too far into my game that, once you make a mistake, there’s no going back, as there are no Load states. Here’s my story of both problems combined.
I made a family with myself and my husband, James. You can choose your Tinies’ personality traits, and they greatly affect your emotions and how functional they can be during the session. I did not know this. So, I made us as accurate as possible: Lauren was a Vegetarian Introverted Foodie Thinker, whilst James got the Extroverted, Likeable, Thrifty, and Vegan traits.
What did this affect?
– Lauren hated any food that anyone cooked until around Level 8 Cooking
– James hated buying any mildly expensive possession
– Both had limited food options
– James needed constant social stimulation.
All these meant negative moods, reducing the options the Tinies had to improve themselves or their lives, but the last was by far the worst. Socialising in the game is easy, so it was fine at first. But as soon as James felt +1 Sad because he hadn’t mingled with other Tinies for too long, it never went away. This (I assume) glitch meant that I got up to +17 Sad at one point. To combat this, I dotted expensive paintings and flickering candles throughout the house with no thought for design, trying to combat the negative moods with positive ones to balance him out. As a writer, I wanted him to churn out books to publishers, and you can’t do that if you’re sad!
But, RESULT: once they aged up to Elders, I could remove the Extrovert trait, removing that negative mood state forever!
…only for Lauren, Firefighter extraordinaire, to Work Out with her free weights and immediately die of geriatric over-exhaustion. And with no Load states, I couldn’t do a thing about it.
Much like The Sims 4, I was soon burnt out. But I look back fondly at my time playing, and I’m sure once more content is added, I’ll jump in for another 8 hours and see what other game-breaking glitches I can find.
Pokémon TCGP
Like everyone else on the planet, it seems, I’ve recently got into Pokémon TCGP. As a longtime Pokémon lover, I’m amazed it took me this long to get obsessed, but here we are.
It’s the definition of a quick gaming fix. You’re incentivised to open the app every day with daily missions (spend stamina to open 1 pack, Wonder Pick 1 time, and even log in). While you’re there, why not dive deeper? You can open more packs, create decks, or battle against both real people and AI opponents. You can trade tokens for play mats and tokens and “like” other players’ items. It’s addictive but, thankfully, not too time consuming.
My favourite parts are opening the packs and battling. Opening the packs is as exciting as opening a pack in real life—without the potential actual loss or gain of real money. As a Pokémon fan, I love filling out my Dex, and when there’s a shiny or rare, it’s a real thrill. My husband and I often open each other’s, giving us a competitive edge.
Battling is dynamic and swift. Reminiscent of the real-life game, you put out 1 to 4 Basic Pokémon in the Active Spot and your Bench, and start the battle. Energy is generated every turn to give your creatures the mana required to attack or retreat. You can evolve your Pokémon with the right cards, as well as use Support or Trainer cards to do things like draw cards, give Pokémon tools to raise HP or poison the opponent, or reduce the retreat cost of your Active Pokémon. Ultimately, the aim is to get 3 points by knocking out your opponent’s creatures before they get yours.
The strategies can get surprisingly deep! I often use 2 Energy decks, but sometimes this means being unable to use a move that needs Water Energy because you’re only generating Psychic Energy. Retreating is sometimes better than allowing a Pokémon to faint.
It’s super quick and easy to pick up your phone when you’re bored and try to climb the ranks. RIP my phone charge.
Twin Mirror
As I’ve said, I love getting absorbed by a well-crafted pixelated story. Sometimes, this means investing 10 hours instead of 100 into a game world, and that’s where Twin Mirror piqued my interest.
You play as Sam Higgs, a former investigative journalist who returns to his small hometown in West Virginia to attend the futural of his close friend, Nick. But the car crash that led to his death is suspicious: Nick was working on a damning exposé that threatened to uncover the dirty laundry of plenty of the townsfolk. Coincidence? Perhaps not.
Sam has an “imaginary friend”, who represents Sam’s emotional side. Sam is a very logical being, relying on his mind palace to put together clues and solve problems. But he’s also a little socially inept, with an unspecified neurological disorder that is strongly hinted to be autism. So, he needs his doppelgänger to help him see events and people from more empathetic positions.
It’s an interesting concept, and I found the mind palace an intriguing gameplay loop. However, I did find that the game was inconsistent, particularly with Sam’s neurological disorder. It can’t quite decide if people are aware of Sam’s disorder, or whether he’s hiding it successfully with the help of his reflection. Additionally, by the end—spoilers—you must decide whether to keep the doppelgänger to help you with the final confrontation, or to use your mind palace. It seemed to be framed as “be happy within the community but push down a part of yourself” (keep the doppelgänger) or “be yourself but be misunderstood by others” (keep the mind palace).
I genuinely thought the right choice would be to help Sam be himself, and if others can’t understand him, that’s their problem. Should we ask our autistic friends to sacrifice themselves for our comfort? Sure, it would be nice to be liked more, but it’s clear Sam feels more at home when talking about “real” things, rather than keeping up social appearances. I know that no ending is the “perfect” ending, but the “good” ending where Sam compromises his personality for his community left a weird taste in my mouth. Neurodivergent friends, please let me know if this is a strange take or not!
Ultimately, it was an interesting way to spend a few hours, even if the story and gameplay left a lot to be desired.
Marvel Rivals
Is it time to smash with the Hulk? Erase reality with Scarlet Witch? Or pop some heads with Black Widow?
Marvel Rivals is a great PVP to jump into for an evening with your friends—and, after cutting myself off from the world playing the ever expansive and entertaining Yakuza Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth, I needed to let off steam yelling with some of my closest friends on Discord.
Whether you’re taking a point or moving a payload, there’s nothing like coming back against a particularly devastating enemy team. I love laughing with my explosive friend yelling at the enemy Iron Fist to stop being so annoying and fight face-to-face (comms off, of course!). Healing and cheering on my teammates to a particularly powerful MVP or Ace. Balancing teams to decimate the opponents. Chatting between rounds about anything and everything.
While playing Marvel Rivals can be exhausting, that’s kind of the appeal. Every so often it’s the tonic I need to connect with my friends while raising my adrenaline. It’s the unpredictable nature of the game against real players who force you to learn and adapt your strategies based on who you’re facing—and no two battles will be the same. It’s thrilling, and absolutely required as a palate cleanser after exploring an expansive world by yourself for hundreds of hours.
Hearthstone
Going to the pub with your friends? Stopping off at a café on a city break? Or simply bored on the bus?
Hearthstone has been a staple in my gaming library for around 15 years at this point. It’s evolved pretty extensively over the years, but the concept remains the same: build a World of Warcraft based deck and fight your opponent with your minions until your opponent’s health—or your Hero’s—hits 0.
Like many collectible card games, it’s addictive. Getting packs and rising through the ranks are worthy rewards for engaging in the scintillating strategy and thinking outside the box to take down your opponent.
Just some of the most interesting mechanics to play with include:
– Discover: this allows you to find card from a selection, such as “Discover a spell” or “Discover a dragon” from outside your crafted deck. This gives gameplay a little more random strategy, and can really fuel the excitement of trying out a new or overpowered card without going overboard on RNG.
– Battlecry & Deathrattle: gives minions the chance to perform an effect either as they enter the battlefield or leave it. The latter in particular forces opponents to change tactics and prevent your minion from performing the action if it’s devastating or annoying enough.
– Lifesteal: perfect for Warlock or Priest builds, Lifesteal takes away life from your opponent or their minions to give to your Hero.
– Silence: to stop your opponent’s more unique minions in their tracks.
– And, my current favourite, Plagues: not quite a mechanic in the way the others are, but using the Plaguebringer to shuffle—you guessed it—Plagues into your opponent’s deck to damage or debilitate them is fun…for me, at least.
I don’t really engage with it enough to get much out of the Battlegrounds or limited time events any more. It’s fun to get a new deck, but it’s such a fast-paced, strategic game that you can quickly be left behind when new sets are released. That’s why it’s a game to whip out during some down time, or to challenge my husband to over a Spoons breakfast. And I may always love it.
Pathologic 3: Quarantine (demo) – bonus!
What better way to get a quick gaming fix than to trial the sequel to one of my favourite games of all time?
As a demo, this one’s certainly an outlier on our list. Set to release in 2025, Pathologic 3 dives into the plight of Bachelor Danlil Dankovsky, a young doctor from the capital who is sent to the timeless town on the Gorkhon to fight a mysterious plague. Or was it to learn the secret to immortality? Or something else?
Set on the spiritual yet chilling Russian Steppe, Pathologic 3: Quarantine follows the path of an arrogant doctor who doesn’t have the connection to the Earth that his predecessor from 2 has. You are instructed to examine patients and diagnose diseases to prescribe treatments and stop the plague from spreading. As an influential, educated figure, your choices change the town immeasurably—but will you be thanked for your choices? Or hated?
It was very interesting to play a game where I already know the events that are due to unfold—or, so I think. The Pathologic series isn’t straightforward, and a key aspect of the demo, and the game itself I’m sure, is the ability to manipulate time. Perhaps this is intentional. A lot of players will already know the story from their experiences in 1 and 2, so the mechanic of going back in time to fix past mistakes and prevent the catastrophe to come is intriguing for both new and old fans. However, there’s no guarantee that the events will unfold in the same way as it did in Pathologic 2, which already altered the story fairly drastically from the original game.
A brand new mechanic is Danlil’s mental state. You have to constantly monitor his mental health, which swings between “mania” (giving him heightened alertness and perception, revealing hidden clues and allows for faster movement) and “apathy” (leading to disengagement from the world and slowing his reaction times). For example, committing morally questionable acts can push Daniil towards apathy, affecting gameplay and interactions. I’m excited to see how this is expanded upon in the full game.
A quick gaming fix like a demo is a fantastic way to drum up my hype for a game due to come out soon without getting too bogged down in the details. I can’t wait to dodge plague clouds and spar off with the Haruspex whilst getting increasingly frustrated with the townsfolk who impede my efforts at every turn.
Sounds fun, eh? We may have different opinions on “fun”, but either way, this series changed my life, so I’m ready.
Wrap up
It’s been a fun and freeing few weeks, getting stuck into these shorter games whilst I decide what to play next.
What are your favourite quick gaming fixes? Let us know via our Zatu socials!
