- I've been playing the original Doom on and off for more than 20 years now. The weapons and monsters are perfectly balanced and fair, and there's a ton of extra levels and mods, with new ones even still being released.

- It's not necessarily one game, but they're all so similar that I'll count it: whatever the current Need for Speed game is (Unbound, Payback, etc.). The arcade-style racing handling is more satisfying to me than "realistic" racing, and customizing the cars is a lot of fun.

I play Quake frequently, but mostly custom-made maps and map-packs. Some of them are pretty impressive, like Brutalism Jam III.

The original Colonization.

I'd looped through Universal Paperclips[1], exCtly 100 times in a row, when I accidentally clicked on the option at the end to actually exit instead of restart. I figured is was a sign from God

Why? - I managed to get Covid/Long Covid in 2020, and have subsequently been yeeted out of the workforce, and find myself with nothing but time on my hands, and little energy to actually do anything productive.

I've played thousands of hours of Factorio[2], I tend to play a rocket-rush game on an island, and stop when I've cleared the island of biters. The Space Age expansion made it interesting, but there's something about the grind that just killed the fun for me.

I keep playing Exponentile[3], which I think was from someone here on HN. (Yep, it's from MikeBellika, [3a])

Now I find myself playing Arrows Escape[4]

I love MineCraft[5], but I can't play it because it induces vertigo. The same was true of Doom[6], and pretty much all first person shooters from the distant past.

Oh... List minute update before the edit window closes. Railroad Tycoon 3 is still fun too.[6]

[1] https://www.decisionproblem.com/paperclips/

[2] https://factorio.com/

[3] https://www.bellika.dk/exponentile

[3a] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39897112

[4] https://arrowsgo.io/game/

[5] https://www.minecraft.net/en-us

[6] https://store.steampowered.com/app/7610/Railroad_Tycoon_3/

Borderlands 2 (BL2). I love the characters, the writing and the story. Handsome Jack is my favorite villain of all time. The game play mechanics feel good to me. The difficulty levels goes up with subsequent play-throughs (True Vault Hunter Mode (TVHM) and Ultimate Vault Hunter Mode (UVHM)). There's decent DLC; "Tiny Tina's Assault on Dragon Keep" was my favorite. Also, it is possible that the story of BL2 hits for me because I also played the snot out of BL1 and fell in love with the characters there who re-appear in BL2 in very well written ways. For the record, I think BL3 and BL4 are inferior to BL2 by a long shot.

Stardew Valley. The first play-through without spoilers and without knowing what I was getting into was magical. After that, the variety of things to do and different ways to play the game kept me coming back. You can just chill and take things slow, or min/max it, or try a speed run, or just focus on your farm.

Edit to add: GTA V. Love the characters and the open world. So much to do.

For me it’s probably Age of Empires. I used to watch my father play it when I was younger, so replaying it now feels weirdly nostalgic.

Sim City 4 and Civilization 5. Both are timeless and I still play them a few times a year. Hard to believe Sim City 4 is over 20 years old.

Slay the Spire 1 and 2.

Morrowind, without a doubt. It looks and feels janky now but the storytelling is amazing. Far more interesting and unique quests than later TES games.

If we go by number of times I started up the game, it’s probably Super Mario Bros, just based on age and availability over the years.

If we’re going for hours played and the game with the most replay value for me, that’s probably Breath of the Wild. I never seem to get tired of it, as there are infinite ways to approach it.

Without a doubt DayZ. Many thousands of hours in, and I'm still a n00b. This game is the final form of gaming. The ultimate survival sandbox.

For more recent games: Control, HardSpace ship breaker, Ori, and Hollow Knight.

Oh and Journey

If we don't count shooters or MMOs, probably some flavor of Civ.

Solitaire is probably right up there though lol.

Sudoku. Wordle is a distant second.

Minecraft and the Civilization series.

Deus Ex or Half-Life, probably. The first Halo, too.

gta vc - one love, play it every time feel depressed to be recovered by warm childhood memories (around once a year)

Witcher 3

Probably Manic Miner!

Football manager

Command and Conquer series skirmish

Cities Skylines

Slither.io