The last thing you want to help you sleep is lights flashing in your face. Buy a book, not too interesting but enough to keep you reading for a bit. My go to book for years was Don Quixote. Lately I switched to David Copperfield. The Count of Monte Cristo would also be a good one.
I agree. If you're having trouble sleeping, playing an interactive game at bedtime is likely to make the problem worse, not better. If reading isn't your thing, consider listening to audio books or podcasts.
The official advice is you should read nonfiction. However, I highly agree with going with a book.
However, if you must go with a game then it should be non competitive and relaxed. Something like Animal Crossing so you could emulate or go with something like My Time at Portia. As long as you stick to the chores portion.
Stardew Valley is $15 USD. It's pretty laid back. Easy to set down and pick back up. I like to play it when my head is all over the place and want something soothing.
Stardew Valley is what I was going to suggest as well. Honestly, I wasn’t sure if I’d like it but it was cheap (I bought it fir the Switch) and it has been worth every cent so far.
There’s so much that you can do but nothing you really have to do if that makes sense. There’s very few missable elements (if any) and it’s surprisingly deep if that’s how you want to do things.
Get this one OP.
I’d disagree only in the sense that Stardew Valley is not easy to set down for me. It’s never helped me get to sleep, only stay up way past when I should.
Easy to recommend Vampire Survivors. It's not at all as stressful as it looks. All you basically do is walk around trying not to get hit (or try to get hit if you have the right build) and choose the random items on level up. It's 5 bucks without sales, so the financial entry is low too.
Maybe not a popular opinion, but how about No Man's Sky? It's where i chill out - just ignoring story and quests and go exploring, collecting resources, literally picking flowers and taming an animal to see it run around.
That or just go into the big empty space and shoot rocks. Both are basic things but i find it meditative. Get some chill music going...
Stray, while relatively short, is the perfect game to fall asleep to, and plays beautifully on deck. Vampire survivors is a great time waster, its pretty fun Slime rancher is colorful, cute and really fun
Dave the Diver! Super chill, endless content, great for picking up and putting down
Stardew Valley is probably the best recommendation being made. 85 percent of the game happens with zero combat and the combat that does happen is pretty simple.
I will say that doing something interactive to try to get to sleep can easily back fire on you if you find the activity too engaging. You may be better off trying to read a book or taking a small dose of melatonin about an hour before bed.
Melatonin is the chemical your body produces to help you go to sleep. If you go this route just be careful to start with a small dose and work your way up if you find you need more. And also, don't take it too late because it will make it difficult to get up on time if you do.
Outer Wilds.
Open World - Puzzle - Exploration - Mystery - Space
Outer Wilds is not small (15-25 hours, + about 10-15h for DLC), but it is a great game to be enjoyed in shorter gaming sessions (even just 30-60min) each night if that's your requirement. Although if you get hooked I expect you to think about the game during the day as well out of session.
OW is not too mechanics-intensive, nor is it action-based. Most of your time is spent exploring the nooks and crannies of a solar system and following your leads to uncover an ancient mystery. The puzzles are genius, differ between small and large in scale and figuring them out feels rewarding. For the most part, it is far from stressful, maybe excluding certain few parts of the game.
The game is very curiosity driven. Your hand is not held after the first hour or two - it's only you, your ship and the tools at your disposal. Progression is unlocked via knowledge, not power-ups or new tools, so you need to thirst for new pieces of information.
The game is on sale right now. If you're intrigued, give it a go!
Outer Wilds can be very intense so I wouldn't recommend it to play before going to bed
If you like puzzles and open world games, have you tried The Witness? There are a lot of puzzles to complete so it should take you a while!
Not currently on sale on Steam, but it does drop in price regularly. Depending how you feel about key reselling sites, you might be able to get it cheaper.
Here’s where the hard part comes in: It’s gotta be cheap (25 or less)
That's not hard. I don't even buy games above 15 € anymore. And I still get tons of great games that way.
(Not that I would need any new games with my unplayable backlog.)
I would say Stardew Valley or Tetris Connect. I don't remember the exact price on either but they aren't super expensive, are pretty laid back and fun, and you can play in small chunks.
I cannot play Vampire Survivors because it puts me to sleep every time. I don't know why. Some searching around on the web indicates it's not just me.
That being said I don't have sleep issues so your mileage may vary.
(1) Get EmuDeck if you like playing old games on emulators. It's free, and very worth it. It takes a little bit of setting up but it's mostly automatic, and it sets up each ROM as a non-Steam entry on your Deck library.
(I have mine set up with RetroAchievements.org so that I can have achievements while I play SM64 and OoT. It's very cool.)
(2) I recently picked up Tunic, and so far it seems like a pretty good before-bed kinda game. It's like Zelda 1/LttP.
(3) Or if you want a good new platformer, I recommend Pizza Tower or Celeste. They're both immaculate platformers with little to no penalty for failure. You can't die in Pizza Tower (only lose points), and Celeste only sends you back to the beginning of the screen on death so you really only lose 10-30 seconds of progress. Both are very easy to learn, with a crazy high skill ceiling. Also, PT has insanely good music, and if you like old cartoons like Ren and Stimpy you'll love the art. I can't recommend that game enough.
Both these games are tied for my favorite 2D platformers, and both work on Deck out-of-the-box, no setup.
I've been meaning to do a puzzle game recommendation overview on kbin after forgetting to back up an old post on the subject before purging my Reddit account, but I'll share a few recommendations for the time being. Given that lots of Steam games are a much better deal if you wait for the Winter or Summer sales, I'll list the regular and expected sale prices as such: (Regular/Sale). Since you've played the Portal Games and TSP, other three-dimensional exploration puzzle games in that vein include The Witness ($40/$10), The Talos Principle ($30/$4.50), Quern: Undying Thoughts ($25/$10), and Lightmatter ($20/$7). Among those, I think Quern is the best due to its resemblance to Myst without the solutions to most puzzles being overly obscure. Other three-dimensional puzzle games that focus less on exploration and more on puzzles include The Room Collection ($25/$7) and The House of Da Vinci Complete Bundle ($54/$27), with both series sold as individual games as well.
In terms of longevity, some 2D puzzle games have—in addition to their regular puzzle sets—daily puzzle sets or custom puzzle generation, adding to replay value at the cost of a degree of repetitiveness. These include LYNE ($3/$1.50) and LOOP: A Tranquil Puzzle Game ($5/$2.50), among others.
My current SD favourite is El Paso, Elsewhere Heavily inspired by Max Payne, it's a horror-noir TPS shooter with cool slow-mo dives and dual wield gun combat.
The story is completely bonkers, the main guy is a drug addict, who fell in love with a girl, who turned out to be Dracula, lord of vampires. So now our guy is at an interdimensional ever changing motel in El Paso to stop her from invoking the apocalypse. So unlike Max Payne you will fight vampires, ghouls and werewolves.
LOADS of bite sized levels, great narrative and music. Its an indie gem.
Have you seen superliminal? It's a very similar vibe to Portal.
Also the guy who made The Stanley Parable has like three other games. One is free to play, very short. But worth downloading. There is another that is about a friend who does or something, it's really meta but different than TSP. Also, The Stanley Parable has a remaster with a bunch of new content. I don't remember the names of these games but if you are at your computer they shouldn't be hard to find.
Have you tried many roguelike games? They are basically games that are super easy to sink an hour or two into without much consequence. They intend for you to die and just start over frequently. Anyways, some of my favorites are Inscryption, Cult of the Lamb, and Slay the Spire. The first and last are card games too. So super easy to start and stop.
My go to game for relaxing is snowrunner. Trundling around in the mud and snow in trucks seems to be my valium for some reason. Fits into your cheap, open world and longevity requests well (games is huge and there's lots of expansion levels if you like it). It's pretty simple to start, but has plenty of complexity to grow into.
Depending on your definition of laid back, maybe Dredge? You can run through it in probably 10ish hours if you're just trying to complete it. But if you want to see everything, relax, and fish you can stretch that to 30 pretty easily (it's claimed you can do it in 16-17 but I've spent 30 just hanging out and fishing and I don't have it all yet because of the relaxed pace I set).
The stressful parts never really felt stressful to me. Very little is timed. At its core it is an inventory management fishing game with a couple of jump scares. Plays well on the deck.
Otherwise, Stardew Valley like others have suggested.
Second Dredge!
Hades is a great game. It's action though.
If playing a roguelite isn't stressful, then slower paced games like Slay the Spire or Into the Breach might be better.
Supraland is the game you want - it fits all your criteria except the most important one: it’s currently Unsupported on SteamDeck. I found reports of people getting it to work but not without some fiddling. It has a sequel, though, which is just as good and which is Verified. The sequel is called Supraland: Six Inches Under.
The first game is an indie gem made mostly by one guy but it is very polished. This sequel was made by a small team. Don’t let the cute graphics throw you - it’s not a kids game. It’s a first-person open world metroidvania (not really a shooter, though there are enemies you’ll be hitting) with gameplay reminiscent of Portal, Zelda, and Metroid. Currently on sale for 40% off ($11.99). About 8-20 hours long.
Control is great. It's beautiful and atmospheric and tells a great story, but shakes that up with some pure chaos and stuff flying everywhere.
Here are some more good puzzle games that are not Portal/Portal 2:
If you can only play one of the above, then as the other commentors have said, make it The Witness. The recent remake of Myst is also very good.
Do you know which if these are fun in local multiplayer/Splitscreen? Played unravel 2 and It Takes Two with my wife and am looking for more.
Unfortunately splitscreen and local multiplayer games are getting pretty rare. There are some steam curators that make lists of them, here's one that I know of for local 2-player games:
https://store.steampowered.com/curator/34907518-Games-for-Lovers/
Great resource, thanks!
Idk about how it runs on the deck, but have you tried undertale? Also, the portal series by valve should run awesome on it
Fez and Outer Wilds are both must experience games imo and have a really chill vibe.
I absolutely loved Outer Wilds. The game throws you in and the rest is up to you, go where you want, play when you want etc. The music and atmosphere are great.
Sea of Stars. Nice RPG, inspired by Chrono Trigger. I've been playing that for some nights on my deck. Easy to engage, nice story and difficulty can be adjusted depending on how much time you want to invest.
I'm in a similar situation to you, except that I've got a Switch rather than a Steam Deck.
I've been playing Lego Jurassic World, and it should tick all your boxes. I've got no idea how the Lego games work on the Deck though.
I got Lego Star wars and it worked magnificently. I'll have to check to see what others are available.
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