What Are Your Quarantine Games?

You’re stuck at home, jumping between work and home duties, Netflix, and existential dread. After logging off from work, nothing feels better than opening your computer or game console and spending a few hours grinding within the world of your choosing, whether it’s some dark fantasy world or a futuristic dystopia. So, I’m asking you guys: what games have you spent a lot of time in while in quarantine? What are the nice, comforting games that you turn to to keep your mind away from, well, everything that’s happening to the world right now?

I’ve got a few games that I started to play and found relaxing in the couple of months that I’ve been stuck at home. Here’s what I’ve been playing:

Stardew Valley

As I haven’t jumped on the Animal Crossing: New Horizons bandwagon just yet, I decided to revisit one of the games I played just five minutes of and dismissed when it first came out. Stardew Valley is just fun relaxing work. There’s a plot somewhere but I haven’t gotten far into it – I just spend most of my time planting turnips and interacting with the villagers. I don’t know, man. I don’t want to. I just want my garden to look pretty.

The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt

I’ve been playing Witcher 3 since October, and I must’ve spent over 200 hours in it, going through every single inch of the land, slaying creatures left and right, fulfilling various contracts, and giving that annoying old lady her frying pan.

I normally give myself a few weeks after finishing a game before jumping on the DLC and/or expansions, but I went straight to Hearts of Stone and Blood & Wine immediately after finishing the main quest. I’m floored at how great this game is. The expansions can be full games in their own right, and I feel like I’m going to revisit this game eventually to fire up New Game+.

Splatoon 2

In Splatoon, I’m a squid kid living in a post-apocalyptic world where humans have been wiped out by nuclear war, and squids have evolved into humanoid things and they are now the dominant species.

This is a fun game.

Except when I lose in yet another Turf War, and that happens 50% of the time. But Nintendo’s take on the shooter is the one shooting game that I can play for long, and as someone who despises online shooters and can only tolerate just a few of these games, it says a lot.

ARMS

As someone who totally sucks at fighting games, I’m surprised that ARMS managed to wrap its long, squishy, gross – er- arms around me and kept me playing as much as I did. I spent so much time online, fighting off hordes of inhumanly good players, and surprisingly winning!

Nintendo did this game dirty by not promoting it as much as it deserved. Whenever I go online, I’d see that online players aren’t as numerous as I would’ve liked. Not quite into “dead game” territory, but this game deserves a higher playerbase.

Come on, guys, jump right in and let’s play.

Dead Cells

Okay, sure, I’ve talked about Dead Cells way too much. Heck, it’s the game I almost always go to whenever I bother to stream. I also played it way too much. It’s a roguelite, which means that every run will be unique, with enemy placements, weapons, and buffs different every time. Plus a great new DLC just came out and it’s been so much fun!

Ashen

Yes, Ashen is a Dark Souls. You traverse through a desolate land, fight off enemies with a mix of light and strong attacks, and you manage your stamina and avoid blows with rolling. Lots and lots of rolling. However, this game is significantly easier, and I managed to get my Dark Souls muscle memory back in no time, dodging and rolling like there was no tomorrow.

Why’d I chose to play Ashen instead of Dark Souls with my unfinished game sitting in Blighttown, you ask? Because thematically, after two months in quarantine, I feel like Ashen is better for my mental state.

Sure, they’re both about hope, but Dark Souls is a metaphor for depression and how you must fight through the overwhelming dark to reach the light. In Ashen, a world bathed in dark is suddenly presented with a chance to bring back the light, and it’s your job to protect it. It’s hopeful from the get-go.

I’m still in the first few hours of this game, and I might review this once I’m done with this and the DLC, but I’ll be enjoying it right now as I spend the last leg of quarantine, holed up from the rest of the world.

What about you, what’s your quarantine game? Tell me about it in the comments!