What do you play in the neutral times of your existence?

We've got a thread for the games we finish.
We've got a thread for the games we don't finish.

Here's a thread for the games we won't finish.

What do you play when you've just got a spare hour, or you haven't got a big game on the go, or you just feel like mucking about?

In the past, Splatoon and Pokken Tournament have been that game for me. If I'm being totally honest, my game at the moment is Monster Hunster. I almost always have my 3DS on me, I can play out and about or at the girlfriend's or while the telly's on. And unlike other games I play just to play- multiplayer stuff, or score attack stuff - a quick mission in Monster Hunter will actually add up to something I'm aiming for. It can also be enjoyed solo as much as online, which is a big issue when you live in bleddy Somerset.

P.S, the name comes from here in this episode of The Computer Game Show.

It has, at different times, been whatever the latest Smash is or Meteos. Games against three CPUs wouldn't achieve anything, but they'd be just challenging enough to engage, and the permutations varied enough to while away some time.

Nothing else has really filled 'those neutral spots' in the same way. The game in question needs almost perpetual replayability and a perfectly gauged difficulty level.

Overwatch, now that Andy, Jay, Muss have picked it up along with people I know already playing it. I can see myself playing OW for ages and is something I play now again but is like the only thing I am playing though.

At the moment, Super Hexagon. Make no mistake, though; once I've got over 60 seconds on Hexagonest, I'm deleting it from my phone. Ruddy annoying/addictive, so it is.

Pokemon Showdown. By virtue of its very nature, being a battle simulator whose only purpose is battling other people it cannot be beaten. It's also my go-to time waster, when I'm bored, an extremely common event, I'll just stick on some music on the mediaplayer jam on my headphones and play a few matches, usually with a rain dance team of some kind (basically the only team I can create well).

I could cheat and mention titles such as Smash 4, Mario Kart 8, and of course Pokemon, however all of those have a clearable single player mode so I've never considered them unbeatable. The former does see a fair bit of usage when I'm bored, or it did until I got thrown in to For Glory Hell indefinitely (turns out people get veeeery salty when they're owned by Dedede).

I drift in an out of playing sports games such as NCAA Football (college american football), NBA 2k, or Footy manager. I like to come up with elaborate backstories for the players I sign, and always pick shitty teams that need to be built up into something great over time. I normally spend more times in manager type games in the end though, because I always work out how to beat the ai and I don't like playing with babies online.

Otherwise I normally have a casual online shooter, which was Star Wars Battlefront in the past, but more recently Overwatch. Which reminds me, I need to check out Rainbow Six Seige again at some point and possibly Rocket League.

Like Balla said, the latest iteration of Smash Bros. usually holds my attention off and on again. Monster Hunter is becoming like that too though - it's properly grabbed my attention!

I'm another one who just plays the latest Smash when there's nothing else on the go. It's the only Wii U game that I've played for over thirty-five hours, because...well, aye, there's not often much else on the go.

The amount of people saying Smash kinda surprises me. That was always a multiplayer one for me (which admittedly got played a ludicrous number of hours back when I was 16 and me and my friends had nothing else to do).

I beat up CPUs in my free time to make myself feel good about my Smash skills. It's probably why I have nearly over 300 hours in it...

Drunkalilly wrote:

The amount of people saying Smash kinda surprises me. That was always a multiplayer one for me (which admittedly got played a ludicrous number of hours back when I was 16 and me and my friends had nothing else to do).

Not complete trash online modes exist now yo

JayMoyles wrote:

I beat up CPUs in my free time to make myself feel good about my Smash skills. It's probably why I have nearly  over 300 hours in it...

I do this, all the way down to the ridiculous time spent.

Destiny has been a big one of these for me lately, until the patch kinda screwed up the drop rates I was on every day when I get home from work until my gf got in/I was meant to be playing something else. That'll fix itself next week, so it'll probably return to that spot again. Other times it'll be whatever indie game I'm playing at the time, Binding of Isaac, Stories, Gungeon, Pacman etc are often on the PS4 so I can jump in for a quick round (generally whilst waiting to go to the shops/cinema).

I could see Smash being one of these games, but the problem for me is that the Wii U spends the least time plugged in, so if I'm only playing for a little bit I'm unlikely to switch the HDMI/plug if it isn't in already.

I guess travel time kinda comes under this too, then it's whatever I'm playing on 3DS/Vita.

cpu's are boring, they only ever come in combo fodder or input reader modes.


I totally didn't spend over 700 hours on single player cpu matches in brawl, nope.  Not me.  Brawl totally isn't my most played game of all time solely on single player cpu matches, nu-uh!

It all depends on what I feel like playing, will say that 99.9% of the time it's something in my 3dd ranging from Pokémon to MH to Hyrule Warriors. At the moment I'm mainly focusing on Spirit of Justice

LIKE EVERYONE ON THE FORUM SHOULD BE (apart from those playing catch-up with the other AA games).

It's always been PES for me. If I don't know what to play or fancy something that's not too involving, I'll play a few matches of Master League or Become a Legend. I don't think the game can end, but I've never gone beyond ten seasons on previous PES games. Imagine it just populates the game with a lot of re-gen players.

Thinking about it further, it's very rare that I'm not purposefully (ha) concentrating on a particular game... but I am trying to play Super Mario Maker in the times between disc-based games on the Wii U. Perfect to dip in and out of for a Mariohead such as myself.

A few spring to mind and those are Rainbow 6 Siege, a game which no round is ever the same & with the recent patch they have somehow made it feel like a brand new game. PES for the reasons that GJones mentions & other day I threw on Rocket League for about 30/40 minutes to check out the new rumble mode.

The Jak and Daxter series is infinitely replayable to me, I frequently go back to the games and play through all or parts of them, or just mess around in Jak II.

Link's Awakening is the other game that I will always end up playing some of in spare moments, I know the game near inside-out yet I still love every moment.

Star Wars Battlefront II on PSP used to be this kind of game for me -- I really should rebuy it on Vita. Likewise Timesplitters 2 used to be never far from my PS2, and I miss playing it.

The Precursor Legacy regularly sees a replay from me, actually! It's short enough that I can usually bash it out in a sitting or two so I've found myself playing that when I've nothing else to play to kill some time.

Athrun888 wrote:

Not complete trash online modes exist now yo  

It isn't even the quality of online that puts me off. My enjoyment of Smash has always been as a hectic, on-the-couch, party kind of multiplayer, so playing it alone or online doesn't feel right. Which I now realise is totally subjective to how I first got into the games, and shouldn't have any bearing on how I expect other people to play it.

^ One of the best things about Smash (besides Brawl) in my eyes is how deep it can get. Nintendo has this amazing talent for making games that are suitable for absolutely any type of gamer, from those who just want a bit of light fun to those that want a deeper and more intense experience.

With the release of the new PES it'll likely be that for a few months at least, before that it was probably Rocket League although a few games on that almost always turn in to non neutral times of existence.

JayMoyles wrote:

The Precursor Legacy regularly sees a replay from me, actually! It's short enough that I can usually bash it out in a sitting or two so I've found myself playing that when I've nothing else to play to kill some time.

Yep! You can 100% the game in 5-6 hours easily enough so its a very fun game to just replay. The only gripe is the unskippable cutscenes.