There’s just something special about really sinking your teeth into a game that continues to reward you the more time you spend with it. Games that respect your time can be a rare occurrence in an industry obsessed with artificially padded runtimes and progression systems governed by microtransactions, but there are a few games that are an exception to this norm. With this feature, we will be listing down 15 of the best games where you can spend thousands of hours without experiencing even an inch of boredom.
Baldur’s Gate 3
Developer Larian Studios’ Baldur’s Gate 3 is an unforgettable adventure that can easily take up to a hundred hours even if you are rushing through the campaign. But the essence of the game lies in experimentation and seeing how your choices in not only the story but also the combat encounters play out in the long run. It’s a truly ambitious game with tons and tons of different possibilities, and there’s plenty of incentive to explore the game in depth which can take up to 1000 hours if not more.
Monster Hunter World
Monster Hunter World has established its reputation as a top tier action RPG that consistently delivers years after its launch. While the gameplay loop essentially revolves around collecting the proper gear before diving headfirst into a battle with a monster and doing it all over again, the sheer variety of the enemies and the engaging progression loop is what keeps it all enjoyable right through to the end. In addition to an already meaty base game, you also have plenty of DLC and the Icebourne expansion to extend your playtime even longer.
No Man’s Sky
No Man’s Sky might not have started life on the best foot forward, but Hello Games was able to turn the game’s fates around with a steady stream of meaningful content updates through the years. No Man’s Sky currently features an insane amount of planets to explore, wildlife to find, and bases to build which can easily eat up thousands upon thousands of hours thanks to a strong procedural generation system underpinning every moment of the gameplay.
Fallout 76
Talking about games that turned their fates around for the better, we have Fallout 76. Through its consistent efforts, Bethesda has turned this live service game from a massive failure to arguably the best way to experience the franchise. There are just swaths of content available at your disposal to keep you entertained for hours and hours upon end, and a constant slew of new updates make sure that Fallout 76 is a game worth sticking around with in the long term.
Terraria
Re-Logic’s Terraria offers players a sandbox filled with virtually unlimited possibilities, and its tagline of the world being your canvas stands true in every sense. You can explore the randomly generated worlds at your leisurely pace, craft all sorts of things with the many resources at your disposal, and fight a wide array of bosses peppered among a whole host of other activities. It’s not a really complex game but the engaging gameplay mechanics make you want to keep playing for hours and hours on end.
The Elder Scrolls Skyrim
The Elder Scrolls 5: Skyrim was released well over a decade ago, but it continues to serve as a shining example of how to really capture the sense of thrill and adventure in an open-world setting. Set against the backdrop of a large kingdom adorned with mysterious caves, towering peaks, and lush jungles, Skyrim presents a compelling opportunity at every turn with loads of quests peppered throughout the map. In addition to the staggering amount of content itself, the game offers plenty of choices in terms of the gameplay ranging from different weapons to different skills and builds, and experimenting with that can easily eat up a ton of time.
Forza Horizon 5
Playground Games’ latest Forza Horizon 5 is a virtual playground for fans of car lovers. It’s a really enjoyable game on even a basic level with its quality driving mechanics and huge open world, but what makes it worth sticking around till the end is the quality and the variety of content on offer. You can take part in all sorts of events and races scattered across the map, and the progression systems always make sure to generously reward you for the effort – which can become a driving motivation to spend hundreds upon hundreds of hours.
Elden Ring
FromSoftware’s Elden Ring is the game that has catapulted the Soulslike genre to the mainstream with its impressive open world, and it’s precisely the reason why the game is on this list. The Lands Between is chock full of secrets ranging from hidden dungeons to abandoned fortresses to an entirely optional underground realm, and the fact that none of it is presented to you on a silver platter makes the exploration all the more engaging. Beating it alone can take up to a hundred hours, but seeing all the game has to offer while experimenting with different weapons can cost you more than a thousand hours without an inch of boredom.
Red Dead Redemption 2
Red Dead Redemption 2 isn’t an extremely long game in terms of content; beating the main story will only cost you a hundred hours at maximum. But the beauty lies within the immaculately detailed open world, exploring each nook and cranny at a leisurely pace. Rockstar has employed a bunch of subtle design tricks and systems to reduce the pace of gameplay, and the game becomes all the more rewarding when you take every opportunity to smell the roses and soak in the sunsets – and that alone can skyrocket your playtime by an exponential margin.
RimWorld
RimWorld thrusts players into a sci-fi world inhabited by colonists and space pirates, and tasks you to forge your own destiny in a world wrought by all sorts of dangers and threats. At the heart of RimWorld lies an intelligent AI storyteller who carves out a tale based on the decisions that you make throughout your journey, and that level of unpredictability is what ultimately makes it hard to put dow
Stardew Valley
Eric Barone’s Stardew Valley is an innately therapeutic experience where the fun comes from seeing your farm transform from its humble beginnings to a full-blown mechanized magnum opus, and that journey can take you anywhere from just a few dozen hours to hundreds upon hundreds of hours depending on your personal goals.
Factorio
Factorio is a game about building Factories, and while it doesn’t sound all that exciting at first glance – it is anything but. You start out simple by building humble manufacturing plants, but the game soon ramps up the intensity by tasking you to build towering monuments of capitalism and use your intelligence to optimize the manufacturing flow and cut down costs wherever possible. It has a steep learning curve to its many aspects, but Factorio is definitely worth a try if you are looking for an engaging game to really sink your teeth into.
Destiny 2
Bungie has been doing a fantastic job with Destiny 2, and it’s one of the very few live service games that have managed to not only survive but consistently thrive in the modern AAA gaming space. And a lot of that could be credited to the immensely satisfying gameplay, a compelling progression loop, and interesting world design that will keep you coming back for more with each new expansion. It’s a game overflowing with swaths of content to the point that the developer is vaulting off old content, but what’s here will serve you well for thousands of hours and well beyond that.
Escape From Tarkov
Escape From Tarkov is a first-person shooter with some pretty brutal shooting mechanics, and despite the game having a rather simplistic suite of game modes – the fun comes from dynamically creating strategies for and applying lessons from past runs to make it to the finish line. There’s quite a steep learning curve to Escape From Tarkov, and add up an even higher skill ceiling – and it becomes a game that’s worthy of your undivided attention.
Kenshi
Lo Fi Games’ Kenshi is a really ambitious RPG where you get to create a custom character and forge your own destiny in an open world that spans over 800 square kilometers. Kenshi offers a ton of freedom to build out your character how you see fit, make critical decisions in quests, and much more. The primitive graphics hide a ton of depth beneath them, and fans of flexible RPGs should definitely give this one a try.
Share Your Thoughts Below (Always follow our comments policy!)