My partner expressed an interest in finding a game for both of us to play. She doesn’t play many games, and I generally prefer single player games so I find myself at a loss for what’s out there that we might like. Hoping the community here can help!
We have played some retro platformers together. Super Mario World, Donkey Kong Country, that kind of thing. And I know she plays puzzle match games on her phone. Which isn’t a lot to go on.
It needs to be a multiplayer PC game that runs on Linux/Proton (if unsure, please suggest your game anyway. It probably does). One machine is a mid-range PC from about 5 years ago. So probably no recent AAA games with high system requirements.
I’m thinking:
Easy to pick up and play and can offer a satisfying play experience with short play times.
Cooperative play would be a plus.
Being able to play with just two people (not forced to play with random people online).
My particularities:
I won’t play a game that requires creating/signing in to an account to play it at all. I can tolerate that requirement for multiplayer play, but I’d rather it just use a Steam account.
I’d prefer if it didn’t install a launcher.
I’d like it to either have a built in server and/or be selfhostable.
I’ve posted about this somewhere else too, maybe a different account idk.
But for games to play with people that aren’t really “gamers” I actually prefer single player games with light amounts of fast paced action or none at all. The “coop” comes from taking turns with the controller.
This works well with puzzle or logic games with generous reaction time requirements (again, or none at all), as well as story based games with light action. A lot of these games also come with natural pauses in the story that provide opportunities to either swap who is driving or put the game down for the day.
I’ve had a lot of success playing through many of these titles with partners. I’m sorting these roughly by category and then how strongly I recommend them. Some of these games I haven’t actually played yet, but I know them to fit the overall vibe.
Puzzle/Logic - no reaction time required
Chants of Sennaar (HIGHLY recommend, requires decent notes and map making, so the person not using the controller still has a job)
Strange Horticulture (HIGHLY recommend, also requires some light note taking to make life easier)
Strange Antiquities (sequel to above, have not played yet, high expectations)
Return of the Obra Din (have not played yet, high expectations)
The Case of the Golden Idol + DLCs (STRONGLY recommend, got a bit burnt out by the end, but very fun, also light note taking)
The Rise of the Golden Idol (sequel to above, have not played yet, moderate to high expectations)
Baba is You (HIGHLY recommend, nice learning curve but becomes brutally difficult towards the end of the game)
Myst (HUGE game, very good, but daunting and little to no hand holding, detailed notes required)
Kind of a category within a category, haven’t played these, but they’ve been referred to as 1.5 player games.
Spiritfarer
Chicory
Child of Light
Puzzle/Logic - aim and reaction time needed
Portal 1
Portal 2 (and its coop if you have 2 devices)
Portal Reloaded (community mod adding a portal through time with some seriously mind bending puzzles)
Portal Revolutions (another mod, haven’t played yet but looks fun)
Viewfinder (HIGHLY recommend, spiritual successor to Portal IMO and a very, very good game)
Superliminal (HIGHLY recommend, a “Portal-like” that uses perspective as the core mechanic)
Story Based - some action sequences requiring aim and reaction time and some puzzling
Stray (just a cute good time with some spooky, heart rate spiking moments where you really don’t want your kitty to get hurt)
Alien Isolation (if you’re horror movie people at all this is like an interactive movie)
Shadows of a Doubt (might be a miss for a lot of people, immersive detective sim)
Firewatch (played this a long time ago, might not hold up)
Dredge (spooky but cute fishing sim with good story)
Summertime Madness (not much reaction time needed, but still some aim or speed based puzzles)
All of these that I’ve played were on either Arch (custom), Arch (Garuda), or NixOS based systems under Proton. Two of those systems were installed from scratch and they performed flawlessly, so if you’re on a system that handles all the audio and video driver installation for you things should be very smooth. The Garuda machine is a laptop from 2016 that is plugged into my TV and actually saw the most play time for these titles. It held up perfectly. The other two systems were back to back installs on my fairly beefy desktop, but installation and running the games was smooth after the initial effort to get the systems fully functional with drivers and controller support.
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I’ve posted about this somewhere else too, maybe a different account idk.
But for games to play with people that aren’t really “gamers” I actually prefer single player games with light amounts of fast paced action or none at all. The “coop” comes from taking turns with the controller.
This works well with puzzle or logic games with generous reaction time requirements (again, or none at all), as well as story based games with light action. A lot of these games also come with natural pauses in the story that provide opportunities to either swap who is driving or put the game down for the day.
I’ve had a lot of success playing through many of these titles with partners. I’m sorting these roughly by category and then how strongly I recommend them. Some of these games I haven’t actually played yet, but I know them to fit the overall vibe.
Puzzle/Logic - no reaction time required
Kind of a category within a category, haven’t played these, but they’ve been referred to as 1.5 player games.
Puzzle/Logic - aim and reaction time needed
Story Based - some action sequences requiring aim and reaction time and some puzzling
All of these that I’ve played were on either Arch (custom), Arch (Garuda), or NixOS based systems under Proton. Two of those systems were installed from scratch and they performed flawlessly, so if you’re on a system that handles all the audio and video driver installation for you things should be very smooth. The Garuda machine is a laptop from 2016 that is plugged into my TV and actually saw the most play time for these titles. It held up perfectly. The other two systems were back to back installs on my fairly beefy desktop, but installation and running the games was smooth after the initial effort to get the systems fully functional with drivers and controller support.