For me it‘s management stuff. What occupies my brain the most is Crusader Kings 3, always something interesting to do, I can always burn 6 hours on a session easy. There‘s always something to think about but it‘s also pausable.
In 3D games, I need it to be stutter-free and smooth. I instantly see stutters (also because OLED screens flicker when there‘s a stutter) and it instantly takes me out. That’s probably my sole grievance with PEAK - the frequent stutters that take me out of it. I also need good sealing in-ears to shut out my surroundings. Oh, and no TAA blur…
I have a pretty broad interest in game genres, so I can get immersed even in silly stuff like the Henry Stickmen Collection - it just can‘t be sad or dark.
My gf and I enjoyed:
Stardew Valley
Starbound
Cook Serve Delicious 2 and 3
Out of Space
Overcooked 2
Pizza Possum
PEAK
Biped
Cat Quest 2
Cats Love Boxes
Core Keeper
Temtem
These are the good ones (the ones where I felt like she was having a blast) which should run on anything. She’s also not good at games and has a fairly low-powered laptop. Looking back at them I can‘t believe we‘ve played that many lol
We‘re currently playing Schedule I but it‘s so buggy in co-op that I can‘t recommend it…

I think it‘s just an old PC term for turn-based games where you play multiplayer on the same machine with the same peripherals. Basically, you play your turn, get up, let the next player take the seat in front of the monitor, they take their turn, etc… Since not everyone is playing at the same time, you can play together by playing in succession. „Hotseat“ as in passing the seat in front of the PC around like in hot potato, I guess lol

Horizon Zero Dawn
Still not a fan. I find it very generic and soulless. Very pretty and robot dinosaurs but at the same time also very empty. One of those „find the colored ledge where the devs want you to climb - and nowhere else!“ games, had me run around a cliff a dozen times already. SPOILERS: That in the end they made an AI to fix extinction by AI to be screwed over by another AI again was funny tho lol. Anyway, gonna beat it now, I‘m basically at the end anyway, might as well. Forbidden West is practically off the table for me.
Schedule I
My gf wanted to try it so I said yes. What all the reviews don‘t tell you: If your connection is not top notch stable, the game loves to desync and eat your inventory without telling you at all. We had days where other games were fine but Schedule I would desync and/or dc every 2-5 minutes. When it works it‘s fun though. My gf loves cooking if you know what I mean.
I keep chipping away at Octopath Traveler (chapter 3s) and Titan Quest (works criminally well on Deck for being stitched on gamepad support) on my Deck before bedtime.

I enjoy this „about games“ content a lot more than the „behind games(/the scenes)“ stuff or self-promos, and OP usually keeps it digestible and doesn‘t turn it into an essay. Not missing a day has been insane as well obviously (the posts, I mean). Playing every day I find kinda easy with a Deck, at least I can play for 30m before I go to bed, sometimes that‘s just staring at a Baba Is You level before giving up lol. Making a post about it every day on the other hand… I couldn‘t do it.

Neon White
I think I‘m almost done, minus the rushes. I kinda dread handing in all the gifts cause the dialogue‘s been pretty bad but I also kinda wanna read it now that I’ve collected them all lol
SCARLET NEXUS
I can‘t really recommend it. It runs kinda poor for essentially looking like a PS4 game and the game’s whole movement and combat feels insanely awkward and clunky. The story‘s ok but yeah. I like anime games but this one‘s a stinker in my book. The systems just aren‘t coming together.
Deathloop
I don‘t really have an opinion yet (outside of the game seemingly randomly enabling/disabling settings like vsync for me). I‘m still confused about most stuff and haven‘t found my groove yet. Dishonored‘s for sure better though. But this might be alright. We need more immersive sims honestly.

I seem to already have all the deep discounts I‘d be interested in… I currently only buy 80%+ discounts (if anything) since experience has taught me that anything lower than this will get there again very soon, so I’m not missing out by skipping now. I have like 200 untouched games anyway so I‘d probably just be throwing more on the pile… Gifts for friends are in the cart tho
I‘ve sorted my library by release date, and there are five games which have released this year in it that aren‘t just remastered or early access which finally hit 1.0. Of those five I‘ve played three. Also of those five, three are indie games.
Monster Hunter Wilds
Poorly received across „enthusiasts“ as too easy of a MH game. I personally liked it a lot. The wounds mechanic is fun, focus mode is good but too much, performance is absolutely horrendous. One of the things I’ve always hated with MH are those stiff ass animations that made you miss combos by a cm, focus mode helps with that but now you can just 180 during a swing which is overkill IMO. I miss tracking monsters - which made me feel more like I‘m actually hunting game - as well as wallbanging them. The current mounting feels less interesting overall. 150 hrs played and they were a lot of fun with friends.
PEAK
Probably my GOTY (cause I didn‘t play much from this year anyway, see above lol). There‘s only one thing that bums me out: The game should have DLSS/FSR cause it‘s really heavy God knows why and the internal upscaler is meh. Otherwise, the most fun I had in a multiplayer game in a long time. Did ascension 7, unlocked all the stuff, gobble up every update, great fun with friends (also if solo but less so). 110 hrs, amazing game for less than ten bucks. Fuck those sencient tornados.
Mario Kart World
Idk, as the successor to MK8 it‘s kinda mid in comparisson. The feeling of speed, the racing flow, they‘re kinda missing. Lots of uninteresting filler tracks. Idk why this had to be an open world game. Some of its soul died for that. I got gold on all the cups but haven‘t touched it since. Pro tip: If you have trouble at max diff, stop drifting. The game ups the difficulty (read: rubberbanding) PER DRIFT, and it stacks up across the whole cup!

I‘ve mainly been playing Assassin‘s Creed: Rogue so far this week and the camera‘s been killing me. How did they end up thinking this was good or to not at least have an option to not have the camera on roller coster rails? Otherwise the game‘s alright but obviously the camera‘s with you the whole game whether you want to or not lol

I have successfully (?) played (sometimes semi-suffered, cough, Sekiro) through a buncha popular hard games and have a way less „strong“ opinion on this but also think that an „easy mode“ as an accessibility feature is a good thing.
If, for example, a parent wants to connect with their child and also experience that game they‘re playing, it‘s really no big deal to me if they could turn on easy mode in, say, Sekiro to stand a chance. Not like it‘d impact my own experience at all, and I don‘t feel the need to force them to go through my own experience either. In Celeste, for instance, you can literally fly through the whole game if it makes you happy, and yet I still grabbed all strawberries the normal way and don‘t care if others did as well or just flew to them.
It‘s less of a demand from me and more of a „if you can you should definitely include it,“ though. Obviously doesn‘t work for full on competitive multiplayer titles or something similar though.
Not even sure how much of this addresses your remark specifically, but my feelings on this felt best placed below yours lol

My first thought was Minecraft. I‘m not sure if it‘s playable offline still but a google search makes me believe so.
It runs on basically anything, and if the kids in question are still super young, there should be a peaceful/creative mode without monsters to scare them or survival mechanics to worry about, making it essentially just more complex LEGO.

Horizon: Zero Dawn. I have yet to finish it but apart from robot dinosaurs, it feels so generically open world… Admitedly, a very pretty-looking open world. Can‘t really get into the story so far either since it takes itself so seriously while I‘m having a hard time not thinking too much about how ridiculous its world is. So apart from sight-seeing, there hasn‘t been much in this game for me thus far.
Edit: This comment section is a treasure trove of hot takes, so many of my beloved games mentioned making me go „What the fuck…,“ I love it

I think artificial scarcity in survival horror is kinda annoying. A flashlight burning through batteries as if it was a battery-powered oven is just an eyroller to me, the dude having the stamina of someone who‘s just woken up from a decade long koma doesn‘t help my enjoyment either. It just makes it annoying to me to play. I know it’s meant to make me feel weak and scared but I’d prefer if they could realize that in other ways.
The story was alright though IMO. I enjoyed the town sections the most.

Since they didn‘t mention anything (and I assume they would‘ve if there was a change worth mentioning) and they already have the remaster and as such no reason to put money into the chunky version, it doesn‘t seem to be anything that makes the game better. I wonder if there‘s some weird distribution/licensing thing going on and they legally have to rerelease lol