(logo trills)
(upbeat electronic music) - [Falcon] A lot of games nowadays are intended to be played forever. But it's not necessarily
because they're replayable. It's because they're games as a service. And I don't wanna talk about those today. I've talked about those enough. Let's talk about something good. Hi folks, it's Falcon,
and today on Gameranx, 10 games with infinite replayability. Starting off with number 10,
it's the "Hitman" trilogy, the "World of Assassination." You know, three games
with more than 20 maps, multiple game modes,
and tons of challenges. And with the new freelancer update, it's basically an infinite
game with randomized targets, random loop drops, and tons
of ways to kill your target. It's just a ton of content just in the basic campaign
mode for "Hitman," but that's the beginning. Yeah, you can spend hundreds of hours screwing around in the standard levels, testing your assassination skills, (dramatic music)
(character choking) and attempting every possible
unique kill you can get, but there's so much
more to these games now. So much more, it's kinda crazy. On top of the campaign,
there's elusive targets, which are special one-time
only assassinations where you get minimal in-game assistance, contracts mode where you get
your own custom scenarios and attempt ones built by other players. There's escalations which
challenge you in unique ways. They mix up standard
maps to be more difficult or limit your options. That's a lot, but then they throw in
the new freelancer mode, which has been dominated
by time with the game. It turns the game
basically into a roguelike where you go on campaigns and take out randomly generated targets using a limited inventory. It's randomized, so it changes up how you
play even more than usual. It's a fantastic mode
that's completely free and adds a ton of replayability to an already basically
infinitely replayable game. And number nine
(rock music) is "Risk of Rain 2," a third person, roguelike shooter. It's extremely fun, it's highly addictive, and it's a pretty big challenge, honestly. But the thing that makes
it infinitely replayable is the co-op. Playing games with a friend can make basically any game more fun, but when you take a
game that's already good and throw in some really,
really good multiplayer action, that's what keeps a game alive long past when you might
individually get tired of it. The thing about this game is it's not really the most
feature rich or complex. It has a lot of items, and it's been getting
solid updates for years. But what really makes it great is just how mechanically solid it is. It's a roguelike that is
just incredibly fun to play. There's a lot of classes to pick from, tough bosses to fight, and it's still getting serious updates. In fact, there's an
expansion coming out soon. This is one I haven't gotten a chance to highlight much in the past, so it's overdue for a mention. A great one to waste a lot of time on. And number eight
(dramatic music) is "Monster Hunter World." Now that it's exceptionally cheap and more people are playing it than ever, why not jump back into
"Monster Hunter World"? What else is there to say about this one? It's great. The premise is simple,
but it's crazy addictive. You hunt monsters. There's a lot of monsters. There's a lot of weapons. That's it. That's the game. That's "Monster Hunter World." You'd think something that's
basically a glorified boss rush would get old after a
while, but it doesn't. (explosions rumbling)
(dramatic music) The game keeps you on a hamster wheel trying to get resources,
build better armor, make weapons, take on the toughest hunts, and as someone who's
finished the game completely, it's hard not to wanna jump
back in with a new character and try it out with different
weapons and synergies. It's a ton of fun by yourself, and it's great with friends too. This game has been getting
updated for years too. They've added so much extra craft to it, but it's just as straightforward and easy to jump in as ever. Once you get used to the controls, I mean, there's not a lot
else that you need to know. You go out, fight monsters, carve 'em up for
resources and do it again. What more you need? And number seven
(dramatic upbeat music) is "Vampire survivors." The original is still one of the best. For a game meant to be
played in bite-sized chunks, there's just something
incredibly addictive about it. The gameplay is about
as basic as you can get. You don't even control your attacks. Your guy just attacks automatically, but it's so fun and satisfying to play. It's great. Seriously. As a chill out game,
there's very little better. It's not chockfull of annoying
microtransactions and ads like a lot of other casual games, and just to be frank, that's fantastic. The game basically always drip feeds new content and unlockables, and it keeps things interesting even as you're essentially
just doing the same thing over and over again. You can tell the guy who made this worked in the gambling industry. He clearly knows all the tricks to keep the dopamine flowing, just he doesn't do it to be predatory, which is, I mean, just
astounding in of itself. Somebody's like, "Yeah, I'm
gonna take all these concepts and make it so that it's
just about having fun." (dramatic upbeat music)
(game chiming) I'm not going to actually
take anything from the player. I'm not going to exploit them in any way. I'm just going to give them a thing that continually gets more and more fun. Like seriously, can you
imagine that type of mindset in one of the larger
companies in gaming today? I cannot, obviously. Anyway, "Vampire Survivors"
is a really basic, but incredibly entertaining game. And hey, if you get tired of it, there's a ton of copycats
to try out instead. And a lot of those are pretty good too. For me, though, the
original's good enough. I'll pop into the thing and get addicted all over
again every few weeks. Mechanically, it's not a deep game, but who really cares. Look at the flashing lights. Sometimes the flashing
lights are all you need. (dramatic upbeat music)
(game chiming) And number six
(intense electronic music) is "Battle Brothers." Where "Vampire Survivors" is
endless positive reinforcement, "Battle Brothers" is the opposite. This game is brutal, random, and ruthless, and if you wanna get anywhere, you're gonna have to die a lot before you start understanding
how any of it even works. The gameplay, kind of a cross between a tactical strategy
game like "Mountain Blade" with a mean streak a mile wide. Like I'm not highlighting a second game to combine "Mountain Blade" with. I'm saying it's if you combined
that with a mean streak. You start off with your little
company and mercenaries. You take on jobs, try to survive in this low fantasy,
randomly generated setting. Death comes fast, and it comes often, which is how I remember my teams. Oh! Anyway, many players outright lose the second or third encounter. That's how ruthless the game is. Once you start to understand
how the stats work and what you're meant to do in combat, everything gets a lot smoother. Doesn't get easy though. In fact, it might make you more angry when you randomly lose your best guy on a 90% chance to miss attack roll. But that's just the way it is. There's enough tactical depth here to keep players coming back, even when it's kicking your teeth in. You might call fans of the
game gluttons for punishment, but when you finally start
to turn things around and actually succeed, it's one of the most satisfying
roguelikes out there. And number five is "Deep Rock Galactic." This cooperative FPS mining game is so much more fun than the
description makes it sound. Even trying to explain the game makes it sound boring and samey, but it's extremely
engaging, it's very unique, and most of all, it's a ton of fun. How this one works is you pick a class, select from a wide variety
of different missions, each with their own
objectives and challenges. Then you explore a procedurally
generated cave system. Sounds like an FPS "Minecraft" mod, but it's got a lot more going
to it, believe me on that one. It's one of the best
cooperative games out there. It's so well balanced
and fun and satisfying. Every class feels unique and powerful. The environments are surprisingly varied for a bunch of randomly generated caves, and above all else, it's got one of the best
friendliest communities out there. It's tough, like, I'm not
gonna say it's impossible, but even when you fail a mission, it feels like you accomplished something. It's a game you can easily
waste hundreds of hours on. It just doesn't get boring. At number four, it's "Dead Cells," and this is another game I haven't really gotten to talk about at the length that I would like to, but it, fortunately,
did get enough attention during its primary life cycle. Like I don't wanna act like
this one hasn't gotten its due. I just am happy to get to talk about it and maybe persuade some people who haven't tried it to do so. It was kind of one of the first in this big indie roguelike boom, and it's still one of the best 'cause they keep adding stuff to it. Like it's probably one
of the most feature rich roguelikes of all time. It's absolutely bursting with content. Hell, they basically added
a new game on top of it with the "Castlevania" DLC, and there's so much to dig into there. The side scrolling action platformer is just relentlessly fast and intense, and that's the thing that
stands out about it to me, just how quick and deadly it can be. Once you get good at it, you can dash through
the levels in seconds, but you can also be like me and carefully scope out
every enemy encounter to avoid getting killed randomly and still end up dying anyway. I never claimed to be
good at "Dead Cells," I just said I like it. It's actually the case
with a lot of games. But, you know, compared to a lot of roguelike
games, especially now, "Dead Cells" really isn't that tough. It gets tough around higher difficulties, and that's where the game
really gets interesting. But if you just wanna play a fun game, you don't have to make
things hard on yourself. A lot of the pain in this
game is self-inflicted. It's one of those games that's fun to challenge
yourself in though, and you can spend a lot of time doing it. And number three
(dramatic music) is "Seven Days to Die,"
the elevator pitch, "Minecraft" crossed with zombie survival. But that's also selling it pretty short. The thing I really like
about "Seven Days to Die" is it's a huge map filled with interesting points to explore. That's the thing that
keeps me coming back, on top of the challenging
survival gameplay, and that's what really makes it stand out. The base game is a lot of fun, even if it's another perpetually and early access kinda game, there's still a ton of stuff
to get up to inside of it, and it's one of the best
survival games out there to play with friends. It's simulation gameplay is a lot more sophisticated
than "Minecraft," but one thing it does have in common is that there are a lot of mods. Like there's tons of ways
to tweak the gameplay and make it more unique so to speak, and a lot of 'em are pretty impressive. I've spent quite a few hours
messing around with this game just playing the base game, but the mod scene is absolutely crazy. Extremely impressive stuff out there. And number two is "Stellaris."
(dramatic choral music) Listen, you could put
any Paradox game here, "Europa Universalis IV,"
"Hearts of Iron IV." Like these are all massive time stealers that can easily become forever games, but let's focus on "Stellaris,"
their 4x space game. Like all Paradox games, the grand strategy is just
a means to generate stories, and "Stellaris" pushes
procedural storytelling more than any other game in their catalog. That can make it a somewhat divisive game because certain mechanics are pretty bare bones when it came out, and you really need to get at least some of the fairly expensive DLC to get the most outta the game, but if you're willing to invest in it, there is a well of deep
strategic gameplay to dig into. You don't even have to play
the regular game though if you wanna spend an infinite
amount of time with it. Just play the mods. There's a ton of 'em and they're
practically retail quality. Like there's a "Star
Trek" mod for this game that's better than the actual commercially available "Star
Trek" game put out by Paradox. With mods, this game isn't
just one massive game, it's a ton of games. And finally, at number one,
(upbeat electronic music) it's "RimWorld." This colony builder is like if you crossed "Prison Architect" with "Dwarf Fortress." And like "Stellaris," it's less of a deep strategy game, more of a sandbox to mess around with and have funny, unexpected things happen. The thing that makes "RimWorld" stand out compared to so many other strategy games is how much personality
your colonists have. It's like an M rated "The Sims," where half of the time,
someone'll flip out and go feral. Civil wars start to break out, brutal power struggles take place, and you can interfere as much
or as little as you want. The DLCs and mods make even
more possibilities for the game, but in this case, the base game is more than
enough to waste away your days. It's just endlessly entertaining
building up a colony only to watch it inevitably decline and have everyone go
crazy and kill each other. It's not a pretty game by any means, but it's so addictive that
it's easy to look past. I have some bonus games for you. Most of them are obligatory mentions just because, I mean,
they've been around forever, and this is their reputation, but let's start 'em off
with "The Binding of Isaac." It is truly an endless game. It just keeps going and going, and they just keep updating it. Like the amount of bosses, items, areas, it's all ridiculous, and there's so many different
characters to play as. You're always trying something new. Lots of content keeps the game replayable, but there's also something
about "Binding of Isaac" that makes it an infinity game. The short run length, the
simple, but deep game play, the crazy variety of items and builds that make every run feel different. It's like the platonic
ideal of a roguelike. Next is "Stardew Valley,"
(upbeat music) another one of those games that the devs just can't stop updating and people can't stop playing. It's a farm game, which sounds boring, but it's really addictive. The cycle of waking up, tending
the farm, talking villagers, completing jobs and exploring the world is beyond satisfying. The repetition in this case is a positive, but the game gives you
so much other stuff to do if you want. It's the kinda game that's
impossible to put down, but you've always got a new
goal or something to achieve, and it never takes too long
for anything to happen. Like it's a nonstop feedback loop that keeps you constantly engaging even when you're doing the
most mundane of things. The next one's an oldie,
(dramatic music) but a goodie and an obvious one, "Skyrim." What else needs to be said here? The game's plenty replayable on its own, but the mod scene is probably
second to no other game. There's so many excellent mods that completely remake the game or massively improve some
part of the gameplay, and messing around with the mods is still basically a game all on its own. It is an alchemy to
managing mods in "Skyrim." You can spend hundreds of hours just staring at the mod manager,
let alone playing the game. This will take your life
from you if you allow it. And then finally, what's a bigger of course,
(triumphant music) than "Skyrim"? Well, "Minecraft." You can't not mention
it in a list like this. It's got a mod scene
that rivals "Skyrim's." There are multiple massive mods that completely upend the game, and there's so much you can do with it that it's overwhelming. It's a game with infinite possibilities. like anything can be done in "Minecraft," so I have to mention it. But that's all for today. Leave us a comment, let
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for watching this video. I'm Falcon. You can follow me on
Twitter @falconthehero. We'll see you next time
right here on "Gameranx."
