Games that my non-gamer girlfriend can watch me playing?

verycoolusername@lemm.ee to Patient Gamers@sh.itjust.works – 107 points –

I recently finished The Last of Us 2. My girlfriend sometimes watches me play my games. And while I thought that TLoU would be a great game to follow, it was hard for her to watch (due to the violence). I wonder if there is a game that would be easy or even interesting for her to watch while I play, without it having to be something strictly "family friendly" , that also has fun gaming mechanics and isn't just a walking simulator. Looking forward to any ideas! :)

83

The Quantum games (Heavy Rain, Beyond:Two Souls, Detroit:Become Human) are great for that. Also the Life Is Strange series. Abzu, Journey are "cinematic games" of their own. Maybe Firewatch? Outer Wilds?

Second this. My girlfriend has absolutely not interest in playing games but enjoyed going through Detroit with me and helping choose different options as the game progressed. We even went back to replay some of it to get to different endings which is something I barely ever do when playing games by myself.

I liked Firewatch a lot, but it basically is a walking simulator

It had me intrigued at first but it didn't really lead anywhere. Overrated game with pretty dated graphics imho

I played it back when it first released and loved the graphics, I think it's still generally agreed to be a beautiful game to my knowledge.

The only bit I was underwealmed by was the ending, but they'd also write something with grounded intrigue, which is a difficult thing to pull off without having a cynical ending of "of you thought this was gonna be exciting? This is real buddy", which wasn't really what firewatch was evoking.

Adding on:

LA Noire is pretty good, it's slow enough that you can talk through the different options, or just be silly while having a laugh

The Outer Wilds is my vote. The kind of game that can be made much better with a spectator helping keep track of things and figuring out puzzles with you

Outer Wilds, not to be confused with The Outer Worlds!

Great suggestion. Me and my partner "play" a lot of games together where one of us controls but both get to have input and make decisions, and this is a fantastic example.

Holy crap I didn't even realize Outer Wilds and The Outer Worlds were two different games. I keep hearing how good Outer Wilds was, so was excited when it was on the Humble Bundle Choice games a few months ago. Turns out it was The Outer Worlds. Dammit.

So many people make the same mistake, you are definitely not alone. VERY different games though.

Seconded! Thirded, even! It's so fun to figure things out as a group and do discover things together.

There's a whole channel that kinda answers this! Girlfriend Reviews started as a channel where the presenter reviewed what it was like to live with someone that played games - i.e. how good it was to watch someone else play. She's started playing some of the games herself lately, but the point still stands.

In a recent video Should Your Boyfriend Play Spider-Man 2? she says it's

the best game to watch someone else play this year

(at which point I paused to go find this post and see if anyone else had posted this channel already).

I dunno but many said 'stray' was good, but it's defo also a walking sim in some ways

Life is Strange (1 and Before the Storm), Witcher 3, Detroit: Become Human.

Life is Strange is also amazing if she wants to try playing since almost nothing is timed and you can rewind most choices too

Though that one choice that cannot be rewinded I obviously fucked up in my first playthrough.

+1 for Detroit. If you want to stress her the hell out, have her play as the pretty girl android

My wife played Pokemon and Mario Kart before we dated. After dating for a bit she took a bit of interest in what I was playing and even started playing some games on her own.

My wife liked watching:

  • Witcher 3
  • Red Dead Redemption
  • Assassin's Creed (pre-Origins style games)
  • Portal
  • Devil May Cry (besides DmC)
  • Prototype
  • Xenoblade Chronicles
  • L.A. Noire
  • Spiderman

She joined me or played some others on her own:

  • Stardew Valley

  • Rust (surprisingly)

  • Conan Exiles

  • Golf with Friends

  • Animal Crossing

  • Dinkum

  • Core Keeper

  • Terraria

  • Truck Simulator

  • Ori and the Blind Forest

  • Assassin's Creed Black Flag (she liked to gather supplies and do small secondary quests, or just sail around)

The all-time winner was Breath of the Wild, she loved to watch and play it, and sometimes I watched her play it too. She solved problems in very different ways than I did and it was interesting. Example: my primary way to kill Guardians was to deflect blasts, while she just rode her horse at them and cut them apart. You can imagine how nuts Tears of the Kingdom has been lol.

I feel it might be worth mentioning she did not enjoy watching or playing:

  • Monster Hunter

  • Any flight/space sims (Ace Combat, Elite Dangerous, etc.)

  • Factorio

  • Minecraft

  • Remnant

  • Deep Rock Galactic

  • Vermintide/Darktide

  • most Metroidvanias

  • Civilization

If I had to guess at what these share in common, its a lack of story and NPC interactions, or pacing that makes it less interesting to watch.

Thank you for this personal recommendation. Was interesting to read from first-hand experience!

Zelda Tears of the Kingdom is a ton of fun to both play and watch. Speaking from experience. Finished it myself, then watched the wife complete it. Both were fun as hell

Anything story heavy would be good because then for her it's like watching a movie. Like spiderman, uncharted, god of war, telltale games etc., I would stray away from most RPGs though even though they are story driven but there's usually a lot of fluff gameplay where you're just grinding which wouldn't be very fun to watch.

This. Basically anything that you could watch "as a movie" on YouTube that doesn't have excessive filler in between

My Dad really liked the Uncharted series. It'd be great for OP if his girlfriend doesn't mind some violence. TLoU is a bit high on the graphic stuff

I think how they portray the violence in uncharted games is very different to how bleak it's shown in TLOU though. The tone is overall very cheery and Indiana Jones-esque.

Definitely! It wasn't clear if the goal was closer to "no violence" or "less graphic violence" though

Horizon Zero Dawn. It actually got my wife to put her Switch away and watch. That's saying something.

Baldurs Gate 3.

Added bonus that she can help you decide on dialog options

I am a very casual gamer, but my partner is much more invested and skilled when it comes to gaming. I ended up really enjoying watching him play Returnal, to the point that I'd be annoyed if he played without me. It was visually beautiful, the story was movie-like, and I was even helpful in watching where the monsters were so they didn't sneak up on him.

I hope he wants to replay it, because I'd love to watch it again. Highly recommend!

To The Moon is worth playing even if the story has some sad points.

Point and click adventures or visual novels might also be a good fit to play together without it mattering much who has the controls.

Ooh. Been a while since I've heard of To the Moon. There's a sequel to that called Finding Paradise, which I also remember liking. Haven't followed them since, but their latest game Imposter Factory seems great too judging by the overwhelmingly positive reviews on Steam.

Outer wilds I think would be an excellent game to play for the first time with a partner and each try to work out how to progress together.

I think the Telltale games would be good for this. Something relatively short, easy to follow and the storylines from the different games are fun and varied.

My girlfriend loves to watch me play games. She likes to do “comms” as she says, where she researches tough boss guides, cool weapon locations, etc while I play. It’s interactive for her, and she doesn’t have to learn how to play the game (she doesn’t enjoy most video games and finds them frustrating). One of her favourites was Elden Ring, but really any RPG is a ton of fun for her. My dad used to watch me play video games sometimes too when I was younger, and he liked the Fallout games specifically.

"Baba is you" the game induces the "ah-a" moment when you just came up with a solition to the puzzle. The player has perfect knowledge about the state of the game but they don't know the solution. It could be played with two heads and one controller.

imo, the funniest part of the game is listening to the player(s) repeatedly stating things from the game like cavemen

"baba is you, rock is push, water is sink... what? ok ok, rock is float.. AARGH"

I like the low ominous sound when you accidentally erase yourself.

"Ah, but what if baba is key? Oh....oh no"

final fantasies violence tends to be comic bookey (and not the adult hardcore type) and have great stories. final fantasy X is such a great story.

Persona 5 is fun to watch someone else play. Kinda rare for an rpg, I think it's the music and artistic style.

  • The Stanley Parable
  • What Remains of Edith Finch
  • Anything from D'Avekki Studios
  • Anything Telltale

Have you asked her if there are any games she would be interested in watching? If there's a game I want to see the story of but am not interested in playing it myself, I ask my husband to play it. (BioShock, Mass Effect, Assassin's Creed, shooters or platformers in general). I usually help with puzzles or give input on dialogue options if I want to.

Any RPG with dialogue and choices. Bonus points for custom characters or male/female options.

Before my girlfriend got into games, I would often play a new game with her and ask her to design the create-a-character and ask for her input on dialogue choices. Sometimes we would take turns reading aloud in game text and documents. It got her invested without the stress of having to handle the game.

She eventually bought herself a switch and blasted out 500 hours of animal crossing during the pandemic lockdown and now she is all in on games.

Possibly puzzle games like Return of the Obra Dinn or Antichamber where she can help solve things without needing to play. Portal may be good, too, though it may be hard to play along without control of the camera.

Also, though they're not necessarily good stories, Supermassive Games stuff (Until Dawn and The Quarry) bring all the fun of watching cheesy horror movies together with the added bonus of controlling who dies! Granted, those may also be a bit violent for her taste.

If you or your girlfriend aren't prone to motion sickness, I'd recommend the Portal games and Outer Wilds.

All games from Supergiant games are an automatic recommend from me, but if you're not into fast paced violent games which a spectator might not be able to keep up with, maybe skip Hades and go for their earlier titles.

Both Ori games may be a good choice too since she can enjoy the eye candy and story alongside.

Undertale and Night in the Woods might be interesting choices, the former more than the latter, in my opinion. Neither has any voices, so if your girl won't stop to read, she'll easily "get lost".

If she's into futuristic stuff, the Deus Ex games might be good options. They can be violent, but in a non lethal manner if you play "pacifist". Mass Effect would probably fit into that, too. Would be great for your girl to tell you which lady or dude your Shepard should bang

Days Gone. It's basically a biker road movie set in a zombie apocalypse scenario playing out in rural Oregon. Strong story, beautiful graphics, and a healthy balance between scavenging/exploration and fighting.

If that's still too violent, maybe the Hitman series. That's basically 95% exploration / problem solving because you have to spend most of your time figuring out how to get close enough to your target so you can eliminate them without causing too much of a stir.

Also Deus Ex Human Revolution or Mankind Divided, for similar reasons. You're pretty much always outnumbered and outgunned so you have figure out how to get around and complete your objectives without being detected and only pick your fights sparingly.

The Spider-Man games on PS5 have great storytelling.

Cyberpunk 2077

God of War and God or War Ragnarok

  • I believe both of these have settings that can reduce the “bloodiness”

Destiny 2….. lmao j/k

Slime Rancher? Or a puzzle game like The Gardens Between? You fight in Going Under, but I don't remember it being bloody.

This is such a lovely thread ☺️

Maybe something story driven like Beyond Two Souls or Detroit Become Human

I don't know how it would be for active watching, but I had a girlfriend that liked to read or do some light work while I played. She was absolutely captivated from time to time by Shadow of the Colossus. There's something about the momentum and the music, I think.

If you're into puzzles, the Rusty Lakes series is very story heavy and fun to play, while quite challenging. I imagine it'd be cool to watch and follow the story along. There is a bit of a horror/thriller aspect to it but it's not really realistically gory as far as I remember.

I think Spiritfarer might be interesting to watch too, though might get a bit repetitive.

Also a not recommended game: I watched my partner replay high on life so many times I can almost quote the entire game. It's annoying, it's just a very flipping annoying game unless you're the one playing it, and even then.

Outside is a great game. Lots of spooky shit but not outright violent.

Inside is a good game, but has quite a bit of body horror and violence, so I wouldn't choose that one.

Haha Inside is correct! Yeah you're right now I'm remembering some of the really weird stuff that happens in the game. I loved their game Limbo too but that also has some gruesome deaths

Life is Strange would be a great one! Just don't get the remastered because it's very buggy and has a worse art style in my opinion

I'd say you can try the Witcher 3. It's story rich so could be interesting to just watch too. Lots of violence though, but most of it is quite cartoonish imho so maybe it's still okay.

Perhaps "Contrast"? It's a gloomy puzzler with a good soundtrack, I would imagine it's quite engaging to watch as well as play.

Until Dawn and all the similar games that came since can be pretty good for this. They are set up with a mode where she could control characters if she wants, but otherwise just playing through the story with you controlling everything and her helping make the decisions is a fun time. Play these with my husband every year as part of our Halloween traditions, you can actually learn a lot about a person by seeing what decisions they go with😅

If it was just the constant violence in TLOU that was her issue these could work, although fair warning if she'd prefer absolutely no violence (or horror) at all then I'm gonna just be a second vote for Outer Wilds instead.

Spelunky & 2, Rogue Legacy & 2

Basically any action platformer that relies on observaton and timing.

You can find games to play with her like Wingspan

Silent Hill 2 on PS2, Rise of the Triad for DOS, Donkey Kong for Gameboy, Sonic Adventure for Dreamcast, Microsoft Encarta Mind Maze for Windows 3.11, when you get thru those beauties I can give you some more