Simulators are one of the earliest PC game genres, and remain compelling experiences to this day, even if they’re not as popular as they used to be.
I like all kinds of combat flight sims; the MS Combat Flight Simulator from 1998 was something special, and I’ve had some similar fun in IL-2 Sturmovik. The newest civil air sims are pretty great too, I’ll pop on a podcast and make a flight. They’re particularly cool in VR.
I’ve also found the MechWarrior games to be fun, but I’ve only played 2 and 5. I got to play a bit of Steel Battalion with the full crazy controller at a con a few years back, and that’s got to be a lot of fun once you really know what you’re doing.
So what’s your favorite sim?
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OMG, I can’t believe no-one’s mentioned BeamNG.drive. The stuff that game simulates is off the charts. It’s been in ‘early access’ forever, but if you’re even remotely interested in driving simulators, it’s the gold standard for a realistic driving experience. Crashing in VR in this game is the most visceral thing ever. It’ll change you.
Here’s a clip of me driving a RHD Piccolina around one of my local roads a kindly modder added to the sim until I crash catastrophically.
BeamNG.drive
Starsector
Dwarf Fortress
Dota 2 (psychological warfare simulator)
Carmageddon. It taught me everything I needed to know about the role of pedestrians while driving.
I think this is the first time I’ve EVER seen carmageddon mentioned. Great game
XWing Alliance will probably always be my favorite, but Elite Dangerous is up there. If Elite had story missions and a singleplayer campaign to elaborate on the world building, it probably would be my favorite.
Oh my god I think this is one of the two games from my childhood that I first played and have not for the life of me been able to find
The other is some weird frog sidescroller platformer I got at Staples as a kid in the late aughts or possibly early 2010s
Dwarf Fortress, aka drunken dwarf simulator.
I bought that game just because I watched the Noclip documentary series on the developers. I haven’t played it yet, and I’m not sure I ever will, but goddammit I vicariously love those two men.
It’s not a simulator, it’s a parallel world.
Cultist Simulator. (half joking 😂).
Big fan of Cities Skylines in city simulator genre.
Not super in-depth like some of these other games but I love Snowrunner. I can count on 3 fingers the number of games I’ve spent over $100 on the game+ additional content in my entire life. Civ5, Civ6, and Snowrunner. It’s such a relaxing game but can definitely be difficult as well. Also i can play music at the same time and not miss any story because there isn’t really any story.
I definitely have the most time spent in Project Cars 2 on PS4, but I’ve since switched to PC sims and have been playing Automobilista 2 since it is the most similar.
I’d like to get into Assetto Corsa more but idk how to get the mods running on Linux / Steam
Heavy Gear 1 and 2. So much fun when multiplayer ever worked.
Anything by Janes Combat Simulations.
Euro truck simulator 2! I have lots of hours in this game, playing date and night. At some point I had a Logitech wheel with pedals and shifts, it was so damn good!!!
My routine was to get a long route through graphic and small roads, listening to radio for hours.
My parents got me a copy of Harrier Jump Jet by Microprose one christmas. I can’t even begin to imagine how many hours I spent on that game, both actually playing it and studying the manual for it. Still have the manual actually but the floppies are long gone.
After that I got every Microprose sim I could get my hands on, F14 Fleet Defender was probably my favorite after Harrier.
Then I kinda lost interest in simulators until Arma came along, spent years where I hardly played anything else.
Nowadays though ETS is pretty much the only sim I play.
KSP 1
I credit Kerbal Space Program for my ability to think in three dimensions. Without KSP, I would have been some kind of dumbass. I thought getting to orbit was just a matter of going up until I was like 18 years old
Have you ever pulled up an old save file to look at the stuff you used to design? I did that the other day and found out that I used to be good at this game. Folded space stations, massive mining rigs, Apollo Style landers, a beautiful SSTO that’s braindead easy to fly, an interplanetary module that can dock to the back of said SSTO, I made fancy shit. Nowadays I just slap boosters and docking ports on fuel tanks and call it good enough
I gotta post pictures from that save file sometime
2nding this, but also I’m looking forward to KSA, hoping it can be the true successor
X-plane. Ms flight simulator is drop dead gorgeous, but X plane has a better flight engine.
You can do a lot to improve how it looks, too. There’s a lot of custom terrain, and you can download meshes made from satellite photos.
It also works better in VR.
