While I’m still not sure exactly what’s wrong with my PC, in an attempt to minimize frustration, I decided to figure out what I might want to play that probably won’t result in a whole bunch of random crashes. I figured the best way to go about that is to look for some games that will run on machines significantly less beefy than mine is supposed to be.
And, of course, get that a nice little boost of happiness that comes from buying stuff.
Humble is currently running their spring sale, through May 21st, and with my extra discount from being a Humble Choice subscriber, some of the prices were way too good to pass up. My intention was primarily to only pick up games I could play right now, but I grabbed Lake Ridden anyway, even though its system requirements may be a little steeper than what I can necessarily handle at the moment.
My other two pickups were perfect for my current situation. Shortest Trip to Earth is practically being given away, so I was willing to take the risk that I might find the difficulty and RNG annoying. I expect to dabble in it when I don’t have a lot of a time to put in.
My other purchase – Din’s Legacy – was still a little more than I usually spend on a whim, but the combination of it’s bargain basement system requirements and the fact that I’ve been obsessively collecting Soldak games for awhile made the choice easy for me. Each new title they release adds a new, really interesting mechanic, and this time, it’s mutation.
As you level up, you get both random effects added to different abilities, as well as mutation points, which you can use to grab random abilities from other classes. I’m pretty sure this will make every single character notably different, and since everything is also procedurally generated and dynamic, the replayability here is off the charts.
There are 39 base classes (although the majority of them need to be unlocked through game play), and I expect that, like its predecessor Din’s Curse, this game is going to eat up a whole lot of my time. I put over three hours into it on day one, and I don’t even feel like I’ve really gotten started yet.
Of course, I’d still like to poke away at things already in my library.
The first bit of good news is that – again, just going off of system requirements – I should still be able to play Distortions for #MusicGameMay, and now that I’ve finally knocked out getting BfA flying in World of Warcraft, I plan to start that up in the next few days.
I’m optimistic that I will still be able to participate in the Long Live the Queen! blogger succession game of Civilization VI, but I expect my intention of learning more about the game on my own time is probably off the table for the time being. I should be able to get through 10 turns without locking up my system (especially if I shut down everything else and turn down the graphics a bit), but I’m not entirely sure I want to try to play for extended periods.
A few other things I’ve downloaded from my library to play around with are Saint’s Row 2, RollerCoaster Tycoon 2 / OpenRTC 2, Rocwood Academy, Mutazione, and the Framed Collection.
I don’t expect that having to go somewhat low-spec for awhile is going to be too awful – rather, I feel like it might pull me towards spending time with both some older titles and some less graphically intensive indie games I’ve been picking up along the way.
For those keeping track at home, and my own accountability, I’m currently at a total spend of $34.28 of my $100 budget for Stay-At-Home game spending.
Nerd Girl Thoughts 
When I first discovered Steam I had a laptop with an integrated graphics card. It was an adventure trying to figure out which games might have a chance of running. I ended up picking up a lot of games that I wouldn’t normally have. The good thing is there’s plenty of stuff out there capable of running on lower specs!
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