Stellaris, in particular, might be up your alley.
I like Stellaris quite a bit, but I should note that OP mentioned how he didn’t like spending money on DLC. Stellaris follows the typical Paradox approach of creating a lot of DLC to expand and extend the game as long as people are interested in buying it, and winding up with a large game that’ll cost you a lot if you want all the DLC. It may be worthwhile, but if one wants to get all the DLC, it’s gonna add a fair bit to the price.
(checks Steam)
The base game is $40. Buying every available piece of DLC is another $429.
bassomitron@lemmy.world 2 months ago
++++1 for Rimworld. The first time I really committed to learning to play that game, I lost almost 100 hours in ~3 weeks (which is a ton for me, since I have kids and a job… I lost a lot of sleep). The best part of Rimworld, is if there’s a vanilla mechanic you don’t like or wish was fleshed out more, there’s a 98% chance someone has made a mod for it.
But yeah, it isn’t for the faint of heart. It definitely has a learning curve and it isn’t super easy to just pick up and play for small amounts here and there. It’s a game that you really need at least 1-2 hours per session.
I’d recommend watching a quick start tutorial video before you start playing, as that’ll also give you an idea on whether or not you’ll like it.
pennomi@lemmy.world 2 months ago
I almost religiously play games without modding, but Rimworld is the major exception - it is simply too good to ignore.
snugglesthefalse@sh.itjust.works 2 months ago
It’s fairly playable without mods these days, I’d recommend new players at least try that to find out what they’d want to tweak before diving in. But yeah at 3k+ hours on steam it’s definitely one of the games that’s given a bunch for me. Very moddable but I’d suggest trying to keep your list light (not that that really stops me), use rimpy for mod management and grab the performance mods like rocketman and performance fish.