Suggestions for mouse only games?
I've just broken my left collarbone and for the next couple weeks have left arm in a sling. Thinking about games that are played just with the right hand?
I've already got Slay the Princess which I've been meaning to get around to for a while and Disco Elysium which I never got far through, but taking any suggestions at this point, always keen to try fresh genres and formats.
Let em on me!
Thanks, gang.
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Balatro
Haha as soon as I posted I realized I forgot to mention I've been playing Balerto already! GreR suggestion tho!
When I turn on my PC and can't decide what I want to play, I launch Balatro. Easy choice.
Kinda depends on what type of games you like!
Here's a few different ones: Timberborn, Slay the Spire, Darkest Dungeon, TemTem, FTL, Into the Breach
Edit: some personal favorites too: Dungeon Clawler and Ballionaire
Only a madman would try FTL without a quick pause, although I believe it can be remapped.
Agreed, not a perfect choice for mouse-gaming
TIMBERBORN
Such a good game. Shout-out RCE.
I really like his new shaft...😏
Gotta be honest; I love RCE, but he's been outside my ring of focus for a while, so I have no clue what you're on about. Really strong joke though. Some would say it's efficient.
Thanks for the suggestions! I'll check them out. Appreciate it!
You got it! Hoping you'll have a speedy recovery!
balatro!
Civ 5 and FTL would be my top suggestions. I think anything turn based is likely to be playable with just a mouse
Getting over it with Bennett Foddy.
It's a challenging but deeply emotional game. You only need to use the mouse to climb the character up.
I guess uncontrollable rage is an emotion!
Fair enough! But there's some epic narration done, too. Quite soothing at times
Oh cool that's the kind of thing I wouldn't usually play but reckon I'll have time to enjoy over the next couple weeks. Great suggestion!
Yeah, it is quite an unusual kind of game. But I'd be happy to read about your thoughts if you play it! :)
Balatro!
Edit: inscryption is WASD +spacebar only, if you can do that with a slight seating adjustment. It's great for planes. The post game content might be even better than the game content, haha.
I didn't know that, that is awesome. Inscryption is one of the coolest gaming experiences of the last few years. It's right up there with titles like Subnautica and the Outer Wilds for me. Daniel Mullins is a creative lad.
It's a very good game! I loved Subnautica too :)
Slay the Spire - a roguelike deckbuilder is a lot of fun.
I haven't actually tried it, but Balatro has made a lot of waves recently and I imagine you could play that with only mouse.
Also, what kind of mouse are you using? If you're still on a no thumb buttons mouse, you should definitely upgrade. If you only have 2 thumb buttons, as is most common, I'd recommend looking at something with more. My mouse has 3 thumb buttons, and two extra index finger buttons. and while some people like that mouse (i do) some don't, so I can't say whether you'd like it, but I will say the extra buttons have allowed me to set up a lot of games that would normally require a keyboard as well into a more mouse only friendly experience.
They can also look into an MMO mouse for more buttons.
I've been very happy with my Deathadder, been using it for almost a year now.
I just purchased the naga v2 hyperspeed since that's the kind of mouse i've been using for 15 years. It's been pretty good for the 2 weeks i've had it.
Was thinking of getting back into pillars of eternity 2 but thought you needed a bit of keyboard, like number keys?
People have suggested some RTS titles but I can't imagine playing them without group numbers and force attacks a d things..
Oldschool runescape 😁
Any turn based isometric. Pillars of eternity 1 & 2. Shadowrun returns/dragonfall/Hong Kong.
Pathfinder: Kingmaker and Wrath of the Righteous too.
For point-and-click adventures, I've enjoyed the Samorost series, Machinarium, and Botanicula!
Interesting! Looking forward to checking them out. Thanks!
Seconding Machinarium! It's the first game I thought of
Every game can be mouse only with an mmo-mouse
Haha good point, unfortunately I've also bruised right hand thumb so even if I still had mmo mouse I think it wouldn't work that well. Good suggestion tho!
Vampire Survivors with arrow keys. 🧛
Into The Breach
The last two point and click games I've enjoyed were the Deponia series and the Book of Unwritten Tales. Both really good, challenging and fun :)
Amazing thank you! Will check these out. Appreciate the suggestions!
If you're a grand strategy fan: Crusader Kings 3. You could spend hundreds of hours in that game, and it's mainly designed to be played with only a mouse.
Oh I remember looking into this a while back but it seemed kind of daunting. Perhaps now's the time to take the plunge! Appreciate the suggestion!
It's definitely a bit difficult to get into, but I'd recommend doing the tutorial and going with the flow rather than trying to understand everything. You'll slowly start to realize what's going on.
I'd also add that CK3 is a step above most Paradox games in terms of beginner-friendliness. Everything has a tooltip defining what it does, and most of the game-specific words in that tooltip have tooltips of their own. It's not like the older games and their "lol keep the wiki open and good fucking luck" approach to explaining themselves
CK can be daunting, I recommend you choose which time period you like best and go with that game, e.g. if you like sci-fi go with Stellaris, if you like WWII go with Hearts of Iron 4, etc. liking the time period where the game is set can make a huge difference in you willingness to learn it. For example if you don't like medieval it might be daunting to track lineages and hereditary traits and how the ownership of land works (I once lost an entire kingdom because of it on CK2), but if you like WWII maybe seeing historical facts reflected on mechanics or learning military tactics is more interesting to you. All of those games are very different from one another, but they're also very alike, starting with one that's just the right one can help you pass the steep learning curve.
Chess.
Lots of visual novels, maybe you could try Fate?
There is unciv, a foss and free civ 5 adaptation, Humankind which was free for a time on epic games, civ 6 if it's still on sale, civ 7 if you're free to trying out new things
RimWorld would be nice but the lack of shortcuts will drive you mad
CK3 isn't as bad when you lack shortcuts, it's a fun game
![email protected] can help you out with way more visual novels. Including ones that do not have sex scenes or romance, counter to the stereotype of all VNs as sex games.
(and if you do want romance in your VNs, but from a female perspective, ![email protected] has you)
If you end up liking Crusader Kings 3 you might also like Crusader Kings 2
First of, sorry about your collarbone, that sucks
Second, I think if you're looking for something to disappear into I really recommend Baldurs Gate 3, I've seen it recommend here already but just wanted to second that, it's a really fantastic world to live in for a bit
Ok cool, I've not tried the franchise at all but perhaps now's the time. Thanks!
I don't see any mention of the Civilization games. Civ III is my personal favorite but Civ V was also good. Keyboard shortcuts are a little bit quicker of course but it's turn based so there's no rush!
A lot of RTS games play fine with just the mouse, especially in the early stages of playing. I've seen a few mentioned but I'll put Stronghold Crusader onto the recommendation list. I generally play it without any keyboard inputs.
Peglin
Fuck peglin, go og peggle
Oh! Controversy! I love it! Will have to weigh my options carefully before choosing a side!
I'll throw in Oxygen Not Included.
One of the best games there is, but without any keyboard shortcuts, that will be annoying really soon.
Fair, don't even try playing on anything but normal speed :/
I wonder if Bud Tucker in Double Trouble would still run. Probably would need dosbox
Anyway, whole adventure genre. Syberias, Mysts, Gabriel Knight
I've found Shadowrun trilogy fun
Darkest Dungeon, Oxygen not Included, Surviving Mars
Citizen Sleeper is short but well done, got me hooked to finish it in a single sitting
Arcanum I still consider one of the best RPGs ever made
Fallout 1&2
I don't know if Commandos style games would not require too fast clicking without a keyboard, but you could try out Shadow Tactics, it has active pause IIRC
Speaking of Commandos, Jagged Alliance was fun too
Oh my brother suggested Mysts, I'll look into your other picks too, tho setting up dosbox might be a bridge too far right now. Keeping things simple! Thanks for the suggestions!
Get yourself Broken Sword Reforged and chill
Ok I think I will, thanks!
I actually played all of Talos Principle using only a 5 button mouse when I broke my arm a few months ago. I mapped W and S to the side buttons, jump to the middle click, and the game is actually perfectly playable with this controls.
Old School Runescape if you like grinding. But you might never quit if you get hooked :')
That's only one hand til you get real good, f keys to swap inventory page like the pros do.
Or just click everything because for the first few hundred hours it doesn't super matter anyway.
Ok I'll look into it!
Just started playing lonestar and it's been fun, Slice and dice is one of my favorites, Also pretty sure someone suggested slay the spire already but just wanna 2nd it if you haven't played it yet. Hope your recovery goes well!!
You can play osrs with just mouse, though keyboard shortcuts are handy/mandatory for late game - you won't be there though before the hand heals 😅
point & click adventure games? Some older ones can be aquired for cheap, or even free as some of them have been released as freeware.
some suggestions in no particular order, some are older (like, DOS old, but still good today, imo), some are 2010's or so:
Ones that have some keyboard usage, but are mainly mouse driven (or can be mouse driven)
The older ones can be played via Scummvm (https://scummvm.org/) - it's basically a simplified launcher/runner just for adventure games.
Believe it or not I played Sam and Max Hit The Road when it first came out! Great suggestion thanks!
I only longingly looked at the screenshots of Sam&Max in some gaming magazine at the time, managed to get the game waaayyy later. But man was it worth the wait :)
You're welcome! Also, there are still some more-or-less indie devs who keep the point&click adventures alive, afaik most, if not all from Wadjet Eye's catalog are great, eg: The Excavation of Hob's Barrow, Strangeland, Primordia.. worth checking out!
Rimworld can be played only with a mouse pretty good. And City Skylines too
Faster than light
Stardew valley with the mouse move mod /hj
Or bloons tower defence :3.. I've gotten a lot of gaming hours out of btd5
While we're talking about tower defence, I really recommend the Gemcraft series! IMO probably the best tower defence games out there. Chasing Shadows and Frostborn Wrath are both on Steam, and I highly recommend them.
Thanks I've e e enjoyed some tower defense games in the last but don't remember any titles, I'll check out these suggestions!
+1 for Bloons
also all the cookie clicker games e.g. https://cheerfulghost.github.io/civ-clicker/
There is no game: wrong dimension
There might be some keyboard moments iirc but they’re not intense and you can let the mouse go iirc
This game needs more love
Intriguing! I'll definitely look into it, thanks!
My random suggestions right now for stuff I like and is played with mouse would be:
Rimworld. Almost any top-down PC management or (not too fast paced) strategy game should work, but, I really like the crazy random shit that happens to the characters you're slowly getting to know in Rimworld.
Almost any of the Zachtronics games, if you like to torture your brain. Open-ended sort-of-engineering puzzles.The bigs ones like Spacechem, Opus Magnum and Shenzhen IO in particular, last call BBS for a bit more variety inside one game. Not Infinifactory, since while it doesn't have any kind of fast paced action it still requires navigating in 3D so mouse only wouldn't work.
I dunno, playing Rimworld without keyboard sounds very hard.
you mean without a keyboard? op said only mouse
Would be my first time playing rimworld. Would it work without a keyboard?
You'd be lacking shortcuts obviously, and very rarely (mostly when you ask for it) you might be prompted to input a name for something, but almost everything else has mouse controls.
Now that I think about it, there are two keys that might be a bit inconvenient not to have, spacebar for emergency pauses (there's a screen button but it's harder to hit in a bind) and shift that let you queue an order instead of replacing the current one.
Yea I meant that
Slay the spire
Oh good suggestion I was playing that w couple years ago might be time for another go!
Classics like The Incredible Machine and Ultima 8 come to mind.
Haha I'm not mentally prepared to get back into The Incredible Machine right now. Thanks for the suggestion tho!
Here is a good one. The Case of the Golden Idol
Buy a mouse with a joystick or D-Pad on it. Or one of those 15 button mice meant for MMOs. Then you can play anything.
I tried attaching movement controls to my logitech g600's number pad, it wasn't practical
I agree but it works in a pinch and is better than nothing.
Recently did another Plants vs. Zombies run, so I'm gonna throw this one into the mix here.
Backpack Battles! Fantastic little inventory management game with a load of replay value.
Huh! I've never come across the genre, I feel this is a good opportunity to try some new things so I appreciate the suggestion. Will look into it!
Oh I forgot to mention this part. They have a free demo on Steam with ~1/3 of the playable content. That alone is great. The full game is reasonably priced too and they’re still rolling out content updates frequently
You did say "just right hand," there was a thread before asking for one-handed games in general
With the exception of chat, try Old School RuneScape. Good game for passive gameplay as well as more intensive/focused gameplay.
Mini Metro was the first thing that came to mind. Fun little time waster.
I have also recently been playing Mini Motorways and found it more fun than Mini Metro (too bad it's not available on Android, since mini metro is one of my favorite phone games)
If you don't mind something older, both Star Wars Knights of The Old Republic games can be played only with mouse. It's bit clunkier than also using a keyboard, but doable. I used to play them like that while smoking many years ago.
Without numbered groups and force attack/move tho?
Cookie Clicker
Peggle Deluxe and Peggle Nights are awesome mouse-only (except typing name i think) casual games!
https://store.steampowered.com/bundle/15495/Peggle_Pack/
Uow about some visual novel style games like 999, Hotel Dusk (DS emulator), Ghost Trick, Professor Layton (DS emulator or mobile)
Warcraft? Sid Meier's civilization?
Or in general any top down RPG game, like RuneScape.
I'd say most RTS games I can think of can be played with just a mouse
Older diablo-like ARPGs didn't really rely on the keyboard too much IIRC, the modern ones do tend to rely on the keyboard a bit more
If you don't mind older games, basically the whole genre of point and click adventures is this by definition
Peggle, Nubby's Number Factory, Peglin, Ballionaire
Since Ellipsis hasn't been mentioned yet, here's my recommendation:
Ellipsis is an action-packed Avoid ’Em Up with minimalistic, yet powerful neon styled visuals. Guide your ship through a mysterious universe while deftly avoiding hordes of roaming enemies, spikes, lasers and more.
Ellipsis on Steam Store
Give Kingdom of Loathing a try.
Nubby's Number Factory
If you want an alternative to Slay the Spire i can recommend Monster Train; you mainly summon different Hellspawn and cast spells, which gives it more of an Magic the Gathering feel.
If you want an ARPG fix and have thumb buttons on your mouse you can try Chronicon, don't let the gfx stop you, it's an excellent hack&slash game, and you can put all your skills onto 1 button if you like - i use the middle and the right button for most builds and thumb keys for pots
If you want a new spin on Darkest Dungeon, give Iratus - Lord of the Dead a try. Or if you played a lot of Darkest Dungeon and want more of it, try Black Reliquary, a huge (and free!) mod with a lot of new mechanics!
Going into the same direction as Into the Breach is Shotgun King - the final Checkmate. It's really fun and the higher difficulties really make your brains work out. Workshop support with lots of extra content included! Also great for Turn-based Tactics is Invisible Inc., putting you in control of an spy agency which has been hit hard and tries to recover.
For arcade games i can recommend Utopia must fall - it really captures the spirit of old arcade games, but feels real fresh. You can also go for Nova Drift, which is also an excellent arcade game.
Then there is Cultist Simulator and its spiritual successor, Book of Hours. It's basically a card based riddle game, and very atmospheric.
There is always Shattered Pixel Dungeon - it is also available on Steam or Gog, but you can download and play it for free from the link i provided.
I think your collarbone might have healed until you've finished that list, have fun!
Get a giant D-pad for one of your feet to use for wasd
Citizen Sleeper and Citizen Sleeper 2 can both be played entirely with just a mouse. No keyboard inputs needed.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/616110/SPACEPLAN/
airborn empire is a fun city builder/resource management game
X-COM 2 is fully playable with just the mouse.
If you're looking for something a bit lighter, there's The Enchanted Cave 2, a nice little roguelite with an interesting loot system.
From memory, Fallout and Fallout 2 are fully mouse-playable too.
Shogun showdown
Nubbys Number Factory, addicting and mouse only.
Lonestar if you like or are interested in roguelike deck builders. There are a lot of great games coming out in that genre, here are some others I like:
Balatro
Slay the spire
Bounty of One (not a deck builder, just a roguelike)
Edit: I just realized some of these were already suggested but I'll leave it
Settlers.
Btw: There are USB foot keyboards on the soulless online marketing platform of your choice. They can usually be programmed to different keys or combinations. While it is not something I would use for FPS gaming, it can come handy in situations like yours. I have one with three different switches that are programmable which is quite handy.
If you rebind the pause/unpause button, Starsector can be played mouse only too.
2 very different genres, since you didn't specify:
FlatOut 2 is a fun, fast-paced arcade racing game that can be played with one hand. You just need the cursor keys and Ctrl for Nitro.
In Papers Please, you work at a Soviet-like country's border crossing and have to check every immigrant's details while making difficult moral decisions under time pressure. Mouse only.
A large proportion of games that have both mobile and PC releases are going to be designed around mouse-only use.
Scarlet Hollow
I installed PPSSPP on my phone and paired a switch joycon. Played through a few really good games that way when my kid required being held to sleep. I'd imagine you could pair one to your computer and find some games that you'd like.
You could try of The Devil! It's an episodic indie cyberpunk courtroom mystery game and the first episode is free. (also i've been obsessed with it lately and need more people to talk about it pls pls pls)