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Test Drive Unlimited 2 - two huge open-worlds to drive around in, some Sims-like fun
Forza 3 - a tonne of cars to collect and upgrade
Gran Turismo 5 - a tonne of cars to collect and upgrade

GTA 5 is awesome, I played through it twice: great writing, cool characters, lots of humor, fun missions, plenty of surprises to find in the game-world. I enjoyed all of the side activities, like flying and racing.
The only negative thing I have to say about GTA 5 was that the business-empire thing felt more or less pointless in single-player, you have grind for a long time to buy the cool stuff.
To me GTA 5 is one of the best games ever made.
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misteryo: What an interesting question!

The usual way to ask something like this is by means of a desert island. And I always understood that question to mean something more like: "You can only have 5 games and never get any more for the rest of your life. Which do you bring?"

But this question seems to predicate that you will be playing these games most of your waking time. Perhaps that is what at least some of the "desert island" questions meant, but I never understood it that way. I have always figured I would have an awful lot to do if I were stranded on a desert island. And I never considered using the games to ward off loneliness. That doesn't work. But they are awfully nice for some civilized past time.

But this prison question. Much like the desert island scenario, I would not count on the games to pass the time. If I were playing games 8 hours per day, I would become miserable indeed, and which games does not matter at all. Even if chess is one of the games, it is not what you actually do all day. You keep it in the back of your mind most of the time, while you are doing other things.

I would have to construct quite a day-to-day routine to survive 3 years of imprisonment. Excercise, prayer, reading, writing, and find creative ways to have both short and long-term goals that I can make some measurable progress in. Games could be a part of my routine. Again, like the desert island, it is quite nice to have some civilized form of entertainment, but to rely on the games heavily for my sanity?! Oh, no.

All that in mind, I would choose

CIV V complete - or some likewise big 4X game
Don't Starve - some likewise big survival/crafting game
Skyrim - or some likewise big open world rpg-ish game

Point is, I would want three very different kinds of games, and yet games that could be played 1-5 hours per week over a period of three years.

Cheers.
Well thoughts you bing up there. Ofc youll need a routine with sport and writing and stuff. So all things you can do in prison normally you can still do.CIV and Skyrim i can understand. But why Dont Starve? I liked the game too (back when the underworld wasnt totally finished) but it didnt made the impression to be that huge to me.
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Xray10000: i asked for games. And there re no system restrictions. So Pc, gameboy, xbox is all allowed. Maybe post the Level5 games you had in mind.
I had the impression you'd allow 1 system, lugging 3 different systems to your cell with 3 separate games seems like something the guards and prison wouldn't allow.

Still the Level-5 games in question would be: Dark Cloud 2 (Dark Chronicle), Rogue Galaxy, and Ni no Kuni. I've played all of these three games but haven't beaten any of them. I haven't played/seen any of the other games Level-5 has made so i can't really suggest ones i'd go for, probably end up with PS2 titles though :P
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Ricky_Bobby: Test Drive Unlimited 2 - two huge open-worlds to drive around in, some Sims-like fun
Forza 3 - a tonne of cars to collect and upgrade
Gran Turismo 5 - a tonne of cars to collect and upgrade

GTA 5 is awesome, I played through it twice: great writing, cool characters, lots of humor, fun missions, plenty of surprises to find in the game-world. I enjoyed all of the side activities, like flying and racing.
The only negative thing I have to say about GTA 5 was that the business-empire thing felt more or less pointless in single-player, you have grind for a long time to buy the cool stuff.
To me GTA 5 is one of the best games ever made.
Unfortunately, op stated no internet access so that blows your R* linked DRM fest out of the water. From what you are saying, other than the whole always on social club garbage, GTA5 is nothing whatsoever like GTA4?
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hyperagathon: Well, I'd want something with both replayability and variety. So basically, 4X and sandbox games. The only problem is that I don't like those one bit. I'd sooner spend a year playing Tetris than "play" Minecraft for half an hour.

If playing online was an option, I'd go with a Quake-like shooter. Probably OpenArena, because I don't know if there are still servers for Q3A.

But since it isn't, the only thing I'm certain about is some roguelike - most likely TOME4. Finishing it with all the different classes and subvarieties would take a long while. And it's moddable, so I could entertain myself that way as well. In fact, I think programming would be my main "game" - judging from some recent indie RPGs, three years is nothing :)

A fighting game might work, if I could play with other people and I knew these other people weren't the sort to shank me because they got pissed off. So probably not.

Something with insane griding potential might also work. Disgaea comes to mind. On that note, here's the top 20 longest games according to howlongtobeat.com:

1 Clicker Heroes 392 Hours
2 Kerbal Space Program 335 Hours
3 Monster Hunter Freedom Unite 251 Hours
4 RollerCoaster Tycoon 2 175½ Hours
5 Animal Crossing 171½ Hours
6 Rocksmith 2014 164 Hours
7 MAG 162½ Hours
8 Animal Crossing: New Leaf 160½ Hours
9 The Legend of Zelda Collector's Edition 160 Hours
10 Might and Magic: Heroes VI 156 Hours
11 Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate 152 Hours
12 The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim - Legendary Edition 151½ Hours
13 Gran Turismo 4 139 Hours
14 Monster Hunter Tri 135½ Hours
15 Dragon Warrior VII 135 Hours
16 The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind 134 Hours
17 Mount & Blade: Warband 133½ Hours
18 Animal Crossing: Wild World 133 Hours
19 Frequency 130 Hours
20 Crusader Kings II 129 Hours
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hyperagathon: Well, there's stuff wrong with that list: #1 is a clicker "game", and only two users, so let's chuck that out. #6 doesn't seem to be a game, likewise for #19. And #7 is online multiplayer only, so it's out as well. So we need four more titles:

21 Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate 129 Hours
22 White Knight Chronicles II 128 Hours
23 Animal Crossing: City Folk 127½ Hours
24 Record of Agarest War 120 Hours
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hyperagathon: Egads, more Monster Hunter and Animal Crossing.

Same idea, but from gamefaqs.com, min 50 votes, adjusted for duplicates (same game, different platform) and MMORPGs:

1 3DS Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate 4.65 4.30 80.00+
8 3DS Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate 4.45 3.86 80.00+
9 WIIU Xenoblade Chronicles X 4.44 3.28 80.00+
10 PS4 Disgaea 5: Alliance of Vengeance 4.54 3.05 80.00+
12 PC The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt 4.52 3.16 80.00+
14 WII Xenoblade Chronicles 4.57 3.15 80.00+
17 PS4 Final Fantasy X / X-2 HD Remaster 4.45 3.04 80.00+
18 VITA Disgaea 4: A Promise Revisited 4.48 3.21 80.00+
20 PSP Monster Hunter Freedom Unite 4.49 4.01 80.00+
21 XBOX The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind - Game of the Year Edition 4.36 3.31 80.00+
25 3DS Animal Crossing: New Leaf 4.50 2.54 80.00+
26 VITA Sword Art Online: Hollow Fragment 4.10 3.15 80.00+
28 PC Europa Universalis IV 4.40 3.88 80.00+
31 PS Dragon Warrior VII 4.08 3.44 80.00+
33 XONE Dragon Age: Inquisition 4.28 3.29 80.00+
34 VITA Destiny of Spirits 3.51 2.96 80.00+
41 XONE Fallout 4 4.48 3.18 80.00+
42 PC Crusader Kings II 4.30 3.72 80.00+
43 3DS Persona Q: Shadow of the Labyrinth 4.33 3.34 80.00+
44 PS3 Kingdom Hearts HD 2.5 ReMIX 4.65 3.18 80.00+
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hyperagathon: Phew, that should be twenty. Annoying. Since they're all just "80.00+", I'm not sure how they differentiated between them, which makes this one somewhat less useful. But it's mostly the same games. Monster Hunter ad nauseam.
Nice, i didnt knew those rankings but with Monster Hunter i appearently already picked a good one then. Dont know if those rankings include that you can finish some games way faster even without speedruns. For a game like X3 fe the story is a joke, but you can still play it for over 100 hours at least. From my personal experience this game belongs in those rankings too.
Are you serious with the Tetris-Minecraft thing? Minecraft may have a bad reputation kinda but really Tetris over Minecraft, Tetris at all?
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Ricky_Bobby: Test Drive Unlimited 2 - two huge open-worlds to drive around in, some Sims-like fun
Forza 3 - a tonne of cars to collect and upgrade
Gran Turismo 5 - a tonne of cars to collect and upgrade

GTA 5 is awesome, I played through it twice: great writing, cool characters, lots of humor, fun missions, plenty of surprises to find in the game-world. I enjoyed all of the side activities, like flying and racing.
The only negative thing I have to say about GTA 5 was that the business-empire thing felt more or less pointless in single-player, you have grind for a long time to buy the cool stuff.
To me GTA 5 is one of the best games ever made.
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nightcraw1er.488: Unfortunately, op stated no internet access so that blows your R* linked DRM fest out of the water. From what you are saying, other than the whole always on social club garbage, GTA5 is nothing whatsoever like GTA4?
Utter bullshit. You can play these games offline.

GTA 5 does have offline gameplay if you play on console, which the OP cited more than once as a given option for your choices. More important GTA 5 was not even in my top 3.

Do you even bother to read and think before you start trolling ?
Post edited January 12, 2016 by Ricky_Bobby
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Xray10000: i asked for games. And there re no system restrictions. So Pc, gameboy, xbox is all allowed. Maybe post the Level5 games you had in mind.
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rtcvb32: I had the impression you'd allow 1 system, lugging 3 different systems to your cell with 3 separate games seems like something the guards and prison wouldn't allow.

Still the Level-5 games in question would be: Dark Cloud 2 (Dark Chronicle), Rogue Galaxy, and Ni no Kuni. I've played all of these three games but haven't beaten any of them. I haven't played/seen any of the other games Level-5 has made so i can't really suggest ones i'd go for, probably end up with PS2 titles though :P
Oh now i understand what you meant with Level5 games (had tripple A in mind). Yes how could i forget?
Dark Chronicle is one of my all time favorite. If you can, may consider to finish it at some point. The story really turns up in the end and may make you cry.

Hmm maybe i change it against BaldursGate2 or Minecraft. But idk BaldursGate 2 well enough. And i dont want to pass on Minecraft. Hard choice!
I'd probably pick freeform and skirmish games that I don't normally play, things where you can make your own levels and stuff. So maybe something like this:

1. Minecraft
2. Master of Orion 2, or some Paradox grand strategy game?
3. Diablo 2 (maybe then I'd finally play the game through with all character classes)
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nightcraw1er.488: Unfortunately, op stated no internet access so that blows your R* linked DRM fest out of the water. From what you are saying, other than the whole always on social club garbage, GTA5 is nothing whatsoever like GTA4?
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Ricky_Bobby: Utter bullshit. You can play these games offline.

GTA 5 does have offline gameplay if you play on console, which the OP cited more than once as a given option for your choices. More important GTA 5 was not even in my top 3.

Do you even bother to read and think before you start trolling ?
Oh yes, forgot that console version can be played offline. Was just thinking of PC there.
My selection would be:
_Alpha Centauri
_Diablo 2
_Morrowind

I might take two aditionnal games at the cost of one more year in jail:
_Dawn of War: Dark Crusade
_Warzone 2100

-----
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rtcvb32: I would probably enjoy programming, probably an entire system from scratch in a virtual machine... But that's not a game.
A friend of mine wrote a website during his internment… on paper!
When he finally got out and copied it verbatim on a computer, it was 100% compliant to W3C specifications ;)
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vv221: A friend of mine wrote a website during his internment… on paper!
When he finally got out and copied it verbatim on a computer, it was 100% compliant to W3C specifications ;)
Reminds me of what i did as a kid for Atari BASIC programming... at least until i learned how to use the disk drive to save my programs and progress. :P

As for W3C specifications, it's not really that hard, i've run my pages through a online checker for compliance and managed to put up a nice little sticker/icon that said the site was compliant, almost most of it is just opening and closing all the appropriate tags properly. Most of that is easy enough using PHP where you interlace code and html page design, it's the act of adding extra tags that need extra attention to close them afterwards.
OK, thank you all for your posts and thoughts. Ive read all your comments and want to make some things clear (sorry i wasnt exactly enough in the beginning) :

So first of you start in a single cell. Consider this for multiplayer games like fifa or tekken. And practising gaysex over 3 years isnt an option neither. The normal prison routine is still active. So you can do everything you could normally do in a prison.

You can pick among any platforms and youll get all those platfroms with you too (gbc, pc, ps... multiple platforms are possible). Every game you pick will be fully patched and for pc games theyll work on highest settings.
Games like Diablo2 + Lod or Morrowind + exapnsions count as 1 game. But picking an entire series (like Witcher 1+2+3) isnt allowed as a single pick.
Furthermore no user generated content is available nor programming tools are, this was just about games. Though if a game like NeverwinterNights comes along with an editor its ok.
You can forgot about the Steam-internet thing. Just assume you can play any steam games without internet connection.
Additionally dont mind how complex/not userfriendly a game is, remember you have 24/7.
And pls remember you wont have access to any walkthroughs or wikis, you have to discover the games on your own.

Most interesting things worth considering may be the grinding value, replay value, play time or creativity you can fullfill in your pick.
I already picked 2 good ones i think (MH-grinding & Minecraft-creativity). Baldurs Gate i picked since i dont know it well enough but heard from everywhere that its a real time killer. (As i remembering me being in the first town i can only confirm this.)

Your best suggestions to me are those:
Mount&Blade, always wanted to try this one out.
Chess, some people really voted it and it may would work out as a joker.
Ancient Domains of Mystery, dont know it but i like those stuff, Looks interesting and you wouldnt play it if it wasnt. Tome could work for me too but i usually chose gameplay over graphics. Anyway 2 interesting games i didnt knew so far, thanks at adaliabooks.
The Escapists, looks interesting,

Some of you picked CIV, i can understand you since i played some games of that series too, but never felt in love with it.

Someone posted a huge list with games to spend much time on. Some games i wouldnt pick or even respect them as games. Though im curious about Animal Crossing, never played it but it may has huge time killing potential(may consider any pokemon games too).

Some games which wont work out for me for sure:
Tetris, i hope you were just kidding.
Thief Series, This wasnt about to break out. Those games are fun but i doubt they could entertain me long enough.
Gothic 2, fun but i already know it way to well.
NfS or GT: interesting choice but im not that a big racing game fan.

So finally ima stick to Minecraft and MH, with baldurs gate2 im still not that happy.
Thx for all your replies.
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Xray10000: ...snip
Furthermore no user generated content
...snip
Well that's a blow. One of the big selling points of Mount & Blade, Infinity Engine games, NWN, Thief, Elder Scrolls, Diablo, are the modding scene. Baldur's Gate for instance I wouldn't play without at least Trilogy installed so you can play 1 in the seconds engine to make a complete game. M&B has a loads of modules over different scenarios, I would rarely play vanilla, but POP I could play for months.
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Wolve-San: I don't get, why anyone would spend 392 hours destroying her/his mouse on purpose?
Perhaps they wrote a clicker for the clicker? But does it count as playing the game in that case? Hmm.



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Xray10000: Nice, i didnt knew those rankings but with Monster Hunter i appearently already picked a good one then. Dont know if those rankings include that you can finish some games way faster even without speedruns. For a game like X3 fe the story is a joke, but you can still play it for over 100 hours at least. From my personal experience this game belongs in those rankings too.
Yes, I think if you enjoy MH, it's a good choice. As for what criteria was used for the lists, the second was probably vote-based, and the first one compiled from player reports. So, it really depends on what various people thought was a game completed. It's basically impossible to say for some, like sandbox games.

Are you serious with the Tetris-Minecraft thing? Minecraft may have a bad reputation kinda but really Tetris over Minecraft, Tetris at all?
Well, at least one person in the thread did pick Tetris :) I wouldn't, as Tetris is a game I could always make myself if I suddenly wanted to play it. But yes, I was being serious. However, it has nothing with Minecraft's reputation, it's just that I don't really "get" these games. Zero enjoyment. I could have used any other similar game as an example instead.
Post edited January 12, 2016 by hyperagathon
Building something: Civilization IV or V
Military strategy: Panzer General with some user campaigns
Adventures don't last for a year. A nice tactical shooter with a long single player campaign huge maps (especially outside) would be nice, but I am not aware of any. So another strategy game would be an option (e.g. Settlers), but also a sports management & simulation game.