Personaly I have never played any walking sim. I have had my eyes on Proteus for a while though. The Graveyard sound a bit too depressive and realistic for my tastes. But I have noticed that one of the element I enjoy in Minecraft is walking about and enjoying the sight of the procedurally generated landscape. Sometimes, my enjoyment of the scenery is forced upon me by the game mechanics - The reason I stand on a high earth column and watches the sunset is not the sunset in itself, but rather that I had to escape from the monsters below and have nothing else to do. Still, I got the impression that this game element could work on its own.

This rather relaxed articles take a look at the walking sim genre.

But is walking simulator a genre in its own right? Is there a common thread in the games with that label, or is it merely a derogatory term?

Anyone tried out the genre? If so, what's your judgement?

Yeah, I've played Gone Home and The Moon Sliver recently. Gone Home is absolutely excellent, with a storyline not really seen in gaming, fantastic graphics and ... It's just a good game, as far as walking simulators go. Moon Sliver is a bit worse, especially held back by its production values - well worth playing regardless tho. But... Sure, if ends up clearly identifying those games, it could be a genre, don't see why not.

Daily. With my dog. Multiple times. He gets this particular look in his eyes and on his face. I know I should say no at least once or twice, but he's just so cute and asks for so little.

Actually, he asks for a ton, often. But they're easy things, and I can't help but spoil him.

Wait, is this not what this thread is about?

Real-life walking sims where the players walk, like, for real? Oh-mah-Gawd! Totally blows my mind! :-O

I only just recently found out this was actually a subgenre of games. I was looking at reviews here for The Vanishing of... some guy? Ethan Carter? When the preorder / coming soon thing showed up I was intrigued by how beautiful the game was and the Lovecraftian influences.

When I started reading the reviews people basically referred to it as a "walking sim." I think the other one I saw was Ether One? I haven't played either, and I was a bit turned off by the short length of Vanishing. It seems like it could be an interesting method to tell a story but I think it would have to be done REALLY well for me to get into it.

One I did play, that was awesome was Miasmata. I don't know if this really "counts" as there are some elements beyond walking, but the game features an awesome mechanism for exploring an island. Now that I think of it, you're really only picking flowers and walking around an island. But playing it was so engaging and downright fun that I was hooked on it. Actually felt like wandering about, lost, on an island and trying to get your bearings while pushing further and deeper in. Good game!

Real-life walking sim.

Yup definitely a walking sim with a really bad save system.

Yes! Now that you mention it that was another thing that turned me off (short length being one and the fact that it was described as a "walking sim"). Bad save system is like the coup de grace for me in games. Some of my worst gaming moments have come from being done with a game for the evening, wanting to quit but not being able to because of an awful save system that would cause me to either lose large chunks of playtime or keep... on... playing *cries, bangs head on desk, stares at screen now hating gaming*

I hear the save system does have check points in certain moments but that they aren't paced well enough since you can get set back hours of gameplay. Sometimes there is a glitch with it though that corrupts your game and makes you lose. Really shitty save system indeed.

Yup, happened to me.

Oh, forgot to answer the OP in my previous post.

No, haven't played any walking sim. recently. Last time was over a year ago when i was playing TES: Skyrim. I have however moved onto the more strategic map painting simulator that is Europa Universalis IV and having a lot of fun with it so far. Looking forward to try out the new Art of War expansion for it. :)

I used to sometimes play IGI 1 (not avail on GOG) as a "walking simulator" (before I knew a term for it).

In that game you can walk/run/explore for literally hours in nearly any direction before you hit the "edge" of a level. Ofc there isn't anything out there "gamewise" but the expanse of mountains and terrain just keeps going on and on. Not sure why I liked doing that but I would just head of in some direction and just keep going and going. Found it relaxing in some way I suppose. Cool thing about IGI 1 is you can always come back (if you can find your way) to "the mission" and complete it.

(In I.G.I. 2 Covert Strike the walking simulator part was taken away - if you wander too far from the "mission area" you fail the mission. You do get warned before it comes to that, so you can turn back...)

I'd recommend Gone Home as well, don't even bother with Dear Easter unless you really like to turn narrative upside down to get some meaning by getting through the same non-interactive slog a bunch of times.

Well, that game is just three minutes long and it's free. You should give it a try. It's nice, except for that Dutch song (which lasts for about a third of the game).

What about Eidolon?