University students know as well as anyone that time is precious, and now more than ever we are finding ourselves with less time for gaming. The solution? Our writers have chosen a couple of killer games with short play-times. Find your weekend's worth of gaming here.
Firewatch is an award-winning game brief enough that your grades won't suffer as a result of exploring the beautifully rendered Shoshone National Forest. Unlike some AAA games you can sink countless hours into without really scratching the surface of, it lasts the perfect amount of time to feel like an escape to a lush Wyoming wilderness full of life, intrigue, and adventure.
This 2016 title is all about escape, after all, as the player delves into the complicated, quite painful life of protagonist Henry, who opts to spend the summer of 1989 serving as a fire lookout.
Hiking through a breathtaking forest is a sorely needed reprieve from stress and boredom.
Your supervisor, Delilah, is hilarious and endlessly intriguing - she's also your only companion, just a radio (and entire mountain) away. The dialogue between the two characters flows so naturally, it's impossible not to smile at their good-natured banter and tender, unorthodox relationship.
Campo Santo's Firewatch is described as a mystery, and while the tension escalates until the suspense is nigh unbearable, the game’s environment is why I find myself returning to it: after spending too long in a stuffy library painstakingly writing an essay you couldn't care less about, hiking through a breathtaking forest is a sorely needed reprieve from stress and boredom.
Firewatch is available now on PC, PS4, Xbox One and Nintendo Switch.
Short games are great, they’re quick to the punch and they don’t mess around with any of the repetitiveness of games that claim to have ‘hundreds of hours of content’. One of my favourite games within this category, while fairly old now, is still something I stick on to play on a slow afternoon, when I just want to finish something. That game is Mirror’s Edge.
This 2010 first person parkour-'em-up from DICE makes brevity one of its strongest points. Each level assembles its way across immaculate rooftops of white, with DICE’s visual mastery living on even today. Visual style aside, the game’s parkour features an unfamiliar but innovative control scheme. Before you know it you’re wall-running, swinging and sliding your way through tightly designed levels.
Each level assembles its way across immaculate rooftops of white, with DICE’s visual mastery living on even today.
Each level is impressively well mapped out, usually with multiple ways to navigate the same obstacles, for a quicker completion time. Experienced players will find tiny tricks to shave seconds off their time, amounting in a completion time of around two hours (or about thirteen minutes if you’re a world record speedrunner).
In case that’s too short for you, there are also additional time trial modes to both learn sections of levels and perfect your skills. With such satisfying mechanics to master, and a simple, digestible story, Mirror’s Edge makes for a fantastic 'flavour of the week’ sort of game.
