Recommend PC games to play with disabled partner

[asendedtrunks]

Hi all, I'm wondering if any of you have any recommendations for me and my partner to play together, she unfortunately is disabled and has limited use of her left hand as well as slightly reduced cognitive processing ability.

We are currently enjoying playing Lovers in a Dangerous Spacetime together (mostly on the 2nd easiest difficulty, some levels on the easiest) and a few games we have really enjoyed playing previously are Brothers (with each of us holding one half of a controller), Tiny Brains, LEGO games (The Hobbit, Harry Potter), Rayman Origins + Legends, Castle Crashers.

We also enjoy Overcooked, however our annoyance with that one is you need to beat the harder times to earn enough stars to unlock the later levels and my partner is just not quick enough to earn those last few stars and that is frustrating for us. Not sure if Overcooked 2 is any different in this regard, because if it is I would definitely consider buying that.

Games we have tried but didn't work out for us: Portal 2, Joggernauts, Don't Starve Together.

What we are really after are coop games where gameplay can continue if she dies (i.e. she can just respawn), or games that have a casual setting for difficulty or allow you to set things such as infinite health/lives etc. We can also rule out anything that requires overly quick reactions or anything requiring frequent use of both analogue sticks at the same time as she usually just uses her right hand to switch between the two sticks.

Thanks for reading, I look forward to your recommendations.

[jimbouk]

Pixel Junk Monster 2? Tower defence style. Getting all the stars is annoying - but it's more about knowing what's coming up that quick reactions! And you certainly don't need to perfect every level to progress (completed with other harf with plenty of mistakes). First one was a bit more brutal from memory, many a late night with flat mates trying not too lose a single little chap from the tribe!

Perhaps Divinity: Original Sin 2? Not sure how the combat works in terms of reaction times etc, but sounded like it was pretty involved in terms of story and the role playing element which might be good fun.

[Scryder]

Terraria, can be played co-op online and local with some fiddling around (see below). My 7 year old plays it with some invincibility mode on her tablet, so it's possible to not die at all.

Here's a post I found on the forum regarding local play (not tested it, but sounds plausible): https://steamcommunity.com/app/10560...7554420713020/
And a video, with similar instructions: https://youtu.be/0QUO31SYBvE

[asendedtrunks]

Pixel Junk Monster 2? Tower defence style. Getting all the stars is annoying - but it's more about knowing what's coming up that quick reactions! And you certainly don't need to perfect every level to progress (completed with other harf with plenty of mistakes). First one was a bit more brutal from memory, many a late night with flat mates trying not too lose a single little chap from the tribe!

Perhaps Divinity: Original Sin 2? Not sure how the combat works in terms of reaction times etc, but sounded like it was pretty involved in terms of story and the role playing element which might be good fun.

Not heard of the Pixel Junk Monster games, my partner enjoys tower defence games solo so could be a good one to try.

I enjoyed Divinity: Original Sin 1 and definitely want to play 2nd one eventually but not sure if it's her type of game really, might try the 1st one with her to see how she likes it though.

[asendedtrunks]

Terraria, can be played co-op online and local with some fiddling around (see below). My 7 year old plays it with some invincibility mode on her tablet, so it's possible to not die at all.

Here's a post I found on the forum regarding local play (not tested it, but sounds plausible): https://steamcommunity.com/app/10560...7554420713020/
And a video, with similar instructions: https://youtu.be/0QUO31SYBvE

Terraria could be a good idea, not sure how she'd get on with the precision jumping needed but she might still be able to enjoy focusing on building our base, she has her own computer so we aren't restricted to only local coop games (though it's preferred if possible so we don't need to buy 2 copies or mess around with going offline in steam etc.)

[AGTDenton]

Orcs Must Die 2, this could be a bit of fun. This is both LAN & Online Co-Op with full controller support.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2...cs_Must_Die_2/

[Ttaskmaster]

Have you looked at the We Were Here series?

Xbox and PC. I'm not sure if it requires separate machines or just split screen, but basically it's co-op puzzles. You're in different rooms, with radio comms, and must work together to solve the puzzles.
I don't believe there are time-sensitive puzzles, and the first one is free to play so will cost you nothing to try it out. I think the other two are pretty cheap as well.

[MrJim]

I happen to be physically disabled myself, & enjoy playing PC games online with able-bodied friends. I don't have any use of my hands at all (I use a 'mouthstick' to operate a trackball & keyboard), so I can appreciate the difficulties involved with playing certain games. I can't manage to use a conventional gamepad unfortunately, (although there are mouth-operated alternatives like the 'quadstick' available). I tend to play FPS games mostly, which might not be to you or your partner's taste. I did play my way through 'Orcs Must Die' 1 & 2 though, which were lots of fun. Divinity 1 & 2 are turn-based, which makes life much easier if like me, you're sometimes a bit slow when it comes to button-pushing! I enjoyed playing 'Dying Light' co-op with friends, & I've got over 1500 hours in '7 Days to Die' at this point

I make quite extensive use of an open-source program called 'Autohotkey' to change how keyboard & mouse keys operate in games, for example to allow keys to 'toggle' on or off, rather than having to press two keys at once. I can send you a sample script & explain how it works, if you think that might be useful?

[Zhaoman]

Not strictly co-op but maybe Flight Sim 2020 could be worth trying? You only really need control of one analogue stick when you're in the air and you could both go looking for landmarks or animals on a big screen together. Some classic point and click adventures like Monkey Island could be worth experiencing together?

If you have two PCs then some classic RTS games like Command and Conquer are basically point and click games because you can do all necessary functions with only a mouse. It can be lots of fun doing co-op missions together and wacky stuff like making loads of infantry and frying them with tesla or radiation trucks.

[asendedtrunks]

I happen to be physically disabled myself, & enjoy playing PC games online with able-bodied friends. I don't have any use of my hands at all (I use a 'mouthstick' to operate a trackball & keyboard), so I can appreciate the difficulties involved with playing certain games. I can't manage to use a conventional gamepad unfortunately, (although there are mouth-operated alternatives like the 'quadstick' available). I tend to play FPS games mostly, which might not be to you or your partner's taste. I did play my way through 'Orcs Must Die' 1 & 2 though, which were lots of fun. Divinity 1 & 2 are turn-based, which makes life much easier if like me, you're sometimes a bit slow when it comes to button-pushing! I enjoyed playing 'Dying Light' co-op with friends, & I've got over 1500 hours in '7 Days to Die' at this point

I make quite extensive use of an open-source program called 'Autohotkey' to change how keyboard & mouse keys operate in games, for example to allow keys to 'toggle' on or off, rather than having to press two keys at once. I can send you a sample script & explain how it works, if you think that might be useful?

Thanks it's nice to have the insight from another disabled gamer, was very interesting to research about 'mouthsticks' and "quadsticks" and learn about something new, and it was cool to see a couple of YouTube channels dedicated to this sort of stuff.

We did look into options for adapted controllers for my partner to use but ultimately decided the cost and added complexity probably wasn't worth since she is still able to use the average controller just not as "proficiently" as others.

FPS games aren't really to either of our tastes, I used to play FPS but I don't have the reactions to keep up with them nowadays, unless it's one with a decent story . I would like to get her playing Divinity as I really like it, but not sure it would be to her taste.

Thanks for the offer, however we are already making use of AutoHotKey so I and Steam also has fairly decent support for remapping the controller to keyboard and mouse functions which we use quite a bit for games with no controller support.

[asendedtrunks]

Not strictly co-op but maybe Flight Sim 2020 could be worth trying? You only really need control of one analogue stick when you're in the air and you could both go looking for landmarks or animals on a big screen together. Some classic point and click adventures like Monkey Island could be worth experiencing together?

If you have two PCs then some classic RTS games like Command and Conquer are basically point and click games because you can do all necessary functions with only a mouse. It can be lots of fun doing co-op missions together and wacky stuff like making loads of infantry and frying them with tesla or radiation trucks.

I'm personally an avid flight simmer and have yoke, throttle, rudder system etc. she liked having a play around for fun but wasn't really for her long term. Monkey Island is actually one of my favourite classic games, played it as a kid and still play it now; I've got my partner playing the remaster of Monkey Island 1 - so 2, 3, 4 (probably, I still think it's an enjoyable game despite changing the story in completely convoluted ways) and Tales are definitely on the horizon.

[Ttaskmaster]

FYI - We Were Here Too (ie the second one) just went on sale - 50% off on Steam.
They're doing a complete bundle as well, for about £12.

[kalniel]

Some suggestions in this article - meant to be short games, but some of them are suitable for a partner who is atypical.

https://www.theguardian.com/games/20...r-or-housemate

I'd especially recommend Haven.

[soulblighter666]

Maybe you could try Darkest Dungeon and XCOM. They aren't co-op games but you could do it were you do a mission each, build your own teams etc. Plus the amount of mods for the games will allow you to replay the games.

If you like adventure games I highly recommend the Sierra and the Discworld series. Some of the older titles you had to type but some got re-made in VGA and went to point and click. Their also Flight of the Amazon Queen and Beneath a Steel Sky (which are free on GOG). Also alot of the old adventure games are now free if you download eXodos. I believe it now comes in a lite version so you download the games when you want to play them.

[jimbouk]

Stardew Valley is now couch co-op. Done about a week of game time now, plenty to keep you busy!

[Scryder]

Stardew Valley is now couch co-op. Done about a week of game time now, plenty to keep you busy!

Yep, can totally recommend Stardew Valley. I played it again recently, last was in 2019, and carried on from where I left it off.