More often than not, playing video games is a pretty stressful affair. Loot drops, RNG, bosses, difficult encounters... but what about relaxing PC games? Is there such a thing, even? Or are we all thinly-veiled masochists aching our way through life? We're not pointing any fingers! Hell, yours truly has been hunting for the perfectly rolled Gnawing Hunger in Destiny 2's Reckoning for, oh, months now. To try and alleviate worries like these, today we're offering a list of awesome relaxing games for PC!

Covering a wide range of topics and genres, the relaxing video games featured below will be just the thing to play if you need to unwind. Long days do us all in sometimes, and wandering through a virtual forest is great for relaxation, in our experience. But enough of that - let's see what we've got!

Relaxing PC Games or meandering through the woods? How about both?

We'll concede that not everyone will be a fan of theHunter: Call of the Wild due to its subject matter. Having said that, it is an incredibly calming and relaxing experience through-and-through. If nothing else, virtual hunting is decidedly less violent than the real deal, no?

In any case, we're happy to say that Call of the Wild is perfectly content with simply letting you roam about. You don't even have to lug a rifle around if you really don't want to. The game's renditions of various animal species are as detailed and interesting as they get, and the fact theHunter has been going strong since 2017 speaks volumes about its quality. With a selection of quality DLC at your beck and call, you can even upgrade it with whatever new biome you wish to explore! There's even a cooperative multiplayer mode to enjoy.

Snowsports, perhaps? Hospital management? Wacky Open World Adventures?

Relaxing PC Games

Hey, hunting just might not be your forte. That's completely fair! In that case, chances are that you're looking towards something along the lines of sports. Adventuring, too? If you're particularly cheeky, chill strategy games might be the way to go. Thankfully, we've prepared games that cover each and every one of these three niches.

The first one is - as you may have guessed - Ubisoft's thrilling snow sporting sim: Steep. The main caveat here is that, if you wish to relax, you should avoid going after objectives, and opt for the freeform mountain descent modes. Steeps is great at that!

As for the light adventuring niche, here we've picked out LEGO City Undercover. This wonderful Grand Theft Auto Lite offers an incredible amount of content, none of which should stress you out. Disregarding linear progression, we found ourselves enjoying the game's sandbox mode, and we feel you might, too. Chasing down LEGO nubs and unlocking new suits and vehicles never felt this fun before.

Finally, one of our favorite management games is also getting a mention here. That's Two Point Hospital - the incredibly cheeky hospital sim that will often have you reeling from laughter. Not only do you get the chance to fully outfit and customize your own medical institution, but the game's only as difficult as you want it to be. Its visual style and its unique sense of humor are not to be disregarded, either.

No better subject for relaxing PC games than animals

Finally, we come to the crown jewel of this article. Jewels, actually, if you will. The titles that inspired us to look for relaxing PC games in the first place! If you're not familiar with the visual style shown above, that's the Shelter series of games. An incredible forest adventure where you take control over a variety of critters trying their best to survive. The environment is, sometimes, oppressive and dangerous, but all of the Shelter and Shelter-themed titles have a very meditative and calming quality to them.

The mainline offerings are an obvious choice, as you take control over a family of badgers and lynx-cats, respectively.

We will say that the thematically-appropriate Paws fits in quite well, too. It is a more linear and narratively-heavier experience but has all the makings of a relaxing PC game.  Just like the main Shelter titles!

Finally, there's also the most experimental of the Shelter titles: Meadow. This instanced MMO-like adventure game takes you to a mysterious biome where a wide variety of forest animals have to work together to achieve various goals. The catch is that there are no objectives to concern yourself with, and there's no way to communicate other than using the game's preset emotes. This is a weirder and more oblique gameplay experience than the rest of the Shelter series, but it's also our favorite. We'd compare it to Journey, perhaps.

We hope our list of relaxing PC games achieved its goal of giving you something to play when you wish to be stress-free. Any of the games featured above should do the trick, but it's up to you to pick which might suit you best. Good luck!

More often than not, playing video games is a pretty stressful affair. Loot drops, RNG, bosses, difficult encounters… but what about relaxing PC games? Is there such a thing, even? Or are we all thinly-veiled masochists aching our way through life? We’re not pointing any fingers! Hell, yours truly has been hunting for the perfectly rolled […]