Not OP, but I’ve tried getting into Stardew multiple times and the fatigue mechanic absolutely ruins the game for me. “14 times” is an exaggeration but what it feels like.

People describe it as a cozy game but it is genuinely one of the most stressful games that I’ve played. As in I start clearing the land and then after a very short time my character is exhausted. Either I sleep it off and I’m worried I’ll plant late enough the crops will die in winter or I work through it and end up in the hospital with a bill. Sometimes I’ve used the time to explore the town (as it seems the game mechanics are telling you to do), whereupon I find the shops are closed and I collapse on the way back home.

The one or two times I’ve played long enough to harvest crops I end up eating all of it just to get to the end of the day. Most of the money I make is from selling actual literal garbage I’ve found lying around.

The result of that mechanic is that the game is basically telling me the most cozy part of the game (farming) I’m not allowed to play until I’ve invested enough time to stock up on energy drinks. I’m left with fishing, which just isn’t my thing, and mining, which is what I’ll mostly do until I get bored because it’s honestly kinda mediocre on it’s own. I just can’t get into this game.

(I’m aware that the main pull for the game is the characters, which if you enjoy that that’s good. I’ve just never had much of a reason to be invested in them)

If you like Rimworld the obvious suggestion from me is Dwarf Fortress. It’s on steam but if you’re not sure I believe there’s a free version with the original ascii graphics on the bay12 games website (at least there was when I last played).

Also Factorio might interest you, but for a laid back experience you’d want to turn down biters (mostly disabling expansions). May be mentally taxing.

Another comment mentions modded minecraft, which gets a +1 from me. Though if you want a “forever world” I’d suggest playing unmodded (save for some client side graphics / QoL if desired), as there’s at least some guarantee you can keep the world as the game gets updated. If you do go modded though I’d suggest using prismlauncher and browsing through premade modpacks on modrinth and curseforge. P.S. if you don’t already own the game somehow you’ll want java edition, not bedrock

I’ve been reading some of these other replies and my input is that to me you sound depressed / burnt out. I do not say that as a psychologist or therapist, if you want that diagnosis you’d have to talk to a certified one; however, the times in my life I have been more depressed the more I agree with this sentiment and the less I’ve been depressed the less I agree.

I’d also like to remind you that you are asking this on Lemmy, which means a lot of responses you’ll get here are from a certain nerdy, shut-in type. I say this because people here are likely to agree already, which is good for sympathies but not for answering your actual question.

When people say they enjoy being social, they are not lying (with caveats). Most healthy people have at least a couple of relationships they deeply value, and if you’re missing that I think it’s worth continuing to meet people even if it’s a lot of effort.

Work-wise though, yeah people are mostly lying there. There’s a much stronger insentive structure to lie.

I want to reiterate you should look into whether you’ve got burnout or depression, especially given the current climate. Those both have a way of draining enjoyment from seemingly unrelated things, relationships usually being one of the first.

The thing that finally got businesses to finally get off IE wasn’t from the browser being worse than every other option. Heck, it wasn’t even because it was a decrepit piece of software that lost it’s former market dominance (and if anything businesses see that as a positive, not a negative).

What finally did that was microsoft saying there won’t be any security updates. That’s what finally got them off their ass; subtly threatening them with data breaches, exploits, etc. if they continue to use it. I don’t see google doing this anytime soon, at least not without a “sequel” like microsoft had with edge.