Games where you control the "pace" deliberately

One thing that I really like from stealth games is how you can play them by being patient (or rashly), deciding when to act and how. Every decision has immense weight behind (let's not even mention tension) and in return, you get an fantastic sensation of immersion. In fact, playing so much of that genre has ruined the rest of vidya for me where constant action and movement is needed. In stealth games, you can spent 5 minutes without making a single input and you'll still be immersed in the flow of the gameplay, studying patterns and deciding the best course of action, contrast that with the vast majority of games where time spent doing "nothing" equals to nothing; nothing has changed, advanced or given you a new insight of how to successfully beat the next situation (supposing no enemies are there… if there are, you simply get killed). Most games try to give the player the illusion of control, but in reality most games are in complete control of the player. Cross that invisible checkpoint and we'll lay the pace for you, now shut up and kill these 50 enemies, we won't even let you the option of disengage them. I don't think I can come back to that shite to be honest, I just don't enjoy it anymore.

What other games are examples of controlling the pace through deliberate action? turn-based vidya is a obvious one although I find it less exciting than real-time games and I played my fair share of them in my teens (RPGs). It's kind of expected from them, so I'm more interested in suggestions involving real-time gameplay. Don't necessarily confuse with "comfy games" although some overlap it's to be expected I guess

Your preferences mean you will never enjoy racing games, fighters, STDs, light gun games, character action games.

Do you hate boss fights?

RTS games as well.

no loss there, kek

yes, I hate when a stealth game throws me into a boss that requires direct confrontation.

Don't get me wrong, I'm 31 and I've enjoyed a lot of games from the genres you've listed in my lifetime, but I couldn't care less about them right now. Maybe I'm just getting old.

I like to play single player FPS in the same manner that you play stealth games. Always fighting at max range, baiting and cheesing as much as the game allows. Like you said though, most of them do that "invisible line ambush" thing.

Sounds like modern day open world FPS will be right up your alley.

I enjoyed the first Crysis until "aliens lol". It was such a satisfactory FPS to play at your own leisure…

You're fine dude. I wasn't hating, just trying to make sure I understood your preferences.

Man I just played most of the Homefront: Revolution demo and it was tedious. Far Cry 2 sucks ass as well. Are there any good ones? Do they all have infinitely respawning enemies?

You might enjoy Town-building games, there's at least one series of games for any time period.
Do you want ancient history? try the Sierra ones(Pharaoh, Caesar 3, Master of Olympus, Emperor) or Children of the Nile if you want Egypt in 3D.
Do you want Medieval Europe? try Banished.
Do you want European colonization games? try the Anno games(I only played 1503 and had a blast with it).
Do you want to be a communist dictator on your own Banana Republic? try Tropico(3 is usually considered to be the best).
Do you want modern cities? try SimCity(avoid the newest one), Cities XL.
Do you want futuristic cities? try the Anno games as well.

Now keep in mind that the games are made by different companies(and I didn't list all of them) so they all have different traits, like Anno is based more on commerce, while Tropico is more about finding a way of earning lots of money(well kinda). Some also feature combat like the Sierra ones and Anno, but it's not the main focus(I think Anno has the most depth of them all), while in SimCity your only adversary is your monthly budget.