Currently Battlefield, GTAV, RDR2, Hitman and Wreckfest.
Battlefield is eternally dynamic while allowing me to employ my preferred playstyle at my own pace. Other multiplayer shooters tend to require you to be always constantly on, which can be stressful and frustrating. In Battlefield I can switch at will between that and just puttering around the landscape in a jeep or whatever. And you're one player out of 32. No pressure, just play however. Plus you can disable text chat, which removes any and all toxicity and it's like playing with actual AI.
GTA is the best sandbox game, always has been, especially once mods have appeared. That engine is just really impressive. It does all of the things. Mods allow you to engage with them. The relatively recent Chaos mod seems pretty good at demonstrating this. Might reinstall GTA V for it. Previously I've mostly been flying around in cars and making them shunt other cars into the stratosphere. Jumping the car and boosting is an interesting transportation mode, to steer you have to wait for the rear the point in the direction you want.
RDR2 is just a huge and detailed game that I enjoy pottering around it. I don't know that any other game succeeds as well as creating a world that feels and looks so enticingly natural. And you just find these interesting spots and situations all over. Of course on PC you can skip the sloggy intro. And also there are mods. I find myself not wanting to mess around in this world though. Just have invincibility and stamina and money. And being able to play the piano. And a hunting wagon that I don't really understand. And a ragdoll mode that I keep accidentally engaging. Oh and I made days longer and nights shorter.
Hitman doesn't last forever, but it's very, very, very fun to explore and figure levels out and get into various shenanigans as you do, screwing up, narrowly escaping, just clinging onto the vain hope that you can salvage things....or make them even worse. It's like inserting yourself into a finely tuned script, dragging your muddy boots all over it, and it kind of rewriting itself accordingly.
Wreckfest requires modding to become its best. AI sets, AI names, tracks, soundtrack, money cheat... Without that I would've stopped playing it a long time ago. (Although kudos to Bugbear for adding new tracks without charging for them.) The soundtrack is particularly important for this game, because the original soundtrack is heinous, and substituting my own adds so much to the aggressively vindictive rootin' tootin' fun times feel the game screams for. What Bugbear has nailed though, is the handling of the vehicles, the physics, AI and destruction. No other developer has been able to make driving like an asshole this satisfying. Taking down opponents is not sterile and automatic like in Burnout, whatever happens is entirely because of the timing, positioning and impact of your attack. And so when you really feckin hammer someone into the shit and get away cleanly, and you look back at the chaos of cars turning end over end and flying into the woods, it is one of the few games that can make me feel a rewarding sense of pure glee and pride in my assholery.
