Favorite thumb-twiddler

I've noticed, especially as I've gotten older and don't have the time or patience to invest myself heavily into deep games involving many hours of gameplay. In fact, I've fallen onto a class of games I call thumb-twidders - something just to keep my hands occupied that doesn't really require my full attention. These are games I can play while watching TV or whatever. Many mobile phone games fall into this category for a lot of people, but I've had a few ages before I ever got a smartphone. I think my two absolute favorite standbys are Super Mario Bros. (any version will do, but usually the original) and Star Fox 64. I know both games by heart, can easily beat them in only a few minutes, and so hardly require any concentration at all, while giving my hands something to do. Sure, it may seem incredibly repetitive, but it doesn't really matter because my attention isn't even on the game anyway. And especially with Star Fox 64, it's fun to see if I can beat my previous high score. Anyone else got games like that which serve such a purpose?

That's why I have a retroduo hooked up and on standby on my tv in the living room. It's perfect for this kinda thing, because I really enjoy throwing in some of the arcadey NES games (Excitebike, GunSmoke, Rad Racer, Dr.Mario, etc) when I'm sitting around waiting for food to cook or what have you. Although the past few days I've just plowed through Zelda II, and now I guess I need to replace it with Faxanadu next.

I used to always keep a rom of Advance Wars 2 and Final Fantasy Dawn of Souls on my android phone (with emulator, of course) - because neither of those games had an ATB guage, so I could basically play it at my leisure when at a diner or some such. Friends will really enjoy you whipping out Advance Wars on a phone and passing it back and forth. *Which should not be used as a substitute for conversation

The Katamari games are fun for a bit of spontaneous time-wasting. Unfortunately, sometimes I get caught up in the "just one more go" mind-set and end up wasting more time than intended.

Anyone know if any of the retro' plug-n-play systems have the Road Rash games? The first and second incarnations were favourite time-wasters of old. I still kick myself for ever giving up my Genesis.

Circus Atari. Grab the balloons and try not to make the acrobats smash their heads on the concrete. It's both easy to pick up and put down as it's a classic score game, and you can get it in one of those 'Joypad Game' packs that plug right into the TV (if you don't have the original on the Atari).

I never really got into Katamari a whole lot. I have played a bunch of them, but it gets boring for me pretty quickly. To each their own, however.

I can't see a lot of games that require loading to be a pick-up-and-play kinda dealio. I think that's why I like to leave the cartridge systems out for a quick play. Waiting on the wife to take a shower, I'll throw in Ninja Gaiden 2 and just run through some levels.

The Simpsons: Tapped Out. I don't play many games on my phone or tablet but this is the one that I have stuck with time and time again. They have made a lot of updates to it and have also made some fun extra themes such as the Halloween and Christmas modes and tasks. I just recently found out one of my good friends had been playing it too so now we are linked up and you can get some bonuses that way. If you haven't played it before, think of The Sims meets The Simpsons. I am way more interested in playing this game though because I know all the characters and they did a good job putting in some basic voice acting and even scripted various cut scenes too. Not bad for a free app.

Besides this I have just a few other basic games like word searches and the occasional game of Words with Friends. That's really about it for me.