Gaming

Power wash simulator will be your best friend. No spoken dialogue, no important cutscenes, just you and a power wash gun. The only thing you'll miss out on listening to podcasts is the admittedly very soothing sound of PSSSSHHHHHHHHHH from the washer itself.

FTL is fun and hard.

Also mindustry

Vampire Survivors for sure!

I have a Steam collection just for that purpose, called "zone-out games":

• Factorio
• Euro Truck Simulator
• Viscera Cleanup Detail
• Satisfactory
• Space Engineers
• Hardspace Shipbreaker
• Rift Breaker
• Monster Train
• Jupiter Hell
• Vampire Survivors
• Dorf Romantik
• DOOM (any)
• Nethack

Some advice I want to give is that "games that require a lot of skill" is only a temporary blocker. If you enjoy a hard game enough to play through it repeatedly, it can become a podcast game. Many people play Bloodborne or Binding of Isaac to audiobooks, and roguelikes are generally like this.

That in mind, I have a list of games that are valid podcast games but I haven't built enough familiarity with them yet:

• FTL
• Binding of Isaac
• Terraria
• Risk of Rain
• Against the Storm

My father really likes Mini Motorways. You could try something like that

He's a big fan of sim cities and zoo tychoon and stuff too

Minecraft creative mode can be very relaxing but time consuming, it takes a while to build a big project but looks awesome when completed, you can go for a small hobbit home too and give in some detail, it takes your mind off of things sometimes, especially when doing the math to even builds out.

Mordhau is definitely one of few casual games medieval fighting game where you can mindlessly kill other players and laugh your ass off. But at the same time its the type of game you can get really good at too. So it has a very in depth combat experience

I love to play from time to time Banished with podcasts. Once you figure out how to survive then it's just "how much can I build on a map before my PC explodes".
Ostriv seems nice too, but it's still in alpha, so weird things happen like villagers going out to buy candles or soap and returning with shoes.

Many roguelites could fall into this category, and are generally cheap to boot (i.e. vampire survivors).

Turmoil:

It's a 2d game where you drill for oil, then have some light logistics management to do to load it in to barrels on horse waggons and then sell it. It's a lot of fun.

The answer to your question is Factorio

Vampire Survivors.

A Short Hike has dialog and a shorter play time but you can just ignore that and soar around the island. It's got an isometric view with a pixel art style. I really enjoy it. I play it when I'm hung over.

Stardew Valley is a really chill and fun game. You can talk to the towns people but don't have to and the dialogue is all very short if you do.

Some of the paradox games maybe? I used to chill over Victoria II whilst doing things I really ought to have been giving my full attention.

Cookie Clicker

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1454400/Cookie_Clicker/

But then, to be a crazy person, you can learn some python and automate the clicking so you get more cookies

Skyrim. You CAN pay attention to what's going on but you don't have to, just look at the pretty landscapes while listening to your podcast and follow the questmarkers.

vampire survivors

The first game that popped into mind for this title was Dave the Diver. It is a lovely game where you fish in the morning, then serve up the fish at the sushi restaurant you work for in the evenings. I recommend you check out a video on it! It's technically early access, but the full game is set to release on the 28th.

Terraria may be fun for you. It's actiony but very explore oriented and at your own pace.

Goat simulator is a blast.

It's not clear to me that I could ever listen to podcasts while playing most of my library, but I'll do my best to list some with which I might try:

• Euro Truck Simulator 2 (and, by corollary, American Truck Simulator). If you can listen to podcasts in your car, this is basically a similar experience :)
• Super Hexagon. This is not a game about making conscious decisions, it's too fast for that. You'd have to turn off the music, and determine whether you can retain stuff you're listening to at the same time.
• Race The Sun. This is somewhere in the middle of the above two.
• Solace Crafting. This is a relatively bare-bones sandbox RPG with harvesting, crafting, and building elements, that doesn't require all that much decision making, and can be played at any pace.
• Minecraft (the Java edition). You've probably heard of it! I recommend the Java edition due to the rich modding ecosystem; you can usually find a flavor of content that suits any purpose.
• Cities: Skylines (and, by corollary, SimCity 4). These are both world-class genre-defining city builders, which can be played at your own pace, don't require a whole lot of active involvement, and pair well with background listening of your choice.

Mine is currently Civilization 6 and I don’t think I have anything else that could possibly fit; I occasionally have to step back and decide what to do next as it still is a strategy game, but since turns can take awhile (especially in late game since the AIs have to take their turns), having something else to pass the time helps. The dialogue is pretty inconsequential, and turning the game’s sound off won’t really change anything. I usually have music/podcasts going while I play.

• Nobody mentioned Kerbal Space Program yet? While it's no longer indie, it was during most of the development. It's the space game. While it's not claiming to be a perfectly accurate simulation, it captures the essence of orbital mechanics pretty well. The xkcd comic about it is on point.
• Cultist Simulator. It is a card game that lives from the cards' flavour text. The core gameplay is simple, but the mood the game creates is extremely captivating. You only get served small bits of information at once, and you have to connet the dots yourself (or get spoilers online...). Also, it's not an easy game, and unless you are really lucky you will not succeed in your first few playthroughs.
• Unreal World. This is roguelike survival game set in a fantasy version of ancient Finland.

Also in the truck driving bucket - Snowrunner. The focus is on off road trucking, mud and snow physics, with a winch that you can use to unstick yourself.

Diablo games are easy to play while listening/watching other things. Diablo 4 does have a story, but you don't need to watch it if you don't want to. And after it's beaten, the story will never bother you again. Diablo 2 Remaster is also great if you're feeling a bit more old school.

Snow Runner! Very chill if you like driving and nice sceneries. But it becomes Dark Souls real quick.

If you are into roguelikes noita is really easy to pickup and put down with tons of spells and modifiers and a huge map to explore.

Try Dorfromantik. It's a hexagonal puzzle game where you build a map using different tiles and connecting like with like. Very relaxing, doesn't require sounds or full attention.

Monster train is my go to right now. If you like the deck building genre such as Slay the Spire etc. You can put as much brain in as you want and it's still pretty fun.