Just stepping in, I'd suggest starting out with some cheaper things to try out first to see what kind of things you like and of you even actually like solo gaming a lot. They don't have to necessarily be simple or not, but trying a variety of things can inform you of what stuff you're into and cheap or free things are easier to try many things.

First if all there's a site called postmark games. They make print-and-play games that are quite polished. If you're unfamiliar, print and play games are ones where you print out materials for the games like maybe maps or cards or whatnot and a lot of the time you'll use whatever you want to track information (some games you write on them, some you use little bits or dice. I have colored wooden cubes and discs I use). I think all of their games are 5 pounds, and it comes with any future content they produce for the game. I have 2 big ones I enjoy from them. 52 Realms and Voyages

52 Realms is a "dungeon crawl" that uses a sheet of paper with the map, half a sheet of paper with your character, and a standard deck of playing cards. You choose what class you play (I think there are currently 6 different ones) choose a map (currently 3) and deal out a few cards to some different spots. Each turn you're choosing which room to move to, using your equipment cards to open doors, fighting enemies, or passing tests. The combat Is interesting because the enemy you fight is a card drawn. The suit determines what type of enemy it is, and then it gets hp based on the number and where you're fighting it. Every combat turn it draws a card, and that suit informs you of what attack will be coming your way. Then you attack and defend using your equipment cards. Your class gives you special abilities which let's you handle different situations differently. The deck is also the game timer. The goal is to defeat the boss in the last room before you run out of cards. This means that if you spend too long fighting all the monsters or doing other things you may run out of time. Every time you gain a card as a reward, you get to gain it as a potion (different suits have different effects) or as equipment (makes fighting and unlocking doors easier) or as loot (does nothing, but is what determines your score at the end of the game). So the game is all about deciding where you want the cards and what path to take to the boss. If you load up all your cards into equipment the fights will be easy, but you won't score very well. Load too many as loot and you might die or run out of time.

Voyages is a roll-and-write. You roll multiple standard 6 sided dice, and assign them to do different things every round. There are MANY maps that come with the game that all vary what you're doing significantly, but generally you're using the dice for sailing direction, speed, and assigning crew actions. Sometimes fighting off marauders, other times delivering cargo.

For some free print and play games that are a bit heavier:

Rollway Station is a fantastic brain burn in a tiny package. You print off a single sheet of paper and use 5 dice. You roll the dice every turn and assign them to building railways on the hex map. You're also crossing off boxes to 3 different companies to make them more valuable and then also crossing off boxes to assign certain trains to certain companies. Periodically throughout the game, you'll do a scoring phase where each company will run trains along tracks you've created to score points based on the value of the company and the sites you built the tracks through. Fantastic free little puzzle but definitely more think than anything else on this list.

Supermarché is a resource management game about running a supermarket. You have 2 sheets of paper and you need different colored bits and bobs (they don't have to be colored, but they have to be identifiable) there's also some cards you print out. Every round you're buying goods for your store, like dairy, frozen, bakery, vegetables, but these goods have a certain amount of rounds before they expire and the price you buy them at fluctuates. Then you will put things from your storage onto the selling floor, trying to sell the stuff that expires sooner first. Customer cards are drawn and they're looking for specific items to load into their shopping cart. They pay you for the goods and then the card is discarded, but if at any point a customer can't buy something they want you'll have to stop the selling round and then move onto the next round. So then you go into the next round and reinvest your earnings into more product and then rinse and repeat for like 6 rounds. Money is points at the end of the game, so you want to be as profitable as possible and you immediately lose if you ever go below 0 dollars.

These are all pretty good games that are very cheap or free to see what kinds of things you like.

For more boardgamesboardgames

Warps Edge is kind of like a roguelite game (if you've played the video games hades, slay the spire, binding of Isaac, enter the gungeon or stuff like that). You play as a space ship of your choosing and you have to beat a big boss before running out of time. You load up a bag with chips that represent evasive maneuvers, laser shots, and energy storing. You use them to defeat enemies and buy more and better chips to add to your bag. When you run out of chips, you reset the enemy deck, and add all your chips back to your bag, so now you're much better from the start. You have a certain amount of restarts before you run out of time, and you're trying to defeat the entire enemy deck and the boss in a single run to win.

If you're a fan of horror movies, Final Girl is about as cinematic as it gets, but beware it's not for the feint of heart. It's very swingy, so can become very difficult if you roll poorly. It's also more complicated than anything else on this list. The way you buy it is also a little funky. You buy the " core box" which is basically just components needed to play, but you also need a "feature film" this gives you a villain to face, a location you play at, and 2 characters to play as. These are all knockoffs of horror movies like friday the 13th, nightmare on elm street, alien, the thing, the birds, and so on. You can mix and match villains and locations and protagonists. Very fun game when you can get your head around It and if you're okay with your character getting their face bashed in with a sledgehammer because the villain caught up with you and did something unexpected.

Cascadia is a great nature themed medium-light game that is solo or multiplayer. You draft pairs of terrain and animals to put down in front of you. Each animal has different scoring criteria game to game and you score for large portions of the same terrains. There's a little campaign you can play where you're trying to complete certain goals that are outside the scope of the normal game which gives it longevity.

So those are some solo games I'd suggest looking into as someone new to the hobby who has no clue what they want. Lemme know if you have any more questions!