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Gaming 101: Big Budget Games

In this series, we are learning how different aspects of video games work by playing games that offer an easy introduction to this one concept. This is designed for people new to gaming, and aims to identify games with the least barriers. In this entry we are looking at big budget games.

These games are big, brash and popular. They have big budgets which means the visual and interactive quality is particularly high. They also have strong and wide ranging player communities.

For new players these can be overwhelming as they combine a number of genres like Strategy games, Shooting games, Adventure games, Role Play games. Still, they are a good way to see how these different elements combine in a large and ambitious experience.

This list includes 114 games from the last 30 years, with 4,403 likes. They come from a range of different genres and play-styles and are all good games if you want to play big blockbuster games.

List Details

PEGI Ratings: PEGI 3 to PEGI 18
ESRB Ratings: ESRB EVERYONE to ESRB MATURE 17+
Australian Ratings: G to R 18+
Genres: Action, Adventure, Battle, Brain Game, Collecting, Communication, Creative, Fighting, Narrative, Physically Active, Platform, Puzzle, Race, Role-Play, Sequencing, Shooting, Simulation, Sports, Stealth, Strategy and Traversal
Total Likes: 4,403

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Release Date: 25/04/2020

Out Now: Switch

Skill Rating: 9+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person, Cartoon, Day and Night, Open World and Weather

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The Legend of Zelda: Breath Of The Wild

Release Date: 03/03/2017

Out Now: Switch and Wii U

Skill Rating: 10+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person, Cartoon, Day and Night, Open World and Weather

The Legend of Zelda: Breath Of The Wild departs from the previous Zelda formula with the scale and depth of its world. You walk, fly, ride and climb your way through a landscape that varies in climate, terrain, inhabitants and vegetation. Weather and...

Marvel's Spider-Man: Miles Morales

Release Date: 12/11/2020, updated in 2022

Out Now: PC, PS4 and PS5

Skill Rating: 11+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person and Open World

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Marvel's Spider-Man

Release Date: 07/09/2018

Out Now: PS4 and PS5

Skill Rating: 11+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person and Open World

Marvel's Spider-Man is a series of superhero adventures where you swing through an open-world city fighting crime and advancing a film-like story. Play is a combination of exploration, taking on fights and collecting items. There are also many side...

Super Mario Odyssey

Release Date: 27/10/2017

Out Now: Switch

Skill Rating: 10+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person and Open World

Super Mario Odyssey is a running and jumping game in the long-running Mario series where you save Princess Peach from Bowser. While it's a familiar setup, here you explore vast open worlds and use your hat to help you get around, fight, and even possess...

Halo

Halo (Series)

Release Date: 15/11/2001, updated in 2020

Out Now: Android, Mac, PC, Xbox, Xbox 360, Xbox One and iOS

Skill Rating: 10+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person

Halo is the longstanding sci-fi shooting video game series that started when Halo: Combat Evolved launched alongside the Xbox in 2001. The franchise has featured on every Xbox platform since then, with Halo 5: Guardians serving as the latest entry in...

The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt

Release Date: 19/05/2015

Out Now: PC, PS4, Switch and Xbox One

Skill Rating: 12+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person, Day and Night, Open World and Weather

The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt is an action-adventure game where you play monster-hunter Geralt in a vast open world as he searches for his missing adopted daughter. The game responds to your actions and has dynamic environments, weather and day–night...

Minecraft Dungeons

Release Date: 26/05/2020

Out Now: PC, PS4, Switch and Xbox One

Skill Rating: 7+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person and Blocks

Minecraft Dungeons is an action-adventure game that takes place in the Minecraft universe. You explore various dungeons to complete missions and collect new gear by exploring and finding treasure chests, or by defeating enemies....

The Last Of Us Part II

Release Date: 19/06/2020

Out Now: PS4

Skill Rating: 16+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person and Day and Night

The Last of Us Part II is an action-adventure game set five years after The Last of Us. You control two characters in a post-apocalyptic United States. Ellie is out for revenge after suffering a tragedy, and Abby is a...

Valorant

Release Date: 02/06/2020

Out Now: PC, PS4 and Xbox One

Skill Rating: 13+ year-olds

Components: 3D First-Person

Valorant is a team-based online shooting game, where two teams of five compete under the role of agents with unique abilities. It's designed to be competitive and requires considerable skill and practice to win matches. Between rounds, players spend...

Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order

Release Date: 15/01/2019, updated in 2019

Out Now: PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One and Xbox Series X|S

Skill Rating: 12+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person

Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order is a fighting-adventure game set five years after Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith and 14 years before Star Wars: Episode IV – A New Hope. Young Jedi Padawan Cal Kestis is hunted through the galaxy by the...

Horizon Zero Dawn

Release Date: 01/03/2017

Out Now: PC and PS4

Skill Rating: 12+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person, Day and Night, Open World and Weather

Horizon Zero Dawn, and the follow-up game Horizon Forbidden West, has a post-apocalyptic feel familiar from movies like Planet of the Apes. It plunges you into an overgrown landscape with now-crumbling remnants of modern life where animalistic machines...

Uncharted 4: A Thief's End

Release Date: 19/11/2016, updated in 2017

Out Now: PS3 and PS4

Skill Rating: 13+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person

Uncharted 4: A Thief's End is an action-adventure game set several years after the events of Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception. You play Nathan Drake, a happily married former treasure hunter coaxed out of retirement by his brother. This leads into another...

Immortals Fenyx Rising

Release Date: 03/12/2020

Out Now: PC, PS4, PS5, Switch, Xbox One and Xbox Series X|S

Skill Rating: 10+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person and Open World

Immortals Fenyx Rising is a mythical adventure game where you play Fenyx, exploring the huge open world, solving puzzles and fighting evil fantasy creatures. Fenyx is a newly winged demigod, who was prophesied to be the one to save the Greek Gods' home...

Kirby's Epic Yarn

Release Date: 17/10/2010, updated in 2019

Out Now: 3DS and 2DS, Wii and Wii U

Skill Rating: 3+ year-olds

Components: 2D Side-On and Hand-Made

Kirby's Epic Yarn is a running and jumping game starring Nintendo's Kirby character who can absorb enemies to gain their abilities and powers. It's set in Patch Land, a world made completely out of fabric. You use your platforming skills to collect...

The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker

Release Date: 24/03/2003, updated in 2013

Out Now: GameCube and Wii U

Skill Rating: 9+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person, Cartoon, Day and Night and Open World

The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker is an adventure game in the Zelda series. This one is set on a group of islands in a vast sea and follows Link as he attempts to save his sister from the sorcerer Ganon. This soon develops into a struggle to find the...

Elden Ring

Release Date: 25/02/2022

Out Now: PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One and Xbox Series X|S

Skill Rating: 12+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person, Day and Night, Open World and Weather

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Luigi's Mansion

Release Date: 14/09/2001, updated in 2018

Out Now: 3DS and 2DS and GameCube

Skill Rating: 7+ year-olds

Components: 2D Side-On

Luigi's Mansion is an adventure game where you investigate a haunted mansion to capture the ghosts. As long-standing Nintendo character Luigi, you play a ghostbuster to capture various mischievous ghouls and rescue Mario. It stands out for the unusual...

The Last Of Us Left Behind

Release Date: 14/02/2014

Out Now: PS3 and PS4

Skill Rating: 16+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person

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Uncharted 2: Among Thieves

Release Date: 13/10/2009, updated in 2015

Out Now: PS3 and PS4

Skill Rating: 13+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person

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Uncharted: The Lost Legacy

Release Date: 23/08/2017

Out Now: PS4

Skill Rating: 13+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person

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Out Now: PS4 and PS5

Skill Rating: 13+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person, Day and Night, Open World and Weather

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The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds

Release Date: 22/11/2013

Out Now: 3DS and 2DS

Skill Rating: 8+ year-olds

Components: 2D Overhead, Hand-Made and Open World

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Luigi's Mansion 2

Release Date: 20/03/2013, updated in 2024

Out Now: 3DS and 2DS and Switch

Skill Rating: 8+ year-olds

Components: 2D Side-On and Cartoon

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Sackboy: A Big Adventure

Release Date: 12/11/2020

Out Now: PC, PS4 and PS5

Skill Rating: 7+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person and Hand-Made

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Assassin's Creed Valhalla

Release Date: 10/11/2020

Out Now: PC, PS4, PS5, Stadia, Xbox One and Xbox Series X|S

Skill Rating: 12+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person, Day and Night and Open World

Assassin's Creed Valhalla is the twelfth game in the Assassins Creed Series, an open world action-adventure that takes place over several main story quests as well as many optional side missions.

The Last Of Us

Release Date: 14/06/2013

Out Now: PS3 and PS4

Skill Rating: 16+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person and Weather

The Last Of Us is an action-adventure where You play a father, Joel, whose daughter was killed during the early stages of a deadly fungal outbreak. It’s now 20 years later, and he has clearly suffered from the loss. When Joel is given charge of a...

Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart

Release Date: 11/06/2021, updated in 2023

Out Now: PC and PS5

Skill Rating: 10+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person

Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart is a running, jumping and shooting game. The latest in the series, Rift Apart focuses on jumping between parallel worlds. Play is similar to other Ratchet & Clank games, retaining the dodging, gunplay, bold collection and...

Cyberpunk 2077

Release Date: 10/12/2020

Out Now: Mac, PC, PS4, PS5, Stadia, Xbox One and Xbox Series X|S

Skill Rating: 14+ year-olds

Components: 3D First-Person and Open World

Cyberpunk 2077 is a massive open-world action-adventure game inspired by cyberpunk themes, focused on the merging of humanity and technology. The line between human and machine is heavily blurred in every corner of its world. You have a fully...

Shadow Of The Colossus

Release Date: 18/10/2005

Out Now: PS2, PS3 and PS4

Skill Rating: 10+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person and Open World

Shadow Of The Colossus is an action-adventure game where you play a young man who enters a forbidden land to defeat sixteen massive beings to restore the life of a girl he cares about. It sounds like any other video game, although in fact, Shadow of the...

Ghost of Tsushima

Release Date: 17/07/2020

Out Now: PS4 and PS5

Skill Rating: 14+ year-olds

Components: 3D First-Person, Open World and Weather

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Call of Duty: Warzone

Release Date: 10/03/2020, updated in 2022

Out Now: PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One and Xbox Series X|S

Skill Rating: 14+ year-olds

Components: 3D First-Person

Call of Duty: Warzone is a large online shooting game. It's played with 150 other players with teams in squads of 1 to 4 players. As with other battle royale games, the map on which you play shrinks to great intense finale shot downs. This, combined...

Assassin's Creed Odyssey

Release Date: 05/10/2018

Out Now: PC, PS4, Stadia and Xbox One

Skill Rating: 12+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person, Day and Night and Open World

Assassin's Creed Odyssey is an action role-playing game set in the years 431–422 BCE during a mythological history of the Peloponnesian War between Athens and Sparta. You play as a male or female mercenary fighting on both sides and attempting to...

Destiny 2

Release Date: 09/09/2014

Out Now: PC, PS4, Stadia and Xbox One

Skill Rating: 12+ year-olds

Components: 3D First-Person and Open World

Destiny 2 is a shooting game set in space. You have to play online as it focuses on grand sci-fi adventures with other players. From the same developer, it takes Halo towards a bigger online role-play experience.

Dragon Age

Dragon Age (Series)

Release Date: 03/11/2009, updated in 2014

Out Now: Android, PC, PS3, PS4, Xbox 360, Xbox One and iOS

Components: 3D Third-Person

Dragon Age series are narrative-driven role-playing games with an emphasis on combat and player choices. You play the hero in the medieval fantasy world of Thedas, exploring the world and using your power to stop the impending darkness spread across the...

Death Stranding

Release Date: 08/11/2019, updated in 2021

Out Now: PC, PS4 and PS5

Skill Rating: 16+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person, Open World and Weather

Death Stranding is an exploration game where you deliver supplies across a vast shattered, post-apocalyptic America while protecting and caring for a baby. It's intentionally slow, sometimes excruciatingly so, which means you carefully consider your...

Fortnite

Release Date: 25/07/2017, updated in 2018

Out Now: Android, PC, PS4, PS5, Switch, Xbox One and iOS

Skill Rating: 8+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person, Cartoon and Open World

Fortnite rose to popularity via its Battle Royale mode where 100 players fight against each other in online battles to the death. While they play, using shooting, evasion and building skills to survive, a storm is closing in to make the playable area...

Overwatch 2

Release Date: 24/05/2016, updated in 2022

Out Now: PC, PS4, PS5, Switch, Xbox One and Xbox Series X|S

Skill Rating: 10+ year-olds

Components: 3D First-Person

Overwatch 2 is a shooting game where the focus is on teamwork and skill rather than violence. In teams of five, you communicate and work together to take out the other team and complete your objective. Along with games like Rocket League, it has...

Final Fantasy VII Remake

Release Date: 10/04/2020

Out Now: PS4

Skill Rating: 12+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person

Final Fantasy VII Remake is an action role-playing game set in a decaying cyberpunk metropolis. It is the first in a series of games that remake the 1997 PlayStation game Final Fantasy VII. You play the role of a mercenary named Cloud Strife who joins...

Super Smash Bros. Ultimate

Release Date: 21/01/1999, updated in 2018

Out Now: Switch

Skill Rating: 8+ year-olds

Components: 2D Side-On

Super Smash Bros. Ultimate is a light-hearted cartoon-style brawling game where multiple players choose well-known video game characters to fight. Play involves using your character's move-set to outwit and beat your opponents. You wear down their...

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Game genre:
Style of Play:
Components:

How long to play:
User-generated content:	No
Accessibility features:	Yes

Controls
Gamepad:
Mouse And Keyboard:
Touchscreen:
Motion:	Motion Aiming Motion Pointing Motion Tilting Motion Gesture Motion Camera
Remap Controls:
Button Combinations:	Holding Down Buttons Optional Rapid Repeated Pressing Optional No Simultaneous Buttons
Controller Vibration:
Sensitivity:

Getting Started
Onboarding Before Play:
Assistance Getting Starting:	Tutorials Practice Area View Control Mapping Assistance With Controls Reaction-Time Not Critical Low Pressure Adjust Speed No Jump Scares
Assistance For Progressing:	Guaranteed Progress With God Mode Bank Progress With Frequent Checkpoints Assisted Progress With Boosts Assisted Progress With Hints Assisted Recall for Characters Assisted Recall for Narrative and Dialogue Save Progress Anytime

Reading
Reading Level:
Text Visibility:	Large Clear Text High Contrast Text
Subtitles:
Captions:
Voice Acted:

Navigation
Clarity:
Head-Up Display:
Menu Navigation:

Visual
Contrast:
Interactive Elements:
Visual Distractions:
Audio Cues for Visual Events:
Narration for Visual Elements:
	Motion Sickness Friendly
Colour Options:
Play Without Sight:
Violence:

Audio
	Balance Audio Levels
Audio Events:
	Play Without Hearing

Communication
Player-to-Player Online Communication:
Online Communication Assistance:

Difficulty
Difficulty Options:	Simple and Full Version No Memorisation Advantage No Hidden Information No Deceit Advantage No Colour Advantage No Mathematics Advantage No Weighing Decisions

Getting Started
Assistance Getting Started:	Clear Manual Electronic Version of Manual Electronic Version of Manual for Screen Readers Getting Started Video Digital Version Reference Aid
Assistance Progressing:	Play Order Tokens (Or play order doesn’t change) Reaction-Time Not Critical Low Pressure Low Impact Catch Up Rule

Reading
Reading Level:
Necessary Text Visibility:	Large Clear Text on Board (Or no text required) Large Clear Text on Cards (Or no text required) High Contrast Text (Or no text required) QR Code For Text (Or no text required) Primary and Secondary Text Distinguishable (Or no text required) Information Orientation Clear Icons

Physical
Pieces:	Components are Distinguishable by Touch Components are Replaceable No Non-Standard Dice (Or No Dice) No Tiny Pieces No Paper Money No Sprawl
Cards:	Large Card Size Standard Card Shape Limited Hand Management No Excessive Card Shuffling No Right-Handed Advantage
Placement:	No Unbound Placement Player Components Not Shared No Fiddly Placement Easily Verbalised Actions

Visual
Printed Visibility:	Colour Blind Friendly Design Double-Coding Colour High Contrast Colours
Component Identifiability:	Outline Key Elements No Busy Backgrounds Easily Verbalised Game State No Close Inspection Disadvantage Playable Without Sight

Audio
Communication:	Audio Cues Mirrored Visually (Or no critical audio signals) No Pressured Reveals No Pressured Communication Playable Without Hearing

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Gaming 101: Big Budget Games

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