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Best Role-Play Games

A role-playing video game, sometimes called role-playing or RPG for short, places the player in control of a character living in a deep fantasy or futuristic world. Like the table-top role-playing (Dungeons & Dragons) games they grew from, the focus is on creating an experience from the perspective of another person.

Role-Playing games form a strong backbone for other genres like Adventure and Narrative games. The strong sense of character is created by allowing the player control of the appearance, decisions and direction in the game. Some games create this with tight Fighting mechanics, or intricate dungeon Puzzles while others focus more at offering wider expansive choices with Open-Worlds and Strategic decisions.

DetailsGenre Details

Era: 1974 - 2023
Total Games: 485
Total Likes: 9,660
 

 

Animal Crossing: New Horizons

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

Animal Crossing: New Horizons is a role-play collecting game where you live on a small island teeming with life. Insects, fish, trees, vegetation and fossils are represented with cute cartoon visuals. Rather than the scale or grandeur of other game...

Stardew Valley

Release Date: 26/02/2016, updated in 2018

Out Now: Amazon Fire, Android, Mac, PC, PS Vita, PS4, Switch, Xbox One and iOS

Skill Rating: 9+ year-olds

Components: 2D Overhead, Day and Night, Grid, Open World and Pixels

Stardew Valley looks like a farming simulator. That’s partly what it is, but you also develop relationships with the other townsfolk and delve deep into the mines. Its quirky labyrinthine attention to detail is inviting for young players to try their...

Sea of Thieves

Release Date: 20/03/2018, updated in 2023

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

Skill Rating: 11+ year-olds

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

Sea of Thieves is an online game where you play a pirate searching for treasure and adventure. Cast into a large open sea you work with other online players to crew your ship and find treasure. The game has a main story but really focuses on creating...

Pokémon (Series)

Release Date: 27/02/1996, updated in 2019

Out Now: 3DS and 2DS, DS, GBA, Game Boy and Switch

Skill Rating: 8+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person and Cartoon

Pokémon Sword and Shield are role-playing games where you explore a fictional world and collect different creatures called Pokémon. You progress through the game by exploring the world, talking to characters and winning turn-based battles with the...

Fable (Series)

Release Date: 14/09/2004

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

Skill Rating: 11+ year-olds

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

Fable is an adventure role-playing game set in a fantasy world where your interactions with the world and villagers, and decisions about your use of magical power, substantially alter the story and the environment.

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 Long Dark

Release Date: 22/09/2014

Out Now: PC, PS4, Switch and Xbox One

Skill Rating: 11+ year-olds

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

The Long Dark is a thoughtful exploration-survival game where you have crash-landed in the icy Canadian wilderness after a global disaster and must find a way to survive. Through exploring, crafting and fighting you must look after your body...

My Time At Portia

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

Out Now: Mac, PC, PS4, Switch and Xbox One

Skill Rating: 7+ year-olds

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

My Time At Portia is an adventure role-play game set after civilization has been destroyed, and humans are emerging from underground to rebuild society. By gathering resources, crafting and building you slowly gain the tools to collect food, store...

Graveyard Keeper

Release Date: 15/08/2018

Out Now: PC, PS4, Switch and Xbox One

Skill Rating: 10+ year-olds

Components: 2D Overhead, Day and Night, Grid, Open World and Pixels

Graveyard Keeper is a funeral-themed role-playing game where you are the caretaker of a local cemetery. You make choices about how to lay out the plot, what services to offer and generally how to make money from your unusual enterprise. The pixilated...

Ni no Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch

Release Date: 17/11/2011, updated in 2022

Out Now: DS, PC, PS3, PS4, Switch, Xbox One and Xbox Series X|S

Skill Rating: 11+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person and Cartoon

Ni no Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch is a role-play game and an expanded version of the DS game Ni no Kuni: Dominion of the Dark Djinn. In it, you play a young boy who travels between worlds and battles enemies in an attempt to save his mother. It...

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

Elden Ring is a role-play game set in a fictional world created by fantasy novelist George R. R. Martin, with a focus on combat similar to Demon's Souls and an open world with real time and weather like Zelda Breath of the Wild.

Horizon Forbidden West

Release Date: 18/02/2022

Out Now: PS4 and PS5

Skill Rating: 13+ year-olds

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

Horizon Forbidden West is a post-apocalyptic action-adventure where you explore an overgrown landscape with now-crumbling remnants of modern life. The story of Aloy continues as she sets out to investigate a plague terminating from an arcane frontier...

Griftlands

Release Date: 14/06/2020, updated in 2021

Out Now: PC, PS4, Switch and Xbox One

Components: 2D Side-On, Cards and Hand-Made

Griftlands is an adventure game where you use cards to fight and negotiate your way through a broken-down sci-fi world. You will die or fail often, but then use your knowledge and growing deck of cards to have a better chance of survival on your next...

Pokémon Legends: Arceus

Release Date: 28/01/2022

Out Now: Switch

Skill Rating: 10+ year-olds

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

Pokémon Legends: Arceus is a game in the longstanding Pokémon series of role-playing games where you collect and battle Pokémon. Like the other games, you compete in turn-based battles and try and collect as many Pokémon as you...

Book of Travels

Release Date: 30/08/2021

Out Now: Mac and PC

Components: 3D Third-Person, Hand-Made and Open World

Book of Travels is a role-playing game. It's an unusual online game that focuses on the small rather than the massive. You explore an open world to find others to travel with, gather resources, craft items and learn abilities. It's a game that invites...

Pilgrims

Release Date: 07/10/2019, updated in 2022

Out Now: Apple TV, Mac, PC, Switch and iOS

Skill Rating: 7+ year-olds

Components: 2D Side-On, Cards, Cartoon and Hand-Made

Pilgrims is an adventure game where you collect cards to help the characters you meet. As you progress you assist them to complete their little stories by offering the right cards to the right people. It's a little like Scribblenauts but with less focus...

Sea of Stars

Release Date: 29/08/2023

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

Skill Rating: 10+ year-olds

Components: 2D Overhead, Open World and Pixels

Sea of Stars is an adventure role-play game about two children of the solstice. It combines turn-based combat, storytelling, exploration and interactions with the environment all in a pixel art style. Unusual for a role-play game, Sea of Stars also...

Stray Gods: The Roleplaying Musical

Release Date: 10/08/2023

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

Skill Rating: 10+ year-olds

Stray Gods: The Roleplaying Musical is a tongue-in-cheek narrative game set in a world where Greek Gods live among us. You play by talking to (and singing with) people and deciding who you can trust. It stands out not only for the branching narrative...

Baldur's Gate 3

Release Date: 21/12/1998, updated in 2023

Out Now: Mac, PC and PS5

Skill Rating: 12+ year-olds

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

Baldur's Gate 3 is a role-playing game that recreates the Dungeons & Dragons experience in a digital world. You explore the world and fight enemies by rolling dice and weighing up your stats to see what happens. But...

King Of The Castle

Release Date: 02/03/2023

Out Now: PC

Skill Rating: 12+ year-olds

Components: 2D Side-On and Cartoon

King Of The Castle is a narrative strategy game where you play a monarch battling nobles for power in a kingdom. The twist is that the nobles are controlled by other players who also have their own factions and objectives. You play by making decisions...

Slice and Dice

Release Date: 25/07/2021

Out Now: Android and PC

Skill Rating: 7+ year-olds

Components: 2D Overhead, Dice, Hand-Made and Pixels

Slice and Dice is a small retro adventure game you play by rolling dice to progress with your five heroes. More than this, the faces on the dice represent your party and determine not only who can attack or defend but how likely you are to roll them....

Dragon Quest Treasures

Release Date: 09/12/2022, updated in 2023

Out Now: PC and Switch

Skill Rating: 8+ year-olds

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

Dragon Quest Treasures is a lighthearted and more approachable version of the popular Dragon Quest role-play games. Along with the exploration, light battles and resource collection is a central monster-hunting hide-and-seek challenge where you get...

Barotrauma

Release Date: 13/03/2023

Out Now: PC

Skill Rating: 12+ year-olds

Components: 2D Side-On

Barotrauma is a cooperative space-submarine adventure set after humanity has fled to Jupiter's moon. You work with other players to steer your submarine, work the ageing machinery, fight monsters and fix the endless leaks. It's a game that revels in not...

Adore

Release Date: 18/02/2020, updated in 2023

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

Skill Rating: 8+ year-olds

Components: 2D Overhead

Adore is an action-adventure game where you play Lukha, who can summon and control creatures to fight by his side to offer simple yet satisfying combat. Each round you set out from the hub world, clearing out a region with the creatures you've chosen to...

West of Loathing

Release Date: 01/06/2018

Out Now: Mac, PC, Switch and iOS

Components: 2D Side-On and Hand-Made

West of Loathing is a comedic adventure where you roleplay as a stickman cowboy. The quipping characters and intricate puzzles work best with teenagers, but the slapstick comedy will make anyone laugh. Traverse snake-infested gorges, punch skeletons...

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...

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...

Disco Elysium

Release Date: 15/10/2019, updated in 2021

Out Now: Mac, PC, PS4, Stadia, Switch and Xbox One

Skill Rating: 14+ year-olds

Components: 2D Side-On and Hand-Made

Disco Elysium The Final Cut is a role-playing game set in the fictional city of Revachol where you play Harrier "Harry" Du Bois who must solve a complex murder. Unusually, your choices and actions not only determine how the story unfolds but affect...

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...

King of Dragon Pass

Release Date: 01/01/1999

Out Now: Android, PC and iOS

Components: 2D Side-On and Text

King of Dragon Pass is a fantasy strategy game where you control barbarian clans settling in the dangerous frontier region of Dragon Pass.

Roblox (Series)

Release Date: 15/06/2016, updated in 2022

Out Now: Amazon Fire, Android, Mac, PC, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S and iOS

Skill Rating: 7+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person

Roblox is a series of games where amateur game-makers create simple online games that often mimic real-world grown-up scenarios, like working in a pizza restaurant, surviving natural disasters, escaping prison, scuba diving or playing hide-and-seek. The...

L.O.L. Surprise Official Party (Roblox)

Release Date: 02/04/2021

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

Components: 3D Third-Person and Cartoon

L.O.L. Surprise Official Party is a Roblox game based on the popular collectable toy brand. You perform tasks such as opening furniture boxes to gain coins that are used to buy items linked to the toy brand, including interactive doll characters,...

Portal Knights

Release Date: 25/02/2016, updated in 2017

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

Skill Rating: 11+ year-olds

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

Portal Knights is an adventure set in a Minecraft-like world, but that focuses much more on role-play and characters. You still have the exploration and building elements, but also more story and monsters to take down.

Beholder (Series)

Release Date: 09/11/2016, updated in 2023

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

Components: 2D Side-On

Beholder is a detective game where you spy on tenants in a building, discover their secrets and report violations of laws to the authorities. As the game unfolds and you see more of the controlling totalitarian state, an uneasy tension develops between...

L.O.L. Surprise! Remix: We Rule The World

Release Date: 03/11/2020

Out Now: Switch

Components: 3D Third-Person and Cartoon

L.O.L. Surprise! Remix: We Rule The World is a puzzle game featuring the popular children's toys. You become an L.O.L. doll, visit music festivals and take on mini-games to win items to decorate your home. If you complete all the games you get to...

Boot Hill Bounties (Series)

Release Date: 15/12/2017, updated in 2020

Out Now: PC and Switch

Skill Rating: 10+ year-olds

Components: 2D Side-On, Open World and Pixels

Boot Hill Bounties, following on from Boot Hill Heroes is a comedic adventure into the Wild West. It combines spaghetti western gunslinging, outlaws, brave lawmen, and the untamed wilderness with a role-play experience.

Alt254

Release Date: 04/09/2020

Out Now: PC

Components: 2D Side-On and Pixels

Alt254 is a minimalistic adventure game. Using just a few pixels, it boils down the elements of adventuring (exploration, chests, enemies and landscapes) to the absolute minimum visual representation.

Takeshi and Hiroshi

Release Date: 18/08/2020

Out Now: Mac, Switch and iPhone, iPad

Skill Rating: 6+ year-olds

Components: 2D Side-On and Hand-Made

Takeshi and Hiroshi is a role-play adventure game about two brothers. Its unusual animation and light touch battles, where you chose your enemies rather than how to fight them, make it an ideal game to introduce the genre and for younger players.
...

The Adventures of Robin Hood

Release Date: 01/01/2021

Skill Rating: 8+ year-olds

Components: Bag, Board, Book, Figures, Placeables and Tokens

The Adventures of Robin Hood is a role-play game where you become Robin Hood and his Merry Men battling Prince John to bring order and peace to Sherwood Forest. You play by moving your Character figures around the board, following prompts in the...

Legacy of Dragonholt

Release Date: 01/01/2017

Skill Rating: 10+ year-olds

Components: Cards, Text and Tokens

Legacy of Dragonholt is a tabletop role-play game in the style of Dungeons & Dragons. Here though, things are approachable with less reading and no one (game master) who has to run the game. With up to six friends, you quickly build unique heroes...

Taming Gaming Book Written by parents for parents, the database complements the in-depth discussion about video game addiction, violence, spending and online safety in the Taming Gaming book. We are an editorially independent, free resource without adverts that is supported by partnerships.

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