RPGs really have come a long way since the days of the classic Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest games.
While those titles still certainly have their merits, the genre has evolved. No longer restricted to wandering around a top-down environment and encountering random turn-based battles, games have been able to pick and choose the elements they like and implement them in new and interesting ways.
If you’re looking for a new way to experience adventure, check out these top ten RPGs of 2019!
10. Tom Clancy's The Division 2Tom Clancy's The Division 2 gameplay
Tom Clancy's The Division 2 is for people who like guns, and especially shooting people with those guns. It’s an online action RPG that features a near-future setting with gritty, realistic warfare and lots of disease. You can play cooperatively with other players to tackle the post-pandemic cityscape, or if you’re feeling brutal, kill your fellow soldiers in intense PVP!
Top three things that make this game awesome:
- It takes place in a one-to-one recreation of Washington DC. Talk about your realism!
- The game has three dark zones where players can work together to beat tougher enemies and snag rare loot or turn on their team to plunder their earnings.
- Strong, satisfying gameplay that, while adding new specializations and features, will feel familiar to fans of the game’s predecessor.
Lookin’ good: I’m pretty sure stopping to pose in this environment will get you shot, but I gotta admit, you do look cool.
Amazon air delivery: Silly drone, I didn’t order bullets!
9. The Surge 2The Surge 2 gameplay trailer
Dark Souls is pretty dystopian, but what if it was in the future? The Surge 2, an upcoming title, offers such an experience, blending the brutal, unforgiving combat of the Souls franchise with a dystopian sci-fi setting. You play as a significantly badass man wearing a highly-customizable mech suit, fighting to survive a crumbling futuristic city rife with angry robots and tetanus.
Top three things that make this game awesome:
- Scavenging equipment from defeated enemies becomes even more satisfying with the addition of the ability to target and lop off specific limbs. You have to avoid destroying the gear you want to salvage during your fight!
- You can freely customize your mech suit, swapping out its various parts to better suit your playstyle.
- High-stakes battles where your rewards are multiplied with each kill, and if you’re offed yourself, you only have a short time to retrieve your loot before it disappears forever.
Avant-garde robot: See, this is what happens when you let art historians design your robots. They make a Venus de Milo battle droid.
Camera angle: Nice butt shot. I mean, hey, what’s over there…?
8. GreedFallGreedFall trailer and gameplay
GreedFall is an upcoming game about diplomacy, magic and old timey hats. You play as an explorer on a newly-discovered island whose native people suddenly find themselves beset by foreign settlers, merchants and treasure hunters. This game is an action RPG with a seventeenth century vibe and a wonderfully atmospheric setting.
Top three things that make this game awesome:
- An evolving story that changes based on the choices you make.
- Multiple characters and factions to ally yourself with and against, or even betray!
- A mix of combat and stealth directed at humans, elves and cool fantasy monsters, all of which will definitely try to kill you at some point.
Murder deer: Oh God, what is that?! I think it wants my soul!
Idyllic: It’s like a quaint seventeenth century painting of a farmer and his wife was invaded by an angry lizard dog.
7. Elder Scrolls Online – ElsweyrElder Scrolls Online – Elsweyr necromancer gameplay
The internet loves cats, so it would only make sense for them to invade the MMORPG world of Elder Scrolls Online in its latest expansion. This new addition to the game lets you explore Elsweyr, desert home of the Kajit and infinite sea of kitty litter. Experience classic Elder Scrolls gameplay in a whole new setting, now with fewer trees than ever before!
Top three things that make this game awesome:
- Necromeowncers have now been introduced into Elder scrolls online! Sorry, necromancers. How did that cat pun get in there…?
- A year-long story that starts with thirty hours of gameplay, but will be updated over time, with new content (including new locations) added later.
- There are dragons! Are you telling me Elder Scrolls Online didn’t have them before? What’s with that?!
The smell of roasted flesh: A shield isn’t going to help.
Anger cats: You spritzed them with water for jumping on the counter. Now they’ve come back for revenge.
6. BIOMUTANTBiomutant gameplay teaser trailer
What’s that, a kung fu action RPG that mixes close and long-range combat in which you explore a colorful post-apocalyptic world while playing as an adorable, furry creature? Where has this game been all my life?? This upcoming title features a large world to traverse, weapons to craft and customize and even robot parts that you can attach to your cute little mutant body!
Top three things that make this game awesome:
- A heavily customizable avatar whose physical features actually affect how you play.
- Varied modes of transportation. You can travel on foot for a more grounded experience, or you can take a more varied approach with an air balloon, a jet ski, or even a mech.
- Elemental weapons and cool mutant powers!
Character customization: It’s like choosing every detail of your very own kung fu gerbil at the pet store.
Open up and take your medicine: It’s bullets.
5. God Eater 3God Eater 3 gameplay
God Eater 3 is a post-apocalyptic anime-style monster hunting game. Its action-oriented gameplay is fast-paced and over the top, just like any good anime should be! The game features new varieties of monsters, known in the series as Aragami, many of which look like if a night terror had a body.
Top three things that make this game awesome:
- A dive dash attack that allows you to shoot forward, clearing more ground and striking enemies at the same time.
- Awesome weapons with flashy moves that make for a visually engaging battle.
- You can use burst moves: special, powerful abilities that can turn the tide of battle.
Coffin-snake-orb: Very relaxing.
Murder tops: Can presumably be escaped by ascending a staircase.
4. OutwardOutward gameplay
Outward is an open world survival RPG where you start off about as badass as your average NPC. Its combat is tough and merciless, and along with the need to eat, sleep and be wary of the environment, it really feels like you, the player, just up and decided to go on a fantasy adventure. It’s a lot more painful than it looks in the movies.
Top three things that make this game awesome:
- A magic system that varies heavily depending on your class, one of which allows you to combine spell components to suit your situation!
- A vast, colorful world with an excellent atmosphere that you can explore alone or with friends.
- Along with a night and day cycle, Outward also offers both weather and season systems, the conditions of which affect your character’s overall wellbeing.
Beautiful landscape: That corkscrew mountain could open a reeeeeally big bottle of wine.
Nature magic: The ultimate spell, grass lightning!
3. Code VeinCode Vein gameplay
Code Vein has you taking the role of an anime vampire in the apocalypse, which is just as edgy and cool as it sounds. This upcoming action RPG takes place after the near-destruction of humanity, where those who are left gain otherworldly powers by drinking blood. Travel through connected dungeons with a dystopian theme as you try to find a way to escape the living Hell of the game’s world, all the while trying not to become a brainless kill-zombie!
Top three things that make this game awesome:
- A cast of characters for you to team up with, each with their own story and combat style.
- Dozens of special vampire abilities that can empower you, weaken your foes, or just deal straight up damage to your target.
- The ability to switch your character’s build on the fly.
The grimdark aesthetic: Everyone here looks like a bad guy.
Apocalypse fashion: Fabric is probably pretty scarce after the apocalypse, I’m sure she just didn’t have enough material to repair the holes over her boobs. What’s that, everyone’s wearing full leather armor and fancy coats? Shhhhh, don’t think about it, you’ll ruin the magic.
2. The Outer WorldsThe Outer Worlds gameplay trailer
The Outer Worlds is an upcoming first-person RPG featuring both melee combat and gunplay, as well as a story that changes based on your choices and how you interact with the other characters in the environment. Also, it’s in spaaaaaaace! The Outer Worlds takes you to, well, an outer world, where you explore a space colony and work to uncover the true nature of the megacorporations that have taken over the future.
Top three things that make this game awesome:
- Recruitable companions who fight alongside you and have their own missions and stories.
- If you don’t feel like fighting, the option to avoid combat through stealth or diplomacy. Or both! We call stealthy diplomacy lying.
- A “flaws” system that helps make the game a bit more interesting. The flaw you choose will give you a set debuff or disadvantage but will balance out with a different character perk. It also gives your character a little bit of personal flavor!
Seuss in space: Are… are those Truffula Trees from Dr. Seuss’ The Lorax?
Señor Neon Gums: This thing is hideous, and I love it.
1. Borderlands 3Borderlands 3 gameplay
Borderlands is back! Or it will be later this year, at least. Borderlands 3, a continuation of the popular loot-based FPS series with an RPG-style skill tree and abilities, is sure to offer a brand-spanking-new adventure with the same great style with a whole heap of new content!
Top three things that make this game awesome:
- Play as one of four shiny, new vault hunters with shiny, new skills.
- Explore new worlds beyond Pandora, each with their own unique ecosystems!
- New combat abilities that go beyond the visceral joy of just shooting things in the face, such as crouch-sliding and wall-mounting.
4x buff: It’s like Popeye with performance enhancing spinach. That’s also magic.
Ostentatious robot death skull: This sums up the Borderlands franchise pretty well.
