We browsed through our game library, re-read our diaries, researched the hell out of the internet for the best RPGs of all time and here is the result. This infographic is meant to help you find the best RPG that suits your needs whenever you’re out of ideas.
You might’ve forgotten, but a few months ago, on a cold February afternoon, we released a humongous infographic on the internet containing (what we then thought) a definitive list of the best RPGs. It contained about 100 titles.
We have never been so wrong. After publishing the infographic we got TONS of feedback from our readers. It seems we missed about 400 titles, so we went back to the drawing board, dead-set to create the MOST COMPREHENSIVE resource of RPGs on the internet.
How It All Began
We won’t lie to you – it took a lot of work. Like, a lot. Gathering the data, centralizing the titles, neatly categorizing each game in the appropriate place, and not to mention designing the infographic itself, took a lot of grind and sweat.
- 3 weeks to gather the initial data, researching, and talking to friends,
- 1 week of proofreading and arguing with said friends about the differences between real-time with pause and turn-based games,
- Several hours making research on the difference between high fantasy and low fantasy only to understand that there is no consensus in the media on either definition, and we’re free to accept whichever option we wish,
- 2 days for our designer to come up with a structure that makes sense,
- Hours upon hours to find all the information required,
- 2 weeks of gathering your feedback and doubling the number of games
- Hours of our designer adding all them and alphabetizing all 500+ games per your request,
- 1836 layers in the Photoshop file,
- A full month of being proven wrong each day when we thought we knew a lot of RPG games.
Without further ado, here is THE most comprehensive illustrated guide to RPGs:
Marco Giuliani
Lead Editor
I can reproduce every scene from The Sopranos word by word. I also like to talk endlessly about weirdly specific game mechanics and tropes. But I guess that’s par for the course, right?
We Took Your Feedback Seriously
Little did we know back then that our work was far from finished. Turns out, there’s a lot of RPGs out there, so we’ve missed some of them. Others were included in the wrong category. So yeah, sorry for that.
So, to make it up to you guys, we’ve decided to update the infographic with more games and correct the mistakes. OK, ‘’more games’’ is putting it lightly – in its current form, it’s essentially double the infographic.
Of course, accomplishing this task would’ve been impossible without your help and constructive feedback, so we’d like to thank you all for your suggestions. Yes, even the ones who wished we’d suffer a horrible death for not including their favorite obscure 8bit RPG from 1981.
Contributors:
Marco Giuliani
Tania Preda
Baabuska
Mihai Raducu
PaachiharuIf this illustrated RPG guide hasn’t helped you find a next game to play, maybe the following articles will do the job. We have analyzed the best RPGs and broken down into genres to give you fresh recommandations for your next adventure.
Browse our favorite RPG games:
Divinity Original Sin 2 Guide: Fort Joy - The most comprehensive guide to Divinity Original Sin 2's Fort Joy area, complete with map, markers, secrets, and side-quests. - 28 Best Fantasy RPGs That Everybody Should Play At Least Once - Browse our list of the best fantasy RPGs of all time. From old isometric titles to the latest releases, we ranked our absolute favorites.
- Divinity Original Sin 2 Guide: Fort Joy - The most comprehensive guide to Divinity Original Sin 2's Fort Joy area, complete with map, markers, secrets, and side-quests.
- Here Are Our 9 Best Mobile RPGs - Here are our favorite mobile RPGs that you can play on the go.
- Divinity Original Sin 2 Guide: Fort Joy - The most comprehensive guide to Divinity Original Sin 2's Fort Joy area, complete with map, markers, secrets, and side-quests.
- 13 Awesome Games Set In Real Places - Here's a list of the best real setting games if you're tired of the same old fantasy universe.
- Divinity Original Sin 2 Guide: Fort Joy - The most comprehensive guide to Divinity Original Sin 2's Fort Joy area, complete with map, markers, secrets, and side-quests.
- 16 Best Sci Fi RPGs that Will Blow Your Mind - Browse our list of the best Sci Fi RPGs that will blow your mind and time away. From mainstream titles to niche isometric RPGs, we’ve taken into consideration all titles that feature Sci Fi elements and fun RPG mechanics.
- Divinity Original Sin 2 Guide: Fort Joy - The most comprehensive guide to Divinity Original Sin 2's Fort Joy area, complete with map, markers, secrets, and side-quests.
- 18 Upcoming RPGs That Look Incredible - Check out our list of the upcoming RPGs that we are excited about.
- Divinity Original Sin 2 Guide: Fort Joy - The most comprehensive guide to Divinity Original Sin 2's Fort Joy area, complete with map, markers, secrets, and side-quests.
- 33 Best Post-Apocalyptic Games of All Time - Roam and plunder the wastelands in our selection of great post-apocalyptic games.
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Hey Guys
Just stumbled across this article. I spent the last three weeks at home during the pandemic putting together my list of the greatest games of all time.
I was just curious to see what my list would be and actually how many I own of those games on my list.
My list was a couple hundred games of all genres not just RPG‘s.
So coming across the title of your article I was excited with a ton of glee looking forward to reading it.
I can imagine how hard it was to put together this list as it took me several weeks myself researching online and looking through my collection that was a staggering amount of work.
I am not old, but I am not 23. (63)
I am very much looking forward to your list and seeing it compared to mine.
A small correction: Wizardry 8 is real time with pause. I would also suggest an indication of witch games are multiplayer.
Guys … Vaporum is not High Fantasy – it’s Steampunk … trust me … I should know … 😉
Consider adding the gold box titles from SSI to this list. They are very formative turn based dungeons & dragons crpgs.
Mind if I repost this on another site with a link back to this site?
Hey Ham, of course not. We would love for our guide to be featured on other platforms. Thanks <3
Couple of errors on that list:
Dead state is not High Fantasy but Post Apocalyptic
Dead Island Series is also not Low Fantasy but Post Apocalyptic
Legend of Grimrock is not Turn Based, it’s real time (would be great if it was turn based)
Don’t see why Gothic is mentioned as Gothic Series and Avadon 2 /Avernum 2 are just mentioned alone, even though all Avernum/Avadon Games are Turn based and fit into same criteria.
I’d also add some more classic Dungeon Crawlers there. Lands of Lore is a big one. So is Realms of Arkania (not really a dungeon crawler but fits into first person turn based). But Stonekeep is missing as well. And then there are games like Ishar, Albion Anvil of Dawn and others.
Ofc Ultima as one of the oldest and biggest ones should be mentioned as well. (as isometric action and Ultima 9 as third person action)
I’d also replace the “Windows” to either Windows/Dos or just “PC” or even Home Computer to also Cover C64, Apple 2, Amiga and whatnot.
Hey Kordanor,
Thank you for the suggestions. We will take them into account as we continue to improve our list. “PC” as a category is also a great idea.
Cool list 🙂 I admire the work u guys have done. Just a tip. I would suggest use Indesign (instead of Photoshop) for the main layout. That could probably cut the time spent on the layout in half.
Thank you for the feedback! That is a good idea 🙂
sorry but have to ask , where is Ultima Online? The Ultima Series? Richard Garriotte (Lord British) has been refered to as the father of the RPGMMO for years. I know he is now appearing to be just another money hungry simpleton, but still the Ultima Series is still being honored and brought forward and UO was played for and payed for form more than 20 years and is still out there in FTP formats.
I sent them an email on this as well. Along with being massively influential (Ultima IV, V, VIII, Online, Underworld), several entries in the series routinely make All-Time lists. Pretty big omission when talking about RPGs over a span of 40 years.
We seem to have skipped that title. Thank you for taking the time to leave this comment. We will continue improving the list and finding better ways to include all the noteworthy titles.
Final Fantasy IX should be High fantasy & turn-based. It’s gameplay is virtually the same as all the Final Fantasy games you have already listed un turn-based.
The game also fits all of you High fantasy criteria. The only argument for the Scifi setting is thattechnically some of the characters (3 I think?) came from outer space. This discovery comes late in the game and is hardly enough to label a game that spends the other 90%+ of it’s time in a medieval fantasy/borderline steampunk setting, not unlike Final Fantasy VI which is under high fantasy
an amazing info-graphic, just what i need to find my next game. Thanks!