Top RPGs of All Time

Dragon Age: Inquisition contains a fantasy world so rich and well developed, you might want to go there on vacation if it weren’t for all the monsters. Its story, about closing a breach in the fabric of the world, is about as epic as single-player games get. And its character creation options are nearly limitless. But its most impressive achievement, and the reason players keep coming back to it, is the characters. Inquisition is stocked with sharply written, well acted characters that come to feel like good friends by the time the game is over. Any game that can deliver that kind of experience is worth playing at least once.

One of the lesser known long-running RPG series is Ys (pronounced “ees”). It’s a shame it’s not more popular, because Ys has been offering up enjoyable action RPGs regularly since the 1980s. What you get in this collection, originally released on TurboGrafx-CD but now available more widely, is enhanced remakes of the franchise’s first two installments. The games center around Adol Christin, a redheaded hero on a quest to collect the books of Ys and takes on the evil forces rampaging through the world. With splashy real-time combat and eye-catching anime cut scenes, this collection helped prove that CD was the gaming medium of the future.

Kingdom Hearts 2 considerably ups the combat possibilities of its predecessor, introducing new forms — and snazzy new suits — for Sora to wear. The addition of the Reaction Command in combat also spices battles up, making for a combat experience made even more varied by the addition of the new Nobodies enemies. By streamlining some of the first Kingdom Heart's systems, including magic and the awful Gummi Ship levels — not to mention deepening the lore to stranger, more engaging depths — the first numbered sequel in the 15 year old franchise is still one of its strongest and one of the most fun to play.

Some people like short games: get in, have fun, and move on. Dragon Warrior VII is not for those people. This endlessly charming RPG is so packed with quests and breezy conversations that you can play it for well over 100 hours without ever running out of things to do. You don’t even unlock the class system for your party until around 20 hours in. And while the PlayStation version is a great game worthy of this list, the 3DS remake has some added bonuses, including a new translation, visible enemies instead of random encounters, and even more content — as if 100 hours wasn’t enough.

When it comes to influential JRPG franchises, Final Fantasy sits near the very top of the list. Not only did the first game offer one of the most ambitious adventures available on the NES at the time, but it also spawned a series that now comprises dozens of sequels and spinoffs. With its relatively robust class system, its four-character party, and steady injection of new gameplay ideas throughout the adventure, Final Fantasy helped cement a whole host of RPG tropes that would remain for decades to come. Without this game, many of the RPGs on this list would probably be very different games — if they’d even exist at all.

Calling EVE Online epic doesn’t really do it justice. This long-running MMO contains thousands of star systems you can explore at your leisure (unless space pirates show up and blast you to oblivion). It presents players with a universe to explore and a basic set of gameplay systems. What you do with that is up to you, thanks to open-ended gameplay that rewards creativity and collaboration. You can join up with other players and take part in multi-day space battles, or you can go off and mine resources to sell for a profit at the next space station. If you want to blow tens of thousands of real-life dollars building a city-sized space ship, you can do that too. The universe is your oyster.

Mario was no stranger to RPGs, but Superstar Saga brought Luigi into the fold and kicked off a now-classic series of handheld RPGs. Superstar Saga finds the plumber brothers teaming up with Bowser to get Princess Peach’s voice back from the villainous Cackletta. To do so, they engage in some of the most enjoyable action RPG-ing you’ll find in any game, handheld or otherwise. The story is shot through with humor that plays out in the script, but also in the many expressive character animations packed into the game. Even many of the attacks are clever, like when Mario uses a fireball to set Luigi’s rear end on fire, sending him charging into enemies.

When the spirit of the earth asks you to do something, you do it. That’s what kicks off this action RPG about a boy on a quest to collect Mystic Statues and bring them to the Tower of Babel to save the world from ultimate destruction. But it’s not just the story that makes Illusion of Gaia one of the best in its genre. It’s the Earth-like setting that features locations both real and mythical. It’s the combat, which starts out simple and becomes much more complex as you learn surprising new abilities. And then there’s the soundtrack, which sticks in your head long after you’ve reached the tower, saved the world, and tried to figure out the ambiguous ending.

On paper, Valkyria Chronicles doesn’t seem like it should work. For one thing, it shoehorns shooter mechanics into a turn-based strategy game. For another, it uses anime art to depict a setting very much like Europe during World War II. But somehow Sega took these seemingly incongruous ingredients and cooked up a truly impressive game. The battles are tactical but intense, thanks to a perspective that lets you plot your moves from an overhead view of the battlefield before swooping down and giving you direct control of your troops as you put your plan into action. The characters are well written, and the game actually seems to have something to say about war. It’s rare for a game to try to blend this many ideas into a single package. It’s far more rare for the result to be this brilliant.

The Legend of Dragoon follows Dart, a traditional RPG protagonist who just really can’t catch a break. His parents are killed, his hometown is destroyed — twice — and on his way home from a journey to avenge them he’s attacked by a really cool dragon. The graphics at the time were exceptional, and although Dragoon wasn’t the first RPG with turn-based combat to use an action cue system to make battles more engaging, that is one aspect that made the game memorable.

Disgaea: Hour of Darkness kicked off the popular strategy game series, setting up the franchise’s signature humor and systems with the arrogant Laharl’s quest to reclaim the demon throne and become Overlord of the Netherworld. Hour of Darkness featured several unique systems, like the ability to capture enemies and turn them into allies, though at the risk of killing some of your own units, and a complex “geo panel” system that let skilled players set up gratifying chain reactions during battle. Most of all, it's the game’s irreverant humor that gives it staying power and has earned it a cult following.

Development on the Neverwinter Nights series passed from BioWare to Obsidian for the full-fledged sequel in 2006, but the game didn’t exactly suffer for it. Following an orphaned adventurer investigating relics called Silver Shards, NW2 improved on the first game in marked ways, especially in its narrative. More importantly, it featured online co-op and a development toolset with which players could create their own scenarios for the game, both of which helped ensure Neverwinter Nights 2 would have an avid following to this day.

Before Mass Effect and Dragon Age (although after Baldur’s Gate, Neverwinter Nights, and Knights of the Old Republic, to be fair), there was BioWare’s Jade Empire, an original Xbox game that proved console RPGs could be great. With the traditional story of a martial arts student thrust on a quest to save their master, Jade Empire wowed players with its engrossing world and its surprisingly nuanced dual philosophies, the Way of the Open Palm and the Way of the Closed Fist (mirroring BioWare’s success developing “light” and “dark” paths for Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic).

Sometimes all a game needs is a second chance, and Odin Sphere got one with Odin Sphere Leifthrasir in 2016. A remake of the 2007 PlayStation 2 original, Leifthrasir improved on it in every way, with better combat and AI, more environments, and many redesigned systems that ironed out the game’s kinks and let its strengths shine through. Those strengths include a dramatic, twist-filled story, a plethora of playable characters, and, perhaps most of all, Vanillaware’s signature hand-drawn art style.

It’s amazing what one person can accomplish, and Undertale is proof. Toby Fox wrote and designed, developed, composed the music for, and released Undertale solo, his only help from additional artists. And it took the gaming world by storm, largely thanks to its deceptively simple story and combat systems, which worked together to conceal great narrative depth. Undertale turns nearly every RPG trope in existence on its head, while simultaneously feeling good as an RPG — a truly incredible feat.

An “official Advanced Dungeons & Dragons computer product,” Pool of Radiance cast you as a band of heroes battling monsters and other enemies in and around the town of Phlan. It was the first adaptation of Advanced D&D, helping set the precedent for western RPGs for the last three decades, from Baldur’s Gate to The Witcher 3. It even let players export their characters into later games in the series, another precursor of things to come.

Dragon Quest VIII is considered by many fans to be among the best entries in the series, which is saying something for a franchise this popular. This was back in the height of cartoonish, cel-shaded graphics, but even then this game stood out for its gorgeously rendered world. It also managed to be less complex than some of its predecessors, eschewing a complicated job system, which many players — weary of convoluted systems in contemporary RPGs — found refreshing.

Phantasy Star Online involved a lot of firsts, not just for the series but for RPGs in general. It eschewed the turn-based combat of the previous games in favor of more action-oriented gameplay, and more importantly its impressive network features let players from all over the world connect and play with each other, with innovative communication options including unique emoji and other symbols. The sci-fi adventure singlehandedly provided a good reason to own a Dreamcast, not to mention many players’ first experience with an online RPG.

Breath of Fire and Breath of Fire II were classics in their own right, but Breath of Fire III goes down in history as the one that brought the series into 3D. It also featured voice acting for the first time in the series, not to mention being remembered for its jazzy soundtrack by composers Yoshino Aoki and Akari Kaida. A memorable story involving Ryu, the last survivor of a race of people who can transform into dragons, didn’t hurt, and combined all these elements ensured Breath of Fire III’s place in history.

Shining Force II wasn’t directly connected to its predecessor, but it was praised at the time for its considerable length and the freedom it afforded players. A relatively complex class system and extensive backgrounds for each character helped make the game distinct, while its grid-based combat system made Shining Force II ahead of its time.

There was a Pokemon-like creature collection element to Golden Sun’s Djinn system, but this Game Boy Advance RPG wasn’t riding any coattails. With fantastic graphics, a deep turn-based combat system, and puzzle-based gameplay that pushed the boundaries of what RPGs could do outside of combat, Golden Sun was a landmark. And the fact that it was all on the tiny Game Boy Advance was even more to its credit.

Namco’s expansive Tales series continues to this day, but Tales of Vesperia will always stand out from the rest thanks to its improvements to the series’ signature Linear Motion Battle System and its detailed, attractive anime-style graphics. Following Yuri Lowell and his guild Brave Vesperia, Tales of Vesperia also featured an engrossing story involving abuse of Blastia energy that threatens the very planet. Nobody even cared that this was the basic plot of Final Fantasy VII (and many other RPGs) as well.

Super Mario RPG launched multiple future spin-off series for the famous plumber, including the Mario & Luigi and Paper Mario games. But the original will always be remembered for its impressive (at the time!) graphics, unique cast (Bowser joining Mario’s side was novel at the time), and surprisingly engrossing story. Fan petitions to include Geno, one of the game’s many original characters, in Super Smash Bros. persist to this day.

The World Ends With You featured a really cool story about combatants thrust into a mysterious Hunger Games-like competition in an alternate dimension of Tokyo’s famous Shibuya district, requiring multiple playthroughs to unlock all its secret narrative twists. But if you remember the original Nintendo DS version for one thing, it’s probably the game’s insane battle system, which required controlling two characters simultaneously on the system’s top and bottom screens. It’s a demanding but totally unique system that, combined with an inimitable style, made The World Ends With You a classic.

Phantasy Star IV is as classic as classic gets when it comes to JRPGs, with the turn-based battles and top-down exploration that epitomizes traditional JRPG tropes. It was even criticized on its original release for its outdated graphics. But there’s nothing wrong with that retro look. Thanks to an involved combat and magic system, a solid story set 1,000 years after Phantasy Star II, and themes dealing with global climate catastrophe, it remains more than relevant today.

Stardew Valley captured hearts by feeling like a throwback to a simpler time in gaming, combining all the best bits of classic home-and-hearth games like Harvest Moon and Animal Crossing. It singlehandedly breathed new life into the genre with its polished presentation, deep farming systems, and remarkable freedom. Stardew Valley set its roots deep in the gaming consciousness, and with a Nintendo Switch release coming in 2017, it’s surely here to stay.

At heart, Persona 5 is a game about shaking off the chains of contemporary society. Oh, sure, it's got some exciting turn-based combat, too, but nothing else about it leaves a mark on your soul quite like its leaps from hobnobbing around a Tokyo high school to venturing inside the dungeons of wayward adults and physically battling their personal demons. There's so much here, whether it's dungeons with hidden rooms or branching paths, or weighty modern themes centering on suicide and drug use. Its intimate explorations of multiple characters also make it an intensely personal story, and one that shouldn't be missed.

BioWare first made its name with fantasy RPGs, and Dragon Age: Origins marked a generally triumphant update to its tradition of pause-based combat mechanics and party micromanagement. But its chief strength was its grim setting in a dark fantasy world that married the high fantasy of The Lord of the Rings with the low fantasy of A Song of Ice and Fire, where elves are treated like trash and magic brought with it terrible prices. It's also a character-driven game in true BioWare fashion, with the standout performance coming from Claudia Black as the role of the witch Morrigan.

One of the most appealing aspects of Persona 3 is the way it jumps between what passes through the real world and fantasy, and it pulls it off while being effortlessly cool. The narrative follows a high school student whose extracurricular activities partly involve fighting creatures that gnaw on human minds during the "Dark Hour," and he's surrounding by memorable characters who aid him in this task. Its greatest legacy, though, is the first appearance of the Social Links system, which lets the player level personas (the manifestation of one's inner self) while doing normal-world activities as well as by fighting monsters.

As big as the Dark Souls games are today, it's still pretty easy to find players who've never even heard of their PS3-exclusive predecessor Demon's Souls. But the skeleton of what would come to define Hidetaka Miyazaki's later creations were already in place there, whether it's the minimal story, the high likelihood of death at every turn, or the ability to see how other players died from their blood pools.

You'll have to read a lot in Xenogears, but it's worth it. Throughout its many hours, the plot weaves through religious references and philosophical ideas by the likes of Friedrich Nietzsche, all while also prompting deep thoughts about the relationship between humankind and machines. Naturally, it also lets you stomp around in a giant, spiky mech. It's an ambitious package of near constant wonder, crafted with stellar graphics for the period and complemented with a memorable soundtrack.

You have to dig under a pile of glitches and bugs in an unpatched version of Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines, but if you persist, you'd quickly find one of the most rewarding RPGs ever made. Set in White Wolf's vampire universe and more specifically in Los Angeles, Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines isn't only about sucking blood wherever you can safely find it, but also about shaping your tale according to your actions, beliefs, and your choices. Few RPGs do this better. It's especially successful because few works in any media have ever captured a vampiric setting so well, and Bloodlines uses every drop of this atmosphere to add meaning to everything from fascinating rivalries between vampire clans to hungry hunts for rats in dirty alleys.

Ogre Battle: March of the Black Queen is the tale of the Knights of Zenobia, who are locked in war with the dastardly Holy Zeteginean Empire. But that never really matters so much as the gameplay, which featured the then-unique approach of using tarot cards to influence troops in its automatic battles and taking advantage of the resulting victories to gobble up more territory on a strategic map. Reputation points gained from interactions with NPC factions are important as well, to the point that your choices could lead you to one of 13 different endings.

Post-apocalyptic imagery is somewhat in vogue these days, and thus it's hard to imagine how startlingly original Fallout seemed back during its initial release. This was the age of high-fantasy RPGs that stayed close to Dungeons & Dragons rulesets, but drawing from the earlier RPG Wasteland, Fallout shook up that tendency with fears about radiation, ghoulish societies, and a landscape dotted with the rusty husks of 1950s-style cars and structures. It's serious stuff, in a way, but the whole adventure thrives on a sense of humor and pop-culture references that grant it an uncommon vitality even today.

Neverwinter Nights spins a good Dungeons & Dragons yarn about a deadly plague and a nefarious cult, and it features one of composer Jeremy Soule's most memorable soundtracks prior to his famed work with Morrowind and Skyrim. But it's the dungeon tools for level creation that make Neverwinter Nights so influential and memorable, as they almost flawlessly allowed players to create their own dungeons and campaigns according to the pen-and-paper rules of Advanced Dungeons and Dragons. That was impressive in itself, but the inclusion of an excellent multiplayer system helped make Neverwinter Nights a smash hit.

Advanced Dungeons & Dragons laid the framework for many early digital RPGs, but by the time the '90s drew to a close, sticking faithfully to the conventions of the pen-and-paper version was starting to prove disastrous. But then a fledgling studio named BioWare shook the hallowed RPG property out of its slump. Baldur's Gate stunned players with an isometric version of the Forgotten Realms universe awash in vibrant colors and a landscape populated with memorable characters like hamster-loving Minsc, who'd beat you up if you put off helping him track down his partner for too long. A triumph of storytelling that presaged its superior successor, Baldur's Gate kicked off a renaissance of story-rich RPGs that we're arguably still living today.

Other games emphasize choice, but few showed the effects of those choices over the long game quite like Dragon Quest V did when it launched for the Super Famiconm. The tale here spans an entire three decades, with the hero changing in alignment with the paths taken. It also marks the introduction of the Dragon Quest series' now-familiar ability to let monsters you fight join your party much in the style of the later Pokémon series. It's also remarkable for having a playable pregnancy, a concept that would later influence games like Fable II and The Sims.

Ultima IV: Quest of the Avatar is the video game as morality play. For perhaps the first time in computer RPG history, here was a game that wasn't about defeating a bad guy or unshackling the world from the yoke of evil, but rather about learning to embody eight virtues that made you a better person and thus an inspiration to the surrounding world. Kindheartedness, not battle prowess, is the true star here. This was revolutionary stuff at the time, and over three decades later, it remains so. Alas, it's a little rough to get into these days owing to its complexity and sluggish gameplay, but it remains a profound counterpoint to arguments that RPGs corrupt rather than correct.

Pokémon has always been fun, but it's also clung tenaciously to the over-familiar pattern of venturing into gyms for your battles. That all changed in Pokemon Sun and Moon, and for the better. It's a game that's focused on the outdoors, specifically a lovely region named "Alola" modeled on Hawaii, and the hours that follow deliver a satisfying balance of roleplaying and Pokemon battles. It's not just about fighting, though — you'll also find quizzes, scavenger hunts, and a heavy dose of local lore that makes Alola feel real in a way no other Pokémon setting has before. And as a treat, Pokémon Sun and Moon also cleans up the clutter the user interface had built up from previous games without sacrificing depth.

There's little subtlety in the Monster Hunter universe — you largely end up doing exactly what the title says. But Monster Hunter 4 ensured all that monster hunting was monstrously fun. Verticality stole the show here, with players being able to scramble up walls or vault up surfaces and then leap down to briefly ride the monsters themselves. More impressively, it managed to accomplish these advanced feats while emerging as the most approachable game in the series. These elements alone were enough to make it good, but an extended variety of weapon and a satisfying local and online multiplayer mode push it to greatness.

To the untrained eye, Bloodborne may seem like Dark Souls in different clothes. But oh, what clothes they are. Bloodborne's gothic, vaguely Lovecraftian setting of Yharnam is just as sad as it is unsettling, and the haunting violins of the score rub that sadness ever deeper into your soul. But it also plays well, opting for a far more aggressive style than what you get in director Hidetaka Miyazaki's other creations, forcing players to take increasingly larger risks for the sweet, sweet rewards. There are minimal options for long-ranged and magic and the only shield you do find is little more than a sick joke — all you have to stay alive is the intensity of a blade against the hostile Victorian darkness.

What would Star Trek look like if humans still carried big guns and all of Gene Roddenberry's '60s goofiness was thrown out the airlock? Bioware showed us a decade ago, and that vision captivates us even today. The first entry isn't as strong as the two games that followed, thanks in part to the weak AI in combat and those tedious rides in the Mako across dull alien terrain. But few if any games before had nailed voice acting, facial animations, and character models with such perfection, to the point that it feels like an interactive movie in the best sense of the term. RPGs would never be the same again.

Ultima VII: The Black Gate built on the Ultima series in new, even revolutionary ways. It shed the famously clunky UI of previous games to allow more of its refreshingly detailed world to shine through. Instead, checking your inventory or looting happened in pop-up menus, which not only carried into future Ultima titles, but games outside the RPG genre too. Ultima VII also dropped the strict, grid-based approach to movement, introduced dialogue trees, and went real-time. Its innovations to the format are matched only by its impressive interactivity and the non-linearity of its main plot. You’re free to roam around its open world, pick up sidequests, forge weapons, bake bread, hang out in a pub, and even committ crimes. Ultima VII managed to root itself comfortably in the conventions it created, but still have the sophistication to move forward in awesome new ways.

Smartly combining themes of action, role playing, survival horror, and first-person shooters, System Shock 2 expertly defies simply being a great RPG, showing how innovative mechanics that play off each other can make a game more than the sum of its parts. It also pioneered several methods of storytelling through gameplay that we take for granted — like finding doomed audio logs or reliving echoes of the past that urge you to piece together the larger puzzle of what's really going on. The unsettling and moody atmosphere of the derelict starship go hand in hand with bioengineered horrors that roam free to create the perfect horror environment, and leave you feeling terrified no matter which of the many skills you choose to give your character. There's always multiple ways to solve a problem, letting you get truly creative in ways that never feel out of place with the character you've built.

The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind wasn’t just the first truly modern game in the long-running series, but the one that laid the foundation for all the ones to follow. A smart, action-dependent approach to leveling lets players build out their character naturally, rather than adjusting numbers in a stat menu. An abundance of quests and the freedom to carve out your own path in its world is almost overwhelming. Its visuals were technically impressive for the time and imaginatively stylish enough to hold up even today, making the island of Vvardenfell one of the most memorable settings in the series. But the wonder of Morrowind isn’t a mere technical one. The huge scope and scale of Bethesda’s vision, its overwhelming sense of awe and mystery, and the freedom found therein make it still worth a visit today.

Tactics Ogre: Let Us Cling Together was unlike other turn-based tactics games at the time. It stands out with its dark, riveting storyline inspired by real-life events like the Yugoslav Wars and Bosnian Genocide. The focus on more serious themes means players are often forced to make difficult decisions with sometimes devastating moral implications. With a non-linear plot modeled after visual novels and full of branching paths, turning points, and multiple endings, Tactics Ogre became more than a mere strategy RPG.

With Final Fantasy Tactics, Yasumi Matsuno took everything we thought was sacred about the Final Fantasy series and turned it on its head. While Tactics maintained the familiar creatures and archetypes we all knew and loved, it introduced us to the world of Ivalice, and leaned heavily into the Job system introduced in Final Fantasy V. While the core stable of characters provided a ton of memorable drama, being able to recruit generic characters and fashion them into roles ranging from simple (Knight and Wizard) to downright bizarre (Mime and Calculator) led to an infinite well of depth. While you had to put in some effort to wrap your head around the tactical battle system, the rewarding feeling of mastering the complex systems made it absolutely worth it.

Suikoden II is a special RPG for so, so many reasons. It perfectly balances intimate character drama and friendship with end-of-the-world heroics. Luca Blight is an especially twisted and evil villain in a genre filled with great villains. And of course it’s incredibly rewarding and addictive to solve minigames and puzzles to recruit all 108 hidden characters. A shockingly high number of them can be taken into battle with you, and all of them enrich your castle with interesting dialogue and improvements. Suikoden II’s warm soundtrack and art, snappy combat, and Game of Thrones-esque political storyline are all fantastic, but it’s this castle building minigame-to-end-all-minigames that truly sets the game apart. Your castle is your home, and filling it with artists, shopkeepers, alliance leaders, and so many more friends and comrades results in an incredibly satisfying mixture of gameplay, story, and friendship.

Coming just a year after the groundbreaking original Fallout, 1998’s Fallout 2 somehow found the time to improve on it in nearly every way. Building on the “go where you want, kill who you want” freedom of the open-world exploration and turn-based tactical combat foundation, Fallout 2 tells many small stories, each with their own important-feeling resolutions inside its larger plot, making it flexible enough to allow you to make the wasteland your own. The setting is diverse and dense, thanks to an even-larger slice of the post-apocalyptic West Coast inhabited by everything from primitive tribespeople battling giant insects to the Brotherhood of Steel standing against terrors brought by the power-armored Enclave and brutish supermutants. Throughout it all, there’s an injection of pop-culture humor that keeps the dark mood from becoming oppressive, so no matter which direction you set out in you never know if you’ll find something terrible or sad or funny.

Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic was not only one of the first to let you truly explore the vast untapped universe of Star Wars before the events of the films, but let everyone play out the ultimate fantasy of becoming a Jedi Knight (or a Sith Lord!) in what is probably the best and most satisfying execution of a binary good/evil choice system in a game. Knights of the Old Republic also offered up a great cast of side characters with intriguing and complex relationships (not to mention the best snarky assassin droid this meatbag could ever ask for), and set up one of the greatest player character twists in an RPG.

FromSoftware has been redefining the RPG since King’s Field. While Demon’s Souls was the first game to introduce modern gamers to the studio’s uniquely unforgiving approach to the genre, FromSoftware really hit their stride in its spiritual successor, Dark Souls. With a focus on exploration, Dark Souls pushes players to experiment and take risks in ways few action RPGs have before, and in which few have truly captured since. It defies the hand-holding nature of its peers and forces us to make mistakes in order to grow — whether that means learning how to cautiously navigate its deadly world, take down one of its many imposing bosses, or just level our stats properly. It creates massive challenges out of combat situations that would be minor in any other game, making every moment memorable and every small victory an exhilarating reward.

By the time we've returned to Commander Shepard in this sequel, we have an idea of the threats and mysteries looming over the Milky Way. Mass Effect 2 gives us the chance to get to know them on a personal level with revamped combat that greatly improves upon its predecessor. Mass Effect 2's creative take on RPG systems are more welcoming with its blend of third-person shooter mechanics, and its variety and focus on the new squad members make for a memorable (and sometimes heartbreaking) campaign.

For all intents and purposes, Vagrant Story should not have been a PlayStation game. The sheer volume of systems interacting with each other and the top notch graphics should have crippled the Sony's little system. But somehow, we got to experience Yasumi Matsuno's dungeon crawling masterpiece mere months before the PS2's US launch. You play as Ashley Riot, a member of the elite "Riskbreaker" unit of the Valendia Knights of Peace. Dropped into a haunted city in the middle of a civil war, you must contend with religious zealots, cult leaders, and all manners of ghosts and monsters as you unravel the mysteries of Leá Monde and uncover the truth behind the murder of a Duke. Heavy stuff for a PSX game, but it's handled masterfully through beautiful art direction and some extremely impressive localization. You can also craft gear, chain abilities in combat, explore a massive dungeon called "The Iron Maiden," target specific body parts on enemies, employ super moves, solve puzzles in 360 degree environments, and take on some of the toughest enemies Square Enix ever created. Vagrant Story is the definition of a cult classic, and is undisputedly worthy of the number nine spot on this list.

What many consider not just the pinnacle of the Diablo series, but the pinnacle of the isometric action RPG genre we’ve come to know and love, Diablo II is truly something more than its parts. From its dark, moody music and visual trappings, to its lengthy and lofty story, Blizzard’s return to its series that pits angels against demons with man trapped in the middle is a masterclass in atmospheric adventuring. Made both accessible and engaging by its unique classes and skills, the endless satisfaction of its kill and loot gameplay, and its near limitless equipment variety and character customization, Diablo II's cooperative play and item trading helped to successfully foster not only a communal spirit in each procedurally generated level of each dank dungeon, but one of the greatest roleplaying experiences of all time.

The creators of Planescape: Torment aimed to subvert RPG clichés from the start, and the result is what several critics have called one of the best-written and most imaginative video games ever created. Despite being rooted in a Dungeons & Dragons campaign setting and adhering to Advanced D&D 2nd Edition rules, so much of Planescape: Torment is driven by sharp and engaging dialogue instead of combat. It takes the static alignment system of Dungeons & Dragons — a framework that has inspired RPGs from the beginning — and flips it on its head, daring to ask bigger questions about the nature of “right” and “wrong,” and making every single decision one to remember. Planescape: Torment’s experimental approach to RPG norms, twisted sense of humor, strikingly dark, but fresh setting, and tendency to elevate even the most minor conversations with weighty philosophical questions combine to create a unique personality unsurpassed in the last two decades.

When it initially launched in 2004, Blizzard’s World of Warcraft rapidly became the most popular and beloved MMORPG ever made thanks to its accessibility, exceptionally high degree of polish, and its sheer size and scope. Even if WoW never evolved past this vanilla state, it would still be remembered fondly as an incredible RPG filled with epic dungeons, surprisingly compelling Player vs. Player encounters, satisfying non-combat crafting and social gameplay, and more well-written, hand-crafted quests and adventures than it felt possible for a single RPG to contain. But what elevates World of Warcraft above “Great” and into “Greatest of All-Time” discussions is the care and attention Blizzard has poured into the game in the 13 years since. The game has never stood still. Completely new worlds, revamped old worlds, balanced and well-integrated new classes, risky storytelling, and an almost impossible-to-count volume of quality-of-life improvements have made an already amazing game experience even more amazing, more than a decade later.

In a medium that sees regular and massive advances in graphics and processing power, the relative low-fi appearance of Baldur’s Gate II might seem insufficient. But it’s a testament to the power of the storytelling and mechanics of Baldur’s Gate that the series still delivers a roleplaying experience that’s as good or better than games released 15 years later. Following on the success of Baldur’s Gate in 1998, BioWare surpassed gamers’ expectations with the sequel. In addition to the robust implementation of the current D&D rules, Baldur’s Gate II included massive environments, thrilling turn-based tactical combat, and enough side quests to fill any fantasy lover’s bookshelf. But the real stars of the game were the characters and the story. From the terrifying and complicated villain to the lovable, and lovably hilarious Minsc, Baldur’s Gate II was a fantasy epic as big and wonderful as the genre could hold. If you haven’t played it, you should. And remember, go for the eyes!

Compared to its cheerfully optimistic brethren, Final Fantasy VI is a breath of fresh (albeit bleak) air. It dares to answer the question “what if the bad guy wins?” by actually letting the bad guy win halfway through the story. It isn’t shy about tackling uncomfortable subjects like war, genocide, forbidden love, and suicide. It eschews the myopic viewpoint of a single, designated protagonist in order to tell a larger, more emotionally-charged tale. This willingness to explore heavy themes and unthinkable outcomes — made all the more poignant when set against dramatic set pieces and a soaring score — is one of the biggest reasons why Squaresoft’s 1994 magnum opus is so very special. Its unconventional gameplay is another reason: FFVI casts off the rigid class system of previous Final Fantasies and allows any one of the 14 heroes to use magic so long as they equip magical shards. Its mini tower-defense games break up the monotony of random battles, while each character’s unique combat abilities means everyone serves a purpose. Nothing feels redundant or wasted in Final Fantasy VI. It’s truly like no other RPG.