Key Contents
- RPGs excel at combining narrative and worldbuilding through engaging text.
- Roadwarden, Wildermyth, Citizen Sleeper, Suzerain, and Disco Elysium are known for their immersive text-based experiences.
- These works offer deep emotional connections, rich character creation, intense moral dilemmas, and captivating political narratives.
Role-playing games have their roots in the world of text and text-based titles. Who knows where the genre would be today without the vast world of tabletop RPGs that came before it? If there is one thing that the best RPGs have in common, it is a great combination of narrative and world-building that creates a very compelling and immersive title.
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5 JRPGs with Morality Systems
These JRPGs lead players down a number of moral paths, allowing them to use morality as a guiding tool to make decisions.
But some games in particular know how to use text to enhance their worlds. A significant area of overlap between books and video games is the power of prose to capture the imagination and make players much more connected to the game. For gamers who don’t mind a little reading, here are a few titles to keep an eye out for.
5 Road manager
A longing journey through the untamed interior
Road manager is vibrant, but it’s the best way for the player to feel lonely. There’s a clear emphasis on the protagonist, built from the beginning based on the initial player choices. This almost introspective tone is especially interesting considering the story itself lends itself to a grand adventure story. Roadwarden must build settlements and towns against the wilderness of the peninsula, and protect innocents from the monsters that roam the land.
It parallels many great RPGs with fluid, dynamic worlds that are constantly changing. Road managerThe text is utilized alongside the fantastic graphics in a captivating amber tone. Event descriptions, NPC dialogue, and combat interactions are all fantastic text parts of this title, and the attention to player choice puts it up there with some of the best branching RPGs available today.
4 Wildersmith
A fairy tale epic of mythical proportions
Wildersmith It's one of those games that will stick with players for a long time. Not only is it a surprisingly engaging strategy-style RPG, but it also has a novel character creation system that does the impossible, combining the depth and attachment found in pre-made characters with the creative freedom and narrative choices offered by custom characters. There are a lot of complex ways in which character personalities and events work, but the best way to play this game is to just jump in.
The writing in this game is powerful yet understatedly wonderful, and the hundreds of variations on each event and character’s personality are so artistically written that it’s not uncommon to forget about the world outside the game. Each campaign is structured like an epic, a reinterpretation of a myth, describing a group of adventurers fighting against a long-forgotten threat.
3 Citizen slippers
Dystopian space travel RPG
This unique text-based RPG is a masterpiece of cyberpunk aesthetics and themes, perfect for cyberpunk fans. Everything from the tabletop-inspired statistics to the unique combination of colors and illustrations that make up the game's style has been created with a lot of passion, with a focus on shadows, deep blacks, and bright reds. The text itself is novel-quality, and reads like a mix of 70s and 80s pulp SF classics and the world of enthusiastic DMs.
This is a game of difficult choices, capitalist dystopia, and compelling characters. It’s the perfect title for anyone looking to immerse themselves in a space-centric setting without cutting corners.
2 suzerain
An uncompromising political RPG
suzerain Using text and narrative, it allows players to invest in the deep political machinations of a single nation and a fledgling democracy trying to make its place in the world. In theory, the virtual nation of Swordland is under the player’s control, but those seeking the illusion of power should look elsewhere. An old, crypto-fascist former president continues to manipulate Congress, the political right and left are trying to steer the country in two different directions, and through it all, the president must try to secure a large enough coalition of allies to pass a sophisticated constitution through Congress, his political ambition.
There is no other way to put it. This game is brutal. It is fantastic, utterly charming, and a near-perfect representation of what a good text-based RPG should be. But it is also brutal. There are no promises that things will turn out well, no promises that what one person says is true. But if the player does nothing but compromise and take risks, by the end of this amazing 900,000-word title, they will have discovered a country with little to show for it.
1 Disco Elysium
One of the best RPGs of all time
BAFTA Award Winner Disco Elysium It basically has a level of quality that speaks for itself. It’s one of the best CRPGs of the 21st century, and it comes with a lot of wonderfully written prose. Deciding how your protagonist moves through the world, what his political and philosophical leanings are, and how this shapes the city around him is one of the most engaging experiences you’ll find in a video game today.
Players would be doing themselves a disservice if they didn’t indulge themselves in this gritty, surreal, and deeply engaging RPG, with dream-like text and a worldview that will leave people in awe. Like other titles on this list, the text isn’t a barrier to entry, and while it is at times a very difficult title and requires a solid attention to detail, players who enjoy deep RPGs won’t want to miss this one.
