2024 was a great year to be an RPG fan, with remakes, sequels, expansions and original franchise-establishing games releasing consistently over the course of the year. In this article, we put up what we think are the 7 best RPGs for the year. We have not included games released in Early Access, as while there were worthy contenders there as well, we felt they are better saved for the year when they launch the full version of the game (looking at you Hades 2 and Path Of Exile 2)
8. Diablo 4: Vessel Of Hatred
An extremely encouraging trend this year is expansion packs & DLCs so fully realized that they are as good as the main game itself, which shows the effort and seriousness of developers and publishers to keep giving fans what they liked and want more of. Diablo 4: Vessel of Hatred breathed new life into what was a pretty polished Diablo 4 launch a couple of years back. The expansion pack was released on October 7, and introduced significant updates like a new region (Nahantu), a new class (Spiritborn), new end-game leveling system (Paragon) in addition to new abilities, enemy types, legendary items, aspects and so on. All these landed perfectly with the Spiritborn quickly becoming a favored S-tier class for dungeon-crawling. All in all, Diablo fans have had 2 great years with the expansion capping off a stellar base game launch.
7. Stellar Blade
From the erstwhile Project Eve named game launch announcement back in 2019 to being renamed to Stellar Blade in State of Play 2022, and launching in 2024 for PS5 (& a PC launch planned this year), the game survived the development hell to come out as an excellent addition to the souls-like genre. Stellar Blade currently sits at a critic score of 81 on Metacritic and a user score of 9.2. The story has you playing as Eve, sent on an Earth ravaged by the Naytiba to figure out what exactly happened on Earth. While the story beats are pretty standard sci-fi, what sets the game apart is its excellent combat: the controls are tight and responsive, there is a steady stream of upgrades to keep you engaged against the various boss fights through the roughly 30-hour campaign. And it is on the strength of this that Stellar Blade earns its spot in the best RPGs of 2024 list.
6. Dragon’s Dogma 2
Dragon’s Dogma 2, a long-awaited sequel to the original game that has built its own dedicated fanbase, delivered on the expectations of the community by bringing a solid RPG experience to the table. While it had a pretty flexible build system, a nicely improved upon pawn system from the first game, where Dragon’s Dogma 2 excelled over other RPGs is in the simple joy, thrill & danger of traversing from a point A to an unknown and uncharted point B. No convenient fast travel, a day and night cycle that affected visibility and enemy presence made what is a non-consequential activity in other games a matter of life and death, and true adventure. Yes, the story could have been better and the weapons could have done with a bit more variety, but the strengths of the game make it one of the best RPG experiences of 2024.
5. Like A Dragon: Infinite Wealth
A passing of the torch in many ways as the series long time protagonist Kazuma Kiryu teams up in this one with Ichiban Kasuga who we first saw in the well-received Yakuza: Like A Dragon; Ryu Ga Gotoku take all that worked in the first game and deliver the trademark experiences that they are known for – epic storylines, character arcs, betrayals & redemptions, distractions in terms of side activities, wacky side quests; and dials all of this to 11. The turn-based combat introduced previously has also been sharpened and made even more entertaining with some truly out-there jobs and power-up abilities. The map is also significantly expanded with 2 pretty big cities to explore and a story that delivers some genuinely heart-touching emotional highs, and if for some reason you have not got around to giving this game a shot, you absolutely should – just be prepared for the timesink that the game is, with an easy 70-80 hour requirement to complete the game.
4. Final Fantasy 7: Rebirth
Another sequel that amps up what made the first one so good and takes all of that to different levels – Final Fantasy 7: Rebirth is just filled to the brim with almost a never-ending series of side activities and things to do. While these do bloat the game a bit (in fact, a lot – a tighter experience and sharper story-telling would have probably done Final Fantasy 7: Rebirth a favor), they are on their own pretty involving – and you can always pick ones that you like, and keep others on the side. The world is even more fully fleshed out, and the love as well as attention to detail that Square Enix has put into this one clearly shows, as do the extremely impressive high production values for cutscenes, environment, character models and so on. And these are more than enough to make the game one of the most polished and complete RPG experiences of the year, especially if you have been a fan of the long-running series and played the original.
3. Black Myth Wukong
Black Myth Wukong joins the list of games that fully deliver – or exceed expectations that were constantly built for the game right from the time the first gameplay surfaced back in 2020. The setting of the game also made it quite unique – that of the classic Journey to the West, with the Destined One as the protagonist. The game eclipsed all other Active Player Counts on Steam, and sold 20 million units in the first month itself. All of this for good reason – the combat was just perfect, with a great combination of magic, skills, and melee attacks against tough, fascinating bosses.
2. Metaphor Refantazio
A solid win from Atlus Studios, who used all the years of expertise developing the excellent Persona series, and successfully transplanted this into a different, fascinating world. This one is a triumph in almost all areas – storytelling, worldbuilding, character builds, companions & bonds, absorbing turn-based combat systems – and delivered in a unique and visually stunning style that has Atlus written all over it. The game can easily take up to 100 hours to complete, and we enjoyed each and every moment spent doing that. If there was one game that we would whole-heartedly recommend as a must-play not just from 2024 releases, but from recent memory, this would be a strong contender for that.
1. Elden Ring: Shadow Of The Erdtree
Aaah…Elden Ring. The first and only DLC for Elden Ring delivered a gaming experience that a lot of full-game releases don’t provide. And for fans, a break from doing yet another run starting in Limgrave, giving them the opportunity to test their end-game builds. The DLC also built upon the lore of the game, added verticality big time when exploring, and introduced new weapons, spells and of course, a variety of tough, intimidating, and challenging boss battles. Elden Ring was the best RPG of 2022, and a couple of years later, its DLC Shadow of the Erdtree is our best RPG of 2024.
What do you make of this list? Are there other games that we should have added, or ranked higher?
