Key Takeaways
- PC gaming offers some of the best storytelling with games like Pathologic and The Beginner's Guide.
- World of Warcraft and Half-Life 2 are notable for their compelling narrative and lasting impact.
- Classic PC games like System Shock 2, Planescape: Torment, and Deus Ex offer deep and complex narratives.
As the oldest and most popular gaming platform, the PC has developed a long and storied history of releasing some of the best games ever made. When it comes to storytelling, the PC platform is a proven breeding ground for some of the best.
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Storytelling and story-rich RPGs have become very popular in the gaming world over the years.
Whether they're fourth-wall-breaking meta-masterpieces or philosophical questions about the nature of CRPGs, these are some of the best stories in PC gaming.
Of note, these games were originally released for PC, but some have been ported to consoles.
8 Pathological
A growing disease
Pathological
- published
- June 9, 2005
- developer(s)
- Ice-Pick Lodge
Launched as a cult classic after its release in 2005 and becoming one of the gaming world's favorite indie darlings, Pathological is a game that almost defies description because of its strangeness, but is loved mostly because of its strangeness.
Players take on the roles of three interconnected characters as a plague takes over a quaint little town in the Russian countryside. To solve the plague, the player must survive the brutal difficulties, zombies and monsters that destroy the reality. It's a dull experience, but it's worth playing, as well as the sequel/remake that creates the same brilliant atmosphere.
7 The Beginner's Guide
Unguarded instructions
- OpenCritic
- Top Critic Ratings:73/100 Critics recommend:75%
- published
- October 1, 2015
- developer(s)
- The history of Everything Unlimited Ltd.
Although most would probably put something like that The Stanley analogy as the best fourth-wall-breaking meta-story game, The Beginner's Guide stood out as a more emotional and creatively focused narrative, even if it was not generally appreciated by the players.
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Players play … themselves, while exploring the unfinished levels of talented game designers and developer notes left by their friends. As expected, things start to get very meta, very quickly, resulting in one of the most memorable PC narratives.
6 World of Warcraft
Azeroth liberated
- published
- November 23, 2004
Players have different opinions about World of Warcraftwhich is appropriate for a game that is almost twenty years old. Regardless, it's hard to deny the totemic nature of the game's narrative, and how important it has been since its release.
Trying to summarize the history of World of Warcraft In a relaxed sentence, it's impossible, but needless to say, the player controls a hero as he traverses the dangerous world of Azeroth, defeating world-ending threats and keeping track of The story has literally spanned decades. It's a lot of work, but it pays off in one of the greatest fantasy stories of them all.
5 Half-Life 2
Gordon's Odyssey
- published
- November 16, 2004
Perhaps no game is more influential than a first-person shooter Half-Life 2released in 2004 but still holding up well today, with almost the same engine used in popular platforms such as Garry's Mod.
Half-Life 2 continues the story of Gordon Freeman, now in a dystopian future where the world has been taken over by Combine aliens. Gordon must fight this threat with his trusty crowbar in hand as Valve's sci-fi epic spins and heads towards one of the most famous yet successful cliffhangers of all time. the game, and that's not even counting the crazy content of the game.
4 System Shock 2
SHODAN's pleasure
System Shock 2
Immersive Sim games are known for their engaging narratives as they subtly encourage players to read as much random text as possible and explore the world carefully allowing the environment to do a lot of heavy storytelling. System Shock 2 was the prototype for all immersive sims to follow.
In System Shock 2, The player plays as a soldier awakened from a cryogenic sleep in the Von Braun in the year 2114 who has been attacked by an evil AI known as SHODAN. The game is a mix of sci-fi, cyberpunk and horror, and is worth playing for fans of the immersive sim genre. After the much-hyped remake of the original, there may even be a remake System Shock 2 on the way too.
3 I have no mouth, and I have to scream
Far from Silent History
I have no mouth so I have to scream
- published
- October 31, 1995
- Developer
- Cyberdreams, The Dreamers Guild
As one of the few games based on a horror book, I have no mouth, and I have to scream is based on Harlan Ellison's short story of the same name about a planet-sized computer called AM that tortures the last five survivors.
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The video game adaptation not only adapts the book, but expands on it through the contributions of Ellison himself, resulting in a story that could be an improvement on the original, diving deep into stories of each of the five characters and develop an interconnected narrative that is still as depressing as the original, but even deeper.
2 Planescape: torture
It will take heaven and hell
Planescape: torture
- published
- December 12, 1999
- developer(s)
- Black Isle Studios
- OpenCritic Rating
- STRONG
Many modern gamers have discovered the joys of CRPG through Baldur's Gate 3but veterans of the genre often point to 1999 Planescape: torture as the best of its kind, taking over the world D&D and is more advanced than any previous game.
The player plays as a nameless, amnesiac searching for the plane D&D cosmology with an eclectic team of companions as they struggle to recover their memories and figure out who they once were. The result is a narrative of incredible depth, functioning in part as a philosophical essay, and in part as the closest play ever to the depths of literature's greatest story. . It's incredible, and worth playing for gamers looking for a meaty story to explore.
1 Deus Ex
The Sim Immersive Bible
Deus Ex
- published
- June 23, 2000
- developer(s)
- Ion Storm
As if it could be something else. if System Shock 2 in advance Deus Ex and considered one of the first class of immersive sim, Deus Ex considered the ultimate in the immersive sim genre that has yet to be beaten.
The player controls JC Denton, an agent of an organization in the future of 2052 dedicated to hunting down terrorists in a deadly epidemic called the Gray Death. The game is a masterful cartoon of conspiracy thriller storytelling, weaving a story so deep and complex that it takes more than one playthrough to fully understand the whole. It's one of the best action thrillers ever written, and it's still the best game overall. Deus Ex franchise.
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