Video games are played from all kinds of perspectives and in all manner of ways, but few are quite so infamously well-known in the gaming industry as an isometric view. For players unaware of the meaning of an isometric view, it is simply a sort of top-down view coming from a slight angle to the field of play.
Open-world games are becoming much more popular over the last decade, many take on a first-person view or ordinary third-person. But the popularity of the isometric view hasn’t waned completely in the gaming community, and there are always a number of classics that bring gamers back time and time again to their old favorites. Here are some of the best isometric open-world games.
7 Wasteland 3
The Wasteland franchise is a great series to look into for players who miss the older Fallout games and how they played. While there are some major differences, the perspective and style are very reminiscent of the first games in that franchise. Wasteland 3 is the best of this series and is set in Colorado after an apocalypse has left it a frozen wasteland.
Playing as members of the Arizona Rangers, players (cooperatively in the main campaign, if they so choose) have to hunt down three heirs to the kingdom of the local ruler, The Patriarch. Players can make choices to vastly change the direction of the story as they decide whether to work with or against The Patriarch, in an open-world setting that feels free and extraordinary.
6 Path Of Exile
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It is a contentious thing to call Path of Exile open-world since players go through different areas with many loading screens. It is, however, in an isometric view and is considered one of the best recent RPGs in gaming, particularly for finding ways to keep engaging players in different modes besides just the main campaign.
Often described as a spiritual successor to Diablo 2, Path of Exile is set in a dark fantasy world. Players go from being exiled into a dark land for a crime to accidentally awakening the Old Gods of the world and having to defeat them. Path of Exile tells an extraordinary story, and once players get into it, many find it very difficult to stop playing because of the various leagues they can take part in and the wide variety of ways there are to play.
5 Baldur’s Gate 2: Shadows Of Amn
Baldur’s Gate 2 is based, as all games in the Baldur’s Gate franchise are, in the Forgotten Realms of the Dungeons & Dragons world. Controlling a party of up to six characters, players follow on from the story of Baldur’s Gate after being captured and experimented on by a wizard. The player has to face off with Irenicus, a powerful mage who becomes intrigued by the player's character and their strange heritage.
With a long central quest line even for an RPG and an impressive world built around the D&D style, Baldur’s Gate II has been considered one of the best RPGs and even one of the best games ever made. Players who love Dungeons & Dragons and that world, or merely any medieval fantasy games, will fall in love with this world.
4 Fallout 2
The original Fallout games such as Fallout 2, which helped inspire many other isometric games like the Wasteland franchise, were pivotal in the RPG genre. Set in the 23rd century, Fallout 2 dealt with a descendant of the original vault dweller from the previous game returning to one of the vaults in order to obtain a device that could save their town from drought.
The style of Fallout 2 was excellent, it worked hard to keep a fascinating story in a similar world to the original Fallout while adding more to the combat and enlarging the number of characters and the size of the world available to players. Despite more modern entries in the franchise changing the style from the isometric view, Fallout fans will never forget the roots of the long-running series.
3 Divinity: Original Sin 2
The fifth entry in the Divinity game series, Original Sin 2 was set in the world of Rivellon where inter-dimensional creatures were becoming a larger issue already by the beginning of the game. Players get to create their own hero using a variety of races and customizable options, before going on an adventure as a newly proclaimed Godwoken after being rescued by one of the Original Gods.
From there, the Godwoken has to try and become divine, gaining enough power to defeat the evils facing the world. Original Sin 2 has fascinating morality, and an amazing story and has already since being released in 2017 become one of the most beloved stories and games in recent memory to use an isometric style.
2 Hades
Everything about Hades has been praised by critics and fans alike, from the gameplay and combat to the characters and narrative. A roguelike adventure released officially in 2020 after a lengthy early access period, Hades was set in the Underworld where the player character was Zagreus, the son of Hades and Prince of the Underworld.
In his attempts to escape from the Underworld, so that he may find his birth mother, Zagreus often comes into conflict with his father. Building an extremely fun world around the Greek mythological Underworld and its ruler, Hades is a phenomenal game that is universally beloved. It is also one of the most recent games to use the isometric view.
1 Disco Elysium
Disco Elysium has been called one of the best games ever made a number of times since it was released in 2019. This game is very different from most RPGs, throwing out a lot of combat and instead focusing on being one of the best open-world detective games ever to exist.
Focused on skill checks, dialogue options, and solving a variety of mysteries, Disco Elysium has proven itself one of the most fascinating morality games, allowing players to choose what kind of officer to be as they take on the role of an amnesiac detective trying to figure out who he is while also attempting to solve a brutal murder.