RPGs With The Best Exploration, Ranked

RPGs with the best exploration provide players with exceptional freedom to discover rich and immersive worlds. Each setting is meticulously crafted by developers, encouraging the search for secrets, treasures, and unique challenges hidden throughout the map, enhancing the gaming experience. This freedom of exploration promotes deep immersion, essential for memorable adventures.

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The excellence in exploration of these RPGs lies in well-planned design and engaging mechanics that reward players' curiosity and initiative. By offering multiple paths and possibilities, these games ensure personalized and captivating journeys, standing out as the best in terms of exploration within the RPG universe.

10 Final Fantasy 12

A JRPG With Impressive Exploration

Final Fantasy 12's exploration is one of the game's strongest points, featuring vast interconnected areas filled with secrets and challenging enemies. Unlike some other great games in the Final Fantasy franchise, players can roam through richly detailed zones, freely exploring large cities, forests, and deserts, always feeling like they are discovering something new.

The exploration system is well-structured, with areas that encourage searching for secrets and optional dungeons. This freedom provides an engaging experience as players can choose their own paths, face challenges, and find rewards along the way, all set in visually stunning environments (for their time).

9 Pathfinder: Kingmaker

RPG With Exploration And Time Management

Although Pathfinder: Kingmaker doesn't feature large maps like other RPGs, its exploration is compelling due to an intriguing Time Management system, where some tasks have deadlines. Players must effectively manage side activities while focusing on main objectives.

Even without an open world, the game's exploration remains engaging with numerous points of interest to revisit, offering challenges that test the main group of characters. Additionally, Pathfinder: Kingmaker provides dense areas and plenty of side quests to explore, motivating players to travel across the entirety of the map.

8 Kingdom Come: Deliverance

Historical RPG With Rich Exploration

Kingdom Come: Deliverance excels in exploration by building the game to be as historically accurate as possible. When players choose to set missions aside and explore the map, they're not going to encounter magical items or fantastical enemies.

Instead, exploration leads to authentic medieval locations, such as large forests filled with cabins left by hunters or travelers, treasures lost by someone, and especially bandit camps. Players can also encounter random events or humorous situations that tell small stories when investigated, enhancing the immersive experience.

7 Fallout: New Vegas

Enhanced Exploration With The Wild Wasteland Trait

Another popular franchise renowned for offering players significant freedom to explore is Fallout, particularly in Fallout: New Vegas. Set in the Mojave Wasteland, the game rewards those who set aside main missions to explore the map with various items and interesting side missions hidden in abandoned places.

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For players seeking even more content during exploration, selecting the Wild Wasteland trait early in the game enhances the experience by allowing the Courier to experience new events. Most are pop culture references, adding humor and depth to the Fallout universe.

6 Xenoblade Chronicles 2

An Incredible RPG For Nintendo Switch Players

The Xenoblade Chronicles franchise has been one of the most successful on the Nintendo Switch, offering vast and richly detailed worlds. In Xenoblade Chronicles 2, players can explore varied and beautiful settings distributed across different titans. However, these environments present formidable challenges, as the game doesn't automatically level areas.

This feature creates a constant sense of danger, with high-level enemies appearing in unexpected regions. This unpredictability forces players to be cautious during explorations, rewarding those who dare to venture into these territories with valuable items or stunning views of the entire map.

5 Cyberpunk 2077

CD Projekt Red's Futuristic RPG With Excellent Exploration

Based on its namesake RPG system, Cyberpunk 2077 transports players to Night City, a dystopian future metropolis dominated by megacorporations. In this setting, the main character, V, must advance through missions to survive a chip that is consuming their soul.

Beyond the epic storyline, Night City is a fantastic place for exploration, with its layered design well-executed to allow natural migration from one region to another. Players can discover diverse characters and numerous secrets hidden throughout the city. Although Cyberpunk 2077 includes some smaller adjacent regions, they don't match the charm of the main city.

4 Baldur's Gate 3

Larian Studios' Masterpiece With Incredible Regions To Explore

One of the main attractions of tabletop RPGs is the ability to explore different places with great freedom, a feeling that Larian Studios has successfully translated into Baldur's Gate 3. In one of the best RPGs ever produced, characters have significant freedom to explore maps in a modular fashion, without being limited to missions or the main story.

Despite not being an open world and featuring smaller maps compared to other games in the genre, Baldur's Gate 3 offers many dense scenarios with discoverable content, making it a prime example of satisfying exploration in RPGs. At certain moments, the main story adapts to the paths chosen by the player, further enhancing the experience.

3 Elden Ring

A Soulslike RPG With Extensive Exploration And Challenges

While Elden Ring deviates from traditional RPG interactions by focusing more on combat and build creation, it still offers players incredible exploration of its vast scenarios. The world design allows adventurers to explore maps organically, finding numerous items and stunning regions with loads of secrets hidden away from casual observers.

In addition to the great sense of adventure, Elden Ring hides many dangers for players who choose to explore every corner of the Lands Between, such as powerful enemies. For those who love a significant challenge, this FromSoftware game delivers one of the toughest RPGs with the best explorations available today.

2 The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt

Geralt Of Rivia's Epic Journey Through Diverse Settings

In The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, players travel with Geralt through regions divided into zones like the Skellige Isles and the cities of Velen and Novigrad. Each area offers great freedom to explore different settings, complete side quests, and discover hidden secrets while facing various dangers along the way.

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These zones are rich in detail, providing unique encounters and parallel narratives that enhance the experience. The design of each area keeps exploration engaging, with different biomes and challenges tailored to the player's progress. This modular structure ensures each location has its own identity, making exploration even more rewarding.

1 The Elder Scrolls 5: Skyrim

One Of The Best RPGs With Incredible Exploration Freedom

Since its release over a decade ago, The Elder Scrolls 5: Skyrim has earned a place of respect among many players due to the immense freedom it offers, especially after the events in Helgen, which serve to introduce the story. From this point on, the Dragonborn can explore the entire realm without restrictions, following their own path through the now iconic region.

Beyond the exploration freedom provided by Bethesda's RPG, players have access to a vast amount of content to discover, including dungeons, side quests, and hidden secrets. This richness of detail not only increases immersion but also motivates players to keep exploring, making Skyrim the prime example of an RPG with the best exploration.

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