Summary
Science fiction and fantasy are the two most commonly exploited settings for video games. Both of which free the game designer from having to bend the knee to reality if they do not wish to. However, very few games combine both settings into ascience-fantasy-inspired open world.
Even though this subgenre of games seems to be somewhat underrepresented, there are still some great science fantasy games out there to be found. Some of these add sci-fi elements to a fantasy game, or fantasy elements to asci-fi game. Others go all on, creating a game world that combines both seamlessly.
Released way back in 1995,Chrono Triggerwas one of the first games to try and implementopen-world gameplay. Something the game achieved on the limited hardware of the time by only loading map areas that the player could see. Modern game developers call this technique level streaming, and it is widely used in the most up-to-date games.
Chrono Triggercombines science with fantasy tropes such as magic and classic melee weapon combat. The player has access to advanced technologies such as guns and robotic arms. The game takes a place on this list because of the fact it is likely the very first open-world, science fantasy game.
6TROUBLESHOOTER: Abandoned Children
Anime-Inspired Korean Game
In many ways,TROUBLESHOOTER: Abandoned Childrencan be seen as the love child of Final Fantasy: Tactics and XCOM. All wrapped up into agame with anime-style graphics, and a surprising depth to its gameplay. The game has both online and offline playing modes.
InTROUBLESHOOTER: Abandoned Children, magic meets modern weaponry in some pretty decent turn-based combat. Many of the enemies are very obviously inspired by common fantasy archetypes, and battles are a fun mix of magical mayhem and bullet play. This game isn’t for everyone, it is often cloyingly cute, but no doubt there are some players that will love it.
Open-World Roguelike
Caves Of Qud
Caves of Qud is a science fantasy roguelike epic steeped in retrofuturism, deep simulation, and swathes of sentient plants. Come inhabit a living, breathing world and chisel through layers of thousand-year-old civilizations. Decide: is it a dying earth, or is it on the verge of rebirth?Do anything and everything. Caves of Qud is a deeply simulated, biologically diverse, richly cultured world.DEEP PHYSICAL SIMULATION — Don’t like the wall blocking your way? Dig through it with a pickaxe, or eat through it with your corrosive gas mutation, or melt it to lava. Yes, every wall has a melting point.FULLY SIMULATED CREATURES — Every monster and NPC is as fully simulated as the player. That means they have levels, skills, equipment, faction allegiances, and body parts. So if you have a mutation that lets you, say, psionically dominate a spider, you can traipse through the world as a spider, laying webs and eating things.DYNAMIC FACTION SYSTEM — Pursue allegiances with over 70 factions: apes, crabs, trees, robots, and highly entropic beings, just to name a few.RICHLY DETAILED SCIENCE FANTASY SETTING — Over fifteen years of worldbuilding have led to a rich, weird, labyrinthine, one-of-a-kind storyworld, layered on top of the simulation, all for you to explore. Live and drink, friend.TACTICAL GAMEPLAY — Turn-based, sandbox exploration and combat offers as many solutions as you and your mutations, implants, artifacts, and skills are creative enough to invent.
Caves of Qudis a unique game in many ways. Combining roguelike gameplay with open-world maps that are partially hand-crafted, then fleshed out by random generation. It also features bothprocedurally generatedand hand-crafted quests. This mixture of random generation and manually created content works very well.
The game world is portrayed using pixel art, which works very well. The game combines classic fantasy-style combat with a player character that can use certain cybernetic enhancements and advanced weaponry. Overall, this is a quirky, interesting game, that many people might enjoy trying, just for something completely different to play.
Players of theBorderlandsfranchise will no doubt remember the diminutive figure of Tiny Tina and her propensity for blowing things up. InTiny Tina’s Wonderlands, she takes center stage in an open-world fantasy adventure to defeat the Dragon Lord.
Tiny Tina’s Wonderlandsbrings guns to what is normally a knife fight. And of course, no fantasy game would be complete without magic, which Tina wields almost as effectively as her explosives. This is a game that is intended from the ground up to be simply fun to play. It doesn’t take itself very seriously at all, and this is what gives it such charm.
Explore The World Of Magalan
Elex 2
ELEX II is the sequel to ELEX, the vintage open-world role-playing experience from the award-winning creators of the Gothic and Risen series, Piranha Bytes. ELEX II returns to the post-apocalyptic Science Fantasy world of Magalan – with massive environments that can be explored with unrivaled freedom via jetpack, you will be able to move through the epic story any way you want.Several years after Jax defeated the Hybrid, a new threat arrives from the sky, unleashing the dangerous powers of dark Elex and endangering all life on the planet. In order to defend the peace on Magalan and the safety of his own family, Jax has to go on a mission to convince the factions to unite against the invaders and find his own son, Dex, who got separated from him …Dive into a huge, hand-crafted, completely unique world with multiple factions and diverse environments set in a post-apocalyptic science fantasy universe.
This is a game that aimed squarely at filling a gap in the science-fantasy game genre. Where many science fantasy games either tack some science on the fantasy aspects or vice versa, the open world of Magalan combines both seamlessly.
The game picks up the story several years after the end of the originalElexgame. A new threat has been discovered, and the Dark Elex once again threatens the world of Magelan. The player takes up the torch, and embarks on a quest to unite various factions to combat this threat.Elex 2is a fantastic game that, for some reason, remains relatively unknown.
TheWarhammer 40,000series of real-time strategy games are renowned for mixing science fiction with fantasy in a seamless, believable way. The iconicW40kexperience of an Orc carrying a weapon such as a bolter rifle, and screaming WARRRR! is something fans of the franchise will never forget.
But of course, theW40kfranchise is known for RTS games.Warhammer 40,000: Rogue Tradershakes things up. This is an open-world isometric adventure game, that leverages the lore ofW40kto provide a compelling gameplay experience with a plot that twists and turns. The fact that the player can choose their alignment and that this choice has a meaningful impact on gameplay, is one of the reasons why this game was so well received.
InHorizon Zero Dawn, the player takes on the role ofAloy, a young orphan girlwho struggles to survive alone in the wilderness. The game takes place in a world where predatory mechanical monsters have taken over, driving humanity into small, well-defended enclaves. Aloy takes on the role of savior, and the player must explore the open-world map and discover why this has happened.
With its mix of crazy mechanical enemies, and basic weaponry such as a sling or a bow to take them down,Horizon Zero Dawnsits well within the science fantasy genre. Add to this the fact that Aloy eventually develops certain powers, which could be construed as magical, and this game deserves the top spot on this list.
