Greatest Open-World Journey Games Of All Time, Ranked

Some games promote a sense of adventure, but don’t have a focused narrative to guide players along. For example, no one can dispute that The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild is a great adventure game with good dungeons, a cool world, and more. However, Link is not on a focused journey so much as he has a goal: to save Zelda.

Death Stranding 2: On the Beach and Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor are two great examples of journey-based games. What are some others? Let’s find out and rank them all, taking into consideration their overall quality, but really examining the journey aspects of these open-world games.

10 Pokemon Pokopia

Trying To Find Lost Pokemon

Pokemon Pokopia starts with Ditto coming out of its Pokeball, and finding out their Trainer is missing, so they transform into one instead. On their journey to find their Trainer, they meet other Pokemon who they can lure into wrecked homes and patches of grass, as the entirety of Kanto, the region from the first round of Pokemon games, seems to have been hit with a post-apocalyptic event.

Where did all the humans go? What happened to all of the buildings? What did the Pokemon see, and how did they forget what happened? It’s a mystery, a small one with a cozy vibe, but still engaging.

9 Middle-earth: Shadow Of Mordor

Stopping The Return Of Sauron

Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor is both a revenge tale and a save-the-world scenario at heart. Things begin with Talion, a Ranger, dying at the hands of orcs, who is then resurrected by Celebrimbor, the elf who helped forge the Rings of Power. Together, they must march their way through Mordor, taking out bases and high generals within the orc army to destroy Sauron’s forces and halt his revival.

The game takes place before The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring and features very few interactions with characters besides orcs. There’s a lot of slaying, and the coolest part of the game is that it remembers what players do to orcs if they don’t kill them, thanks to the Nemesis system. Orcs can return as higher members of the army, later swearing revenge in turn on Talion for not finishing the job.

8 Fallout: New Vegas

Return To Sender

Fallout: New Vegas is a revenge story as well, which opens with the protagonist, a nameless courier, who is gunned down by a group of thugs outside of the New Vegas region. Left for dead, players are revived by a kindly doctor who helps stabilize them, gives them a vague direction on where to go, and then it’s up to players to find answers.

On their way back to New Vegas, they will try to piece together what happened. As an open-world game set in the post-apocalypse, players are free to roam around and do side quests to their heart's content or to shoot mutants and bandits in the desert, but the core story is pretty compelling given how things open.

7 Ghost Of Yotei

Another Quest For Vengeance

Ghost of Yotei is technically the last story centered on revenge, and it’s one of the most incredible. It begins with a lone samurai, Atsu, wandering into a village and taking down a crime boss with bloody and fiery combat. Things then flash back to show Atsu’s family was killed at the hands of a masked organization known as the The Yotei Six, who left her for dead as well.

The story will take players across ancient Japan, chasing stories about the Yotei Six to kill them off one by one. After each final encounter, Atsu will wipe their blood on a sash she carries around, which is always satisfying to see.

6 Horizon Forbidden West

Trying To Reach A New World

The goal of Horizon Forbidden West is technically in the title already, as the protagonist, Aloy, is on a quest to expand her horizons by traveling from the post-apocalyptic region of Colorado all the way to the West Coast to discover more answers about her past and the robot animals that roam the world.

Unlike Fallout: New Vegas, this world is rich with vegetation, making it stand out among most post-apocalyptic games. Aloy will also discover high-tech, alien-like invaders that push her story forward, who are trying to use the animal robots for some nefarious deed. It makes more sense if players also engaged with the first game, Horizon Zero Dawn, but given enough context clues, new players can also jump in, as it’s a richer experience overall, from the bow-based gameplay to Aloy’s traversal methods.

5 Like A Dragon: Infinite Wealth

Are You My Mommy?

Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth has a bit of a slow start with a former Yakuza member, Ichiban Kasuga, working for a temp agency. After getting disgraced online, he somehow winds up in Hawaii, nude, only remembering that he is trying to find his lost mother, who abandoned him as a child.

There, he meets gangs who want to keep his mouth shut and locals willing to help Ichiban out, along with some returning characters. The deeper players get, the more the story evolves from tending to a local unhoused mafia to a cult trying to take over. Through turn-based combat, players will help Ichiban find answers about his mom, along with rescuing Honolulu from street violence.

4 Red Dead Redemption

Getting The Old Gang Back Together

Red Dead Redemption is all about the past catching up, focusing on a familiar tale in the Old West. John Marston is a former outlaw who turned his life around years ago to raise a family, but when the government comes knocking, John must oblige, helping them find his former gang.

One by one, John will hunt them down, not on a quest for revenge, but more like a quest for justice. He doesn’t want to necessarily kill them, just help the government track them down to deal with them on their terms, but like most stories involving cowboys in the Old West, players can expect a lot of gunslinging duels and bloodshed.

3 Death Stranding 2: On the Beach

Linking Up The World Yet Again

Death Stranding 2: On the Beach, like the first game, is all about reconnecting the world that has gone through a post-apocalyptic event. The first game focused on a courier, Sam Porter Bridges, who had to travel to bunkers across the former United States to reconnect the nation, and in this sequel, Sam must do it across Mexico and go through a gate that also connects it to Australia.

Players will be given packages to help reestablish these bunkers, and while a game about delivering packages may sound simple, it is more than that. Technically, it’s also a game about revenge and coping after losing a loved one, but at its core, it is literally a journey across part of the world and one that is beatifically rendered.

2 The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt

Where Is Ciri?

The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt is the final part in the first trilogy based on The Witcher books. Part of the focus before was Geralt trying to find his beloved Yennifer, and when this game opens, she is found, and a new emergency arises. Ciri, who is almost like a daughter to both Geralt and Yennifer, has gone missing, and there is a paranormal force after her.

The game’s plot, at its core, is simple: find Ciri before the Wild Hunt does. As a fantasy medieval detective and bounty hunter, Geralt will search for clues about Ciri in each major city, which will also flash back to Ciri dealing with similar situations as a limited playable character. With strong writing, this is one of the best-written open-world games on all fronts.

1 Shadow Of The Colossus (2018)

A Mysterious Journey

Shadow of the Colossus says so little, but it also says so much. The game opens with a young male, Wander, placing a young woman, Mono, upon an altar. After getting instructions to hunt down beasts from disembodied voices within the temple, players will use their magic sword, which will guide them with light toward each new colossus.

By defeating these colossi and absorbing their essence, Wander hopes it will lead to Mono’s revival. This world is open and devoid of life as it lies in ruins, incredibly haunting yet compelling without explicitly saying much. It is the very definition of a game all about the journey, and at the end, well, let’s just say it has an incredible finale beyond all of the epic boss battles.