"The aim of art is not to represent the outward appearance of things, but their inward significance." This is what Aristotle had to say about artistry and it rings profoundly true in the video game industry. A team of people can make great graphics. They can also make great stories. But it's how they combine the two that magnifies each one's power.
By using the environment to punctuate the story, video games can 🀅harness symbols in shapes and colors to bring home a point that static painting and literature cannot. This is not a list of g🅷ames with the most realistic environments. This is a list of games where the game can be played on mute without subtitles and the story is felt profoundly in the hearts of everyone who plays them.
Updated March 27, 2023 by Amanda Hurych: There are so many games that tell a huge percentage of their story through their environments. We've updated this list to include a few more games that show us their narratives through their setting in addition to usual methods. So while yes, you can still expect to see BioShock here, we've added a few newer titles that are just as accomplished at showing, not telling.
16 ✤ Dead Space
Horror games in general usually do a great job of telling a story using their 🐽environments rather than typical plot devices. Sometimes, a blood-smeared wall tells you more than a character walking up to yours saying, "Man, something really bad is going on here."
One of the best horror titles to utilize environmental storytelling is Dead Space (both the remake and the original, coincidentally). Not only is the atmosphere of the Ishimura appropriately terrifying, bloody messages on the walls, pliers in bathroom sinks,♈ barricaded doors, and creepily arranged corpses all tell the story of what happened before Isaac Clarke ever set foot on the ship.
15 Prey
Arkane Studios, also known for their work with Dishonored and Deathloop, mastered environmental storytelling in this gem of gaming. Prey is an immersive sim at its best, and one of the ways you really feel like the Talos I space station is an actual place is through clever instances of environmental storytelling. You'll come across various scenes that show the small details of what happened in an area, and audio logs or emails will later confirm the sequence of events that you stumbled across.
For example, when one "crewmate" is acting suspiciously, you can find evidence they are not who they say they are if you explore the living quarters of the person's assumed identity. If you want to immerse yourself in a fully realized world like no other, Prey should be your number one stop.
14 𒐪 Cyberpunk 2077
There are many reasons to be disappointed in Cyberpunk 2077, but Night City stands out as a monumental labor of love as one of 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:the best cities in the RPG universe. While the script is cringy, the gameplay is underdeveloped, the company beh♋ind it is rotten, and the characters border on hammy, Night City its💦elf can salvage the entire game for players.
Protagonist and newcomer V can learn about the history all around them. See are𓃲as of the city where the old world still thrives between concrete, graffiti, and neon lights. Then see brand new corporate buildings amidst the remnants of the old structures they have bulldozed. The story of people versus corporations is told better through exploring Night City than the dialogue ꧋itself.
13 Batman♕: Arkham Knight
It's a shame that comic books have often missed the mark when being translated into games. The art in the books is as compelling as the written words, the very look of the heroes and villains themselves sometimes tells readers more than a biographical excerpt.
However, Batman: Arkham Knight was exactly what the medium needed. The city of Gotham itself is choking on smog and clouded beneath a mysterious evil. This is well contrasted by the bright moon and shine of Batman's outfit, highlighting the dark goodness that seems to lift the gloomy veil.
12 Uncharted 4: A Thief's End
𝓡As the Uncharted series got more serious, many wo💖ndered if Nathan Drake would ever actually have to confront himself for the murderer and thief that he is. In the past, games about raiding ruins and shooting guards were seemingly unproblematic, but that time has passed.
Drake rarely has to explicitly confess his regrets, though, as the city of Libertalia, a haven for pirates, forces him to see the fruits of his ways as he navigates through the remains of pirate captains amidst their fancy rooms. Beautifully, Drake's conscience and future are laid before players as they navigate the past. 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:The weather itself reflects Drake's mood so that he never has to tell players how he's feeling; it's written all around.
11 🌠 Red Dead Redemption 🍒
Red Dead Redemption 2 tells the tale of a gang whose time is running out. However, there are still open skies and plenty of places to get lost. That's not so in the first game, chronologically occurring after the events of the second. The time of the cowboys has already run out.
Beyond the narrative that stresses this point, you can hardly find an area without cars, telephone poles, and bustling noise all around. You get glimpses into the life that was before, but it's clear that time is up and there is no going back.
10 Inside
Inside tells the tale of a boy who is growing up, the zombie-like natur✨e of the adults in the game is a fitting comparison. This kind of plot has been done in a꧋ ham-fisted way many times, but the point is important, so Limbo does the wise thing and allows the unspoken horrors tell the story in a new way.
Rewards are placed in perilous locations. Things that are impossible to understand are locked up 𒅌for study. The grown-up world is violent and judgmental. The real-world parallels in the game are many and powerful.
9 The Outer Wilds ꦍ
The story is quite literally the environment in The Outer Wilds. The very sky tells the tale of how the player last died in each playthrough. The planets themselves are falling into a deadly singularity. And 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:there remain hidden mysteries across tꦆhe universe.
Saving the galaxy means understanding the galaxy first. Each small planet has been marred, developed, or shaped in some way that is critical to solving t💫he puzzle of what disaster is occurring and how to stop it.
8 BioShock
Along with a slew of other games that went silent, we don't know when we'll see the next BioShock, but the first was more than enough to tell the tale of mankind's admirable and yet self-destructive ambition. 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:The setting of the game feels haunted, even if not by the typܫical supernatural ghost entities gamers are used to.
The world is enticing and begging to be explored. At times, Ayn Rand's vision mixed with underwater Art-Deco themes seems close enough to touch. But the designers wanted to warn players about the dangers of unchecked progress and seeing this fantastic world fallen into dystopia could not have gotten that message across any more clearly.
7 🔯 Final Fantasy VII: Remake 🔯
Final Fantasy: Remake is so visually-forward that even 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:the trailer made from the gameplay ෴is exciting. The best 🥀evidence of the balance between evolution and nature is in Final Fan🅺tasy VII: Remake. Every zone speaks on the overarching theme of progress vs. the world.
It's not that civilization is bad; the tone is hardly druidic. Indeed, mako energy is drawn to humanity as a resource to be carefully used. But there is a need for moderation. Areas that find this balance are beautiful and peaceful while areas that fail to ration mako are intricate and terrifying.