All games offer you agency. You can win or lose. You can complete them or stop at any time. But there are some games that offer a story that genuinely branches. Where you end up will be different from other players. This not only makes your actions really matter but also gives you a reason to play them again.Setting aside games that evolve through simulation, or games where once you die it's game over, these branching narrative games tell a story that ends in a certain way because of the choices you made.
This list includes 32 games from the last 18 years, with 139 likes. They come from a range of different genres and play-styles and are all good games if you want to control how the story ends.
We have other digital stories lists of games:
Paradise Killer
Rating: PEGI 16+, ESRB MATURE 17+
Release Date: 04/09/2020
Platforms: Mac, Nintendo Switch and PC
Genres: Narrative, Open World and Puzzle
Developer: @KaizenGameWorks
Players: This is a single player game
Paradise Killer is a detective game set in the open world of Paradise Island. It's a strange place with quirky characters and an alien obsessed, demon worshiping world. You an exiled investigator brought back to solve the mass murder of the island's...
Last Minute Love
Expected Rating: PEGI 12+, ESRB TEEN
Release Date: 27/12/2018, updated in 2020
Price: Free
Platforms: Mac, PC and Web Browser
Genres: Adventure and Narrative
Developer: @ThePhilipCal
Last Minute Love is an adventure where you play an "old person" in a nursing home who is looking for love. This takes the dating simulator style of game in an unusual direction. You explore the home in your wheelchair, meet a quirky cast of people and...
Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords
Rating: PEGI 12+, ESRB TEEN
Release Date: 15/07/2003, updated in 2020
Platforms: Android, Mac, PC, Xbox and iOS
Genres: Action, Adventure, Fighting, Narrative, Puzzle, Role-Playing, Strategy and Turn-Based
Developer: @Obsidian
The Knights of the Old Republic (KOTOR) is a series of hard narrative-driven role-playing and combat games set in the Star Wars universe, 4000 years before Luke Skywalker and the Empire. You fight enemies and discover secrets by talking to the...
Photographs - Puzzle Stories
Rating: PEGI 18+, ESRB TEEN
Release Date: 03/04/2019
Platforms: Android, Mac, PC and iOS
Genres: Narrative and Puzzle
"Have you ever made a mistake, or hurt people you care about?" Asks the Photographs trailer. It's a puzzle game that aims much higher than to distract you while on the way to work.
Papers, Please
Release Date: 08/08/2013, updated in 2017
Platforms: Mac, PC, PlayStation Vita and iOS
Genres: Narrative, Puzzle and Turn-Based
Developer: @Dukope
You play the role of a border-crossing immigration officer in the fictional dystopian Eastern Bloc-like country of Arstotzka. You review each immigrant’s and returning citizens’ passports and paperwork according to an increasing list of changing...
Coffee Talk
Release Date: 29/01/2020
Platforms: Mac, Nintendo Switch, PC, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One
Genres: Adventure, Creative, Narrative and Role-Playing
Developer: @TogeProductions
Coffee Talk is an interactive story about a barista working in a coffee shop in Seattle. You listen to customer's concerns about life and love, in a retro pixilated world back with lo-fi chilled hip-hop music.
Undertale
Rating: PEGI 12+, ESRB EVERYONE 10+
Release Date: 15/09/2015
Platforms: Mac, Nintendo Switch, PC, PlayStation 4 and PlayStation Vita
Genres: Adventure, Role-Playing and Turn-Based
Developer: @TobyFox
Undertale is a 2D adventure game where you don't have to kill anyone. Providing you unique ways to avoid combat from dancing with a slime to whispering your deepest secret to a knight. However, you could just ignore this option and rain destruction...
Our Personal Space
Release Date: 14/02/2015
Platforms: Android, Mac and PC
Genres: Adventure, Narrative and Turn-Based
Developer: @Rachel_Helps
Our Personal Space is a text adventure where, rather than surviving alien attack or harsh environments, it's your marriage that you are fighting for. You play a newly married doctor on a space colony and must decide how she spends her time, responds to...
Forgotton Anne
Release Date: 15/05/2018
Platforms: Android, Mac, Nintendo Switch, PC, PlayStation 4, Xbox One and iOS
Genres: Adventure, Narrative and Platform
Developer: @ThroughLineGame
Forgotton Anne (Forgotten Anne) is a hand-animated adventure that combines cartoon (Ghibli-inspired) storytelling with running and jumping puzzles. You play as Anne, the enforcer who keeps order in the Forgotten Lands, as she sets out to squash a...
Closed Hands
Release Date: 05/03/2021
Platforms: Mac and PC
Genres: Narrative
Developer: @PassengerGames
Closed Hands is an text adventure game set in the lead-up and aftermath of a terror attack in a fictional UK city. You follow five core characters brought together by the same event. It's a branching story that you discover and influence as you read and...
Fable
Release Date: 14/09/2004
Platforms: Mac, PC, Xbox, Xbox 360, Xbox One and Xbox Series X|S
Genres: Action, Adventure, Open World and Role-Playing
Developer: @WeArePlayground
This is an adventure role-playing game set in a fantasy world where your interactions with the world and villagers, and decisions about your use of magical power, substantially alter the story and the environment.
Bury Me My Love
Rating: PEGI 7+, ESRB EVERYONE 10+
Release Date: 26/10/2017, updated in 2020
Platforms: Android, Mac, Nintendo Switch, PC and iOS
Developer: @BMMLgame
Don’t be put off by the name and theme of this intriguing game, an adventure played by choosing responses in what looks like a messaging app. You take the role of the husband of a Syrian migrant travelling to Europe. As the game unfolds in real time,...
Omensight
Platforms: Mac, Nintendo Switch, PC and PlayStation 4
Genres: Action, Fighting, Narrative and Strategy
Developer: @SpearheadMtl
Omensight is a brawling adventure game where you play the role of Harbinger, a mythical warrior who only appears in times of crisis. As night falls, you witness this destruction of the world at the hands of a dark God but can relive this final day to...
Ord
Rating: PEGI 3+, ESRB EVERYONE
Release Date: 05/06/2019, updated in 2020
Genres: Adventure, Narrative and Role-Playing
Developer: @JoniTweetsGames
Ord is an unusual text adventure, rather than one grand story, you embark on a series of distinct quests. Whether it's defeating an evil warlock or creating your own world as a god, Ord tells stories through simple series of words and word associations...
Reigns
Rating: PEGI 7+, ESRB TEEN
Release Date: 11/08/2016
Genres: Adventure, Narrative, Puzzle, Strategy and Turn-Based
Developer: @DevolverDigital
Take charge of a kingdom, one decision at a time. Each choice is presented to you as a playing card with some advice or a question from one of the 38 different characters. Swipe left or right to make a decision that will impact the church, people,...
Little Misfortune
Release Date: 18/11/2019
Genres: Adventure, Narrative and Puzzle
Developer: @KillMondayGames
Little Misfortune is a dark adventure where you play a small girl called, Misfortune, who, guided by a voice in her head, seeks the prize of eternal happiness for her mother. It's played side-on and unfolds a narrative about the girl's family as you...
Signs of the Sojourner
Rating: Not rated by PEGI or ESRB
Release Date: 14/05/2020
Developer: @EchodogGames
Signs of the Sojourner, an introspective narrative where you interact with characters by solving puzzles with cards that represent emotions. It's a coming-of-age story set in the near-future and explores how relationships form, break, and mend in the...
The Stanley Parable
Release Date: 31/07/2011
Platforms: Mac, PC, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One
Developer: @HelloCakebread
The Stanley Parable is an interactive drama with no combat or action to speak of apart from walking around and interacting with everyday objects. You guide a silent protagonist, Stanley, while discouraging narration plays in your ear. As you discover...
Five Dates
Rating: PEGI 16+, ESRB TEEN
Release Date: 17/11/2020
Genres:
Developer: @WalesInter
Five Dates is an adventure game about finding a partner. You play Vinny, a millennial from London, and join a dating app for the first time during the coronavirus pandemic. The game offers five potential female matches that you must pluck up courage to...
Backbone
Release Date: 24/04/2019
Genres: Adventure, Puzzle and Role-Playing
Developer: @EggNutGames
Backbone is an adventure game inspired by film noir where you role-play as a human-like raccoon detective. As a detective, you search for clues and evidence, talk to witnesses, and choose which leads to follow.
The Longing
Expected Rating: PEGI 7+, ESRB EVERYONE 10+
Release Date: 05/03/2020
Genres: Adventure, Narrative and Simulation
Developer: @StudioSeufz
The Longing is a point-and-click adventure about waiting and loneliness. It's an intentionally slow game that takes 400 elapsed days to finish. It draws on the Idle Game genre, where you use minor interactions to incrementally advance. Here though, the...
The Talos Principle
Release Date: 11/12/2014, updated in 2019
Developer: @Croteam
The Talos Principle is a narrative driven puzzle game, praised for its cerebral and philosophical nature, where you play an android with a human conscience. You explore environments to complete complex brain-teasing puzzles to collect "sigils".
80 Days
Release Date: 31/07/2014, updated in 2019
Genres: Adventure and Turn-Based
Developer: @inkleStudios
80 Days is a travel and culture discovery game set in 1872, where decisions about your journey around the world impact the course of the story and characters.
This War Of Mine
Rating: PEGI 18+, ESRB MATURE 17+
Release Date: 14/11/2014
Platforms: Mac, Nintendo Switch, PC, PlayStation 4, Xbox One and iOS
Genres: Narrative, Role-Playing, Shooting, Simulation and Strategy
Developer: @11BitStudios
Inspired by the 1992–96 Siege of Sarajevo, this is a war game where you play the civilian trying to survive during the fighting. You face tough decisions on how to spend time and resources each day to maintain health, hunger and mood levels until a...
Elsinore
Release Date: 22/07/2019
Genres: Adventure, Narrative, Puzzle and Simulation
Elsinore is a mystery-adventure set in Shakespeare's Hamlet. You play Elsinore who repeats the same four days as she tries to find a way to avoid the tragedy that lies before her.
Recompile
Rating: PEGI 12+
Release Date: Coming soon
Platforms: Mac, PC, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One and Xbox Series X|S
Genres: Adventure, Narrative, Platform and Puzzle
Developer: @phi6
Recompile is a platform game about hacking and exploring an expansive virtual world. Drawing inspiration from the Tron film, It's a combination of classic platform games where you slowly get more powers to advance further, and branching narrative games....
Pendragon
Release Date: 22/09/2020
Genres: Action, Narrative, Strategy and Turn-Based
Developer: @InkleStudios
Pendragon is a character-driven strategy game, from the creators 80 Days and Heaven’s Vault where you rally the Knights of the Round Table to reach Arthur before he meets his fate.
Grace's Diary
Release Date: 09/08/2016
Platforms: Android, Mac, PC and Web Browser
Genres: Narrative and Role-Playing
Developer: @StopTDV
Grace's Diary is a role playing game where you play, Grace, who is concerned about her friend Natalie who's behaviour has changed since she started dating her current boyfriend. By experiencing the conversations first hand and making notes in your...
Chroma Squad
Release Date: 30/04/2015, updated in 2019
Platforms: Mac, Nintendo Switch, PC, PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, PlayStation Vita and Xbox One
Genres: Action, Fighting, Strategy and Turn-Based
Developer: @BeholdStudios
Chroma Squad is a strategy game themed around the The Power Rangers TV show. Rather than the heroes, you play the stunt actors who quit the show to start their own Power Rangers-inspired series. Rather than kill enemies in the turn based encounters,...
The Walking Dead
Release Date: 24/04/2012, updated in 2018
Price: Free-to-start
Platforms: Android, Mac, Nintendo Switch, PC, PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Xbox 360, Xbox One and iOS
Genres: Action and Narrative
Developer: @TelltaleGames
Walking Dead is a survival adventure game series. You explore locations and gather a ragtag group of survivors. How you interact with each of them and make decisions about various dangers results in a branching story where no one is guaranteed to survive.
Disco Elysium
Release Date: 15/10/2019, updated in 2020
Platforms: Mac, Nintendo Switch, PC, PlayStation 4, Stadia and Xbox One
Genres: Adventure, Narrative, Puzzle and Role-Playing
Developer: @StudioZAUM
Disco Elysium The Final Cut is a role-playing game set in the fictional city of Revachol where you play Harrier "Harry" Du Bois who must solve a complex murder. Unusually, your choices and actions not only determine how the story unfolds but affect...
Burly Men at Sea
Rating: PEGI 3+, ESRB EVERYONE 10+
Release Date: 29/09/2016, updated in 2018
Platforms: Android, Mac, Nintendo Switch, PC, PlayStation 4, PlayStation Vita and iOS
Developer: @Brain_And_Brain
Burly Men at Sea is an adventure where you play three seafaring brothers who explore the Scandinavian seas. It's novel because it requires multiple playthroughs to discover the full narrative. It has a unique cyclical gameplay loop that remembers your...
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