16 Great Games Like Backbone

Fire Escape

Content Rating: PEGI 16

Release Date: 29/04/2020

Platforms: Android and PC

Genres: Narrative and Puzzle

Developer: @iNKStories

Players: This is a single player game

Fire Escape is a murder mystery styled on Alfred Hitchcock's Rear Window. You sit on a fire escape and can see into the apartments opposite as well as hear the intimate conversations of your neighbours across the alleyway. You peer into the lives of the...

Beat Cop

Content Rating: PEGI 18

Release Date: 27/11/2018

Platforms: Mac, PC, PS4, Switch and Xbox One

Genres: Adventure and Narrative

Accessibility: 5 features

Developer: @PxCrow

Players: This is a single player game

Beat Cop is a police crime drama where you have been framed for murder. Back on the street, you navigate the pixilated 80’s Miami Vice world to find out who did it. Your approach and decisions matter. Will you go in with the mafia or stay straight?...

Persona

Content Rating: PEGI 16

Release Date: 20/09/1996, updated in 2017

Platforms: 3DS and 2DS, DS, PC, PS Vita, PS3, PS4 and PS5

Genres: Adventure, Narrative, Role-Playing and Turn-Based

Developer: @Atlus_jp

Players: This is a single player game

Persona 5 (also known as Shin Megami Tensei: Persona) is the latest game in a series of role-playing games that focus on a group of students. You explore the world and take on enemies like other role play games. Here though, you manage relationships...

Rivals

Expected Content Rating: PEGI 12

Release Date: 21/09/2020

Platforms: PC

Genres: Narrative and Puzzle

Accessibility: 18 features

Developer: @TimSheinman

Players: This is a single player game

Rivals is a puzzle game where you piece together the story of Josh and Luke and the breakup of their band. Playing detective, similarly to Return of the Obra Dinn, but rather than murder it's musical betrayal you are sleuthing here. You inspect sources,...

A Detective's Demise

Content Rating: PEGI 12

Skill Rating: 12+ year-olds

Release Date: 26/10/2020

Platforms: Android, PC and iOS

Genres: Action, Narrative, Open World and Puzzle

Accessibility: 20 features

Developer: @DuskLightPro

Players: This is a single player game

Pitch Black A Detective's Demise is an adventure game set in a technological noir-detective world. You play using sound alone which offers voice acting and environmental sound effects to enable you to navigate.

Aviary Attorney

Content Rating: PEGI 12

Release Date: 22/12/2015, updated in 2020

Platforms: Mac, PC and Switch

Genres: Narrative and Puzzle

Accessibility: 7 features

Developer: @Sketchy_Jeremy

Players: This is a single player game

A courtroom drama set in nineteenth-century Paris, populated with beautifully drawn animals. Guiding JayJay Falcon, defence attorney, you help investigate each case before each of the four court dates; combing crime scenes, interrogating suspects and...

Beholder (Series)

Content Rating: PEGI 16

Release Date: 09/11/2016

Platforms: Mac, PC, PS4, Switch and Xbox One

Genres: Narrative, Point-and-Click, Puzzle, Role-Playing and Strategy

Accessibility: 24 features

Developer: @Beholder_Game

Players: This is a single player game

Beholder is a detective game where you spy on tenants in a building, discover their secrets and report violations of laws to the authorities. As the game unfolds and you see more of the controlling totalitarian state, an uneasy tension develops between...

Disco Elysium

Content Rating: PEGI 18

Release Date: 15/10/2019, updated in 2020

Platforms: Mac, PC, PS4, Stadia, Switch and Xbox One

Genres: Adventure, Narrative, Puzzle and Role-Playing

Accessibility: 14 features

Developer: @StudioZAUM

Players: This is a single player game

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...

Framed (Series)

Content Rating: PEGI 16

Release Date: 12/11/2014, updated in 2018

Platforms: Android, PC, Switch and iOS

Genres: Action, Narrative, Platform, Point-and-Click and Puzzle

Developer: @LoveShackers

Players: This is a single player game

Framed is a puzzle adventure where you re-arrange panels of an animated comic book to change the outcome and timeline of the story. With a noir-detective look, the puzzles start simply but soon get complex.

Frog Detective (Series)

Content Rating: Not rated by PEGI

Release Date: 22/11/2018, updated in 2019

Platforms: Mac and PC

Genres: Adventure, Narrative, Point-and-Click and Puzzle

Developer: @GraceBruxner

Players: This is a single player game

This is a comedy adventure game where you play a detective frog, named (unsurprisingly) "Frog Detective".

Gunpoint

Expected Content Rating: PEGI 7

Release Date: 03/06/0013

Platforms: Mac and PC

Genres: Action, Platform and Puzzle

Developer: @SuspiciousDev

Players: This is a single player game

Gunpoint is a stealth puzzle game where you play freelance spy Richard Conway, tasked with infiltrating buildings. To succeed you must avoid guards and bypass security, using various high-tech gadgets. Through these missions you seek to clear your name...

Tangle Tower

Content Rating: PEGI 7

Release Date: 19/09/2019

Platforms: PC, Switch and iPhone, iPad

Genres: Narrative, Point-and-Click and Puzzle

Accessibility: 18 features

Developer: @SFBDim

Players: This is a single player game

Tangle Tower is a murder mystery game, from the same developer as Snipperclips, where you explore a grand old house and its intertwining families to solve a mysterious murder. You are given the events of the murder, each...

Argument Wars

Content Rating: PEGI 3

Skill Rating: 10+ year-olds

Release Date: 16/09/2016, updated in 2020

Price: Free

Platforms: Android, Web and iOS

Genres: Narrative and Puzzle

Developer: @iCivics

Players: This is a single player game

Argument Wars is an adventure game where you play a lawyer in a U.S. Supreme Court. It's a card game that recreates constitutional arguments behind some important historical cases.

MP For A Week

Expected Content Rating: PEGI 3

Skill Rating: 11-15 year-olds

Release Date: 11/04/2016

Price: Free

Platforms: Android, Web and iOS

Genres: Puzzle and Strategy

Developer: @UKParlEducation

Players: This is a single player game

MP For A Week is a puzzle game where you play an MP for a week. That might sound sedate and a little boring, but things soon kick off as you try and survive a week in politics. Like Reigns, you need to balance keeping your party, your voters and the...

Harold Halibut

Expected Content Rating: PEGI 3

Release Date: Coming soon

Platforms: PC, PS4 and Xbox One

Genres: Adventure, Narrative and Puzzle

Developer: @Slow_Bros

Players: This is a single player game

Harold Halibut is a narrative adventure set on a city-sized spaceship submerged in an alien ocean, after fleeing the Earth 2050 years ago. It's beautifully created with real puppetry and fully voice-acted. The result is a filmic adventure where you...