Games With The Most Complex Stories

Early video games focused on simple ideas and stories, rather than complicated, multi-path adventures. For instance, the original Super Mario Bros. was about saving Princess Peach from Bowser, though those characters didn’t have official names at the time. After the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES), game stories began to grow more intricate and engaging, and some became quite challenging to understand without help.

Stories can explore complicated ideas or be set in cultures different from our own, which might introduce unfamiliar customs. Plus, it’s often enjoyable to chat with friends or online communities about these games, especially because they often have surprising and exciting conclusions.

There will be spoilers.

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33

Nothing Is Real

The game Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 follows the journey of Expedition 33 as they sail across the sea to confront The Paintress. This magical being has been mysteriously removing people from existence, targeting them based on their age, for several years.

Defeating the boss isn’t the true end. Soon after, people will start vanishing, revealing the shocking truth about the world and its inhabitants. One of your companions, Maelle, secretly comes from the real world – Paris, specifically – and the world you fought so hard to save is actually an illusion. That’s just a brief overview of what happens next.

Silent Hill f

Must Replay

The game Silent Hill f starts with Hinako heading to town to find her friends, but a strange, floral growth begins to consume everything, and tragically, one of her friends, Sakuko, is killed. Though Hinako occasionally reunites with Shu and Rinko, they also vanish. Adding to the mystery is the existence of another world and a powerful fox spirit.

The story isn’t fully revealed on your first playthrough – you’ll uncover details through notes and clues. It’s designed with multiple endings and branching paths, meaning you can’t experience everything in a single run. Even after replaying, some aspects can still be a little confusing.

Final Fantasy 7 Remake

What’s With The Wisps?

The remake of Final Fantasy 7 is set entirely within the city of Midgar, a much smaller area than the original game. While the main storyline stays true to the classic, the added content is sparking a lot of fan theories. A new element introduced is the presence of mysterious, ghostly figures that seem to prevent Cloud and his companions from altering the events of the past.

The final boss battle includes multiple appearances by Sephiroth, showing up much earlier than expected. Even dedicated fans familiar with all things Final Fantasy 7 might struggle to understand how this game connects to the larger series, because it isn’t a traditional remake.

Kingdom Hearts 3

Hearts Into Darkness

Kingdom Hearts 3 has a complex history, building on the stories of eight previous games. It attempts to tie up loose ends and explain events from those past titles, offering satisfying resolutions to long-running plotlines. For example, the game finally reveals what happened to Aqua and her team at the conclusion of Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep.

The game cleverly includes references to the mobile game, Kingdom Hearts Union X, even in the second-to-last fight. It’s a loving tribute to the series and a fitting conclusion to the story. However, despite Square Enix’s efforts, the narrative isn’t flawless and leaves some questions unanswered, such as the true identity of Xigbar and Sora’s current location, even with the additional downloadable content.

BioShock Infinite

Your Owen Villain

At first glance, BioShock Infinite appears to be a straightforward rescue mission: private investigator Booker is tasked with saving a girl named Elizabeth from the floating city of Columbia. However, the story quickly becomes much more complicated with the introduction of alternate realities and time travel. It’s revealed that the game’s main villain, Comstock, is actually another version of Booker himself, and Elizabeth is, in fact, his daughter, Anna, from a different timeline.

Man, things have been messed up ever since that whole baptism thing turned Booker into Comstock. Now, to fix everything, I basically have to let a ton of different Elizabeths and Annas… well, drown me. It’s the only way to break this crazy loop, and honestly, that’s just scratching the surface of how weird things are.

Death Stranding

Entering The Kojimaverse

Death Stranding is a particularly complex Hideo Kojima game. It takes place in a completely new world with a large cast of characters and unique terminology, often requiring players to keep notes. The story centers around Sam, a delivery person who must travel across a ruined America to rebuild a communication network similar to the internet.

The story features fantastical elements like babies who can see hidden monsters, a secret world hidden underground, characters who can be reincarnated, and beaches symbolizing the cycle of life and death. While still quite unusual, the second installment of the story is more straightforward to understand.

Metal Gear Solid 5: The Phantom Pain

Needs Another Game

Metal Gear Solid 5: The Phantom Pain is a game created by Hideo Kojima, and it turned out to be his final installment in the Metal Gear series before his departure from Konami. It was designed to conclude the story arc focusing on Big Boss’s origins.

The game suffered from plot holes because of limited time and money. A special version of the game even includes an early, unfinished final mission that highlights these issues. Beyond just missing content, many events lack proper explanation, leaving players to piece together the story themselves – things like the mystery surrounding the character Quiet, the identity of the flaming man, and the true nature of Venom Snake are left largely unexplained.

Xenoblade Chronicles 3

Time Is A Loop

Until Xenoblade Chronicles 3, each game in the Xenoblade series felt like a self-contained story, similar to how each Final Fantasy game has its own unique world. But the ending of the latest game suggests that it actually combines the worlds of Xenoblade Chronicles and Xenoblade Chronicles 2, which is a complex idea that requires a good understanding of both previous games.

These three games offer around 180 hours of gameplay, and that’s a high estimate. The story, which involves worlds colliding, centers around time travel and reincarnation. Time travel plots can get complicated, and this one is no different, especially since the two main characters, Noah and Mio, end up fighting their past selves.

The Evil Within

Inception: The Game

The game The Evil Within starts with a seemingly normal police investigation at a hospital following a series of murders. However, things quickly become bizarre when Detective Castellanos, the main character, unexpectedly finds himself transported to a strange, medieval-style world inside the hospital.

The game’s world feels reminiscent of films like Inception and The Matrix, especially when it’s revealed that characters are connected through pods in a virtual reality. While the sequel explores the technology behind this world in more detail, the original game offers few concrete answers, leaving players to piece together the story through clues and notes they find in the game.

Deadly Premonition

Get A Load Of These Scars

Deadly Premonition is a famously strange horror game. It’s set in the small town of Greenvale, where a string of murders has taken place. The game follows FBI Agent Francis York Morgan, who has the peculiar habit of constantly announcing his identity and talking to someone named Zach, leaving everyone around him puzzled.

He goes by Zach on his name tag, but in the game, he’s known as York – a role he adopted after something happened to him as a child. And the strange rain and altered reality in town? They weren’t natural – they were the result of a secret military experiment, though that’s only the beginning of the story.

2025-12-08 08:35