The Best RPGs Based On Novels

When players think of RPGs, they’re often thinking of long, engaging stories affected by the player’s actions. There’s a lot of world-building, character building and interaction between various NPCs and factions to consider when creating an RPG world. That’s why it comes as no surprise that novels are often used as source material to help with world-building. It’s a lot easier to have a fleshed-out world history if that history has already been written.

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RPGs also need the flexibility for players to tell their own stories within these worlds. As such, we see a lot of games that will use a novel or book series as a starting point, before creating their own branching narratives separate from the source material. This way, developers hope to marry the long-standing worlds that readers love with the player agency of an RPG. These are the best RPGs based on (or heavily influenced by) existing novels.

8

Dante’s Inferno

Based On The Divine Comedy Part 1: Inferno By Dante Alighieri

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Dante’s Inferno

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Released

February 9, 2010

Publisher(s)

Electronic Arts

Dante’s Inferno is an action RPG brawler in a similar vein to God of War. Released in 2010 on PS3 and Xbox 360, the game is loosely based on the first part of Dante Alighieri’s epic poem The Divine Comedy. The game follows the story of a Templar Knight who chases after his wife’s soul as it’s dragged down to hell, guided through the nine circles by the spirit of the poet Virgil.

Perhaps the biggest similarity to the source material is the game’s depictions of the nine circles of Hell, which take a lot of cues from the visuals painted in Alighieri’s poem. As for gameplay, players have various melee combos at their disposal, as well as a holy cross that can be used for ranged holy attacks and to “absolve” defeated enemies and receive their souls (XP).

The absolve mechanic is the main route towards upgrading the player’s abilities, with special abilities being unlocked both via progress and via a skill tree. Players can also cleanse the sins of various historical characters they meet throughout the story in a mini-game for more XP gains. Gameplay also had the standard action-RPG mix of traversal and environmental puzzles, making for a solid action game.

7

The Godfather

Based On The Godfather By Mario Puzo

Though The Godfather and its sequel are technically based on the infamous movie adaptations of the same name, those films are all based on Mario Puzo’s 1969 novel. The game tells its own story that happens alongside events from the novel/film, using well-known characters from the Corleone family to augment the story.

Given its 2006 origins, the game tried to do several things to push the open-world formula of the time. One of the primary mechanics was extorting businesses to extract protection money and eventually control them. This fed into a wider system of district control, with rival families owning different parts of the city and the player working to take control of it all.

Progress for the player involves both climbing ranks with the family by controlling businesses, completing story missions, and leveling up personal stats and abilities via the Respect system. Perhaps the biggest flaw of The Godfather game is its limited use of the source material, as most of the story focuses on the previously unknown player character, Aldo Trapani.

6

Conan Exiles

Based On The Hyborian Age By Robert E. Howard

Conan The Barbarian has suffused into general fiction such that few perhaps remember Robert E. Howard’s various original stories featuring the character. Those who do will know that Conan Exiles borrows its whole world from The Hyborian Age, a companion world-building essay that Howard wrote as the fictional setting for his Conan stories.

The game itself makes great use of the setting and fiction of Howard’s world, if not the titular character. Players can choose to represent any of the world’s religions, including Conan’s own deity, Crom. The enemies and mythology that players encounter are mostly consistent with Howard’s world, too.

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As a survival RPG, Conan Exiles has found lasting popularity with players. The sandbox MMO format of its world, which allows players to build their own bases and recruit thralls as they progress, has proven to be a winning formula, keeping the free-to-play game going over six years after its initial release.

5

S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart Of Chornobyl

Based On Roadside Picnic By Arkady And Boris Strugatsky

Systems

Released

November 20, 2024

OpenCritic Rating

Fair

Though it’s hardly stated front and center in the games, the original S.T.A.L.K.E.R. trilogy was inspired by the 1970s sci-fi novel Roadside Picnic by Arkady and Boris Strugatsky. While the game creates its own stories, the setting and central fiction are the same, so it’s safe to assume that S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 is also still based on this source material.

The nature of S.T.A.L.K.E.R. as an RPG might be called into question, but the game certainly allows for a large degree of player freedom in how they approach side missions, factional relationships, and NPCs. This gives the player the ability to play a role, even if the game doesn’t have skill trees and stats are all granted by gear.

S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 makes the list above its classic counterparts as it represents an excellent modernization of the core of the series. It could be argued that the game could still benefit from some polish and refinement, but assuming those upgrades happen over time, S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 will one day stand as perhaps the best entry in the series.

4

BioShock

Based On Atlas Shrugged By Ayn Rand

While it’s not directly based on the work, BioShock is heavily inspired by Ayn Rand’s philosophical text Atlas Shrugged, mostly via the ideologies expressed by antagonist Andrew Ryan. Rapture is essentially a Randian idea of utopia, though the creators also expressed other novel-based inspirations, such as the works of Aldus Huxley and George Orwell.

BioShock remains a classic FPS RPG and the gameplay is equally compelling today as it was at release. Players gain new powers via plasmids—essentially injectable superpowers—and can approach combat in a variety of ways. The game also allows for some moral decision-making throughout the story, though the choices are essentially binary.

Returning to Rapture in its original incarnation always has a way of feeling special. That’s thanks in part to the deeply entrenched, unified philosophy that the fictional underwater city was built upon. Through some careful storytelling and world-building, players get to see what Rapture was as it grew, and what it became as it fell.

3

Black Myth: Wukong

Based On Journey To The West By Wu Cheng’en

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Black Myth: Wukong

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Released

August 20, 2024

OpenCritic Rating

Strong

For players who were left wondering where the fanciful Chinese philosophy, poetic language, and myriad mythological enemy designs in Black Myth: Wukong came from, it was inspired by the Chinese epic Journey To The West by Wu Cheng’en. The work is considered one of the great classics of early Chinese literature and follows the story of Sun Wukong, the monkey king.

The game takes place after Sun Wukong’s defeat and enshrinement in stone and charges the player with the task of recovering the relics that represent Wukong’s six senses in an attempt to restore him.

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Most players will likely be familiar with the soulslike gameplay style and progression systems in Black Myth Wukong. What might not be obvious, though, is how many of the characters and even items that the player wields actually come directly from Journey To The West. For example, the scene where the player receives the Plantain Fan from Rakshasi is an analogue of one of Wukong’s feats in the novel, where he uses the same fan to extinguish the fires of the flaming mountains.

2

Parasite Eve

Based On Parasite Eve By Hideaki Sena

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Parasite Eve

Systems

Released

September 9, 1998

Developer(s)

Square

Publisher(s)

Square

Parasite Eve tells its own unique story, but the game is actually a sequel to the story told in the 1995 novel of the same name by Hideaki Sena. The novel was a smash hit that helped reignite the Japanese horror genre, and the Parasite Eve game was released close to both the film and manga adaptations of the same property.

The game is a highly experimental RPG, even by the standards of Square at the time, using an ATB-based third-person shooting mechanic augmented by magic-like abilities that use Parasite Energy. Players visit various locations on the New York City map as they hunt down the titular antagonist, Eve.

The game sets itself after the events of the novel and uses a few references and plot devices that lean on the original story, such as main character Aya’s mother being revealed to be Mariko Anzai, who Eve chose as a host in the novel. The story of the game was developed by Square’s Hironobu Sakaguchi and Takashi Tokita, although it did not include the involvement of the original author.

1

The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt

Based On The Witcher Novels By Andrey Sapkowski

Unfortunately, most fans became aware of Andrey Sapkowski’s novels, which inspired the Witcher games, via the creator’s original disdain for the franchise and legal spats with publisher CD Projekt Red. These days, the relationship between the two is more amicable, thankfully. While the Witcher games diverge from the novels in many ways, they owe a lot to the setting and characters created by Sapkowski.

The Witcher 3 is both the game that is widely regarded as the best in the franchise, and the one that diverges the most from the source material. Far from making it a lesser game, the creative decisions here allowed CDPR to forge their own core relationship between Ciri and Geralt, and thus set up the franchise for its future incarnations.

What’s most interesting about the franchise is how, in many ways, the games parallel the novels in terms of progression from one to the next. Much like how the first Witcher book is a collection of almost parable-like tales, the first game focused on Geralt and the problems he encounters directly. The second and third games then introduce more political intrigue and deeper relationships, much like the novels do. Problems Geralt, or the player, can’t control but must deal with become the foundation of the morally gray world of both the games and the novels.

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