If you’re a fan of classic roleplaying games like me, 2024 is our year. With the huge success of titles like Baldur’s Gate 3 and Owlcat’s Pathfinder/Rogue Trader series, more developers are working on exciting CRPG titles. Here are our top 10 best CRPGs releasing in 2024.
Top 10 Best CRPGs Coming in 2024
Unforetold: Witchstone
Unforetold is a great starter to our list as it encapsulates that classic RPG feel of a sandbox isometric world where choices matter. The setting mixes medieval fantasy and arcanepunk technology powered by magic. Fun fact, Ed Greenwood the creator of D&D’s The Forgotten Realms is the main worldbuilder here. You’re thrust into a war-torn tale where the story reacts to your decisions which we’re seeing a lot more of in recent years.
As for gameplay, Unforetold features a familiar turn-based RPG tactics combat style. You’ll form a party and adventure through social challenges between factions, and action-packed combat ones, and there’s even a stealth system for achieving your goals unnoticed. The game is currently in Early Access as of January 25, so let’s see what Spearhead Games has in store for 2024.
Sovereign Syndicate
Up next we have a grim dark tale called Sovereign Syndicate set in a Victorian steampunk world. With this setting comes a subtler social approach to gameplay focused on murder mystery solving, investigation, and gathering information from NPCs. Tarot cards are used instead of dice to represent chances and there’s a skill and etiquette system to dictate success and failure.
You’ll play as three unique characters as you uncover the secret behind an emerging cult and recent townsfolk disappearances. The three character storylines intertwine throughout the main narrative depending on your choices offering branching outcomes. All you have to do is make decisions and roleplay solving problems through combat, magic, persuasion, or explosives as Crimson Herring Studios points out. You can find the Sovereign Syndicate on Steam as of January 15.
Felvidek
While Felvidek is a JRPG-inspired title it simply oozes classic RPG vibes. From the isometric semi-open world and retro graphics to the first-person turn-based combat system. At times it makes you feel like you’re playing Dungeon Master back from 1987 but with modernized mechanics. The game is based in an alternate reality in 15th century Hungary though enhanced with magic and the occult.
In combat, you’ll face enemies in first-person as you swap between characters in a turn-based style. You’ll employ medieval weaponry, guns, and magic while out of combat you’ll face moral quandaries and alcohol problems. It’s an immersive RPG title with a linear story and interesting NPCs that doesn’t take itself too seriously but isn’t afraid of getting grim dark when it needs to.
The Way of Wrath
We’re going way back in time to the heroic Bronze Age where we’ll be taking the role of tribe chieftain in The Way of Wrath. This CRPG focuses on turn-based strategy with a real-time option in classic D&D fashion, while offering plenty of tough social decisions as a leader of a clan. The basic premise is that a powerful enemy will reach your village in 10 days. You must combine your leadership and combat skills to survive and make your last stand.
Character customization plays a huge part in this as you choose your character’s origin, abilities, and skills in a freeform class-less system where each decision changes how others perceive you. Solve disputes among your people and be the judge in morally dubious situations where each decision can change the outcome of the final battle. There’s also a base-building element in the game as you gather resources and construct structures, gear, and traps. The Way of Wrath is scheduled for early 2024 though there isn’t an official release date yet.
SKALD: Against the Black Priory
The artstyle doesn’t get more classic in this list than with SKALD: Against the Black Priory. Even the name is something akin to an AD&D adventure book. SKALD is all about retro graphics depicting a Lovecraftian eldritch horror world with an epic fantasy base. You’ll be playing as a party of heroes in a modernized retro RPG where both your decisions in conversation and combat matter.
The grim dark world aside, the combat focuses on turn-based tactics and class progression as you level up your party from level one to 20. Each level brings new abilities, spells, feats, and of course equipment choices. I’m incredibly excited to see how High North Studios introduces modern-style choices-matter ideas and combat mechanics into an old-school retro experience. The game is coming in Q2 2024.
New Arc Line
A lot of CRPG fans are talking about New Arc Line as it has the biggest budget out of all CRPGs here. It’s an upcoming steampunk and story-rich tactical RPG with magic, elves, and dragons, yes, but also mechanical golems, tesla guns, and flying zeppelins. From the looks of it, this might be our 2024 steampunk Baldur’s Gate 3.
New Arc Line is a story of industrialism, social politics, and racial prejudices. The game aims to dive into a branching choices-matter narrative as much as combat. Speaking of combat, you’ll get access to 6 classes, 12 subclasses, and a system where you combine magic and technology to craft wondrous gear and equipment. Outside of combat, you’ll navigate ethical quandaries where your actions might end up in the local newspapers as you change the fate of the New World forever.
Sandwalkers
One of the defying elements of table-top roleplaying games is hexcrawling. That is, exploring the open world structured in hexes holding combat, social, and environmental encounters. Sandwalkers is an upcoming party-based tactical RPG set in a mysterious desert world.
If you’re a veteran of a desert-based setting, a good TTRPG description for it would be Dark Sun-lite. It’s not as post-apocalyptic and grim-dark as Dark Sun but it shares many of its intriguing elements. Sandwalkers’ combat system has a JRPG feel with a turn-based system where characters have jobs offering unique skills. But you’re not exploring just for the sake of adventure. The story revolves around ecology as you plant new tree cities, share knowledge with your people, and attempt to revive the Mother Tree, Umama.
Zoria: Age of Shattering
This is an upcoming tactical turn-based CRPG in a gothic setting. It focuses on fast-paced action with a freedom of movement system and quick ability uses. What caught my eye on Zoria’s Steam page is that class progression offers a kind of Metroidvania gameplay style. Certain areas or scenarios are accessible only if you develop certain skills in specific classes. Furthermore, the combat system also focuses on the environment which you can exploit like in Larian’s games.
Furthermore, Zoria also includes management. You can manage your followers and send them on missions to gain experience. There’s also a crafting and construction system as you build up your outpost for various upgrades. In this regard, it sounds very much like Pathfinder: Kingmaker offering a mix of story, combat, and base management. It’s set to release on March 7.
Successor
As many of us do, I tend to associate CRPGs with tabletop and Successor caught my eye with massive board gaming vibes. If you look at some gameplay footage you’ll see that Playwood made their combat system look like a board game. There’s a hex-based tabletop housing miniatures on little stands. Even out-of-combat scenarios are designed to look like someone arranged DIY terrain elements and arranged them on a table.
It’s quite evocative but let’s also talk about the mechanics. Successor is a turn-based tactics game, yes, but it’s also a rogue-lite strategy adventure. Each run, you’ll delve into and explore a procedurally generated sequence of regions facing social and combat challenges against the many factions of the world. Each run, you’ll perfect and upgrade your team of heroes with new skills, abilities, and gear options as you face increasingly dangerous adventures. I’m highly excited for Successor, though the release date is still TBA.
The Necromancer’s Tale
Up last The Necromancer’s Tale is expected in Q4 2024 and it might be worth the wait. That’s because it’s a CRPG where you’re playing as a Necromancer raising an undead army. Now this is an exciting idea that many games have attempted to execute but never in a story-focused choices-matter CRPG environment with your Necromancer character as the main focus.
The game also has a highly developed social system as you interact with NPCs, investigate, negotiate, flatter, and coerce in order to uncover the mystery behind the story. The world of the game is focused on the occult as science and magic blend to create an immersive intrigue-based gameplay experience. You’ll also master various rituals from an ancient spell-book to raise and commune with the dead. The only downside is the Q4 2024 waiting time but I hope Psychic Software updates us regularly with gameplay footage.
This concludes my list of the top 10 best CRPGs releasing in 2024. If you’re interested in more upcoming games, check out our top indie games, roguelites, and overall RPGs coming out in 2024.
