Focused on driving the story home through its dialogue alone, Lost Records: Bloom & Rage slows things down so you can truly take in every moment it has to offer. If you enjoy slow-burners with relatable characters and an overarching mystery to sink your teeth into, then there are plenty narrative-driven games for you. But where do you start?
Many narrative-driven games handle darker themes, often told through a character’s past and how it’s changed them into who they are today. But few manage to create a realistic setting, captured by the setting, dialogue, and character development. This means many cannot hammer home the profound message they’re trying to portray. Whether you enjoy Lost Records for the characters, dialogue, or themes it handles, here are 9 games we highly recommend for the narrative adventurers out there.
As Dusk Falls
As Dusk Falls is an interactive game that follows two families across three decades. Their stories overlap, having you control both families during a hostage situation. As Dusk Falls has an interesting art style that blends concept art with realism that resembles live action. Scenes are shown in still pictures rather than a fluid, moving image, making As Dusk Falls appear more like a storyboard.
The main reason to give this game a shot is for its interactive story that plays much like a movie, where you can choose how to react to alter the outcome. What’s important to note is that As Dusk Falls plays similarly to a visual novel, having little to no gameplay for you to interact with.
Beacon Pines
Beacon Pines immediately stands out for its cozy aesthetic, delivered in watercolor landscapes you can freely explore. Although you’re confined to a small area at a time, the narrative and wholesome characters makes Beacon Pines a cozy, charming experience. Like a choose-your-own-adventure game, progressing in Beacon Pines is achieved through selecting keywords on the storybook you’re reading throughout the tale.
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If you’re someone who enjoys seeing everything a game has to offer, alongside having a mysterious undertone following the narrative at all times, then Beacon Pines is the one for you. To learn everything there is about this game’s charm and mystery, you need to speak to everyone and find all the charms to unlock each branch, thus giving you a reason to replay the game if you want the full story.
Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons
Offering both single-player and co-op, Brothers has you play as both characters to navigate across various terrains while solving platforming style puzzles. Instead of having an AI-controlled side character when you’re riding solo, you control both brothers with the analog sticks. Brothers has a fantastic story that’s carried primarily through its visuals, as most of the game is silent, featuring no understandable dialogue whatsoever.
The scenery is beautiful and you feel like you’re being carried across this game as it progressively gets darker and darker. What starts as a somewhat hopeful story about the determination of two young boys, turns into a devastating conclusion that’ll likely leave you in a puddle of tears. You see the development of the brothers through their actions alone.
Life is Strange: True Colors
When it comes to choosing a favorite in Don’t Nod’s Life is Strange series, I think True Colors takes the crown for its lessons on love, loss, and friendship. While the OST is fantastic across each game, True Colors pairs beautiful scenery with calming music to create thought-provoking cinematic moments. This is only one reason to enjoy True Colors, however. Although the narrative is simpler and more predictable than others in the series, this allows the small things to really shine.
True Colors shows the mundanity of life and how—with the right perspective—you can truly enjoy what little time we have on this planet. A story about time, and how it can slowly heal all wounds, True Colors is full of beauty. But time was needed to watch Alex’s friendships and relationship develop, as that was sadly skipped over. True Colors is packed with adorable moments that will leave a smile on your face and bittersweet lessons from the other side that’ll have you with tears rolling down your cheeks.
Long Gone Days
Long Gone Days is a JRPG with relatable characters and excellent dialogue. Focused on delivering a story through its narrative alone, Long Gone Days has a really interesting premise that mixes in linguistics to tell a realistic story about war and what it does to the people living through it. We have a cast of likeable characters, who are all from different backgrounds, each getting their moment to shine as you progress through Rourke’s adventure.
Trained from birth to become a sniper, Rourke, like many others, was bred to follow instructions and not ask questions. It’s only when Rourke goes to the surface for the first time that he starts to realize that the enemy may not be as threatening as he was conditioned to believe.
Midnight Scenes: From the Woods
A story about romance formed in the unlikeliest places, From the Woods is the fourth episode in the Midnight Scenes series (inspired by The Twilight Zone). A short tale with excellent queer representation, featuring themes of racism, homophobia, animal cruelty, and bullying, From the Woods is a side-scrolling horror game that’s light on the scares, but full on the immersion. A mysterious tale, something has followed one of the patients to their new sanctuary, bringing years of hatred and wrath along with it.
From the Woods tells a story about the importance of a community, paired with a spooky narrative that has a heartfelt ending. If you decide to give this game a shot, be sure to play Midnight Scenes: The Nanny first, as From the Woods continues the story from the third episode.
Night in the Woods
We’ve all probably felt what Mae was feeling when she dropped out of college and returned to her hometown—lost and uncertain about her future. The perfect coming of age story, giving the adolescent freedom to spend your days doing whatever you want (with little repercussions) tells the wholesome story of Night in the Woods. A quirky and loveable cast joins Mae on her adventure, each with flaws that humanize these zoomorphic characters.
This side-scrolling adventure is simple in its design, but Night in the Woods is a special experience for its script and characters you’ll immediately fall in love with. You can easily lose yourself in the worldbuilding of this quaint town, where everyone is just trying to get by. For a game that looks cute and cozy on the surface, Night in the Woods deals some hard-hitting truths that’ll surely stay with you long after you’ve finished.
Tell Me Why
Made by the same developer as Lost Records, Tell Me Why is an obvious pick to recommend. Don’t Nod offers a real and sensitive story that features important LGBTQIA+ representation. An engaging narrative from start to finish, Tell Me Why falls short in the gameplay department as it uses basic walking-sim exploration to carry the game forward. But it’s in its story about loss, trauma, identity, and dark themes of violence and suicide where Tell Me Why has a very real impact to those willing to listen.
Twins Alyson and Tyler are the primary focus of the story, their lives, both past and present, unfolding before our eyes. Although many gamers may not be able to relate to Tyler’s story, it’s still an important one to tell, as it helps expand our understanding of identity.
Until Then
Until Then shows the true power of an excellent story and script. You don’t need amazing visuals or flashy images to get something exceptional—and Until Then demonstrates just this. There’s zero voice acting, yet the music and pixelated, homely visuals create an experience that’ll make you reminisce about a time when life felt easier. A coming of life story that has rich character development, told through multiple media forms that replicate our reality, we are able to align to our cast as if they were our own friends.
Until Then doesn’t conclude from a single playthrough either. There are hours of content to explore to fully digest everything Until Then has to offer; from its sentimental moments, to understanding the mystery surrounding Mark. This is a dialogue-heavy game with a ton of heartfelt moments that’ll surely tug on your heartstrings. It’s beautiful and real, with a story about friendship and loss.
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