RPG Bucket List

Magic returned to a 2050s corporate world, so elves and orks now run cyberware-assisted espionage against the megacorps.

Night City between the corporate wars, the current edition of the Pondsmith line that Cyberpunk 2077 was built on.

Paizo's continuation of D&D's third edition after Wizards moved on, with the Golarion setting and its book-length adventure paths.

Percentile rolls, 1920s investigators and a sanity score that only goes down; the oldest RPG still in print after D&D.

Vampires in a modern city hiding from mortals and from each other; the game that put clan politics ahead of dungeons.

A crew of thieves in a city lit by demon blood, where the heist is planned backwards through flashbacks instead of at the table.

Character creation runs a career term by term and can kill you before play starts; the first science-fiction roleplaying game.

The friendlier way into Gloomhaven, with a tutorial campaign and a printed map.

The 200-hour sequel: a frontier outpost to rebuild between dungeon crawls.

No subscription, instanced land outside the towns, and a build capped at eight skills chosen from hundreds.

Tamriel with the level gates removed, so a new character can start in any chapter and scale to it.

Middle-earth from the Shire to Mordor, with instruments that play real notes so players can hold concerts in Bree.

A monk, a hive of demon insects and two side dungeons; the 1997 expansion Blizzard did not make itself.

Kul Tiras and Zandalar on opposite sides of a faction war that starts with Teldrassil burning.

The afterlife split between four covenants, each with a campaign and a set of abilities you commit to.

Four players from four countries in one Dreamcast lobby in 2000, talking past the language barrier with a symbol chat.

The Dark Portal opens onto Outland, blood elves and draenei join, and Illidan waits at the top of the Black Temple.

Northrend, the death knight as a playable class, and Arthas on the Frozen Throne at the top of Icecrown.

Quel'Thalas and Silvermoon opened up in March 2026, with player housing added twenty-two years late.

Dynamic events that fire whether anyone is there to see them, and world versus world fought across three servers at once.

Turn-based tactical combat on a grid inside an MMO; the French world that has been running since 2004.

Norrath in 1999, where dying left your corpse and your gear where you fell and you had to walk back naked; still running.

Top-down and unforgiving since 1997: die and you lose experience, skills and part of what you were carrying.

Free to play and paid for with cosmetics, built around a passive tree of more than a thousand nodes and a new league every few months.

Castle sieges of hundreds of players in Aden; the Korean MMO the clan wars of the 2000s were fought in.

The Spiritborn class and the jungle region of Nahantu, from October 2024.

A character creator people spend an evening in, combat built out of directional combos, and a trade network that runs while you are away.

The Dragon Isles, dragonriding flight with real momentum, and talent trees handed back to the players.

Paladins and warlocks land on the Skovos Isles in April 2026, and the water is worse than the shore.

Grinding Gear's sequel, in early access since December 2024 with half of its planned acts still to come.