10 Best RPGs of the 2000s

The 2000s were a heck of a time to be an RPG fan. Consider this — to start with, in 2000, the world was only three years removed from the release of Final Fantasy VII. That's important, as that game opened the floodgates of popularity of the RPG genre in the West for the first time in, like, well... ever. OK, that's oversimplifying things, but in 2000, RPGs were still on everybody's Hot This Summer lists.

Add that with the fact that the gaming industry was in the midst of a generational change the likes that seemingly nobody was prepared for. The leap in processing power between the original Sony PlayStation and the PlayStation 2 alone was astronomical. Now, combine that with the potential of the new guy: Microsoft's Xbox. Along with Nintendo's GameCube (which, despite what its cutesy design aesthetic would have you believe, was an actual beast), designers were suddenly able to create things that were simply unheard of just years earlier.

So, today we're going to look at ten RPGs (as opposed to JRPGs, which we already did a list for) that we consider the best of the era. This list is in no particular order, so the last item here isn't necessarily the be-all-end-all of RPGs, just for reference.

10 Deus Ex

There Still Isn't Anything Quite Like It

Don't let the first-person perspective fool you — Deus Ex is an RPG, through and through. I know, I know, we live in a timeline where games like Cyberpunk 2077, Avowed, and Kingdom Come: Deliverance exist. But they wouldn't if it weren't for Deux Ex. Well, okay, we don't know that for sure, but they probably wouldn't.

But, this game isn't on this list just because it's historically significant. You ever go back and play one of those "historically significant" games, and it just didn't work for you in modern day? I'm looking at you, Shenmue. Anyway, Deus Ex is not that because even today, it still holds up. It even spawned a number of sequels, including one released that same decade, Invisible War. That one was pretty good, actually, and highly underrated. However, it just didn't really offer the same freedom the original did — whether it's going in guns blasting or, you know, the opposite of that.

9 Fable

People Are Still Mad About That Acorn Thing

Despite all of the amazing features it did have, Fable sadly has more notoriety around what it didn't have. That's because Fable was the brainchild of Peter Molyneux who, while rightfully considered one of the greatest game designers ever, is also known for his overenthusiastic promises regarding said games. None of these claims were made to fool the gaming audience, mind you. He just had a bad habit of spitting out game ideas to the press before finding out if they were actually possible.

Which is a shame, because even without things like the acorn that grows into a tree in real time, Fable is an astonishingly great action RPG. The story was brilliantly written, and it was affected by player choice in ways that felt nuanced and not forced. The combat was fun and fluid, as switching between ranged, magic, and melee attacks was seamless. It's also one of the funniest damn games ever made.

The Fable Anniversary edition is really the way to play this one, especially as it includes all of the extra Lost Chapters content, but you really can't go wrong with whatever you end up kicking chickens in. The sequels were also pretty great, too, though the third was a bit too "political" for some.

8 Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic

Are You Aware of the Legendary Twist? Bruce Willis Was Dead the Whole Time!

BioWare cut their teeth making amazing Dungeons & Dragons RPGs (more on those later), but they really didn't become BioWare until they released Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic. Taking advantage of both the impressive hardware Microsoft had in the Xbox and the surprising amount of creative freedom afforded to them by LucasArts, BioWare made magic. You could even say... The Force was with them.

You can see KOTOR's fingerprints not just on the majority of BioWare's games after, but console RPGs as a whole. However, like so many other games on this list (and thus part of why it's on it), it's still highly replayable today. Yes, the dialogue and voice acting don't hold up as well, but the story, characters, and gameplay all do. Its morality system — Light Side vs Dark Side and all that — is still compelling, even after other games after it have kind of done it to death. And that twist involving your character and the villain in the game? It still ranks as one of gaming's best.

7 Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines

A Game About the Undead Kept Alive By Its Fans

Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines is a great game. Like Deus Ex before it, it offered players an exceptional amount of freedom, while set in a world that had atmosphere to spare. A lot of this freedom comes from its character creation module, where even the slightest detail can affect how you experience the game. Factor that in with how the fan community of this game went above and beyond when it came to mods and updates, and you have a cult (almost literally) classic for the ages.

The series has perhaps seen better days since this entry, but for anyone that wants to go back for it, Bloodlines is very cool.

6 World of Warcraft

For the Horde!

I need to address something here. I know, from a certain perspective, that it might look like we're including World of Warcraft here in order to make sure MMORPGs are represented on this list. And while, yes, that's part of it, Blizzard's iconic game would have still made this list regardless.

World of Warcraft has been running for over twenty years. Think about that. It has been providing players with fun, engaging content for longer than some of you have been alive. Content that was provided across a seamless open world with no loading screens. Part of that longevity comes from the fact that it offered just as much single-player content as it did for groups. It soon spawned a culture of its own, one that still goes strong to this day — and shows no sign of stopping.

5 Jade Empire

Less a Hidden Gem, and More of a Forgotten One

When Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic became an undeniable phenomenon, BioWare was ready to move on from the worlds of others and create some of their own. That part is pretty widely known. If you were under the impression that they went from Star Wars to Mass Effect, you'd be forgiven. You'd also be wrong (thus the need for forgiveness.) Before the adventures of Commander Shepard in deep space, the developers took us to mythical ancient China.

Jade Empire took the KOTOR blueprint but traded lightsabers and blasters for martial arts. Rather than exploring the world of the Star Wars films, they focused their attention on Hong Kong Kung Fu dramas. What they created was something the gaming world had never seen before — and wasn't quite ready for, either, apparently. Jade Empire was, sadly, a flop, despite other media like Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon being all the rage at the time.

Thankfully, Jade Empire has gained a sizable cult following. Like KOTOR before it, it combines addictive gameplay and fun combat with a brilliant story and fun characters. The worlds in the game are also incredibly vibrant and colorful, a stark contrast to the color palette we were about to endure in the generation that followed. It even featured Nathan Fillion of Firefly and Superman providing the voice of a Chinese guy for some reason.

Even the Graphical Power of This Game Seemed Like Magic

Months before the launch of the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, I distinctly remember reading an article in Game Informer about the graphics potential that generation of consoles was going to have. They showed heads with facial details far beyond anything we'd seen up to that point. In fact, even compared to what we've already seen in games like Final Fantasy X and XI, these looked almost photorealistic. And the game they were using to demonstrate this quantum leap in quality? The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion.

Of course, graphical quality would get exponentially better as the years went on. Yet, Oblivion is still a damn pretty game to look at. It also took the brilliant gameplay and seemingly boundless freedom of its predecessor, Morrowind, to even greater heights. The world was populated with characters that all had their own lives and schedules, and who interacted with each other as often as they did with the player. It had a set of horse armor that you could buy for three bucks. Three dollars! That same thing would cost you, like, twenty these days.

Recently, Bethesda released a full remake for current consoles and PC. It looks nice. Actually, it looks amazing. But the core gameplay is still the same, which is a testament to how great this game was to begin with.

3 Baldur's Gate II: Shadows of Amn

This Game Had Smoochin' In It

Here's a stupid joke. Baldur's Gate II was the Baldur's Gate III of its day. I know, hilarious. It also has the extra added benefit of being true.

This was BioWare really hitting their stride in the first half of their existence as a studio. They had already proven they could successfully bring the D&D ruleset to video games, with Neverwinter Nights and the first Baldur's Gate, as well as its Tales of the Sword Coast expansion. It was the sequel where they really began to show off their knack for creating amazing characters and writing great situations to find themselves in.

That included romantic situations, something the Canadian studio would find themselves especially well known for. That all began here. Fans from way back will recall the romance with Jaheira, assuming they were actually able to pull it off. Doing that (at launch, anyway) was more complicated than a lot of the game's puzzles.

2 Dragon Age: Origins

Best of Both BioWares

As we've talked about earlier, BioWare kind of has two different eras in its history. There's the early stuff where they primarily focused on Dungeons & Dragons adaptations (and MDK 2, for some reason), followed by Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic and everything that came after that. It was near the end of the decade when someone at the studio thought, "Hey, why don't we make a fantasy game kinda like D&D but in the style of our newer games, eh?" And then they probably apologized.

What they came up with was Dragon Age: Origins and it was one of the studio's finest achievements. The "Origins" in the title, of course, refers to the fact that it's the first game in what they hoped would be a long-running franchise (they hoped right), sure. But it can also mean it's a game loaded with origins, as each class and race combination each had its own 2+ hour opening at the start of every new game.

Combine that with a gritty fantasy world, some absolutely brilliant character interactions, and an otherworldly voice cast, and you have a game not even BioWare themselves have seemingly been able to match over the years.

1 Fallout 3

War May Never Change, But Fallout Sure Did

Weird observation: Fallout 3 ("War never changes") and Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots ("War has changed") came out within months of each other. Crazy, right?

The Fallout series began its irradiated life as a collection of isometric, top-down third person RPGs set in the aftermath of a nuclear war. None of the games were blockbusters, but they did okay. Bethesda bought the rights to the IP and decided to cram all of that into their iconic Creation Engine (well, technically, Gamebryo, but it's still basically... anyway). Which was a smart move because, despite throwing everybody for a loop when they saw a new Fallout game on the shelves, it sold like hotcakes.

Along with the Creation Engine, Todd Howard and his buddies also implemented the V.A.T.S. System, a fantastic blend of turn-based combat and firearms. It wasn't long before millions of players were freezing time and blowing the cojones off of giant irradiated cockroaches. It also led to a sort-of sequel, Fallout: New Vegas, which, let's be honest, would be in this spot instead if it had come out a year earlier.