10 FPS Games That Felt Larger and Larger the More People Learn About It

First-person shooter games are commonly known for displaying fairly linear experiences and worlds with little room to delve deeper into worlds or characters beyond what's featured in a given campaign.

However, there are several FPS games that do allow players to explore and learn more about their worlds in several expansive ways if players take the time to go off the beaten path or even dive into consuming external media such as books, comics, and even films.

Here are 10 FPS games where players will discover that their worlds are far more large and complex the more players take the time to explore and learn about them.

10 Portal 2

Valve's Interconnected World

If gamers only play Portal and Portal 2 without exploring every nook and cranny of each test chamber or even trying out Valve's other games, they may think the world of Portal is only confined to the white-painted rooms of the test chambers, but the world of Portal is far more vast than it appears.

In Portal 2, players are able to explore the long-abandoned depths of Aperture Science and learn how it was founded in the first place in the mid 20th century by Cave Johnson, with many of its early test subjects being astronauts, Olympians, and veterans.

Players can learn more about Portal 2 worlds by searching for hidden art created by Doug Rattmann, one of the last surviving employees of Aperture who managed to avoid GLaDOS' wrath, as well as exploring Aperture's older labs, with one office in particular leading to a dock for the icebreaker ship Borealis from Half-Life 2.

9 Titanfall 2

Typhon's Mysterious Past

At first glance, gamers may perceive Titanfall 2 to be a rather bland, military-focused FPS title like the plethora of Call of Duty entries many of Respawn Entertainment's staff used to work on, but Titanfall 2 actually has a lot more depth tied into its worlds and characters than most COD titles.

From Titanfall 2's beginning, players learn about the intergalactic conflict between the Frontier Militia and the oppressive Interstellar Manufacturing Corporation among the Frontier colony planets, but the game's primary setting of the world, Typhon, holds a dark secret that makes this single world alone far more complex than any other shown in the series.

About halfway through the campaign, players will come across an abandoned IMC testing facility and be randomly transported years into the past and back to the present to discover that the IMC had been working on a weapon known as the Fold to utilize time displacement to destroy entire planets.

8 Metro 2033

The Factions of Moscow's Metro Tunnels

It's rare for video games to be developed based directly on books, let alone FPS titles, but Metro 2033 is a perfect exception as it not only masterfully adapts Dmitry Glukhovsky's novel of the same name into a video game but allows players to learn more about post-apocalyptic societies and wildlife.

Metro 2033 is set in a future where, after the world was destroyed in a nuclear war, a community of Moscow residents survived in its metro tunnels, founding the Exhibition society within the VDNKh station where the game's protagonist Artyom is raised.

Artyom has never left VDNKh station before in his life, so he learns about the other factions surviving within the metro, as well as the mutated creatures surviving on the irradiated surface, just as the player does, with neo-Nazis and Stalinists waging wars within the tunnels, mysterious psychic Dark Ones seemingly tormenting people, and giant bat-like demons patrolling the sky.

7 Overwatch

The Fallout of the Omnic Crisis

As a PVP oriented hero shooter, Overwatch's story is somewhat difficult to comprehend for those who only play multiplayer matches, but if players take the time to read character and map descriptions, watch cinematic animated shorts, and even read external comic books, they'll find Overwatch to be a rich, storied world.

For example, if players watch Overwatch's first cinematic trailer from 2014, they'll learn a bit of Overwatch's origin as an elite international peacekeeping task force that has since been officially retired, with some of its members since serving as vigilantes or corrupt mercenaries.

However, each new trailer delves deeper into a character, faction, or event's past with The Last Bastion and Honor and Glory depicting the robot uprising of the Omnic Crisis which led to Overwatch's founding, while Reign of Talon depicts Vendetta's takeover of the terrorist organization Talon and the death of Doomfist.

6 Halo Infinite

Zeta Halo's Ancient and Modern History

Most Halo games tend to take place in various locations across the galaxy, but Halo Infinite is one of the few Halo titles that takes place primarily in one location, with that being Installation 07, Zeta Halo.

If players only play Halo Infinite's main levels without searching for audio or text logs, they'll learn a bit about Zeta Halo and how it was used millennia ago to imprison the Xalayn and how it's being used in modern day by the Banished to be the Jiralhanae's new "homeworld" but Zeta Halo has a far more complex history.

For those who collect all of Halo Infinite's audio and text logs and read supplementary stories such as Halo: Primordium, Halo: The Rubicon Protocol, and Halo: Edge of Dawn, they'll learn that Zeta Halo is the last ring of the original Halo array and was used as a temporary home for ancient humanity before being corrupted by the Flood and the Primordial.

5 Doom Eternal

Wars of Earth, Mars, Hell, and Argent D'Nur

The Doom franchise isn't especially known for featuring complex narratives or levels, but this changed with 2016's Doom, which saw the Doom Slayer be teased with a complex, medieval-like past that was further explored in Doom Eternal.

Set 14 years after the events of 2016's Doom, Doom Eternal sees the Doom Slayer leading the fight against the demonic invasion of Earth and Mars while hunting down Hell Priests and preventing the awakening of the Icon of Sin.

During this crusade, it's revealed that the Doom Slayer is, in fact, the same Doom marine from 1993's Doom to Doom 64 and that after 64, he was transported to Sentinel Prime and recovered by Night Sentinels, who trained the Doom Slayer and later had him join their fight alongside the angel-like Maykrs against Hell as seen in Doom: The Dark Ages.

4 BioShock Infinite

A Multiverse of Intricate Histories

2K's BioShock games feature some of the most enthralling worlds in all of gaming, but in terms of worlds that feel bigger the more players learn about them, there's no larger BioShock title out there yet than BioShock Infinite.

BioShock Infinite begins in an alternate 1912 where the U.S. constructed a floating city called Columbia which seceded from the U.S. to form its own independent, religious-centered utopia, only for the intervention of Booker DeWitt to help spark the city to fall into civil war.

What follows is a time travel and multiversal escapade throughout not only Columbia's dark past, but alternate Columbias and even the original Rapture-focused BioShock, with DeWitt and a mysterious girl named Elizabeth at the crux of this crazy dimensional adventure tying countless worlds and timelines together.

3 Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora

The Diverse Clans of Western Pandora

The extraterrestrial world of Pandora has enraptured billions of people worldwide via James Cameron's record-breaking Avatar films, but those three movies have only shed light on a small portion of the Alpha Centauri exomoon, with Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora bringing audiences to its western regions.

Set primarily around the same time as Avatar: Fire and Ash, Frontiers of Pandora has players embody a young Na'vi called Tamtey of the nearly extinguished Sarentu clan as they and their fellow Sarentu survivors set out to join the human and Na'vi Resistance and attempt to unite western clans to fight the oppressive RDA.

Here, players not only learn about the Sarentu, who were nomadic storytellers and diplomats, but also learn about the art and cloth-focused Aranahe clan, the nomadic, zakru-traveling Zeswa clan, and the isolating herbalist Kame'tire clan, with players able to learn more about each clans' history, culture, and traditions.

2 Fallout 3

Life Beyond the Capital Wasteland

There aren't many FPS RPGs out there, with most RPGs being primarily played from a third-person or isometric perspective, but one of the best FPS RPGs out there that players can spend literal weeks exploring and still find something new to discover is Fallout 3.

The first Fallout game developed by Bethesda, Fallout 3 was, for many gamers, their first exposure to the 1950s Americana-inspired nuclear post-apocalyptic world of Fallout, with players being able to explore the irradiated Capital wasteland spanning from Virginia to Pennsylvania.

For some gamers, they might have initially believed that Fallout was always centered on the American East Coast, but as people explore the Capital wasteland and interact with the Brotherhood of Steel and the Enclave, they'll discover that there are several communities out west and even far north and south, referring to factions seen in Fallout 2 and Fallout 4.

1 Destiny

Lands Beyond Old Russia

In terms of an FPS game where the world or universe feels bigger the more people learn about it, there's no better title that matches that description than the record-breaking FPS MMO than the first Destiny game.

Set in the 28th century after most of the humanity was wiped out following an event known as the Collapse, Destiny has people play as a deceased human, alien Awoken, or cybernetic Exo, as they're revived by a drone-like Ghost to become powerful Guardians with the goal of protecting the last of humanity in Old Russia from dark alien threats.

Little of Destiny's history, alien races, or past conflicts are directly explained in the game's story, but as players explore each planet and moon in the Sol system and unlock lore-focused Grimoire Cards, they'll begin to learn the rich history and culture of the Cabal, Fallen, Hive, and Vex, with many coming from other systems the Traveler once visited.