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Given how many new and exciting games launch every month, along with our endless backlogs that already contain dozens of titles, there’s rarely a concern of having nothing to play next. As such, playing through any game twice has to be truly earned, and not every open-world RPG offers enough reasons for doing so.
Some games, though, are explicitly built to be played multiple times. They’re known for their unparalleled flexibility and ability to reveal new layers with each subsequent run. Each of the open-world RPGs below is long, absorbing, and branching — often to such a degree that you won’t experience their best parts in a single playthrough, no matter how thorough a player you are. Only by seeing some of the alternatives and possibilities can you fully appreciate the depth of these true masterpieces that you should play at least twice.
Fallout: New Vegas
Perhaps Still Obsidian’s Magnum Opus
Even with several newer Fallout installments available today, Fallout: New Vegas remains perhaps the most beloved game in the series. It perfectly encapsulates the franchise’s unique spirit and its roots in RPG freedom. New Vegas is a true paradise for role-play, taking into account nearly everything that you might come up with when building your character or approaching almost every quest.
While later entries significantly streamlined character progression toward action, New Vegas still relies entirely on S.P.E.C.I.A.L. This makes your character feel truly unique every time, defined by their own strengths and weaknesses. You can be a charismatic swindler, a silent and deadly sharpshooter, a fierce barbarian, a lucky stealth burglar, a cannibal psycho, or even a complete idiot, quite literally.
The Mojave wasteland is also perfectly matched to these rich RPG possibilities. It’s full of reactive NPCs, fleshed-out factions with their own agendas, hidden questlines, and far-reaching consequences. Whether you chase down as many quests as possible or simply experience the world through the barrel of your gun, Fallout: New Vegas delivers a rewarding journey with huge replayability potential.
New Vegas is a truly enormous game, especially its Ultimate Edition package, easily offering well over 100 hours of playtime. While such colossal scope might make a second full playthrough daunting right after the first, the game more than deserves to be revisited from time to time.
Disco Elysium
Political And Psychological Like Nothing Else
Disco Elysium might not be a true open-world RPG. Its setting is confined to the small, densely packed urban district of Martinaise in the city of Revachol, with distinct areas explored gradually rather than through a massive sprawling landscape. Yet when it comes to playing your own way, it has very few competitors.
Incredibly politically and psychologically charged, and almost entirely devoid of traditional combat, Disco Elysium was specifically written and designed to account for as many complex choices and outcomes as possible. This results in a deeply personal narrative flow filled with mutually exclusive branches. Beware, though: the gameplay consists mostly of reading and skill-checking, so it might not suit some seeking a more dynamic time.
Several clever design choices make the game truly special. Disco Elysium uses the amnesiac protagonist trope to great effect, as the predetermined "hero" has no memory of his identity or the world around him. This lets you shape his personality with remarkable freedom, engaging in fascinating dialogues with your inner self at every step as you indulge or resist your most primitive urges, all while surrounding NPCs react accordingly. This layer alone is unique enough to place Disco Elysium in a league of its own.
Another standout trait is that there’s no real solution to the game’s main quest, combined with soft time passage. You can only resolve certain portions of the story in each playthrough. All of this creates a fragmented narrative with time-sensitive quests and events that need to be played at least twice just to experience their full scope — something that the upcoming Blood of the Dawnwalker seemingly aims to replicate on a larger scale.
NieR: Automata
Reaching The Credits For The First Time Is Just The Beginning
NieR: Automata is a completely different breed of open-world RPG. You play as predetermined characters with far fewer options to tailor your own build or combat playstyle, aside from some optional quests and the fates of supporting characters, which might even lead some to consider it a linear game. Its true hook lies in its structure, which is far more intricate than a simple path from beginning to end.
Upon completing the game for the first time (Route A), you quickly discover that it’s hardly a traditional ending, with plenty of questions left unanswered. Instead, NieR: Automata sends you into round two with a new playable character. Some might see little incentive to replay the entire campaign as 9S rather than 2B, even though the gameplay for both feels markedly different. Yet quitting here would be a huge mistake.
Pretty soon, NieR: Automata begins delivering surprise after surprise, with some twists as unexpected and shocking as they come. Of course, one can debate whether the game’s three main routes should even be considered separate playthroughs at all, rather than parts of one larger “full” story. No matter where you stand on that, reaching the end credits for the first time in NieR: Automata is merely the beginning. Its structure remains truly unique in the medium, with very few titles even attempting something similar.
Kenshi
Pure RPG Sandbox At Its Harshest
Kenshi is yet another open-world RPG that takes a completely different approach to the genre. It offers no branching stories or character-driven quests — in fact, it has no predetermined story at all. Instead, the game is a unique blend of genres and inspirations that results in something totally fresh and emergent, a title you can replay literally endlessly.
First things first. Kenshi is a really tough, unforgiving, often unclear, and unfair experience. Newcomers should expect to put real effort into grasping the essentials just to survive in its post-apocalyptic world for more than a few days. It’s a true sandbox in its purest form; a "thousands of ways to die" simulator, if you will. Losing through various outcomes here is a part of the charm, making Dark Souls games feel like a walk in the park.
With all that said, Kenshi isn’t mandatory for a second or third playthrough in the same way as the other titles here. It’s more of a necessity to keep learning, failing, and trying again. Once its sandbox structure really clicks, you get a general understanding of what to expect, yet it will still surprise you countless times.
With such an endless variety of possibilities, from your playable character (or squad) to flexible base building and the overall direction of your playthrough, Kenshi is one of those so-called endless games that you can keep installed at all times, and experience something entirely different whenever you feel like returning to its brutal and unscripted world.
Cyberpunk 2077
Surpassing Even The Witcher Games
Cyberpunk 2077 needs little introduction today. It’s one of the most-played single-player open-world RPGs on a daily basis, enjoying huge surges in popularity even without new content injections. As Cyberpunk 2077 saw over 100 thousand concurrent players following the recent Edgerunners Season 2 trailer, fans are already begging CDPR to consider a second expansion akin to Phantom Liberty.
Of course, such massive popularity stems directly from the game’s high replayability and admirable variety in branching quests, possible alliances and allies, combat playstyles, and a thriving modding community. Playing through CP2077 only once means experiencing just a fraction of what’s on offer.
Unlike The Witcher 3, in Cyberpunk 2077 you can create your own character. V’s gender and one of three possible lifepaths add enough differences to give each run a vastly distinct flavor. Which quests you choose and how you tackle them, which relationships to invest in, how to treat Johnny Silverhand, and which ending to chase — it’s all part of a second playthrough’s charm.
Adding to its Ultimate Edition appeal, Phantom Liberty is yet another example of huge storytelling branches, making the expansion an essential experience that must be played twice. Depending on who you decide to trust, Solomon Reed or Song So Mi, a large portion of the DLC plays out entirely differently, and trust me, you don’t want to miss out on either path.
