The RPG genre is notorious for massive games that can take days, weeks, or even months to complete, as players unravel epic storylines and tinker with the numbers of an entire adventuring party. Not everyone has the free time to invest in such long quests, but hope isn’t lost. There are some RPGs that can be finished in a single weekend.
To qualify for a shorter RPG, a game needs to be finishable in around fifteen hours or less. This is a harder metric to meet than it sounds for the genre, as many RPG fans attribute length to quality. However, size isn’t everything, and in an era when aging gamers have less free time than they used to, a shorter, high-quality experience is more valuable than a bloated quest, one where it’s easy to lose interest, the longer it goes on.
Shadowrun Returns Is A Compact CRPG Experience
After MMOs, the CRPG sub-genre has the longest games. Anyone who wants to belly up and play Baldur’s Gate 3, Neverwinter Nights 2, or Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous better put a lot of time aside, as those games are mammoth experiences that can eat up whole days of someone’s life.
The Shadowrun Trilogy is the exception to the rule, though only because it consists of three games with relatively short runtimes. For those unfamiliar with Shadowrun, it’s based on a tabletop RPG set in a Cyberpunk future, where fantasy races exist in a sci-fi setting. This is a world where elf hackers hang out with dwarf mages, fighting against mega corporations that run the world, while dragons secretly manipulate presidential elections from the shadows.
Someone interested in shorter RPGs could tackle all titles in the Shadowrun Trilogy across multiple weekends, starting with Shadowrun Returns. The world is fairly linear, especially compared to similar games, but that just means there’s less chance of getting lost in side quests, so the player can focus on the main storyline, where they’re on the hunt for a killer in Seattle.
Shadowrun Returns is a great way to fill that Baldur’s Gate 3 or Solasta-shaped hole, for people who want a big CRPG experience, but one that they can see through to the end in a relatively short time. It has the same turn-based combat as the other TTRPG greats, with an expansive class/skill system to tinker with, but it never overwhelms the player, meaning it’s easy to stick around until the end credits scene.
Crisis Core -Final Fantasy 7- Reunion Kicks Off One Of The Best RPG Storylines
The Final Fantasy 7 franchise has effectively been split in two, with the Compilation of Final Fantasy 7 containing the original game and its sequels/spin-offs, while the remake trilogy is considered a separate entity, with its own timeline. One game connects the two iterations of Final Fantasy 7, as it’s a prequel set at a point before the timelines separated, showing the events leading up to Cloud Strife’s arrival in Midgar.
Crisis Core -Final Fantasy 7- Reunion stars Zack Fair, a member of the elite SOLDIER unit, during the closing days of the Wutai War. He quickly learns that the ultra-powerful, high-ranking members of SOLDIER, Angeal, Genesis, and Sephiroth, have dark secrets behind their birth, culminating in a bloody conflict with the Shinra Corporation.
Unlike the other Final Fantasy 7 games, Crisis Core is a single-character action RPG, with the player controlling Zack throughout the whole story. This makes the combat more challenging, as there are no party members to bail him out. If the player can avoid completing the game’s excessive side quests, then they quickly blitz through the main storyline.
The only potential issue with playing Crisis Core is that it has massive spoilers for the story of Final Fantasy 7, especially the original game’s biggest twist. Anyone planning on playing the series in chronological order, rather than release order, should be aware, even though the secrets of Final Fantasy have long been openly discussed online.
Look Outside Is An Underrated Horror RPG Gem
Not every amazing RPG is some triple-A release by a big company, as indie developers have taken up the gauntlet and released classics of their own. A modern example of this is Look Outside, a criminally overlooked horror RPG with some of the creepiest character designs ever featured in a video game.
Look Outside uses a contemporary setting, with the main character, Sam, trapped in an apartment building, thanks to the Lovecraft deity that appeared in the sky one day, transforming anyone who looks at it into a monster. Sam has to explore the apartment in search of supplies and allies, while the halls are teeming with those who looked outside, and now only want to murder, devour, or some combination of the two.
The gameplay in Look Outside is standard turn-based RPG fare, with Sam able to use melee weapons and guns, with special moves learned from playing video games. It’s the party member and monster designs that are the real standout of Look Outside, as they’re terrifying to behold, with nearly every resident of the apartment block resembling Lovecraftian horrors, with wicked smiles concreted onto their faces.
While Look Outside can be finished over a weekend, it’s also a difficult game, even for RPG fans, and it’s advised that prospective players check out hint guides beforehand. There are some incredibly powerful optional party members hidden in the game’s opening hours that are easy to miss, and those that seek them out will have a much better chance of surviving.
Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars Is One Of The Best Nintendo Switch Games
Nintendo has published many Super Mario Bros. RPGs over the years, most of them of varying quality, with the later ones generally not being up to snuff. This might be because the original one on the SNES, created by Squaresoft, was one of the all-time greats, and its spiritual successors have never quite matched up to it.
Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars masterfully mixed the platforming elements of the source material with turn-based gameplay, with jumping attacks featuring quick-time events that can increase their effectiveness. This adds a great deal of interaction to the combat, something rarely seen in RPGs of the era, and is still seldom seen today.
In Super Mario RPG, Bowser is sidelined by a new villain, Smithy, who takes over the Mushroom Kingdom. It’s up to Mario to team up with his old foe, as well as brand-new heroes, on a quest to save his home. While Super Mario RPG is on the shorter side, at least in terms of first-party Nintendo games, it’s absolutely packed with content, with not a dull moment throughout, making it ideal for someone who wants to complete an RPG in a single weekend.
While Super Mario RPG is available on the Super NES Classic Edition, modern gamers can purchase its remake on the Nintendo Switch, which is also compatible with the Switch 2. The remake not only has gorgeous visuals, but it adds new content, including a rematch with the original’s secret boss, adding a new layer of challenge to those who breeze through the game.
Undertale Is A Once In A Generation Classic
Undertale wasn’t the first indie RPG, but it’s easily the most famous, going from a Kickstarter project made by Toby Fox, a Homestuck contributor, to one of the most beloved video games of all time. It’s one of the greatest underdog stories in gaming history, made possible by the quality of a title inspired by the 16-bit RPG era, as well as arguably the greatest soundtrack ever made.
The protagonist of Undertale is a young child who falls down a hole while exploring, arriving at an underground kingdom full of monsters. It’s up to the player whether they want to experience Undertale like a standard RPG, fighting anyone who gets in their way, or if they want to befriend everyone, avoiding bloodshed. There’s also a third path, for those who go out of their way to slay every living being in the kingdom, with the story reacting to every decision they make.
Undertale is a game carried by its writing, with some of the funniest dialogue ever put into an RPG. The experience of exploring the underground world, especially if the player goes in without spoilers, is unforgettable, as Undertale loves messing with the idea of what it means to be a video game. Few games challenge the player’s conception of why they play RPGs as well as Undertale does, which is partly what made it so successful, especially for a generation of Final Fantasy fans who killed countless monsters without thinking twice.
The story of Undertale might not even be over yet, as Toby Fox’s current ongoing game, Deltarune, is dropping massive hints that it’s connected to his previous work in a direct way. Those who are waiting for Deltarune to be finished (with the final chapter likely coming in 2028 or 2029) have plenty of time to get up to speed, with one of the greatest RPGs ever made.
