Smaller-budgeted games, whether that's AA or Indie, can often feel more impressive and creative than their AAA counterparts. Once such sub-category of games, affectionately known as Eurojank, manages to create unique but flawed gaming worlds for its players to inhabit.
Piranha Bytes’ RPG Gothic became something of a cult hit during the early 2000s and is probably the most known Eurojank title. However, there are a slew of other titles from European studios which are just as fun, full of charm, and worthy of investing some time (and patience) to fully enjoy as a palette cleanse from the AAA gaming landscape.
10 Sniper: Ghost Warrior 3
Ever wanted an intense sniper gaming experience, but with all the open-world possibilities of an early Far Cry installment? Then CI Games’ Sniper: Ghost Warrior 3 is right up your alley. Although it received middling reviews and a less-than-polished release, in the years since its release it has (through patches and improvements) become a quirky entry in the Sniper: Ghost Warrior franchise.
While it’s still poorly optimized at times (the occasional long-winded loading time can drag it down), the core gameplay is highly entertaining, while the story falls squarely into the schlocky and ridiculous direct-to-video fare.
9 The Technomancer
With just over 70 employees, French developer Spiders continues to push itself and actively tries to reach higher with each subsequent game they release. While they are more recently known for Greedfall (a BioWare-Esque RPG) and Steelrising (a Soulsborne action game), their earlier games are also worth the price of admission. TheTechnomancer, despite its generic-looking cover and title, is an interestingly flawed sci-fi RPG.
Set in the same universe as the equally interesting Mars: War Logs, the player gets to indulge in space magic and intense combat encounters. Some of the combat might feel a tad stiff and the game generally lacks a little polish, but it's still worth trying out, particularly for fans of Greedfall.
8 Terminator: Resistance
Games licensed from film properties often get a bad rap. In more recent years, the abundance of film-to-video-game adaptations has significantly lessened. Who’d have thought that one of the best video game adaptations would come from Teyon, the same Polish game developer responsible for Rambo: The Video Game?
It might be Fallout-lite in-between missions, but the developers clearly love the Terminator lore and have made the T-800s menacing again, and in doing so have created the best piece of Terminator fiction in years with Terminator: Resistance. This is the very definition of a diamond in the rough game.
7 Vampyr
Dontnod Entertainment’s AA action RPG Vampyr has plenty of Eurojank running through its veins, but that’s no bad thing. It’s refreshing to play a modern RPG that is more focused on actions, consequences, and atmosphere than it is on grinding for loot or making choices that seem superfluous when all is said and done.
Technical issues aside, Vampyr’s trump card is protagonist Dr. Jonathan Reid, who is both complex and charming; all the best traits of a vampire. The story, which uses the Spanish Flu Pandemic as its backdrop, adds tension and atmosphere to the already dark post-WW1 era setting. With its semi-open world, visually distinctive aesthetic, and monster fights galore, Vampyr is worth seeking out.
6 Styx: Shards Of Darkness
There’s very little in the way of goblin-centric games. Most of the time gamers are hacking the mischievous fantasy creatures into chunky green bits. Not so with Cyanide Studio, who saw the appeal of playing as a foul-mouthed little goblin in Styx: Master of Darkness and Styx: Shards of Darkness, and then tailoring that experience to feel reminiscent of the original Splinter Cell and Thief series.
Stealth is key here, with head-on encounters between humans or elves often leading to a quick and painful demise. Despite its dated-looking visuals and occasionally clunky controls, it does feel like an old-school stealth game experience and is recommended for those who are after a challenge. Quite possibly the best goblin stealth game ever made.
5 Necromunda: Hired Gun
Necromunda: Hired Gun taps into the primitive joy often found in older FPS games, such as running and gunning while taking out hordes of enemies to an ear-shattering soundtrack. Granted, some would say that’s almost identical to Doom Eternal, but there’s something refreshingly different about Necromunda: Hired Gun, such as the sheer level of verticality which can be used during combat encounters (emulating the tactics used in its tabletop counterpart).
French developer Streum On Studio took their passion for the Warhammer 40K universe and created a manic, blood-jibbing playground, full of impressive underground vistas and grin-inducing moments of FPS hilarity despite its technical shortcomings.
4 Divinity II: Ego Draconis
While it's great to see Belgium game developers Larian Studios receiving acclaim for Divinity: Original Sin II, more recently taking the reins for Baldur’s Gate III, some of their earlier games are rarely discussed or often ignored. Divinity's history is one steeped in Eurojank, as Larian tried out different styles of games within the same fantasy universe they created.
One of their most ambitious games was Divinity II: Ego Draconis (or Divinity II: The Dragon Knight Saga as it was retitled following numerous updates and expansions.). Full of interesting side-quests, janky combat, and the ability to play as a dragon (even if it could get repetitive). Divinity II: Ego Draconis reached above and beyond its budgetary limits, and still feels unlike any other RPG in the genre.
3 Biomutant
Eurojank games are often interesting for several different reasons, but foremost is their impressive trait to create something truly unique, even if a game falters or doesn’t entirely fulfill its promise. Biomutant is one such title. With a terrible UI, a narrator that gets increasingly more annoying as the game goes on, and choices that have little impact on the story, can often lead to a frustrating experience.
Where Biomutant excels though, is in its environmental story-telling and fun character mutations to create different builds. When the good elements hit, the game is a fun experience, clearly showing the creativity of Scandinavian developer Experiment 101. Put up with the flaws and there’s a charming and idiosyncratic (if shallow) RPG experience to discover.
2 Werewolf: The Apocalypse - Earthblood
Flawed, short, lacking substance, repetitive, and not that well received, but even with those negatives, Werewolf: The Apocalypse - Earthblood still manages to entertain during its brief game length. Based on World of Darkness’s tabletop RPG, Werewolf: The Apocalypse, this adaptation is a bizarre mashup of stealth with elements of hack & slash gameplay, all topped with lite RPG dialogue trees.
The visuals feel dated (even on modern consoles) and objectively it's a bad game by most metrics. Still, it’s also a great deal of fun to play as a rampaging werewolf, particularly when it harks back to the more simplistic PS2 era of gaming. Complex it is not, but it’s hard to turn down being a werewolf in an imperfect game.
1 Two Worlds II
Mix bad voice acting, clunky combat, a deep crafting system, and sprawling fantasy land with an entertaining magic system, and it creates a joyful melting pot of Eurojank gaming. Developed by the now-defunct Reality Pump Studios, Two Worlds II is an ambitious RPG that reaches for the stars and manages to charm despite its technical shortcomings.
Along with its flexible experimentation of builds and tropical open world full of fantasy creatures (and the occasional dinosaur), it helps to create an RPG in which gamers can lose hundreds of hours in. After spending several hours within Two Worlds II, it is clear to see why it remains a firm favorite among die-hard RPG fans.