Unbeknownst to a lot of gamers these days, some of the best games they have played can be categorized as isekai or a genre where the protagonist gets transported to another world. Turns out it wasn't just limited to oriental video games, but also some of the western classics. Of course, a lot of JRPGs incorporate elements from the isekai genre in anime.
These unexpected isekai games might not have the obligatory "truck-kun" isekai hero delivery service, or they might come without the warm and fuzzy love interests, but they'll surely offer players a weird new world or dimension to explore. And with isekai video games like Forspoken coming out this year, it's time to get familiar with the genre as it makes itself more known in the industry.
8 Genshin Impact
- Release year: 2020
- Platforms: PlayStation 4, Android, PlayStation 5, iOS, Microsoft Windows
Of course it'd be here. It's only one of the biggest games in the world right now, and it proudly waves its isekai banner. Genshin Impact puts players in the shoes of either Aether or Lumine. The twins got separated and transported to another world (tentative theory at the moment) thanks to a seemingly rogue god being.
As such, the main quest in Genshin Impact revolves around players finding their in-game twin in this odd new world. Despite being released as a full version, this open-world RPG utilizes a live service model where it adds content through updates. Its story nor its game world is not yet finished. The game, however, is free-to-play.
7 BioShock Infinite
- Release year: 2013
- Platforms: PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, Microsoft Windows, macOS, Linux, Classic Mac OS
Bioshock Infinite, like one of its predecessors, holds a special place in the video game industry. It's one of the first games that called dibs on parallel universes as its setting (or at least popularized it). Hence, the isekai factor in this game involves players jumping around different dimensions usually to a similar universe but with different historical triggers.
It's all thanks to the help of Elizabeth who was born with the power to tear open portals that allow her and others to travel to parallel universes. Initially, she appears more like a damsel in distress, but the game's complex plot will unfold into something unexpected and revelatory.
6 Brutal Legend
- Release year: 2009
- Platforms: PlayStation 3, Microsoft Windows, macOS, Linux, Xbox 360
Brutal Legend follows the story of a heavy metal rocker who is pretty just Jack Black self-inserting himself into a video game (but without the gut). Eddie Riggs is his character's name and in a true isekai manner, he gets whisked off into an unknown world or dimension.
Lucky for him, this universe serves as the perfect backdrop for a metal music video for all metal sub-genres. This metal isekai open-world comes complete with skulls, fire, blood, leather jackets, black dye, and of course lots of metallic compounds. Also, it has hot goth ladies and Ozzy Ozbourne, truly an isekai masterpiece.
5 ARK: Survival Evolved
- Release year: 2015
- Platforms: Linux, Microsoft Windows, macOS, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Android, iOS, Nintendo Switch, Stadia
For a different flavor of isekai video games, players can sink their teeth into ARK: Survival Evolved. It's isekai but players are trapped in a fabricated world that's full of dinosaurs (usually). It's complicated but ARK's story happens because the Earth was destroyed by essentially human greed. So its former inhabitants created ARKs.
These are vast orbital structures that recreate what life used to be on Earth. Some, however, are more primordial or brutal than others deliberately in order to conduct an experiment on their human inhabitants. Players can also visit other ARKs to see how the other made-up worlds are doing.
4 Ni No Kuni: Wrath Of The White Witch
- Release year: 2011
- Platforms: Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Nintendo DS, Microsoft Windows
Ni No Kuni has captured the hearts and minds of several fans from different fandoms thanks to its style and themes. It's a JRPG rendered in Studio Ghibli visuals with an isekai storyline. Heck, the Studio Ghibli pitch alone was enough to make it sell; it's also best known as "that" Studio Ghibli game.
Storywise, Oliver is the hapless and humble protagonist here. One day he experiences a tragedy that triggers the appearance of Drippy who then asks him to save an unknown world oppressed by an evil wizard even while Oliver was still grieving. Pretty standard for an isekai plot, fans will feel right at home.
3 Returnal
- Release year: 2021
- Platforms: PlayStation 5
It's sadly only available in the PS5 but Returnal is one of the few exclusives that make it worth buying the world's rarest console. Returnal is a roguelike shooter game that follows the struggles of Selene Vassos as she crash-lands on an ominous planet called Atropos. Hence, she's basically trapped in another world.
But instead of medieval fanfare or sci-fi mechs, Selene was greeted by grotesque aliens and a nauseating time loop where every death sends her back to start over at her crash site. It's like Re:zero meets Alien except more disturbing as Selene's corpses stay where she died like a mountain of trophies that rub her failure in her face.
2 Remnant: From The Ashes
- Release year: 2019
- Platforms: PlayStation 4, Xbox One, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X and Series S, Microsoft Windows
Remnant: From the Ashes starts off like a typical post-apocalyptic shooter/RPG made with Dark Souls as a reference. But later levels in the game will have players leaving Earth and getting themselves trapped in a worrying number of different worlds from other dimensions.
That kind of gameplay loop is only part of Remnant's overarching story where players will have to combat the sentient extradimensional hive-mind called the Root in order to free Earth. It just so happens that the Root's span and dominion extend to other worlds as well.
1 Doom
- Release year: 1993 (first game)
- Platforms: Anything that can play a game, including calculators and pregnancy tests
Some might consider this as pushing technicalities, but Doom is as much of an isekai as InuYasha or Digimon. In many Doom games, Doom Guy or Doom Slayer either traps himself or volunteers to go to hell (literal hell) in order to wage an eternal war against demons.
There's not much of a plot here, but such is also the case with other isekai. In the latest incarnation of the franchise Doom: Eternal, Doom Guy even invades heaven after finding out that the guys up above colluded with hell. He didn't need truck-kun, his fists are the truck-kun sending demons to a world of pain.