DUNGEONS AND DRAGONS ONLINE (PC)
You can’t really have a “games like D&D” list without Dungeons & Dragons Online. DDO, for short, is developed by Wizards of the Coast, which of course created the tabletop game. So this is pretty much as close as you can get without purchasing a dice set or tracking down a Dungeon Master to narrate and create your journey.
DDO launched back in February of 2006 and is only for PC players. But don’t let the age of the game or its graphics fool you. DDO receives regular updates, one of its recent big ones includes the Dragonborn race which tabletop players have been utilizing for quite some time now. You can download and play DDO from its official site.
NEVERWINTER NIGHTS (PC)
Next up is a title that’s a little bit older than the first. Neverwinter Nights was released in 2002 but is based on Dungeons and Dragons’ 3rd edition.
Published by Atari and developed by Bioware, Neverwinter Nights succeeds in staying true to the table top way of doing things and features a 50+ hour long campaign, which can either be tackled solo or with a party of people. But what sets Neverwinter Nights apart from other games featuring a lengthy story is the ability to create and edit your own maps and dungeons for players to download and run. You can still buy the original version of the game through Amazon, but for Neverwinter Nights Diamond and Neverwinter Nights 2, you can check them out on GOG.
STAR WARS: KNIGHTS OF THE OLD REPUBLIC (XBOX, PC, IPHONE, ANDROID)
Okay, you may be thinking that there is no way a Star Wars title could be linked to Dungeons and Dragons, but minus the Dragons, this is a damn near perfect rendition of what it’s like to play D&D. You may not see the same classes, such as Rangers or Clerics, and you won’t recognize any Gnomes or Tieflings walking around, but the mechanics of Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic are strikingly similar to the tabletop game.
Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic takes place thousands of years before the rise of the Galactic Empire and your character is the last hope for the Jedi as Sith Lords have beaten the Jedi Order to the verge of nothingness. Will you save the Rebels? Or will you give in to the Dark Side?
Throughout the course of the game, you’ll level up certain skills, much like you would in D&D, and depending on how many points you pump into those skills, you have a higher chance of succeeding when doing things like hacking terminals or persuading someone to shave some credits off of one of your purchases. The dialogue trees are lengthy and every choice you make greatly affects your alignment and how people view your character as you play through this lengthy story.
You can pick up Knights of the Old Republic and its sequel through Steam and the Apple App Store.
DIVINITY: ORIGINAL SIN (PS4, XBOX ONE, PC)
Divinity: Original Sin is another RPG game that closely mimics what it’s like to play D&D. Your character starts out by investigating a murder, but quickly uncovers something much deeper and darker that could shatter the world as you know it.
It’s the journey in this one that makes it feel just like a campaign a Dungeon Master would set up for their players. Alone or with a friend, you can “use and abuse” the mechanics and system that make up this game, both to explore the game and story, but to also create your own adventures and share it with the player-base. Also a sequel, Divinity Original Sin 2, is due out in 2017.
Divinity: Original Sin is available on Steam and GOG, as well as on their official site.
DRAGON AGE (PS4, XBOX ONE, PC)
This last one is for the gamers that are really on the fence about D&D. If it’s being a part of a party and discussing your moves with a party of other people that has you on edge, or you just enjoy using a controller or mouse and keyboard to play your games, getting into a game like Dragon Age may provide you the feel of a Dungeons and Dragons campaign without the math or rigorous character building that happens over the course of your typical D&D campaign.
Like Neverwinter Nights, this is the work of Bioware, and there are a ton of Dragon Age titles to pick up and try. There is even a tabletop version of Dragon Age thanks to Green Ronin Publishing that functions differently in the sense of how you play with the dice but has the same spirit of D&D. So if you enjoy playing Dragon Age: Origins, Awakening, Inquisition, or Dragon Age II, you could make the jump to the Dragon Age tabletop game if you still aren’t sure about Dungeons and Dragons. You can pick up the Dragon Age games across the PlayStation and Xbox family, as well as on PC.
There are, of course, a ton of great RPG games out there, but if you are looking for the Dungeons and Dragons experience without finding a DM or purchasing all of the handbooks, these are some good places to start.
