Best Isometric Games

What are isometric games?

Imagine that you’re flying a drone over the location that your characters are in. With the best isometric games, you still control them in some way, yet have a much clearer vision of their surroundings. You can imagine how important it is, for instance, in strategy titles to know what’s going on in several locations simultaneously. With this angle, it’s much easier to quickly “jump” to other places to see if everything is going smoothly. What’s more, you see what’s far away and have more time to react before something happens.

Moreover, there is often some sort of active pause system in play. This allows the player to stop the action just to correct some things or command a character to do something. It really comes in handy in isometric RPG games, where it’s good to stop for a moment and return to the battle with a new strategy in mind.

Lastly, this view allows for otherwise chaotic gameplay to get much more coherent. With roguelikes, there’s always much going on, and it’s nice to at least know where your character is at the moment. The other side of this clarity is that tons of adventure games benefit from the angled-down view. Precisely because you see everything from a “drone” perspective, it’s easier to see the details you wouldn’t notice otherwise. For example, the item you’re supposed to collect.

Now that we’re done with the theory, let’s talk about the most important installments from the general list of isometric video games to try on PC, Xbox, PlayStation, and Nintendo Switch. Which titles make the best use of this unusual angle?

Explore the best isometric games on GG.deals

We spoke about the best isometric games, Disco Elysium pops up quite often. It combines adventure and RPG elements in a unique mix The role-playing element doesn’t seem too important at first glance, although it plays a significant role in this story about the alcoholic detective. It’s almost as if you’re rolling the dice in some D&D session, but here, it decides how well you’ll perform in a particular action. There’s also a lot of philosophy and dialogue involved, so it's better to save some time to immerse yourself properly.

Even more dynamic subgenres can be adapted into isometric video games, as demonstrated in an action RPG Dragon Age: Origins. The game can get surprisingly difficult for today’s standards, and it’s an absolute necessity to see what your team is up to. There’s also the active pause system we mentioned that helps you take a deep breath and think about what to do next. Along with a fantastic story and well-written characters, this is a great challenge that is equally rewarding.

There are many more titles with this angle to find, obviously. The feeling of proper control over both the characters and the field can’t really get old. Therefore, the isometric view games are revisited quite often by game developers. Whichever genre you choose to explore, these are much more than some gimmicks. No other way than to try it out for yourself.