50 Best Point-and-Click Games for PC: Page 6 of 7

point and click games for pc
"USE [object] WITH [object]" - a game mechanic that entertained a generation.


4) Kentucky Route Zero

Kentucky Route Zero gameplay video

Antique delivery man Conway travels Kentucky on a final trip that will bend the laws of space, time, and the road.

“Excuse me, ma’am, could you help? I appear to have turned into a silhouette.”

Maybe it's premature to put Kentucky Route Zero so high up on the list, given that the fifth part is yet to be released. But even on those terms this game is a masterpiece. The art oozes atmosphere, the storytelling is layered and literate and the pervasive feeling of mystery will grab you and never let go.

I don’t know what “Diesel Liquor Coffee Snacks” are, but I’m sure they’ll perk me right up.

3) The Longest Journey

The Longest Journey gameplay video

The world of magic and the world of technology live side by side, preserved in an eternal Balance. When the Balance is threatened, the universes’ only hope is art student April Ryan and her mysterious ability to “Shift” between worlds.

Fun fact: this set was re-used from an old Final Fantasy game.

Point-and-click adventure games are often limited in the scope of the stories they can tell - sometimes by file size constraints, sometimes by budgets. But no game manages to squeeze a story of epic scope into a few rooms quite like The Longest Journey, which tells a dizzying tale of intertwined parallel universes that somehow also manages to pull off intriguing characters and minutely detailed worldbuilding.

“It’s easy to be a fisherman when you don’t have terrible posture.”

2) Papers, Please

Papers, Please gameplay video

A lone border official at the gates of Arzstotzka must check the documents of people coming into his country. The slightest inconsistency - an expired passport, an incorrectly-stamped visa, an item of contraband - means denial of entry. Failure could mean going cold, or hungry, or without medicine…or it could mean the collapse of society itself as saboteurs and terrorists scheme to destroy Arzstotzka from within. 

“I thought you’d be taller.”

As a memory game, Papers, Please is pretty unforgiving - and that's the point. The game's masterstroke is to use brutal gameplay to trick you into also experiencing a story of crushing despair under an autocratic regime, where the choices you are given have real moral weight. Top it off with a distinctly Eastern European flavor not often seen in video games and you have something very, very special.

“REASON FOR DENIAL: JUST LOOK AT HIM”

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Film student. Game writer. Improv comedian. Passionate lover.
Gamer Since: 1994
Favorite Genre: RPG
Currently Playing: Sunless Sea
Top 3 Favorite Games:Fallout: New Vegas, Gothic II: Night of the Raven, Civilization IV