Shacknews Best RPG of 2020 - Wasteland 3

This year, while tumultuous, has seen a number of great games. So, when we sat down to discuss the best RPG of the year, I couldn’t help but go to bat for one of the most iconic games this year has brought, Wasteland 3.

There’s so much about Wasteland 3 that fits perfectly into the package, the most important of which is the player agency, something that most other games don’t even come close to offering at the level that inXile offers with the latest chapter of the post-apocalytic RPG series. With Wasteland 3 every decision and every shot that you take has meaning. It can directly affect the world around you, giving you an almost unprecedent amount of freedom in a narrative-driven experience.

Everything that makes a great RPG is there. Insane amounts of character customization, a brilliant story that has been weaved between the various plot points. The biggest difference between Wasteland 3 and other RPGs this year, though, is that Wasteland 3 lets you choose the path that you want to take to the next plot point, and even goes one step further, letting you directly influence how that path plays out.

Giving players this amount of freedom had every chance of backfiring, but the work that inXile put into Wasteland 3 shows what has always made the studio and the minds behind the original Wasteland and the original Fallout series such icons in the game developing world. Witty dialogue is mixed perfectly with humorous moments and the enemy variation helps to keep the different factions and groups from blending in together.

All of this comes together in what can only be considered the best RPG of 2020, and honestly, one of the best RPGs of all time. Wasteland 3 is a precedent setter and any RPGs that want to offer the same amount of player agency and freedom will have a fantastic example to follow.

Check out the other winners from The Shacknews Awards 2020 in our Year of the Games: 2020 article.

Josh Hawkins

Guides Editor

Joshua holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Creative Writing and has been exploring the world of video games for as long as he can remember. He enjoys everything from large-scale RPGs to small, bite-size indie gems and everything in between.