Games which, for you, define 'replay value'

[deviltry]

Mostly sandboxy games with new game plus where you keep your powers, ie Prototype, Dark Souls.
Games with co-op, ie Gears of War, Halo.
RPGs where you can replay with different gameplay - wizard, warrior, ie Elder Scrolls, Amalur.
Aaaaand games that are just fun - Far Cry 3, lez go and stab everyone in outposts heu heu.

 

[Lugbzurg]

Could we just say "Minecraft" and leave it at that?

Probably not. I haven't even played it, but I know it's still a good example.
(And yes, it actually does have an ending, which EmceeProfit gladly explained.)

 

[RedDeadFred]

Pretty much every game DEVELOPED by Bethesda. They are gigantic as it is and all demand multiple playthoughs. Plus, if you like to do really in depth roleplaying like me, you can pretty much create an endless amount of characters and adventures to playthrough. And if you some how manage to get bored of all this, there are tons of excellent mods for these games.

LoL is also pretty much a mandatory inclusion for me seeing as I haven't spent a dime on it yet I've probably played it for around 400 hours.

Minecraft to. I am always coming back to it when I think of some awesome new thing I want to build.

Edit: How could I forget? Borderlands 2. I've only owned it for a few months and I've already spent more than a hundred hours on it.

 

[SgtMcgee23]

Fallout 3 or New Vegas

I would lean towards New Vegas being more re-playable I suppose because of all the different factions and what not.

Then you throw in all the mods that are made for the game, and you're looking at even more content.

 

[pakker]

Devil May Cry and Bayonetta. The kind of games that you can play over and over to get higher ranks, try out different weapons and combos, try all the difficulty levels, all the advanced techniques.

This, so much this, though I did not play Bayonetta

The games I keep coming back to, beside multiplayer games, are the spectacle fighters, if I love the combat system on the first "normal" run, I will unlock it all, I will complete every single difficulty you can unlock and so on. This was especially true for me in DMC3 and to some extend 4. Also, do not forget Ninja Gaiden 1 and 2.

What keeps me coming back for more is the increase in challenge, my problem with most games and replay value is that after the first completion it gets too easy, this is why my face is still smashing into Xcom at the moment.

There are a few games that warrants another run, because the games are just so tight, like Portal, Bastion and right now I am considering The Walking Dead again..

So, either ramping up the challenge with a good combat system (Bring your best and I -WILL- beat it syndrome), or a really well-told story (like watching a movie again).

 

[Nannernade]

Any game that has so much content that you want to be challenged through a replay instead of being that high level 100 something one hitting everything. Also it's a proven fact that everytime you replay something you always find something new.

 

[Yellowfish]

Well, for me it's roguelikes, mostly. Also Dwarf Fortress and Minecraft. The latter two aren't my favorite games, but I've sunk several hundred hours into both of them. Every time a major patch for Minecraft is released, I delete all my saves and start anew on a freshly generated world. And Dwarf Fortress is... well, you know that game, it's all about replay value. Chose a bad place for your settlement? Goat guts are coming to life and murdering your dwarves? Well, tough luck, restart and choose a better place. Goblins stole all your children? Just start again! Someone left a cat in that abandoned mineshaft you decided to seal, driving the cat's owner completely bonkers and forcing him to go on a murderous rampage, plunging your fort into a howling vortex of madness, bloodshed and fun? You forgot what that lever does, and decided to pull it, flooding the fortress with magma? A three-legged mutant zombie penguin-human crossbreed has murdered half your dwarves and forced you to seal yourself underground and watch your settlement slowly wither? Well, you can always starts again and there's a good chance that you'll screw things up in a slightly less pathetic way.

 

[Bad Jim]

I think most games these days are taking the right approach by adding customizable maps. once you introduce the core game elements in single player you can then jump online and see how others have built levels in the case of something like little big planet that is 99.9% of the gameplay. the downfall of this is any moron can build a half assed level and you could be left with more monotony than if the devs themselves had done it and end up spending more time searching for something fun than actually playing ( i done that alot with old WC3 maps)

I've made a few Portal 2 maps, and played a lot more. I have noticed that the great majority of maps are indeed awful, mostly because the solutions are way too obvious. I think it is possible to filter the crap and find the good maps, but it's obviously more than one person can do and no-one is motivated to do it. Most maps are largely unplayed. I think Yahtzee made the same complaint about LittleBigPlanet.

I think you could solve this particular issue with some sort of karma system. The more maps you play, the more people(mostly mappers) will play yours. That would mean you could at least get enough people playing your maps to give it a fair rating.

Or maybe make the game free(at least for user content), but charge for the map editor. That way you (hopefully) have a large playerbase compared to the mapping community that can find the good maps.

Of course, a more difficult editor does cut down on the amount of crap, because your level won't get made unless you really think it's worth making. But it comes with the downside that far less gets made. There aren't many Portal 2 maps made with Hammer. I doubt whether great designers like Mevious would have made anywhere near as many puzzles as he has without the easier editor. Going big on user content requires an easy editor and some scheme to ensure that the inevitable flood of content gets rated.

I don't think it's quite been done properly. But I think it can be done.

 

[unstabLized]

A bunch. I'll name a few.

Ace Combat 5 and Zero, GTA Vice City/San Andreas, Gran Turismo 4, Emperor: Battle for Dune, Age of Mythology, Call of Duty 4, the ANNO Series, Skyrim, Battlefield 3, Dungeon Defenders, Borderlands 2, XCOM: Enemy Unknown, Need for Speed Underground 1, 2, and Most Wanted (the original), Serious Sam: The First and Second encounter... That's all i can remember for now.

 

[ShinyCharizard]

Gears of War 3. I've gotten a ridiculous number of hours racked up on the multiplayer and I continue to play it weekly. Also Battlefield Bad Company 2. But it has been difficult to find full matches in that game lately.

 

[OneOfTheMichael's]

Left 4 dead is the obvious choice as replay value. You literally just play 4 campaigns over and over again (without dlc).
But the games I've replayed the most are fallout 3 and new vegas which i define as:

Games you love. Games that allow you to expand on their universe. Games that are fun. Games that have a gripping playthrough.
And for replay value: All of the above repeated time after time.

 

[lacktheknack]

So I'm re-re-re-re-replaying "The Movies" again. It's one of the games I point to when someone tells me Peter Molyneux is a bad designer.

The magic is that it plops you down with a wad of cash and says "survive for a hundred years". And then there's enough options, approaches and charm that surviving is always a minor challenge with a few great game mechanics to keep things fun until the end.

Also, it takes so long that you can completely recompile your approach to the game before you're even done your first playthrough. Plus, the few flaws it has can be modded out for the next run.

And if all else fails, you can film a fifty-foot werewolf beating up a blocky doomsday robot and have it become an epic blockbuster.

 

[ClockworkUniverse]

Well, to make me want to replay it, a game just has to be good. Obviously, narrative and mechanical agency are huge incentives to replay a game, though.

As for the most replayable game...to me, that would be Dwarf Fortress. There are just so many variable aspects of it.

 

[Grottnikk]

I've played the living crap out of games like Civilization and other 4Xers. Some FPS games have it, too, like Left for Dead. I usually play through an RPG a few times at least. Recently, FTL: Faster than Light had me trying to unlock one more ship, one more achievement, go through just one more sector... . Great game.

 

[Kirov Reporting]

So I'm re-re-re-re-replaying "The Movies" again.

Ahh, that game has been sat on my shelf for about 3 years now, just waiting for the spark to get me back into it. Since I last played it, I've had a major PC and graphics card upgrade, and your delightful summary of how much you can do in it has hooked me back in - thank you! I'll be installing that tonight.

Though hopefully I'll end up with fewer alcoholic actors on set than I used to.

 

[xshadowscreamx]

well for replay value, mass effect 3 or gears 3 cuz of the coop horde mode with friends

or long games like skyrim, just about any rpg.

 

[Tom_green_day]

I find it impossible to replay a game.
Be it Fallout, TES, Mass Effect, Far Cry, Assassin's Creed, I've never played a game and wanted to play it again
The problem is that I already know how it goes and all the levels are the same. Usually in my first playthough in these games I try a bit of everything, for example in Skyrim I used Melee, Magic and Range which means there is no need to replay a different style.
The only games I have actually replayed are Rome:Total War, Battle for Middle Earth (1&2) and also the original Black Ops campaign, just because I like the way you don't have to think and it is just a guided tour of killing people.

 

[Baron von Blitztank]

Just reading the thread title instantly screams out "MINECRAFT".
No plot, just building things in a randomly generated blocky landscape because.

 

[Angry Camel]

Resident Evil 4. I lost count of how many times I played through it. The game can be a sastisfying challenge, and then you can buy the Typewriter and utterly annihilate everything in your way.

Super Metroid is a lot of fun to go through multiple times. I ashamed to admit I still haven't got 100% items yet.

Batman: Arkham Asylum is a great experience to go through. For me, it's the right length, you can always improve yourself and the atmosphere is wonderful. I really like Arkham City, but it's almost too big to go through repetitively. 400 Riddler challenges is a pain in the arse, and riddles aren't as easy to find and solve without interrogating thugs because of the shear size of the place.

 

[LK9988]

The main games I would associate with replay value are those which have an element of creativity. Although the quality control of content published on such games could usually be a lot better, I have clocked up hundreds of hours on games like Little Big Planet and Garry's Mod (yes, I know technically it's a HL2 mod but it can be played as a standalone game)because of the ability to create your own things, publish them, and use other people's creations.