Personally speaking, I likegamesthat have a concrete endpoint more than stuff that you’re just supposed to play indefinitely. I like it when a game has a point at which I can say, “Okay, it’s over,” and I can move onto something else.
However, that preference applies primarily to games with end points in the core gameplay loop. When it comes to secondary modes, challenges, and bonuses, that’s a whole ‘nother ballgame.
10 Best RPGs With Infinite Replayability
These are the best RPGs with infinite replayability that can ensure you’re never bored again.
For years, games have employed endless modes as a bonus treat for those who just love playing the main game so much, they can’t bring themselves to stop. The concept of infinite, unending gameplay doesn’t lend itself well to every game ever made.
But for those it does work for, it’s a beautiful Frankenstein ofaddictive gameplayand an endless feedback loop of fulfillment, not to mention the potential for setting world-record high scores. If you want a game with an endless mode that will steal away your time like a black hole, try one of these.
The Cards Keep On Coming
Manyroguelike and roguelite gamesare naturally predisposed toward endless modes. Either surviving or racking up a high score is usually part of the core gameplay loop, so letting you survive or score forever is a natural evolution of that. This, presumably, is why Balatro has its own built-in endless mode, and implements it in a pretty clever and user-friendly way.
In a typical run of Balatro, your defined goal to “beat” the run is to reach Ante 8 and clear the final boss blind. When you defeat the boss blind, you’ve already definitively won the run, and you may return to the title screen secure in that victory. If, however, you’ve got a really spicy deck in motion and don’t feel like stopping, you can just press the Endless Mode button on the results screen and keep on chugging.
From there, the game will keep generating new Antes with progressively higher, more ridiculous blind requirements, eventually reaching numbers so long they can’t all be displayed onscreen. It’s here that the real spicy decks are discovered, as ordinary decks will swiftly fall behind the score curve.
9Batman: Arkham Asylum
Batman’s Got All Night
Batman: Arkham Asylum
In all the Batman: Arkham games, including the originalArkham Asylum, one of the most fun elements is thefree-flowing parry-centric combat. Since Batman doesn’t have any superpowers, he wins fights by being swift and crafty, countering enemies, and occasionally chucking a Batarang in someone’s face. If you enjoyed the combat in Arkham Asylum, then good news: you can do it forever and ever.
In one of the game’s challenge maps, titled “Totally Insane,” you’re pitted against an infinitely respawning supply of various Arkham inmates and forced to brawl until you drop dead. It’s the perfect opportunity to get into that delicious flow state, clubbing punks back and forth to rack up the highest combo possible before your ticket gets punched.
Most of the enemies you fight are regular Arkham inmates, some barehanded and others with pipes, but occasionally, a Lunatic is dropped into the mix. While Lunatics can be knocked over by a regular combo, they can only be defeated with a ground takedown, which keeps you from getting too complacent with your combat against everyone else.
8Super Smash Bros. Ultimate
Everyone Is Here (And Here And Here And Here)
Super Smash Bros. Ultimate
As far back as Melee, theSuper Smash Bros.series has featured endless combat modes. These modes have gone by a few names, including Endless Melee, Endless Brawl, and Endless Smash. In these particular modes, you only fight dummy enemies like the Fighting Wire Frames, Fighting Alloys, and Mii Fighters, which does take some of the fun out of it.
Super Smash Bros. Ultimatechanged things up, though it did sadly come at the cost of the series’ longstanding All-Star mode. Rather than in previous entries, where All-Star had you fight the entire roster once, Ultimate’s All-Star Smash mode has every character on the roster spawning in to take a swing at you in an endless cycle, only ending when you get knocked out.
A fun little element to this mode is that the characters spawn in the order that their hallmark games were originally released in Japan. We start with Mr. Game & Watch, move on to Pac-Man, then Donkey Kong, and so on. It’s like being pummeled by the history of gaming!
7WarioWare, Inc.: Mega Microgames!
Wario’s Greed Is Infinite
In the originalWarioWare, to actually “beat” the game, you have to clear each of the microgame collections, ending with their respective boss microgames. However, after you’ve successfully cleared any of the collections once, you can immediately load them up again into a looping endless mode for setting high scores.
Just like the first time you played through one of the collections, loading it up again will have you tackle a series of progressively faster microgames, culminating in a boss. The difference is that, after the boss, the cycle starts over, resetting the speed and raising the difficulty level.
This can happen twice after the initial clear; after you beat a boss microgame at the highest difficulty, the cycle starts over at a higher speed instead, and just goes on forever like that.
Every game in the WarioWare series has this feature, and it’s one of the elements I adore about it. I still remember playing WarioWare Touched on long road trips with my sister, the two of us fighting off motion sickness as we passed the DS back and forth, trying to set high scores.
6Punch-Out!! (2009)
An Endless Mode With Consequences
Punch-Out!!
In the Wii reboot ofPunch-Out, after you clear all of the career circuits and Mac becomes champ, you unlock Title Defense mode. In this mode, you have to fight all of the boxers again with remixed skills and techniques. After you finishthatmode, successfully defending Mac’s title from all comers, Mac silently informs Doc that he’s had his fill and wants to retire while still at the cusp of his stuff.
This brings us to the game’s endless mode, Mac’s Last Stand. In this mode, opponents will be chosen for you at random from across the entire Title Defense roster, plus guest fighter Donkey Kong, coming at you one after the other.
The only thing you get if you win is another opponent, and if you lose three matches, that’s it for Mac’s career. Seriously, the career mode will be completely disabled, and you’ll have to start a new profile to play through it again.
While the main appeal of an endless mode is its lack of consequences, it was a fun spin on the concept to have Mac end his career through one. He’s clearly ready to stop, so you’re able to either attempt to push it as hard as you like or just let him go down gracefully.
5Puyo Puyo Tetris 2
Go Puyo, Go Tetris, Or Go Both
Puyo Puyo Tetris 2
While the original NES Tetris was technically a game that could be played endlessly, due to limitations in the hardware, the game does eventually killscreen, asproven in 2023 by streamer BlueScuti. That’s a shame, as the wonders of Tetris deserve to be enjoyed ad infinitum. If that’s what you’re in the market for,Puyo Puyo Tetris 2has the processing power to accommodate you.
Puyo Puyo Tetris 2 actually has a handful of different endless modes to meet your precise puzzling preferences. you’re able to play a solo Puyo Puyo board, either with a timer to test yourself or the timer disabled to go truly endless.
There’s also Endless Fever, where you need to solve pre-made Puyo Puyo boards rapidly by slotting one pair of Puyos into the perfect spot. For Tetris, there’s Marathon mode, which goes endlessly so long as you get a high score at least once every 150 lines.
10 Games To Play If You Love Tetris
If you love spending time playing Tetris, these games may scratch that same itch.
If you want to mix it up, there are also endless versus modes, where you can take on an infinite string of CPU opponents wielding either Tetris or Puyo Puyo boards. You can do this both online and locally, which makes it a fun party game.
4Spooky’s Jump Scare Mansion
Running From Horrors Is Great Cardio
Spooky’s Jump Scare Mansion
Spooky’s Jump Scare Mansion, as you’d probably expect from its title, can be a bit of an intense game to play through even in the main game. There are small mercies, particularly that the murderous Specimens can only appear one at a time, and will go away eventually. If you want more spooks in your life, though, let’s crank up the difficulty.
In an October 2017 patch, the HD Renovation of the game received its Endless Mode, starting you outside the mansion and setting you down an infinite path of randomly-generating rooms and sections. You get to choose which weapon you want at the start, but that’s pretty much the only mercy you get. Once you start, you keep on going until you die.
Not only are all the Specimens from the base game in the mix, but there are also several wholly unique Specimens that can only spawn in Endless Mode. Additionally, some Specimens can begin spawning simultaneously, giving you multiple horrors to plan around and run your butt away from at once.
If you manage to clear 1,000 rooms in this mode, you’ll unlock a panel where you may customize Specimen spawns, as well as skip ahead to later rooms if you want.
3Buckshot Roulette
Push Your Luck To Its Limit
Buckshot Roulette
The first time you play Buckshot Roulette, you’re playing in the game’s regular mode. In this mode, the progression of events, including the items you get and how many live rounds there are, are largely scripted. It could be said that this initial run is just a rehearsal for the game’s main attraction: its endless Double or Nothing mode.
By taking the pills that appear on the bathroom counter after clearing the game once, you begin Double or Nothing mode, where the items, shells, and charges are properly randomized.
Beyond that, the gameplay is the same, trying to shoot the dealer and not get shot yourself for three rounds. If you survive all three rounds, though, rather than just getting your briefcase of money and leaving, you get a choice: double or nothing.
If you refuse, you take the money and that’s that, but if you double down, you go through another three rounds to double whatever winnings you previously earned. You can double down as many times as you want, and walk away when you’ve had your fill. Just remember, if you die, all that money goes down the tubes.
Live Out Your Long-Term Zombie Survival Fantasies
Left 4 Dead 2
The goal of any given stage in eitherLeft 4 Deador Left 4 Dead 2 is to fight your way through the Infected-filled streets and reach the barricaded Safe Room on the other side, locking the door behind you to clear the stage. What if there were no safe haven for you to escape to, though? What if all you could do is stand your ground in a single, infinite swarm of Infected?
Survival Mode was added to the original Left 4 Dead via a content update and incorporated into the sequel’s base mode selection. In this mode, played on designated Survival maps, four Survivors must hold out for as long as possible against an endlessly respawning horde of common and special Infected.
There’s no win state for the Survivors; the whole affair just goes on until everyone is dead or incapacitated for the purpose of setting records.
In Left 4 Dead 2, an offshoot of Survival was added to the game’s Mutation cycle called Survival Versus, wherein players controlled the attacking Infected like in regular Versus mode. This offshoot was so popular, it became a permanent addition to the game in a community update.
1The Binding Of Isaac: Rebirth
Once More From The Top
The Binding of Isaac: Rebirth
Part of the fun in any given run ofThe Binding of Isaac: Rebirthis watching your tear shots change and evolve with each new power-up you pick up, not to mention the hilariously horrific mutations each one inflicts on Isaac himself. Whenever you defeat one of the game’s final bosses, all of that sadly goes away. But what if it didn’t have to?
With the game’s Afterbirth+ DLC came the addition of Victory Lap, which allows you to start the whole run over from the Basement with all of your items and power-ups carried over.
This means you’ve got another entire run’s worth of treasure rooms to plunder, and even more gross nonsense to inflict on Isaac. You can repeat Victory Lap as many times as you think you can get away with to keep the pain train rolling.
Unlike some endless modes, Victory Lap does come with some rules and restrictions to amp up the difficulty. Firstly, you’re able to only roll back if you defeat the Lamb in the Dark Room; no other boss counts. Secondly, all subsequent runs will be on hard difficulty, even if the first wasn’t. Finally, after your third lap, all shops disappear, and your character is set to The Lost.
