Adventure games like Oxenfree: Some obvious choices and some lesser-known gems

Oxenfree’s niche in today’s video game market is a result of combining dynamic storytelling, atmospheric discovery, and decision-making within dialogue.

These types of games don’t rely on fast-paced action; instead they focus on developing characters, creating suspenseful moments, and presenting player-driven results.

There are many other stand-out games, which include those with eeriness, emotionality, and choice-driven gameplay that match the gameplay experience from Oxenfree.

Why Games Similar to Oxenfree are so Appealing?

Oxenfree at heart is a supernatural narrative-driven adventure game featuring natural conversation systems and eerie, atmospheric storytelling.

In the game, you’re following a group of teenagers who unintentionally opened a ghostly rift on an abandoned island. How you choose to engage in dialogue affects how well your character interacts with others and the way their overall outcome develops.

What makes games similar to Oxenfree stand out from other games is the emphasis on:

• dialogue branching options that allow for a response based on a situation
• immersion within the narrative rather than reliance upon combat
• atmosphere building through environmental storytelling
• exploring themes such as identity, trauma, and the supernatural
• many possible endings determined by player decisions

Games That are Similar to Oxenfree

We’re giving you a list of games that are interesting, time-tested, and similar to Oxenfree.

Oxenfree II: Lost Signals

A logical continuation of Oxenfree would be Oxenfree II: Lost Signals. Years later than the original, it continues the mystery surrounding the strange radio signals and supernatural events.

Similar to Oxenfree, it provides the ability to use dialogue driven exploration to tell an emotional story.

With regards to gameplay, it builds upon the previous title by providing more open areas to explore and deeper layers of the narrative.

If you were able to appreciate the tone and pace of Oxenfree, then you should play Oxenfree II: Lost Signals.

Firewatch

Firewatch is a highly popular example of modern day narrative adventure games. In Firewatch, you play a fire lookout in the wilderness of Wyoming. You communicate with your boss via radio while investigating odd happenings in the woods.

As with Oxenfree, it uses primarily dialogue and atmosphere to create the experience as opposed to relying on action.

Through voice communications with your boss, you develop an emotional connection with them, and throughout the experience, you begin to unravel a larger mystery that ultimately draws you in until the conclusion.

Life is Strange

Life is Strange is yet another key part of modern day narrative adventure games. Each Life is Strange game revolves around an emotionally charged storyline that is affected by player decisions.

One reason Life is Strange matches up to Oxenfree is because both center around teenage protagonists, supernatural elements, and mostly use dialogue as a means of telling their respective stories.

Also similar to Oxenfree, Life is Strange offers a rewind feature allowing players to experiment with different versions of their narratives as well as provide consequences associated with their decisions.

What Remains of Edith Finch

What Remains of Edith Finch is an emotionally-charged, anthology-style adventure game. Within each of the short, interactive segments that make up this game, you explore the history behind a family afflicted by curses.

Because each section contains a different gameplay element, the experience remains fresh and exciting throughout.

Like Oxenfree, What Remains of Edith Finch focuses on creating an atmosphere that evokes emotion through symbols and mood rather than using traditional mechanics to drive gameplay.

Kentucky Route Zero

Kentucky Route Zero is an example of an abstract, surrealist point and click adventure game. This game follows a mystical road called Highway Zero along with all of the people connected to it.

Similar to Oxenfree in terms of its slow burning narrative style and supernatural aspects, however it places more of a focus on abstract storytelling and theater like presentation.

The Walking Dead

The Walking Dead Season 1 by Telltale Games defined modern choice-based storytelling. Your choices affect relationships, how likely you are to survive, and how emotionally weighted your journey will be in a post-apocalyptic world.

Like Oxenfree, The Walking Dead emphasizes making quick-thinking decisions in high-pressure situations based on what is morally right or wrong. Often times the emotional implications of your decisions are much greater than the actual gameplay mechanics involved.

Norco

NORCO is an industrial themed southern gothic sci-fi mystery point and click adventure game. It combines dystopian corporations with decaying environments and loss of personal identity into an atmospheric story.

Due to its slower paced design, heavy amount of dialogue and environmental storytelling, NORCO will feel familiar to fans of Oxenfree’s tone and pace; however, due to being much darker and focused on social-political issues, its tone differs greatly.

Disco Elysium

While much closer to role-playing games than traditional adventure games, Disco Elysium deserves mentioning for being one of the most complex narrative-driven games ever made. As a detective trying to solve a murder case, you must navigate through fragments of your own broken mind at the same time.

Completely reliant on dialogue (with no combat), Disco Elysium shows how engaging storytelling and player choice can be when compared to action mechanics.