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The 30 Best Games with the Most Unique Art Styles

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News - July 16th 2024, 14:30 GMT+2
2024 07 15 17 39 news

About this list

For this list, we decided to start with the most popular game installments and franchises, gradually descending to some of the rarest titles you'll ever see. Additionally, we tried not to include multiple games with the same artistic style or from the same company, as we want to focus on the word "unique."

Also, the world of video games is vast, so it's possible that you have a game you really liked aesthetically that isn't on our list. If so, why not leave us a comment about it?
Elden ring

Elden Ring

In reality, any of FromSoftware's games could make it onto this list, creating outfits, armor, and creatures with so many details that it would give the world of Warhammer 40k a run for its money. But the reason I decided to include Elden Ring over the rest is due to its clear inspiration from Kentaro Miura's designs in Berserk, emphasizing the "high" in high fantasy. | © FromSoftware

Journey

Journey

If you had a PlayStation in the 2010s and were lucky enough to come across this title, it surely changed the way you see video games, as it was one of the first titles that began to be considered art in the media world. Just look at the silent desert landscapes and the somewhat religious robes that protect us from sandstorms. | © Annapurna Interactive

Disco Elysium

Disco Elysium

How do you replicate a fictional world similar to ours without falling into over-the-top fantasy or science-fiction concepts, and that aligns with the dense political and philosophical content of Disco Elysium? Its mix of muted colors with the gloomy post-war environments is ideal for an unconventional noir adventure. | © ZA/UM

Hollow Knight

Hollow Knight

More than once, Hollow Knight has been compared to Dark Souls, and it's not precisely because of its mechanic of dying to retrieve your currency or the large number of bosses, but because of the design of its world. Although HK is set in this beautiful underground world where insects are the protagonists, its style definitely has that environmental storytelling typical of FromSoftware titles. | © Team Cherry

Ori and the Blind Forest

Ori and the Blind Forest

The curious thing about Ori and the Blind Forest is how it comes to mind for anyone thinking of visually beautiful games, and it’s a considerable feat since it stands out above any other aspect of this game. With simple, nothing revolutionary platforming gameplay, what Ori changed in the industry was setting a new benchmark for how games can be aesthetically. | © Moon Studios GmbH

Cuphead

Cuphead

Do we need to say more? The fame of Cuphead lies in its entirely hand-drawn art, which reminds us of cartoons from the 40s, 50s, and 60s, or the golden age. Thinking that each animation had to be programmed with the interactivity of a video game, creating hitmarks and more, makes my head explode due to the masterpiece that this game is. | © Studio MDHR Entertainment Inc.

Dont Starve

Don't Starve

Rarely will you find something as similar to an animated film by Tim Burton or Henry Selick as Don't Starve and its cooperative version, Don't Starve Together. It's not just the color palette and the pencil strokes outlining the characters, but the very atmosphere of the world, and the exploration of the unknown, with creatures that could easily come from a horror story. | © Klei Entertainment

Persona 5

Persona 5

Of all the games that blend anime style with the 3D world of JRPGs, none does it as stylishly as Persona 5, very reminiscent of titles like Catherine. While the entire franchise has its merit, Persona 5 has managed to push the limits in terms of extensive gameplay, killer soundtrack, and, of course, its visual style with more saturated colors than ever. | © SEGA

Borderlands

Borderlands

When you think of a post-apocalyptic desert world, so many titles come to mind that the word "unique" disappears from your vocabulary. But when Borderlands arrived on the scene with a somewhat cartoonish style, 3D models with thick outlines, it managed to establish its own visual style. In service to its own comedy, it moved away from the grim, dark, and monotonous landscapes typical of this type of shooter. | © 2K

Limbo

Limbo

I was tempted to put Inside or Little Nightmares, but the reality is that for these titles to gain recognition for their visual aspects, Limbo had to take the first step. Essentially, it is simple, with a monochromatic world, but the lighting and texture of the models and the environment do an incredible job that works with the game's mysterious and somewhat unsettling aura. | © Playdead

Okami

Okami

It's impossible to make a list of unique artistic styles without mentioning Okami, which, like the Ori franchise, gained its fame through its visual aspect. With that very particular style of ancient Japanese paintings that reminds us of Hokusai's work, Okami has become a title impossible to replicate in its art without being mentioned as an inspiration first. | © Capcom

Psychonauts

Psychonauts

If Don't Starve resembles the style of Tim Burton's animated films, Psychonauts reminds us of the grotesque and somewhat realistic aspect of some of his live-action productions. You will hardly see in another game so many abstract character designs that perfectly represent their personalities, nor environments as twisted as the minds you will enter in this game and its sequel. | © Double Fine Productions

The Witness

The Witness

If any game on this list deserves applause for the raw effort put into its world design, it's The Witness. To create the levels, architects and designers were employed, and it shows not only in the great color palette this game possesses but in the excellent way it immerses you in the different zones of the game. It couldn't be called that without having a whole world to observe, right? | © Thekla, Inc.

Blasphemous

Blasphemous

Many players believed that Blasphemous took a hint from the art of FromSoftware games, and while we can certainly say it took inspiration, it would be a disservice to say it doesn't have its own unique pixelated style, heavily inspired by what we might call "Christian mythology." This makes living in this world very different from the representations in Dark Souls and allows it to find its own essence. | © Team17

Gris

Gris

Gris has little gameplay, being nothing more than a short platformer, and it feels like an excuse for the artists to showcase what they've created. And you know what? The art is so fantastic that if it is an excuse, I'll take it. Not only does it already have a blend of 2D and 3D animation that works exceptionally well, but there are also certain levels where a duality is created between the monochromatic and the detailed colorful worlds, something we have rarely found in other titles. | © Devolver Digital

Katana Zero

Katana ZERO

The music? Incredible. The story? Intriguing. The gameplay? Replayable. Katana ZERO is such a wonderful game that it also needed a visual style of the same caliber to represent it. The cyberpunk aesthetic combined with the vibes of Neo-Tokyo has never reached the same level as the pixelated and neon art of this title, featuring a samurai in the middle of a colorful futuristic city. | © Devolver Digital

Hyper Light Drifter

Hyper Light Drifter

And speaking of pixel art, no game has pushed the boundaries of what it is capable of like Hyper Light Drifter, living on the edge of the amount of pixels you can add to a design before it becomes a more realistic figure. But if that wasn't enough, the color palette combined with the levels of technological ruins creates an experience that feels familiar but is represented in a very different way. | © Heart Machine

Return of the Obra Dinn

Return of the Obra Dinn

It may not be the most pleasant game to look at with its retro-pointillism style in monochromatic 3D worlds that remind us of those handheld consoles that tried to compete with the Game Boy and failed, but Return of the Obra Dinn is the definition of a unique visual style straight out of the dictionary. I haven't found a game that even comes close to it, and with such a rare style, it's likely it will never be reproduced. | © 3909

Alice Madness Returns

Alice: Madness Returns

American McGee created his first twisted version of the world of Alice in Wonderland in the year 2000, and then brought it back to life ten years later with the sequel, Alice: Madness Returns. Imagine the dreamlike worlds of this classic novel, but with an aura of horror and some gore that, instead of ruining the beauty of these levels, enhances it. | © Spicy Horse Games

Machinarium

Machinarium

Amanita has a great number of point-and-click adventures that deserve attention solely for their visual aspect, but none of their titles have captivated us as much as Machinarium. Not only is the design of the different robots marvelous, but also the background art that gives us a glimpse of how rich and extensive the universe within this game is. | © Amanita Design

Pyre

Pyre

One of the most difficult tasks in creating this list was not including all the games from Supergiant. And while Hades, Transistor, and Bastion are exceptional, I'm afraid the best of them all in terms of art has to be Pyre. Although it is the least popular game, perhaps due to its gameplay resembling a sports game, the design of the different races and species of this planet, the style of their outfits, and even the map art are so full of watercolor colors that it manages to bring what the company's other games have shown in their concept art into the game itself. | © Supergiant Games

Signalis

Signalis

If you want to create a horror story based on autocratic space governments mixed with Lovecraftian horror, you only need two colors: red and black. But in the case of Signalis, it doesn't stop there; it extends to the very presentation and use of this palette, creating a title that plays like Resident Evil, feels like Silent Hill, and looks like its own unique thing. | © rose-engine

Monument Valley

Monument Valley

The cool thing about Monument Valley is that it manages to capture impossible levels taken from the works of M. C. Escher with an isometric and colorful style, creating a curious and different puzzle game whose gameplay wouldn't be possible without this unique visual style. | © ustwo games

Sable

Sable

If you're a fan of Bande Dessinée (or French and Belgian comic strips, as it is translated), you'll surely feel at home with Sable. Its world, character design, and even vehicles seem taken from the works of Moebius and Jodorowsky, with pastel color palettes combined with futuristic and desert worlds, very typical of these countries, and rarely replicated in animation, much less in video games. | © Raw Fury

Pentiment

Pentiment

But what happens when the game itself deals with works of art? Well, if they're part of the gameplay, they better be bloody good! And that's the case with Pentiment, where the romantic and gothic art typical of the medieval era comes to life, so much so that it is the core of the game's gameplay, as you have to solve a murder based on paintings. | © Obsidian Entertainment

Lorelei and the Laser Eyes

Lorelei and the Laser Eyes

There are many horror games that use a minimalist and pseudo-monochromatic style, using different gradients of black, white, and gray to recreate their world and characters, sometimes adding a touch of color like red for blood. However, we believe that Lorelei and the Laser Eyes is the closest to perfection in this style that we've seen. Just look at the use of gradient for the little color within this game. Chef's kiss. | © Annapurna Interactive

Nine sols

Nine Sols

If a game manages to take inspiration from the many stylized platformers both within and outside of this list, but using its own drawn style instead of the classic pixel art, it's Nine Sols. Although the game is still very new, it has quickly won the hearts of its fans with its visual style. In particular, the backgrounds of the levels are striking, with details that make them feel like we are in a living world. | © RedCandleGames

World of horror

World of Horror

Do you know who is a unique artist in the world of manga? Junji Ito, creator of Uzumaki and many short horror stories with strips so detailed that they've etched themselves into our minds and keep us awake at night. But what if someone decided to make a game based on Junji Ito's art? That is the premise of World of Horror, which, with a somewhat pixelated style, manages to perfectly imitate the terror of the great mangaka. | © panstasz

Killer7

Killer7

I could easily put any of Goichi Suda's games, better known as Suda51, but none captured that first impression of his style like Killer7. Using untextured geometry and cel shading and lighting, it creates this particular style that is able to combine the somewhat noir seriousness of its genre with the fun and ridiculousness of its characters and stories. His style is so distinct that it’s impossible to play one of his games without immediately recognizing it. | © NIS America, Inc.

SLUDGE LIFE 2

SLUDGE LIFE 2

As always, I want to end the list with a game that is strange and different from anything you've seen, and that is the gritty world of SLUDGE LIFE 2. You don't need textured surfaces or extremely stylized designs to create an artistic style different from the rest, and this game is proof of that. Just breathe and let yourself be carried away by the strange universe of this title, which is only possible thanks to its unique art. | © Devolver Digital

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There is a plethora of gorgeos games out there with interesting visual designs that have captivated us over the years. However, more than "beautiful," we want to focus on those games that left a mark in our memory for being different from the rest of the industry in terms of visuals, and I have to say upfront that not all of them are pretty and pleasant to look at. This is a list of our 30 favorite games with a unique, different, and refreshing art style!

There is a plethora of gorgeos games out there with interesting visual designs that have captivated us over the years. However, more than "beautiful," we want to focus on those games that left a mark in our memory for being different from the rest of the industry in terms of visuals, and I have to say upfront that not all of them are pretty and pleasant to look at. This is a list of our 30 favorite games with a unique, different, and refreshing art style!

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