The “realistic” umbrella is wide, but we understand what you want. You’re craving something that uses realism to convey an immersive, fun, and complex experience. Where are these games, and how many genres can they cover?
Selecting the Best Realistic PS4 and PS5 Games
“Realism” is one of its most popular features in the gaming industry. It ranges from photorealism and satellite-made graphics to fully-fledge and immersive gameplay without a UI. Some of the most critically acclaimed in history boasts these elements. They offer photorealistic graphics capable of transporting the player to the story. Moreover, they offer a series of mechanics that feel intertwined with the world rather than intrusive. Realism also doesn’t mean the game can’t be fiction, but it’s hard to deliver a fantasy. Still, the fewer UI and microsystems the game has, the harder it becomes to survive in fictional environments. Moreover, some of the best realistic titles require genuine physics. These technical requirements are common in sports games. The reason is they emulate the real world as closely as possible.
Best Realistic PS4 and PS5 Games
Red Dead Redemption 2
Red Dead Redemption 2 is a realistic and immersive story-driven shooter. It boasts photorealistic graphics that remain relevant to this day, plus a highly reactive world. Moreover, it features several gameplay mechanics that happen without a UI.
Photorealistic graphics and attention to detail.Memorable lighting, shadows, particles, and similar.Accurate weapon systems (recoil, bullet drops, decay, etc.).Realistic survival systems to manage such as sleep, hunger, or thirst. Credible motion animations and facial animations.Credible 3D sound designs.Physics engines and other systems consider extra variables, other than how to play, to determine your results. Heavy simulations of real-world interactions, events, challenges, and situations present in the game. Sims should feel complex, multi-layered, and without easy or obvious choices. Reactive NPCs and reactive worlds (like towns and cities).Immersive elements; fewer interfaces to deliver more natural mechanics.
These elements typically feature shooters, sports games, sims, and survival games. From shooting your way to a zombie apocalypse to tracing a supercar, let’s browse for the best realistic PS4 and PS5 games. You play as Arthur Morgan, an outlaw and member of a decaying gang. The setting is an open-world wild west, where you can complete the main quests with branching paths, side quests, and several activities. These activities are often realistic, and because you’re an outlaw, they thrive on a “Wanted” system. Like GTA games, your criminal actions have repercussions. Then, several activities like trimming your hair, maintaining guns, or hunting happen in-game, without menus. The realistic features are not enough to sell the game, though. Rather, RDR2 features a stellar story and a world that keeps reacting to how you act and choose. Gunplay is also great fun, featuring time-accurate firearms and subtle ways to progress your character.
This War of Mine: Final Cut
This War Of Mine is based on the siege of Sarajevo (1992 to 1996) and other modern sieges. The setting delivers a 2D management sim where you handle a group of civilians during dire war times. The civilians want to survive, but the city is under siege. You face a lack of food and medicines, constant danger outside your shelter, bandits, snipers, and more. Moreover, you’ll face complex moral issues and the mental health of your survivors. Then, during the day, you’ll tend to your shelter. You make people work, fabricate items, trade, and explore around. Moreover, you take care of the citizens (food, medicine, and a place to sleep). This takes inspiration from real events, on the stuff war survivors deal with. Lastly, you’ll face life and death choices. There’s no good and no wrong. There’re only “what ifs,” the possible consequences of every step you take. For example, will you help the newcomers and trust them? Or do you think they are bandits, and you’ll let them go?
Assetto Corsa Competizione
Assetto Corsa Competizione is regarded as the most realistic racing title for consoles. It comes from KUNOS Simulazione, a gaming company focusing on realistic driving sims. The title uses the GT3 setting to deliver tracks, professionals, and vehicles. So, you can compete in real-life situations, and every scenario features impressive detail. Also, you can play it online with up to 20 people via PS Plus. Moreover, the game features a sophisticated physics and mathematical system. The calculations simulate every aspect of the race. That goes from motor throttle to tire friction, aerodynamics, suspension, weather, and more. Therefore, driving becomes a matter of balancing multiple variables and mastering the controllers. Additional systems like damage, vehicle balance, and electrical system will make races even more complicated.
theHunter: Call of the Wild
theHunter is a simulation open-world hunting game. It offers a relaxing first-person hunting experience, good for enthusiasts and veteran hunters. You enter an open-world island with photorealistic graphics. The setting takes inspiration from places in the French Alps, the Washington States, and the Australian Outback. Within the island, you’ll find several species you can hunt, like rabbits and deers. Each animal lives in a particular habitat and has particular behaviors. The game’s engine mimics these behaviors to deliver an immersive experience. It goes as far as encouraging you to hunt each animal with different weapons and tactics. So, the core experience revolves around tracking, finding, hunting, and harvesting the animals. You also have a digital camera if you don’t want to hunt the living creatures. Also, you can find the animals by using the in-game GPS.
Ghost of Tsushima
Ghost of Tsushima is also a top contender, although it features a fictional story and character. First, understand it’s a character-driven action-adventure with character progression. So, it’s not immersive: there are all kinds of menus. The game features cutting-edge graphics plus an exceeding level of detail. It delivers a beautiful, Feudal Japan open-world in technicolor. Then, it renders human sounds, movement, and combat better than anything before. Also, combat is smooth and satisfying but not very realistic. It’s a third-person slasher, most of all. You slash, parry, dodge, block, and use various swordplay techniques to defeat different weapons. You also use stealth and other gadgets to defeat your enemies in unconventional ways. Lastly, you play as Jin Sakai, a samurai hero. You’re fighting against the Mongolian invasion of Japan (1274). The journey heavily develops the character, as it takes a toll; the road to victory is nothing like the samurai path.
Uncharted: A Thief’s End
Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End is realistic in a special way. It’s more than a game, but it doesn’t feel like real life either. It’s more like watching a good action-adventure live-action movie. You’d forget this is computer animation after a couple of hours. That’s because the story, characters, voice-acting, and motion capture go above and beyond what most games do. There’s also a great deal of attention to detail. Clothes get wet, flames dance in the wind, surfaces reel underneath your tires, and the environment constantly reacts to you. Moreover, there’s great attention to the architecture the game displays. It goes to distance, as the linear story happens across several episodes in different parts of the world. That said, you play as Nathan Drake, a former treasure hunter, on a personal quest. Lastly, the gameplay is simple but just as important as the cinematics and scripted scenes. You play in the third person with a mix of melee, stealth, and firearms. Aside from defeating your enemies, you solve puzzles, traverse areas, and explore around.
Gran Turismo 7
Gran Turismo 7 is the latest entry in the racing simulation saga. It’s not as realistic as ACC, but it thrives on a physics engine that simulates many aspects of the races. The downside is its heavy emphasis on micro-transactions and grinding to progress your character. See, driving online or offline grants currency you can spend on customizing your chars, character, badges, and more. Its main mode is the career mode, which simulates your rise from amateur to professional. You race across hundreds of tracks with a mixture of traditional and more real-life cars. There are competitions, driving schools, tunning stores, and car dealerships. Lastly, the game includes dynamic weather and time-of-day effects. It also includes top-of-the-line and photorealistic graphics, ray-tracing, 3D spatial audio, and incredible detail.
Hunt: The Showdown
Hunt: Showdown is a multiplayer FPS game. Like other Crytek games, it revolves around realistic mechanics to deliver a punishing experience. It’s not friendly for newcomers, and we don’t recommend you play it alone. You can join its 12-player matches as part of a 2-player team. The reason why it feels so realistic is how guns work. They are area accurate (around 1890), making different noise levels while offering different levels of accuracy and power. Then, the title features a complex 3D audio system. Everything you do makes a sound, and everything others do, as well as NPC enemies, do, also make a sound. So, it’s a matter of balancing stealth, power, speed, movement, cover, and patience. As for gameplay, you join these maps to defeat a boss enemy. These bosses are monsters, like werewolves and zombies. Before finding the monster, you must find the clues. And if you defeat it, you can escape through specific zones and take the bounty home…or lose everything you’re carrying!
Horizon Zero Dawn (& Forbidden West)
Horizon: Zero Dawn is a realistic and interactive open-world action-adventure game. You can hunt everything you see, harvest plants, talk to any NPC, and climb every mountain. On top of that, the setting is gorgeous. You play as Alloy, a member of the Nora tribe. The setting happens thousands of years after war ended civilization. Technology hardly exists anymore, so humans live in tribes. However, machine creatures, akin to dinosaurs, roam the land. Your job is to travel the world across various biomes to solve a mystery regarding these creatures. You’ll also uncover realistic combat that relies on hunting abilities along the way. You use bows, slings, a spear, and similar weapons (plus ammo) to defeat creatures and enemy humans. Also, the game features a character progression system. You level up and gain points to develop in various skill threes. These improve your crafting, mounting, stealth, bow combat, or melee combat.
7 Days To Die
7 Days To Die is an open-world zombie survival sandbox. It’s also a voxel title, which means you can use every square you see to harvest resources and transform the environment. Aside from its realistic graphics, were choose it because of its highly interactive world. Imagine it like Minecraft with more realistic graphics. You can gather anything, mine anything, and craft anything. The core loop revolves around a 7-day cycle. You have seven days to explore the world, gather resources, build a base, and build your defenses. When the timer runs out, you play through a “tower-defense” segment, as zombie hordes will attack your location. On top of that, you customize your character’s level up, as this is also an RPG. You gain experience from killing zombies, harvesting resources, repairing, building, looting, crafting, or using schematics. Then, you spend skill points on several skill threes to further customize your avatar.
Rust Console Edition
Rust is a multiplayer and hardcore survival PvP shooter. You select a server that alters the rules and the number of players and joins solo or as part of a team of friends. Every map is the same, though, and the experience is always similar. You start with a naked rock to survive for as long as possible. Then, you’d learn the countless systems in-game. You can harvest resources from trees, ruins, rocks, water, and more if you have the proper tools. Then, you use these resources to craft tools, build structures, create your gear, and make your supplies. The game’s realism shows how weapons, damage, and supplies work. Weapons feature realistic recoil, bullet drops, decay, degradation, and other systems. Damage is punishing; you can’t heal as easily as you’d think. And lastly, you need to drink, eat, sleep, and stay warm to survive.
