Any more games like Diablo, Wolcen or the free Path of Exile? We have collected the best hack & slays for you to play in 2022.
No warrior thirsting for thick loot and monster blood ever has to be idle. Even if Diablo was the dominant top dog in the action role-playing game sector for years, new game series have been shaking its throne for a long time.
We therefore show you the best current action role-playing games that are similar to Diablo. So if you want to think outside the box, are fed up with Diablo 3 or simply have to kill the waiting time until Diablo 4, then take a look at the 18 best action RPGs currently available.
1. Lost Ark
(Developer: Smilegate/Tripod Studio – Release: Feb 11, 2022 – Platforms: Windows – Score: 79)
What is Lost Ark? The big hit from Korea made it to Europe and the USA in early 2022 after a whole three years. Lost Ark is not only an ARPG, but also an MMORPG with which you can spend a hell of a lot of time.
There are two worlds here, Arkesia and Petrania, which stand for light and darkness respectively, but were both created by the same god: Regulus. As the player, you go into battle for the former and must find the lost arks to prevent the archdemon Kazeros from breaking out of his prison.
Suitable for whom? Lost Ark places a particularly large focus on its PvE mode and exploration. There is also an optional PvP mode, but if you don’t like things like quests, hunting for achievements and collectibles, crafting and so on, then the game is probably not for you. PvE fans, on the other hand, get the whole package.
After initially being able to follow a story, you need to bring a love for end-game content with you for Lost Ark. Because once you’ve reached the maximum level 50, you’ll primarily only deal with those.
2. Weird West
(Developer: WolfEye Studios – Release: Apr 31, 2022 – Platforms: Windows – Rating: 83)
What is Weird West? When you mix a dark fantasy role-playing game with the classic Western setting, it becomes unusual: that’s probably what the developers of Weird West thought and named their game accordingly. In this version of the Wild West, you will encounter all kinds of supernatural creatures such as werewolves, witches and bison minotaurs. You will also experience eerie stories about these creatures, curses and ghosts.
In Weird West you can expect an exciting story, which you master with five different characters, but also really good action role-playing game fare. In the battles, you must proceed tactically and skilfully exploit the strengths of the different types of weapons, from shotguns to revolvers to bows. You can also use the environment to create destructive explosions and fires with dynamite barrels and oil lamps.
Weird West invites you to experiment and lets you do things your own way. You develop your character with various talents, but these do not require skill points. Instead, you must find relics scattered throughout the world.
Suitable for whom? If you like unusual scenarios and action RPGs with a gripping story and exciting battles, but you prefer to play alone and don’t want to invest too much time, then you should take a look at Weird West. However, if you prefer to play with mouse and keyboard, you will have to compromise on the controls. This is because the controls are optimised for the controller.
3. wolcen
What is Wolcen: Lords of Mayhem? Here you can expect an action role-playing game in the spirit of Diablo 3, which also looks really good thanks to Cryengine. In contrast to its great role model, however, you don’t choose a class in Wolcen; instead, your equipment alone determines your abilities. You can therefore experiment with all kinds of weapons, melee and ranged combat or magic at any time.
In addition to a solid combat system, Wolcen also convinces with a motivating talent tree where you hardly have to waste points on unwanted skills. Individual skills can also be improved further and further. However, some players might be disappointed by the story, which ends just when it is fun and confuses with a very abrupt ending.
With Wolcen, its developers wanted to create the big new Diablo competitor, but stumbled over the technical implementation of the pretty action role-playing game. Because of the enormous number of bugs, crashes and annoying errors, we had to downgrade the game in the test and remove it from this list. In the meantime, however, Wolcen has been largely fixed and has earned an upgrade:
Suitable for whom? Wolcen is often referred to as Diablo in Cry-Engine and still makes quite a splash by today’s standards. If you enjoy brute combat in spectacular graphics and want more freedom to experiment with play styles thanks to the lack of classes, you’re probably in the right place. After most of the bugs have been fixed, the role-playing game plays smoothly, but you’ll have to be able to forgive the abrupt story endings.
Wolcen: Stumbling Diablo competitor returns with a major patch
4.The Ascent
(Developer: Neon Giant – Release: July 29, 2021 – Platforms: Windows, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S – Rating🙂
What is The Ascent? After Diablo led the way, a great many ARPGs rely on a fantasy-medieval setting. The Ascent swims against the tide and offers you a post-apocalyptic cyberpunk world instead.
The game begins when one of the largest megacorporations mysteriously closes its doors. In the resulting power vacuum, all sorts of struggles ensue. As a former work slave of the massive company, you throw yourself into the middle of the fight and try not only to find out what happened to your former employer, but also to end the faction battles in parallel.
Suitable for whom? The Ascent is the Diablo for fans of cyberpunk settings. Because instead of swords and magic, you go into battle here with firearms and cyberware. Accordingly, it is also possible to specialise, which is especially helpful in co-op. In this way, everyone can bring their own strengths into the team, so that together you can fight the numerous enemies even more effectively. However, you must be prepared to encounter technical problems:
The Ascent post-test: Why we’re sticking with the downgrade despite everything
5. Warhammer 40,000: Inquisitor – Martyr
(Developer: Neocore Games – Release: Jun 5, 2018 – Platforms: Windows, PS4, Xbox One – Rating: 60)
What is Warhammer 40,000: Inquisitor – Martyr: As a member of the Inquisition, you are sent to the Caligari Sector to fight in the name of the God-Emperor against aliens as well as the armies of Chaos that threaten the Empire. From particularly strong boss opponents to whole swarms of aliens, a whole host of enemies run before you here.
In addition to the main programme, Martyr, there is also a stand-alone expansion, Prophecy. This not only continues the story, but also adds another class to the gameplay with the tech adept.
Suitable for whom? In our test, the game received a mere 60 points, but it does have its fans who can overlook flaws like the poorly motivating character system. It’s not for nothing that it has 79 percent positive reviews on Steam. You will especially enjoy it if you are a fan of the Warhammer 40k universe.
6 Chronicon
(Developer: Subworld – Release: Aug 20, 2020 – Platforms: Windows – Rating: 79)
What is Chronicon? In Chronicon, you could almost pack your bags right away. Because evil has already been defeated! However, here you travel back in time with the titular magical device to experience the great achievements of various heroes. And they have dealt with all kinds of monsters. Accordingly, you play as a Templar, Berserker, Guardian or Warlock and fight your way through randomly generated dungeons and areas with up to four players.
Suitable for whom? Chronicon is a feast for friends of character customisation. For there are more than 400 unique items, with very special abilities. In addition, there are 900 skills, abilities and perks as well as infinite character progress through mastery ranks. You can do theorycrafting here for a correspondingly long time.
7. Diablo 3
(Developer: Blizzard Entertainment – Release: May 15, 2012 – Platforms: Windows – Rating: 89)
What is Diablo 3? Right. We don’t have to explain Diablo to anyone at this point. Nevertheless, it should not go unmentioned for the sake of completeness. Diablo 3 is the latest offshoot of the series that made this type of action role-playing game salon-worthy in the first place.
At the time of its release, the game itself had to contend with a somewhat arbitrary distribution of loot and the controversial auction house, but with Reaper of Souls at the latest, it has regained its composure and since then has been offering visually stunning action entertainment of the very highest order. Especially since Blizzard already succeeded in the basic game to strengthen the almost limitless flow of the game, which has become iconic for the series, with increasing playing time.
Suitable for whom? Diablo is, of course, one thing above all: the original. The game can look back on a lively history and therefore scores extremely well with its nostalgia factor alone. However, with the third part at the latest, Diablo is no longer the top spearhead in terms of complexity. Blizzard focuses on accessibility and only offers really crunchy challenges after the end of the main story. Diablo 3 is a game for fans and players who are looking for the best compromise between accessibility, story and multiplayer experience.
8. Path of Exile
(Developer: Grinding Gear Games – Release: Oct 23, 2013 – Platforms: macOS, Windows – Rating: 90)
What is Path of Exile? Incredibly complex, incredibly dark, incredibly motivating: Path of Exile is considered by many fans to be the true heir to Diablo 2. Mainly because its multi-layered character development really makes every competing game look like a child’s birthday party.
The seven classes pick new characteristics out of a huge ability network, and theoretically every class can develop in every direction – only the starting points differ. We unlock active abilities via gems, which we insert into our equipment and freely modify via further connected stones. So a fireball can punch through enemies, jump from one target to the next or split into several on impact – or all at once!
Suitable for whom? In case it wasn’t clear in the text above: Path of Exile is a scope and complexity monster! It’s a home for any player who invests hours into their own class build and keeps striving to climb up the leaderboards. And to top it all off, it’s completely free! Path of Exile has probably one of the fairest Free2Play models on the market, we only pay for cosmetic items or luxuries like additional chest compartments. So if you’re ever short of cash, there’s little better to do than spend hours immersed in the world of Path of Exile.
Path of Exile: The new expansion Expedition will be huge – this is what you can expect
9. Vikings: Wolves of Midgard
(Developer: Games Farm – Release: Mar 24, 2017 – Platforms: Linux, macOS, Windows – Rating: 78)
What is Vikings: Wolves of Midgard? In action role-playing games we always discuss how complex the character development is and how motivating the endgame is. Vikings: Wolves of Midgard doesn’t care about all that. The Edda carnage offers an incredibly dynamic combat system, in which every blow feels as if it were led by Thor himself. Hardly any other action role-playing game is as convincing in one area as Vikings. But almost all the other core content comes up a little short.
For whom is it suitable? Vikings is not a game for people who want to spend 100 hours or more with it. Even if you’re looking for a gripping story, you’ll only find a very simple narrative here. But if you just want to have fun massaging the skulls of hordes of enemies with a mace or axe, then you shouldn’t ignore Vikings: Wolves of Midgard.
10. The Incredible Adventures of Van Helsing
(Developer: Neocore Games – Release: May 22, 2013 – Platforms: Windows – Score: 80)
What is The Incredible Adventures of Van Helsing? Action role-playing games are allowed to show some biting humour? Then The Incredible Adventures of Van Helsing is worth a look! Although it doesn’t necessarily score points with its story, it does with its wonderfully coherent atmosphere: as the gentleman monster hunter Van Helsing, we set out together with our cynical family ghost Lady Katarina to hunt down heaps of classic Dracula monsters and steampunk constructs.
Van Helsing also impresses mechanically with some cool ideas. For example, Lady Katarina is not only good for nasty spells, but also lends a hand in combat and can be further developed in her own character tree.
Suitable for whom? You shouldn’t expect anything miraculous from The Incredibles Adventures of Van Helsing. Especially in the battles, the action RPG is much less bombastic than the competition. But if you’re less interested in action and more in atmosphere, then you shouldn’t miss out on Van Helsing’s monster hunt.
11. Victor Vran
(Developer: Haemimont Games – Release: July 24, 2015 – Platforms: Linux, macOS, Windows – Rating: 81)
What is Victor Vran? Victor Vran has quite a lot in common with Van Helsing, because Victor also earns his money by hunting monsters. Unlike the good Van Helsing, however, Victor primarily targets demons. We can decide very freely how he hunts down the beasts. Our abilities change with the type of weapon we have.
If you want to perforate strong single opponents particularly quickly, you can use a rapier, for example. If, on the other hand, whole hordes of monsters are to be set on fire, the grenade launcher is the weapon of choice. Demon powers such as meteorite bombardment as well as costumes and fate cards with passive bonuses give us further freedom to customise our hero.
Suitable for whom? Victor Vran is perfect for all those for whom action role-playing games are especially important. In addition to the classic mouse control, we can also move our hero using WASD, which feels much more direct – and quick footwork is much more important than in Diablo 3, for example, regardless of the control scheme. Victor Vran is certainly not the most complex hack & slay, so those who like to pore over ability trees for hours on end won’t get their money’s worth here. But when it comes to fast and action-packed monster slaughtering, this gem is a real insider’s tip!
12th Torchlight 2
(Developer: Runic Games – Release: Sep 20, 2012 – Platforms: Linux, macOS, Windows – Rating: 85)
What is Torchlight 2? No game on this list comes closer to good old Diablo 2 than Torchlight 2 – no wonder, it comes from some of Diablo’s creators! Its strengths are those that made the whole genre great in the first place: Detailed and free character development, enormous collecting motivation after whole mountains of cool loot and a perfect game flow when slaughtering monsters.
All this in a huge game world with enormous replay value – especially since the eager modding scene provides additional fodder. In the meantime, Torchlight 3 has already been released, but it cannot reach the level of its predecessor.
Suitable for whom? Torchlight 2 may not bring the genre forward tremendously, but it is one of the best representatives of its classic virtues. So if you want a game that very skilfully reproduces all the strengths of Diablo and don’t expect too many innovations, you can grab it without hesitation. However, Diablo veterans should also bear in mind that the gloomy atmosphere of the genre’s father gives way to colourful comic graphics in Torchlight 2.
13th Grim Dawn
(Developer: Crate Entertainment – Release: Feb 25, 2016 – Platforms: Windows – Rating: 86)
What is Grim Dawn? Grim Dawn is the spiritual successor to Titan Quest and comes from some of the same developers. Among other things, it inherits its quirky but nicely thought-out character system: for our hero, we freely combine two classes of our choice and then work our way up their two skill trees to define how our character plays. Also, when it comes to loot hunting and monster brawling, Grim Dawn doesn’t have to hide from the competition.
Suitable for whom? One of its greatest strengths is the enormously atmospheric game world. Grim Dawn sends us into a post-apocalyptic Victorian scenario, which we can sometimes even influence through our decisions. This makes Grim Dawn an exciting Diablo alternative for all those for whom the game world and scenario are more than a mere story framework. If you also find Path of Exile too complex and Diablo not deep enough, then Grim Dawn offers you the perfect mix.
14th Last Epoch
(Developer: Eleventh Hour Games – Release: 30 April 2019 – Platforms: Linux, Windows – Rating: Not yet awarded)
What is Last Epoch? The action role-playing game Last Epoch takes you through time. You can travel through its world in four different eras and, as is typical for this genre, in each of these eras you deal out violent blows to rows and rows of enemies. But that also means that you have to deal with different types of enemies in each era. In the prehistoric era, for example, you’ll kill one dinosaur after another, while in the imperial era you’ll turn the undead hordes of an evil emperor into bone powder.
You choose your hero from four upper classes. While the primalist draws on the power of nature, the acolyte simply summons a few corpses herself. The mage also uses elemental powers and the sentinel wears heavy armour and then hits. Last Epoch is still in development, but is already playable in Early Access on Steam.
Suitable for whom? Since Last Epoch is still in Early Access, you should not expect a full game. The end game and some loot rewards are still to come. In addition, the graphics are never quite fresh. The same applies to the sound. Nevertheless, you can already have a lot of fun with the action RPG, especially since it has far fewer bugs than Wolcen, for example. In terms of complexity, Last Epoch is somewhere between Diablo 3 and Path of Exile and offers a very exciting skill system with individual talent trees for each ability.
15th Titan Quest
(Developer: THQ Nordic – Release: Jun 26, 2006 – Platforms: Windows – Rating: 79)
What is Titan Quest? Titan Quest was originally released back in 2006, but received another three new addons in 2017, 2019 and 2021, as if out of nowhere. The action role-playing game takes you through numerous mythological settings. Starting with ancient Greece, through Babylon and China to Atlantis and the icy north. Accordingly, you also beat up the diverse monsters from the respective mythical worlds.
The game stands out with its character system. You don’t choose a class, but up to two specialisations. For example, you can create a pure warrior, but also a battle mage or a powerful sorcerer who not only rules over the dead, but can also control fire.
Suitable for whom? Titan Quest is very linear, especially compared to Diablo 3. The areas are designed by hand and therefore look very pretty, but they are also absolutely identical every time you play. Even quests and tasks are always in the same place. However, the numerous combinations of the individual specialisations offer a lot of freedom in character creation. This allows you to spend hours finding the best synergies.
Finally, three exotics
This list is basically more about action role-playing games, which are very reminiscent of Diablo. But the whole genre is of course much, much bigger. So if you’re basically more into action and loot, but want to break up the formula a bit, here are three more unusual alternatives. Of course, that doesn’t make these games any less worth playing! They are also the inspiration for a whole new category of games – roguelites and loot shooters.
16. Borderlands 3
(Developer: Gearbox Software – Release: Sep 13, 2019 – Platforms: PC,PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S – Rating: 88)
What is Borderlands 3? What’s true of Borderlands 3 is also true of its two predecessors to a certain extent: here you’ll let thousands of guns go bang and embark on a completely bonkers wasteland adventure. Borderlands virtually founded the loot shooter and transferred the Diablo concept to the first-person shooter genre.
But unlike many copycats, Borderlands always offers an absolutely remarkable story campaign that keeps both single and multiplayer entertained for hours. The stars here, apart from the wacky world, are clearly the numerous bizarre characters. Hardly any other series puts such memorable characters in front of you so regularly.
Suitable for whom: Borderlands lures you with the same loot spiral as Diablo and relies on a seemingly endless number of different guns. You won’t find so much variety in the weapon selection anywhere else. But you must be aware that this is a first-person shooter. Borderlands also gains a lot when you venture into the wasteland with a few friends. Just don’t expect a beastly plot. Borderlands is famous and loved for its quirky but still excellent humour.
17. Hades
(Developer: Supergiant Games – Release: Sep 17, 2020 – Platforms: PC,PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, Switch – Rating: 90)
What is Hades? In Hades you take on the role of a boy named Zagreus. His problem is that if you have the god of the underworld for a father, you certainly don’t live your best life. Zagreus agrees and decides to run away. Father Hades does not like this at all and unleashes the hosts of hell to kill his son. And he succeeds. And again. And again. And… yes, again. Each death leads to a new attempt to escape. Meanwhile, a story unfolds that, with love, intrigue and betrayal, is in no way inferior to a Greek drama.
That alone would be enough for a recommendation. But Hades also offers an incredibly varied combat system that enables countless different combinations of divine abilities. If you want to beat up Hellenistic hell instead of Christian hell as an exception to Diablo, this is exactly the right game for you.
Suitable for whom: You should definitely not have any problems with dying many deaths. But you shouldn’t therefore obsessively think that Hades requires a high level of frustration resistance. The game is a master at putting each death in perspective and it never feels like a clumsy setback. Each playthrough gives you new opportunities and the story continues. Lootgrind is less important in Hades. The game motivates you to constantly try out new builds and abilities.
18. Tiny Tina’s Wonderlands
What is Tiny Tina’s Wonderlands? Although the name of the game doesn’t give it away directly, Wonderlands is actually also part of the Borderlands series. However, the spin-off is based on a DLC for Borderlands 2, in which we attend a game of Bunkers & Badasses, the Borderlands variant of Dungeons & Dragons.
As in the DLC, we are effectively the characters in the game, which makes for an entertaining meta-level in which the conversations of Dungeonmaster Tiny Tina and her fellow players partially change the world. We also don’t explore a sci-fi world like in Borderlands 3, but a weird mix of fantasy scenario with Borderlands elements.
The gameplay also differs slightly from classic Borderlands games. You still use firearms, but instead of grenades there are now various spells that are staged to great effect. You can also choose a second class in the course of the game and thus combine more skill trees.
Suitable for whom? As with Borderlands 3, you can expect a motivating loot spiral, an incredible number of different weapons and quirky humour. The Wonderlands are also best explored with friends, but you can easily go off on your own. Thanks to multiclasses, you can experiment even more with different skill combinations, and the story convinced tester Dennis more than that of the predecessor.
Tiny Tina’s Wonderlands in review: The rescue throw for the Borderlands series
