Best Atmospheric Open-World Games To Play At Night
Gaming as a hobby has always been an escape from reality, a way to leave real-world problems behind and completely immerse oneself in an alternate reality. Owing to their freedom of exploration and expansive nature, open-world games are best at this. While technically a genre, open-world covers an incredibly wide range of tones, settings, and gameplay loops. Some titles are all about basking in the sun and enjoying the easy life, while others abandon you in the dark and challenge you to survive.
Free Open-World Games With The Best Exploration
These free open-world games offer vast and beautiful open worlds, great exploration, loads of content; there’s almost no catch.
There is a certain intimacy inherent to late-night gaming, something that isn’t present during any other time of day. The quietude enhances the experience, turning it into something otherworldly, making immersion into a vast open world easier than ever. Open-world games that are slow and methodical become better when experienced at night, especially if the game world itself is dark, dreary, and melancholic.
Honorable Mentions:
Here are a few other open-world games that are perfect for night sessions.
- Elden Ring
- Need for Speed: Underground 2
- Need for Speed (2015)
- Outer Wilds
- Pathologic 1 & 2
- Project Zomboid
- Rain World
- S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl
- Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines
5
Skyrim
Gorgeous Night Skies Invite Contemplation
Skyrim is not a game that needs an introduction. It is Bethesda’s magnum opus and one of the very few single-player games that are still going strong 13 years post-release. Admittedly, while its accolades are undeniable, Skyrim is not a game that seems like it would be significantly better to play at night. But that is only on the surface.
Skyrim’s open world is vast and sometimes can feel quite empty. Trudging through the Whiterun tundra at night, when the sky is in full view and absolutely no one is around, is an experience in and of itself. The shining stars look otherworldly under the haze of the aurora, and if it is a full moon out? Even better. Any gamer with a decently powerful PC owes it to themselves to experience this phenomenon in Ultra-modded Skyrim at least once. It’s something they’ll never forget.
4
Dying Light
As Darkness Falls Upon Harran, The Worst Infected Come Out To Play
When it comes to the best games to play at night, horror is the most natural fit, but there aren’t many open-world options. You could just focus on survival games like The Forest and Green Hell, which will definitely give you thrills and scares in equal measure; however, an arguably even better candidate is Dying Light. All three games incorporate day-and-night cycles, with the latter turning the already dangerous streets into hellholes that quickly become overrun with infected, who generally cannot function in the light.
Best Co-Op Open-World Games
Here are a variety of options for the best co-op games that can be experienced in an open world setting.
While the sequels are great in their own right, the original entry is still the best horror experience, and its nighttime sequences are among the most intense and terrifying in gaming. You have to get to a safe zone, as surviving without the protection of the sun is nearly impossible for more than a couple of minutes. Even though you can avoid getting trapped outside in most situations, there will come a time when you will find yourself roaming Harran’s rooftops as the night dawns, resulting in an eerie silence that beckons the arrival of infected hordes. At that point, all you can do is run.
3
Cyberpunk 2077
Night City Is A Treat Like No Other
CD Projekt Red’s biggest achievement in Cyberpunk 2077 isn’t the combat, the story, the skill system, or even the voice acting—though all of these aspects are great. No, the most impressive part about Cyberpunk 2077 is Night City.
The world-building is downright incredible, breathing life into the NPCs, the streets, the buildings, and everything in between. Starting from the very first time V visits the city with Jackie, driving on the streets of Watson at night in first person while it’s raining outside, and the Ray Tracing settings are cranked to the max, setting the tone for what Night City has to offer. And it only gets better from there.
2
The Long Dark
Slow, Gritty Survival Game With Long Periods Of Solitude
The Long Dark is a brutal survival game that puts heavy emphasis on the storytelling aspect and forgoes base-building mechanics entirely. The goal is to survive in the cold, harsh woods, with the biggest enemies being the wildlife and the weather itself.
The Long Dark is about moment-to-moment survival with the threat of danger around every corner. It takes a very deliberate, slow-burning approach, encouraging players to immerse themselves in the world and the setting. It never lets the player become overpowered, and every encounter is a life-or-death struggle to the end. The world of The Long Dark is scary and violent, but it’s the moments in between the carnage that make it worth playing. Plodding across the snow-filled landscape, trying to find tinder to light a fire, all alone with nothing but thoughts for accompaniment. It promises a solo adventure with nothing but time to think and ruminate.
1
Subnautica
A Deep, Dark Dive Into The Ocean
Subnautica is an adventure, survival, and base-building game set entirely underwater. While players start near the surface of the sea, their ship crash-lands into, the majority of the game is spent exploring the deep depths of the ocean, looking for rare resources, seeking out clues about the world, and more.
Exploration in this game is a curiously cathartic experience, quite unlike anything else out there. Playing Subnautica at night, turning off all the lights inside the Cyclops while hundreds of meters underwater, and just… floating in the void. While the game doesn’t really fall into the ‘cozy game’ category, it does have a way of soothing the mind, especially during nighttime when there is nothing else but the player, the screen, and the disguise of darkness.
8 Best Open-World Games To Just Explore, Ranked
Open-world games are known for their exploration, and these titles shine the brightest in this area.