Great Games to Play If You Love Parkour & Freerunning

Parkour is one of the most interesting and impressive outdoor sports. Unfortunately, not everyone can flip off a wall or vault over urban obstacles. Luckily, there are a variety of video games like Dying Light and Mirror’s Edge that have provided outlets for everyone’s freerunning fantasies.

The appeal of a good parkour game like Dying Light comes in two forms. First, there is speed. A skilled player should rarely, if ever need to slow down. Obstacles are meant to be quickly and smoothly bypassed. The second appeal is flair. The more skill a player has, the easier and more creatively they can maneuver between obstacles and the more impressive they should feel for doing so. A good parkour game should make the player feel like an unstoppable freerunning monster, and this should be reflected in the game’s level design and the player’s abilities.

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The most successful freerunning games like Ghostrunner are characterized by gameplay mechanics such as vaulting, wall running, and sliding. Essentially, there should be an answer for most (if not all) of the physical barriers a player will encounter. No matter the interference, the player’s character should be capable of smoothly and swiftly circumventing it without losing critical momentum. Many games have adopted some or all of these mechanics, but there are a few select examples that excel at making them work in tandem to form a strong focus for the gameplay.

Great Parkour Game – Mirror’s Edge

In many ways, Mirror’s Edge is the end-all be-all of parkour games. It was one of the first games almost solely devoted to the art of free running, capitalizing on its beautiful setting and strong, linear level design to give players the perfect parkour playground. Atop the high-reaching skyscrapers of Mirror’s Edge‘s sterile city, players are free to jump, roll, slide, and wall run as they please; all while evading the city’s oppressive police force (using guns is considered optional, if not discouraged by the community). Along with that, Mirror’s Edge tells a thrilling mystery story about a rebellious courier on a mission to absolve her sister of a murder she did not commit. The series’ reboot, Mirror’s Edge Catalyst provides a similar experience in an open world setting. However, both are must-play projects for freerunners or fans of the FPS genre.

Great Parkour Game – Dying Light

Part of the freerunning sport is to be fast, so it seems like a good idea for a game all about freerunning and parkour to have the player outrun opponents rather than run toward them. That’s why the Dying Light series works so well. In its zombie apocalypse setting, parkour is just about the best way to outmaneuver the hordes of undead in Dying Light, who are hellbent on devouring the player. This is especially true if the player makes the mistake of going out at night. The Volatile infected that emerge when the sun goes down are the only zombies capable of keeping up with runners and pursuing them on rooftops, so surviving a night outside of a safe zone either requires a lot of firepower or some extremely slick moves.

Great Parkour Game – Ghostrunner

If Mirror’s Edge and Titanfall had a baby with Superhot, it would look almost exactly like Ghostrunner. In this surprise sleeper hit, player takes control of a katana-wielding, wall-running ninja cyborg tasked with overthrowing the tyrannical ruler of a massive city-sized skyscraper known as Dharma Tower. Like many freerunning games, its linear level design encourages relentless movement above all else. This, in combination with the fact that both enemies and the player die in a single hit, results in a sense of urgency that makes Ghostrunner an exhilarating experience from start to finish.

The satisfaction of outmaneuvering and cutting down the tower’s forces one by one as the player climbs ever-higher up Dharma Tower is palpable, and it’s a major reason why Ghostrunner was so surprisingly successful. Games like this one, Mirror’s Edge, and Dying Light are perfect for someone looking for a straightforward experience that excels at making the player feel like they’re actually using parkour.

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