Stealth games might not be the most popular genre, but it’s a type of genre everyone likes. Unlike action and shooting games which are mostly based on fast-paced action and straight fighting, Stealth games bring you to a shadowy underworld where your weapon is stealth and disguise and your victory is in concealing your character rather than fighting your enemies openly.
Today, we’re going to look at the top 7 best stealth games. These are games that are built around sneaking past your enemy and using distractions as opposed to fighting them head-on. We’re going to rate these game franchises based on their stealth gameplay, including the moves offered to players, the weapons, the gadgets, the level design, and the replayability that only the best stealth games offer.
7 Best Sneaky and Stealth Games that You Should Play
1. Alien: Isolation
Rather than giving players assault rifles and rocket launchers, stealth games nowadays strip you of all your weapons and force you to take a stealthy approach to help make your experience more realistic and horrifying. Alien: Isolation is the perfect example of this. In Alien: Isolation, you’re stuck on a giant space station with the famous xenomorph roaming the halls.
The artificial intelligence used for this alien is unmatched in gaming and is incredibly unpredictable. It will consistently be within hearing range, meaning any wrong move on your part can bring it sprinting straight to you for instant death.
This game’s stealth is brutally unforgiving, and distractions need to be carefully thought through to avoid screwing yourself over. You can craft objects like noisemakers and flashbangs to help allow yourself to slip past, but often you’ll be reduced to timing your movements carefully and sprinting only when you know you can get away. Alien: Isolation is one of the paradigmatic action stealth games and one of the best survival horror games that you should try.
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2. Watch Dogs
Watch Dogs franchise takes you to the fictional rendition of San Francisco, where Marcus Holloway and his friends aim to destroy the ctOS 2.0 system, which serves as the core of the city controlling the lives of its inhabitants.
Gameplay includes stealth mechanics, providing players with various types of guns, from modern laser guns to outdated pistols. You have to carry out your missions without getting caught by the city police. However, there are times when a non-lethal style of gameplay doesn’t work, and it’s better to use weapons first. Melee weapons are more suitable due to their silence, but if there is more than one guard, then using modern guns becomes necessary.
This game could have a better following if its developers focused on car customisation and weapon modding and improved the online mode. Currently, players can only engage in PvP and open-world lobbies with up to 8 players.
3. Hitman
Hitman is one of the most unique and creative examples of stealth games on this list. Most of the titles on this list focus on hiding from the enemy and sneaking past them without being seen, whereas Hitman focuses on a different form of stealth: Hiding in plain sight.
In Hitman, the goal of each level generally involves needing to assassinate a target. Each game gives you several options to kill your target in creative ways. The most impressive mechanic in the Hitman franchise is the ability to disguise yourself as someone else. You can steal clothes from workers or soldiers in the levels and use them to walk straight past enemies to get closer to your target.
In the Hitman franchise, leaving no evidence is crucial to avoid suspicion. Later entries introduced sneaking without disguises, with basic stealth mechanics like sleeper holds and blending into crowds. Climbing pipes, ledges, and detection metres were added in later games. Mastering stealth without disguises demands knowledge of levels, enemy patrols, and strategic timing, making Hitman one of the top stealth action games.
4. Tenchu
Tenchu is a third-person stealth action franchise that we haven’t seen in recent years. While the franchise hasn’t had the best reception overall, the game’s stealth mechanics are some of the best in the genre and also some of the most unique.
In Tenchu, you play as a ninja and need to sneak through levels, stealthily taking out enemies along the way. Cool gadgets like a blow dart grappling hook and even a scornful, you could use to hide underwater for extended periods your performance is right at the end of each level with the most stealthy players being awarded with the coveted Grand Master rating.
The detection metre works similarly to the modern-day detection metre in video games where they would alert the other nearby guards to your location. We were never forced to stay in combat and always hid long enough to force the guards to return to those patrols as if nothing happened.
5. Dishonored
Dishonored is another perfect example of the new-age stealth games. The game’s stealth is very simplistic in design, and levels are small, offering only a few options that are pretty blatantly obvious. The detection metre is present in this game, and while darkness does play a factor, it’s also very simplistic, only indicating in binary whether or not the player is hidden in a dark enough spot to avoid being spotted.
Sound design is also very simplistic with basic noises like sprinting and firing your gun being the only real ways to alert enemies. Objects in the game world do not have much of an impact, but what sets this game apart from other stealth action video games are these supernatural powers.
In Dishonored, you can unlock upgrades to these special abilities that allow you to stop time, teleport, and even turn into rats or fish to help sneak into small vents in the building. These powers can be strung together to make some very creative approaches to objectives, and the entirety of both games can be played without ever killing a single enemy.
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6. Deus Ex
Deus Ex is an RPG stealth action video game with the freedom to play however you like, similar to a few of the other entries already mentioned. The level design in Deus Ex is always top-notch and offers an exhausting amount of entry points, most of which are only accessible with specific abilities.
This game can also be played without killing anybody, and the choices made throughout each game can greatly affect the outcomes and reception of other characters in the game world. Stealth is generally the best option in each situation and can be brutally difficult, especially with the clunky control scheme that the game offers.
Tripwire alarms, cameras, automated machine guns, and high-tech patrols are all obstacles that need to be overcome throughout the series. The desperate need to loot hard-to-reach areas for necessary ammo and weapons only enforces the need for a stealthy approach.
7. Thief
Thief is a first-person stealth action game that revolutionised the stealth games genre. The original Thief is one of the first video games to offer a morally ambiguous set of choices that force the player to make decisions that they think are the right course of action, as opposed to just being given options in black or white.
In Thief, you need to sneak around dark levels and loot cards without being seen. Players were required to monitor lighting while also keeping track of how much sound they were making, something that would eventually go on to inspire other major stealth action franchises.
Eventually, the franchise opened up and had much larger open-world level designs, but the most recent entry in the series fell flat in comparison to competitors like Dishonored. Still, the original two Thief games are arguably some of the most difficult and rewarding stealth actions you can have in a game.