Sign in to your ScreenRant account
Custom Image by Steven Garrard
The Indiana Jones franchise has finally received a definitive adaptation with Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, that replicates the bombastic action scenes, engaging storyline, and unique settings of the film franchise. Even though The Great Circle is many players' first entry into the virtual world of the Indiana Jones franchise, there are plenty of high-quality adaptations worth playing. With the first game being released in 1984, there is a variety of gaming experiences out there perfect for fans of the iconic action-packed adventures of the great archaeologist.
For a long time, the Uncharted and Tomb Raider games had become the go-to choice for fans hoping for an Indiana Jones-esque experience. The Great Circle lets players step into the shoes of Indiana Jones from a first-person perspective, providing a unique experience when compared to the competition. While not all of them are as highly rated, there are more than enough Indiana Jones adventures for players itching for more after beating The Great Circle.
Indiana Jones And The Staff Of Kings
Highly Ambitious Follow Up To Indiana Jones And The Emperor's Tomb
Released in 2009 for the Nintendo DS, PlayStation Portable, PlayStation 2, and the Wii, Indiana Jones And The Staff of Kings was an action-adventure game that aimed to realize the excitement of the films with a new game engine. The story follows Indiana searching for the ancient Staff of Moses, traveling the world while beating up enemies and solving puzzles in a linear story-focused structure.
Staff of Kings also includes a separate co-op story following Indiana and Henry on a standalone adventure.
Despite its issues, Staff of Kings offered unique gameplay and interesting story beats that made it an underrated experience, being praised for its graphical quality, talented acting, and varied gameplay mechanics. While Staff of Kings offered a memorable experience to players that could get past its wide array of performance issues on every port, it was outperformed by many similar games at the time and still remains one of the weaker entries in the Indiana Jones franchise.
Indiana Jones And The Temple Of Doom Arcade Edition
A Challenging Experience For Die Hard Fans
Unlike most Indiana Jones games released, The Temple Of Doom first saw its debut in 1985 on arcade machines across the world, later released for home computer systems in 1987. Following closely with the events of the similarly named film, The Temple Of Doom follows Indiana Jones infiltrating the lair of the Thugee cult, freeing captives, recovering stolen relics, and defeating the deadly cult leader, all while escaping alive.
The Temple of Doom was incredibly successful for an arcade machine at the time.
The gameplay of The Temple of Doom followed three separate levels based on scenes from the film, each looping up to four times with greater difficulty while adding new hazards to encounter. While the visuals don't hold up as well today, The Temple of Doom was incredibly successful for an arcade machine at the time, likely attributing its boost in awareness to the massive popularity of the Indiana Jones IP at the time.
The popularity of the Temple of Doom also led to the creation of an NES port three years later, following Indiana Jones surviving levels filled with waves of enemies before taking on the final boss in the form of the film's powerful cult leader Mola Ram, all while featuring simplified graphics to run on the home console.
Indiana Jones And The Last Crusade: The Graphic Adventure
The Testing Ground For Iconic Point & Click Games To Come
Released for home computers in 1989, Indiana Jones And the Last Crusade: The Graphic Adventure closely followed the events of the simultaneously released film, adapting the story with an emphasis on unique puzzles. Being one of the first point-and-click games developed by Luscalfilms, it suffered from a lack of experience in the genre, being incredibly difficult without a walkthrough, especially with The Graphic Adventure's use of permadeath for Indy. Despite its flaws, The Graphic Adventure is a novel experience for fans of Lucasfilm's other iconic point-and-click games, benefiting from a charming pixelated art style and inventive game mechanics.
One of the ways The Graphic Adventure tried to solve its challenging puzzles is by adding an IQ bonus points system, rewarding players with additional points for finding creative solutions to puzzles while still allowing for simpler ones to work just as well. While this was great on paper, the game was still incredibly challenging, with primitive dialogue options that would later get drastically expanded in future projects like the iconic Monkey Island series.
One of the most exciting parts of The Graphic Adventure's experience is that it included a replica of Henry Jones' journal from the film, filled with details and drawings of the film that are required to solve important puzzles later in the game.
LEGO Indiana Jones 2: The Adventure Continues
A Complete Adaptation Of The Indiana Jones Film Franchise
Released for a wide array of consoles from the Wii, Xbox 360, PS3, and mobile consoles, Lego Indiana Jones 2: The Adventure Continues was an experimental follow-up to the widely beloved Original Adventures. Rather than simply expanding on the existing content, The Adventure Continues completely reimagined the events of the films from the ground up while including content from the fourth (and, at the time, final) film in the franchise. Taking a more experimental approach to the classic LEGO games formula at the time, The Adventure Continues offered an incredibly unique experience while still retaining the classic LEGO mechanics players expect.
The Adventure Continues offered an incredibly unique experience while still retaining the classic LEGO mechanics players expect.
The biggest issue with The Adventure Continues is that many of its scenes stray drastically far from not only the originals but the movies themselves, taking too many liberties that make it feel more like a LEGO adventure game rather than a true Indiana Jones adaptation, especially with its boss battles. Despite the disappointment over The Adventure Continues not continuing the gameplay of its predecessor, it would act as a valuable testing ground for mechanics like its open-world segments that would be further expanded upon in future LEGO games.
Indiana Jones' Greatest Adventures
An Enjoyable Trip Through Indiana's Greatest Adventures Yet
Launching for the SNES in 1994, Indiana Jones' Greatest Adventures lets players experience the original film trilogy in a short, but fun-filled adventure. Similar to games released at the time, like the more popular Super Star Wars, Greatest Adventures included platforming and sidescrolling action that had players defeating a catalog of Indy's most iconic villains in a wide array of locations. Greatest Adventures was also praised at the time for having a fantastic art style that combined great pixelated graphics with more colorful environments, unlike The Temple of Doom arcade game.
One of the ways Greatest Adventures stood out was by taking advantage of the SNES hardware to introduce 3D-like levels, ranging from forward-scrolling aerial dogfights to traversing over pits of lava in a mine cart. While it had some control issues, the challenging gameplay and great soundtrack make Greatest Adventures an enjoyable and underrated experience for any Indiana Jones fan looking for a splash of nostalgia.
Indiana Jones And The Emperor's Tomb
Improving On The Formula Of Action Packed 3D Platformers
Released for the original Xbox, PlayStation 2, and PC throughout 2003, The Emperor's Tomb is one of the most definitive Indiana Jones experiences available to date. The Emperor's Tomb offered a solid mix of exhilarating gameplay mechanics, detailed environments, and immersive sound, making it not only highly reminiscent of the films but also helping The Emperor's Tomb to create a memorable experience for any player.
Taking players through 10 levels across the globe, the third-person action-adventure game has Indie discovering ancient tombs, traversing dilapidated castles, and surviving expansive cities, all on his journey to safeguard dangerous artifacts from falling into the wrong hands.
The Emperor's Tomb offers a mix of a solid mix of exhilarating gameplay mechanics, detailed environments, and immersive sound.
The platforming and tomb-exploring adventure offered by The Emperor's Tomb even ties into the events of The Temple of Doom movie itself, acting as a prequel that takes place just because of the cinematic storyline. Despite criticism over poor performance and less of a focus on story than previous entries in the franchise, The Emperor's Tomb is still worth playing for any Indiana Jones fan to this day, doing a fantastic job at combining both interesting puzzles and unique combat in a complete package.
Indiana Jones And The Infernal Machine
Offering A Familiar Experience For Fans Of The Classic Tomb Raider Games
Originally released for PC in 1999 alongside the N64 and Game Boy Color in the following years, Indiana Jones And The Infernal Machine is one of the best Indiana Jones games, playing much like the classic Tomb Raider games. While The Infernal Machine faced some criticism over its similarity to the iconic Tomb Raider games, it improved upon the formula by taking entertaining twists on the genre. With a greater focus on story and atmosphere over revolutionary gameplay, The Infernal Machine provided a great self-contained story that nailed the feeling of the original films.
Related
Lara Croft: Tomb Raider Legend Trilogy Remaster Leaks Online
Following two collections of Tomb Raider remasters, it appears that a third bundle dedicated to the so-called Legend Trilogy is in development.
While its gameplay might be a bit hard to stomach nowadays, its puzzle-solving, exploration potential, and fun platforming sections deserve a modern remake just as much as the aforementioned Tomb Raider. Even with the older controls and outdated combat, the focus on puzzle solving and a deep storyline makes The Infernal Machine feel like an adventure worthy of the blockbuster franchise, with the PC edition being highly rated to this day.
LEGO Indiana Jones: The Original Adventures
An Incredibly Creative Perspective On The Beloved Film Franchise
Released in 2008 for PC, Nintendo DS, PlayStation 2/Portable, the Xbox 360, and Wii, LEGO Indiana Jones: The Original Adventures features fantastic level design that offers creative takes on the movies, a fantastic and memorable experience from start to finish. Arguably one of the best LEGO games of the TT Games era, its simple but effective gameplay took great advantage of the successful LEGO formula. Being a faithful adaptation of the movies while still adding unique LEGO gameplay mechanics and humor, The Original Adventures is still one of the best Indiana Jones games out there.
Splitting each film from the original trilogy into separate chapters, The Original Adventures captures the spirit of Indiana's escapades while adding replayability thanks to its plethora of collectibles and secrets to discover. Even though The Original Adventures is on the short side of LEGO games with somewhat aged visuals and humor, it was a great addition to the LEGO lineup, being deserving of an equally dedicated remake that recreates the Indiana Jones films into a modern package.
Indiana Jones And The Fate Of Atlantis
A Worthy Successor To The Iconic Indiana Jones Trilogy
Released in 1992 for home computers, Indiana Jones And The Fate Of Atlanatis offered an original story that matched the quality of the films, being praised as one of the absolute best Indiana Jones games by far. The experience offered by The Fate of Atlantis is easily one of the best point-and-click adventure games on the market, winning several awards at the time, which included Game of the Year from publications like the Game Player's Magazine.
Following Indiana's journey searching the globe for the lost city of Atlantis alongside his companion Sophia Hapgood, they have to race against time to find the ancient civilization's dangerous lost technology before the Nazis, as its power could determine the fate of the world.
The pixel art style of The Fate of Atlantis also holds up great, even if a large portion of the screen is taken up by an outdated interface, and was praised as the honorary fourth story in the Indiana Jones franchise before The Crystal Skull was released thanks to its rich story and visuals. One of the best aspects of The Fate of Atlantis is that players can actually make important decisions that affect the ending of the story, providing genuine replayability that makes it more than worth the currently low asking price.
Indiana Jones And The Great Circle
The Definitive Indiana Jones Experience For The First Time
Released in 2024 for Xbox Series X/S, PlayStation 5, and PC, Indiana Jones and the Great Circle provides the quintessential Indiana Jones experience that's closer than any of the other adaptations ever have, even with its technological advantage in mind. Acting as a light immersion sim, The Great Circle boasts gorgeous graphic settings and art direction that make the experience come to life, with more than enough exhilarating combat and challenging puzzles to match.
Related
Indiana Jones And The Great Circle Review: Already A Priceless Artifact
Indiana Jones and the Great Circle valiantly attempts to recapture what makes the movies special, and like Indy himself, it usually lands on its feet.
While The Great Circle's first-person perspective was highly controversial at first, this departure from the franchise turned out to be one of the best decisions MachineGames could have made, adding even greater immersion to the experience without detracting from the gameplay. Not only does The Great Circle nail the gameplay aspect of modern gaming expectations, but its original story even stands up to the likes of The Fate of Atlantis, albeit without as many endings as the critically acclaimed point and click adventure. Even with the technological advantage in mind, The Great Circle's close resemblance to the feelings of the film is prevalent from start to finish, while taking advantage of the gaming format.
While it's not without some flaws like performance issues or somewhat repetitive gameplay sections, Indiana Jones and the Great Circle is an absolute must-play for any fan of the Indiana Jones franchise, being a worthy successor to entries by providing an incredibly satisfying gameplay experience.
Your changes have been saved
Indiana Jones
Created by George Lucas, Indiana Jones is an action-adventure multimedia franchise that began with the launch of its first film, Raiders of the Lost Ark, in 1981. The series follows Dr. Henry "Indiana" Jones, Jr., an archaeologist who adventures across the world with various friends as he faces off against the likes of Nazis and other groups bent on collecting ancient artifacts of power. Seeking to preserve history, Jones races against his incidental foes to stop them from conquering - or destroying- the world.
Video Game(s) Raiders of the Lost Ark , Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom , Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade , Indiana Jones' Greatest Adventures , LEGO Indiana Jones: The Original Adventures , Lego Indiana Jones 2: The Adventure Continues , Indiana Jones and the Infernal Machine , Indiana Jones and the Emperor's Tomb , Indiana Jones and the Staff of Kings
Character(s) Indiana Jones , Marcus Brody , Sallah , Marion Ravenwood , Wilhelmina Scott , Wan Li , Mola Ram , Henry Jones, Sr. , Walter Donovan , Elsa Schneider , Henry Jones III , Irina Spalko , George Michale , Harold Oxley , Helena Shaw , Jürgen Voller
English (US) ·