The Forgotten City

The Forgotten City is a beauty to behold no matter the eye, a deeply contemplative story matched with wonderful puzzles based in classical antiquity.

90%Game Brain Score

story, gameplay

optimization, grinding

96% User Score Based on 8,462 reviews

Critic Score 84%Based on 40 reviews

Platforms

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About

The Forgotten City is a single player open world role playing game with fantasy, drama, mystery and historical themes. It was developed by Modern Storyteller and was released on July 28, 2021. It received positive reviews from critics and overwhelmingly positive reviews from players.

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96%

Audience ScoreBased on 8,462 reviews

story2.5k positive mentions

optimization38 negative mentions

Exceptional narrative-driven time loop adventure with a compelling mystery and well-developed characters.
Clever and well-executed time loop mechanics that avoid tedious repetition and reward player curiosity.
Beautifully crafted ancient Roman setting with rich historical/mythological details and immersive atmosphere.

Short playtime with limited gameplay complexity and some jankiness in character animations and controls.
Some players find the dialogue heavy and repetitive, with a few pacing issues and occasional bugs.
The ending received mixed reactions; some consider it predictable or unsatisfying compared to the game's strong build-up.

story
4,978 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
50%
49%
1%
The story of The Forgotten City is widely praised as a masterful, deeply engaging narrative that expertly integrates time-loop mechanics, mythology, and philosophy within a richly detailed ancient Roman setting. Players appreciate its intricate plot, memorable characters, multiple satisfying endings, and thoughtful moral dilemmas, which together create a compelling mystery that rewards exploration and critical thinking. While some note minor pacing and technical issues, the storytelling consistently stands out as the game's strongest and most captivating feature.
- “The forgotten city, developed by modern storyteller and published by dear villagers, is a remarkable example of how a narrative-driven game can captivate through ideas, atmosphere, and moral tension rather than spectacle.”
- “The story is captivating, the characters have depth, and the story twists are superb.”
- “With its intricate plot, captivating characters, and morally complex choices, "the forgotten city" stands as a testament to the power of interactive storytelling in the world of gaming.”
- “For all the story potential that was built up from the start of the game, this is a truly awful plot with a ludicrous ending.”
- “The story telling and writing were not without issues; some dialogue options felt arbitrary and some characters were limited to single problems, which hurt the overall depth and polish of the narrative.”
- “Unfortunately, the story and plot twists more than make up for the gameplay flaws, but the ending is corny and undeserved, reducing the impact of the otherwise well-crafted narrative.”
gameplay
1,371 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
36%
60%
4%
The gameplay of The Forgotten City centers on investigation, dialogue, and exploration within a well-crafted mystery, built around a clever and well-implemented time loop mechanic that avoids repetitive frustration by allowing progress and knowledge to carry over between loops. While combat and platforming elements exist, they are minimal and sometimes clunky, with the core experience focused on narrative puzzles and player-driven deduction through engaging conversations and choice-driven interactions. The gameplay is relatively simple but effective, blending classic RPG-like exploration with innovative loop-based progression, making it highly rewarding for players who value story and meaningful decision-making over complex action mechanics.
- “The Forgotten City’s mechanics are brilliantly designed around investigation, consequence, and logical deduction, making every action feel mechanically significant without traditional combat or RPG systems.”
- “The time loop mechanic is super well done—it keeps things from getting repetitive and makes solving the mystery feel really satisfying.”
- “Gameplay mostly revolves around talking to citizens and trying to piece together multiple questions, observations, and disputes, with multiple ways to solve problems and clever use of the time loop mechanic to avoid tedious repetition.”
- “It lacks any actual investigative elements, and dialogue choices lead to an extremely linear gameplay loop where you put the square in the square hole to then talk to someone who points you at another square to put into the square hole.”
- “The gameplay is quite basic, is more or less just a walking sim visual novel, but the story progression and themes carry the narrative.”
- “The gameplay mostly consists of talking to people and solving simple quests.”
graphics
605 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
54%
43%
3%
The game's graphics are widely praised for their beautiful, historically authentic depiction of an ancient Roman setting, with stunning environments, detailed architecture, and a compelling art style that enhances immersion. Although the character models, facial animations, and some technical aspects show occasional stiffness or dated qualities reminiscent of older games like Skyrim, these shortcomings are generally forgiven due to the small development team and the game's strong narrative and atmosphere. Overall, the visuals effectively support the storytelling and mood, making the graphics a standout feature despite minor imperfections and performance variances on different hardware.
- “The graphics of the whole thing is astoundingly beautiful and well done and makes you believe for every moment that you're in an ancient hidden city.”
- “The city itself is beautifully crafted, with impressive attention to detail in its architecture, artwork, and ambient sounds.”
- “The game is stellar from multiple angles – the writing is expertly crafted with a stunning amount of historical depth and character, the voice acting is consistently and astoundingly good, and the graphics are just gorgeous.”
- “There is quite a lot of jank and the graphics look like something from circa 2006, but the story is compelling and the characters are just realistic enough to make you enjoy talking to them.”
- “Facial expressions are simply not there, characters deliver dialogues without any life in their faces and eyes and graphics are so poorly optimized.”
- “This is so poorly optimized that the graphics jumps with 4080.”
music
234 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
62%
37%
1%
The music in the game is widely praised for its atmospheric, immersive, and evocative qualities, often compared to titles like "The Talos Principle" with ambient, religious-like, and historically inspired tracks that enhance the mood and setting. While most find the soundtrack beautiful, fitting, and emotionally impactful, a few note it can be repetitive or less memorable. Overall, the excellent music, combined with strong voice acting, significantly contributes to the game's rich, mysterious, and engaging experience.
- “The story was phenomenal, the characters unforgettable, the sarcastic humor sharp, and the soundtracks breathtaking.”
- “The atmospheric design, coupled with a haunting and evocative soundtrack, creates an ambiance that is both enchanting and eerie.”
- “The music is exquisite and enhances the mood extremely well.”
- “I don't really recall any kind of music in the game, so if there is, it is not really catchy.”
- “The ost is generic and not very memorable.”
- “The forgettable soundtrack is the only thing I would knock the game for.”
atmosphere
188 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
67%
31%
2%
The game excels in creating a richly detailed and immersive atmosphere that vividly brings an ancient Roman city to life through authentic architecture, evocative music, and strong historical and philosophical themes. Its haunting, mysterious, and sometimes eerie ambiance deeply engages players, making exploration and narrative-driven moments particularly compelling despite modest visuals and some gameplay roughness. Overall, the atmosphere is frequently praised as the standout aspect, elevating the storytelling and emotional impact throughout the experience.
- “A richly imagined Roman town brought to life with impressive historical detail and atmosphere.”
- “The city’s architecture—Roman villas, temples, tunnels, statues frozen in their final moments—creates a haunting yet beautiful atmosphere.”
- “The game’s atmosphere pulled me in from the very beginning and refused to let go.”
- “I didn’t feel any connection with them, which really undermined the atmosphere.”
- “The twist at the end is dumb and completely destroys the atmosphere of the game.”
- “Perhaps the biggest problem of the game is attachment, the player gets attached to everyone in this city only to repeat a cycle of coming back and no one will remember you, while you don't have to grind by talking to every single person over and over again (since you keep your inventory with you so no grinding over money or quest items), it does ruin the atmosphere since while you remember your experiences with these people, they know nothing.”
emotional
129 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
100%
The game delivers a deeply emotional experience, with many players moved to tears by its heartfelt storytelling, memorable characters, and satisfying, thought-provoking endings—especially the fourth "canon" ending. Its emotional impact is amplified by clever plot twists, ethical dilemmas, and a strong sense of connection to the characters, making it a rare and memorable journey that lingers well beyond gameplay. Despite some technical or animation limitations, it stands out as a profoundly touching and intellectually stimulating narrative.
- “In 30+ years of PC gaming, no other game has made me cry with so much joy and accomplishment upon finishing it.”
- “I cried for a solid 20 minutes at how beautiful the message was, how wonderfully alive the characters felt, how rewarding it was to take the long and hard ending, how philosophical the overarching topic was, and how well the story pacing was.”
- “Despite technical modesty, it delivers an intellectually stimulating, atmospheric, and emotionally resonant journey—one that lingers long after the final loop has ended.”
replayability
123 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
28%
61%
11%
The game offers moderate to high replayability primarily through its multiple endings and achievement hunting, encouraging several playthroughs to explore different story branches. However, many reviewers note that once all endings and major plot points are uncovered, the replay value diminishes significantly, limiting long-term replay appeal. Overall, it’s well-suited for players who enjoy narrative exploration and completionism but less so for those seeking dynamic or endlessly replayable gameplay.
- “It's short, but very sweet with a ton of replayability that doesn't overstay its welcome.”
- “Excellent feel of gameplay, compelling story and mystery, you'll likely get an Elder Scrolls feel from this game and that's not an accident, it's based on a Skyrim mod, but takes what they did with that and hits the ground running, honestly a solid 7-8 hours of gameplay if you're fairly good at figuring things out, plus there is quite a bit of replayability to it all.”
- “Three playthroughs later I must say this is a quite enjoyable little game with lots of replay value, clever writing, interesting characters, and an ending that, while a little derivative, still gave me that feeling of satisfaction that made me come back for playthroughs 2 and 3, just to find out what I had missed.”
- “Since it’s basically a 3D visual novel, there’s no real replay value once you’re done, but it’s a decent experience for a single playthrough.”
- “The game has limited replay value, because once you've gone through the story and received the canon ending, there is little reason to return to it.”
- “There is no replay value and the first ending you get will become a precious memory.”
optimization
100 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
31%
31%
38%
The game's optimization is inconsistent, with many users reporting frequent stuttering, frame drops, long loading times, and occasional freezes, particularly when transitioning between areas or at higher settings. While some players experience smooth performance after adjusting settings or using an SSD, others find the issues significant enough to impact enjoyment. Overall, despite impressive voice acting and storytelling, the technical performance often feels unpolished and in need of improvement.
- “No glitches, no performance issues, game ran as if the devs thought of everything.”
- “Even optimization is outstanding... this is 10/10, everybody should buy it and get lost in this story, it's a gem.”
- “- very good performance on "high" settings, no frame drops or stuttering at all.”
- “The game is horrendously optimized, to the point of almost making me quit.”
- “The only negative point is the optimization: there are a lot of frame drops and game freezes, especially when going from one area to the next.”
- “The only bad things in the game is the lack of polish, as the game does suffer from performance problems, which I believe are caused by memory leaks in the VRAM as the game plays fine after it is restarted.”
humor
96 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
99%
1%
The game's humor is a mix of clever, witty, and often meta jokes, featuring dark humor, self-awareness, and amusing historical and pop-culture references that many found charming and laugh-out-loud funny. Some players noted occasional corny, awkward, or shoehorned modern jokes—like "Karen" references and political undertones—that could feel misplaced or detract from immersion. Overall, the humor contributes positively to the game's unique tone, balancing seriousness with playfulness and adding to its distinctive charm.
- “Without spoiling anything, the story had me glued to the screen from start to finish, the characters you meet are all interesting and mostly sympathetic (I especially like Vergil), you learn a bunch about history and ancient legends, and the dialogues are well made and often funny (you can explain memes to a Roman priestess).”
- “The writing made me laugh out loud quite a few times, especially the more meta lines like talking about living through a pandemic and how memes have ruined the name Karen xd.”
- “Had me chuckling when the devs decided to add a Karen joke and have it tie into the story, genius!”
grinding
93 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
9%
10%
81%
The game cleverly minimizes the often tedious nature of grinding found in time loop mechanics by allowing players to skip repetitive tasks and retain progress, making each loop feel fresh rather than monotonous. While some combat and dialogue-heavy sections can feel slightly grindy or tedious, overall the pacing and quality-of-life features prevent repetition from becoming frustrating. This thoughtful design keeps exploration and story progression engaging without unnecessary repetition.
- “The time loop wasn't tedious: you could choose when to end it, and didn't have to do all the steps again once you've done them once.”
- “There is no grinding, no meaningless slaying... all you do is purely for the progression of the story, your story, your goal, your morality, for them.”
- “Not grindy, but there is a fair bit of story to uncover.”
- “The problem with many time loop games is that it quickly becomes tedious doing the same actions over and over in subsequent loops.”
- “While I initially really enjoyed discovering the city and the inhabitants, it really started to feel tedious when I had to repeat processes or backtrack through areas to try and find missing conversation and set pieces.”
- “Most information is beyond tedious to acquire, half of it doesn't make sense, and if you mess up once you have to go back 6 saves to undo whatever thing you did to upset an NPC with vital information—otherwise they refuse to talk to you from that point forward.”
stability
64 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
9%
3%
88%
The game exhibits a range of stability issues, including frequent minor bugs, glitches in combat and dialogue, occasional crashes, and stutters during area loading, which sometimes require reloading or machine resets. While the clunkiness and bugs detract somewhat from immersion, they rarely break the experience, and the developers are actively addressing issues with updates. Overall, stability is flawed but manageable, especially given the small development team, making the game playable and enjoyable despite its technical rough edges.
- “No glitches, no performance issues; the game ran as if the developers thought of everything.”
- “Game runs great on my lower-end rig (RTX 4050), averaging about 124 fps at max settings and never dipping below 100 fps.”
- “It also runs great on my older hardware, with everything turned up to full.”
- “After being out for years, it is still janky, buggy, and glitchy, which is just a shame.”
- “I am enjoying the game quite a bit, but it freezes constantly, sometimes requiring a reset of my machine.”
- “Problem is, even though I installed this game on my SSD and have a powerful laptop with RTX 2070 and 32GB RAM, while loading visual assets and new areas, the game stutters immensely and even freezes at times.”
character development
24 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
54%
33%
13%
The game features strong and skillful character development intertwined with an engaging narrative and well-designed characters, making interactions and story progression feel believable and immersive. While some players noted occasional superficiality or shorter story length, overall the rich character arcs, subtle themes, and dynamic personal growth are praised as highlights of the experience.
- “Set in an ancient, mysterious city, the game offers rich character development and a choose-your-own-adventure experience that lets players explore a variety of paths and outcomes.”
- “The dynamics of character development that each person goes through while you talk to them and complete their quests is genius; everything matched up, from motives to embellishments, making each character believable and engaging.”
- “All in all, 'The Forgotten City' is a masterfully crafted narrative-driven game that deserves recognition for its storytelling, character development, and exploration of complex moral themes.”
- “Characters are missing a lot of depth, feel bland, and could make use of better character development.”
- “Short story, no real character development, and the 'multiple endings,' well... 4 possible endings isn't what I'd call multiple.”
- “That initial confusion also works as being part of your very own character development, so it works for it.”
monetization
5 mentions Positive Neutral Negative
20%
80%
Monetization in the game is not centered around microtransactions or cash grabs; instead, it focuses on delivering a well-developed, polished narrative experience. Advertisements highlight the game's story, reflecting genuine creativity rather than exploitative practices.
- “Kind of the same as getting a soggy Big Mac while expecting what they show in ads.”
- “Nothing about the advertising at least at face value is indicative of the game's low quality and that's honestly the saddest part.”

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84%Critics’ scoreBased on 40 critic reviews

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9h Median play time

9h Average play time

6h Main story

10h Completionist

7-10h Spent by most gamers

*Based on 72 analyzed playthroughs

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The Forgotten City is a open world role playing game with fantasy, drama, mystery and historical themes.

The Forgotten City is available on Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Steam Deck and others.

The main story can be completed in around 6 hours, while the entire game is estimated to take about 10 hours to finish. On average players spend around 9 hours playing The Forgotten City.

The Forgotten City was released on July 28, 2021.

The Forgotten City was developed by Modern Storyteller.

The Forgotten City has received positive reviews from players and positive reviews from critics. Most players liked this game for its story but disliked it for its optimization.

The Forgotten City is a single player game.

Similar games include Roadwarden, Minds Beneath Us, Elsinore, Outer Wilds, Twelve Minutes and others.

The Forgotten City

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