10 longest video games that take ages to finish

Finishing these video game stories will take you longer than any other

Persona 5 Royal / Atlus

When putting down your hard-earned money on a video game, you want to know you’re getting your money’s worth. For some people that means a solid story, unique gameplay loop, or multiplayer mayhem, while for others, it’s all about the ratio of money spent to hours played. There’s a great feeling in starting a game and knowing you’re going to get to throw yourself in it for a triple-digit number of hours.

To see what games truly took this to the extreme, we’ve gone through and looked for the longest games ever. To fit our criteria these games must have a clear main story and obvious end-point, so games you can play forever like Minecraft, or games that constantly get story expansions like most MMOs don’t count. 

We’re taking just the time it takes to complete the main story too, not to do all of the side stuff because not everyone’s a completionist – these numbers are according to HowLongToBeat.com.

Gran Turismo 4 – 77 hours

Gran Turismo 4 / Sony

While racing games can fall into the “infinite” category, most of the Gran Turismo games do have a dedicated campaign and Gran Turismo 4’s stands out as the longest in the series by quite some distance. In this campaign you’ll be taking on tough races throughout lots of vehicle categories, growing your car collection along the way to be the very best racer around.

My Time at Sandrock – 78 hours

My Time At Sandrock / Pathea Games

Life sims can be played infinitely, but many implement main storylines that encapsulate just about everything there is to do in the game, and My Time at Sandrock is one of the best examples in this category. Focusing on building rather than farming, Sandrock has a great story filled with colorful characters, plus a surprising amount of mystery and action.

Dragon Quest 7: Fragments of the Forgotten Past – 78 hours

Dragon Quest 7 / Square Enix

The 3DS remake of Dragon Quest 7 just has the edge on the original, stretching out the game’s runtime a little longer than before. It drew criticism from some for this, but it’s a Dragon Quest game, so it’s not like it’s a bad time even if it doesn’t have the best pacing. It’s a fun adventure about finding a mysterious map and restoring lost continents to the world.

Story of Seasons: Trio of Towns – 79 hours

Story of Seasons Trio of Towns / Marvelous

Like Sandrock, Story of Seasons is a farm/life sim game that has a proper ending, with your character slowly aging as the game goes on, letting you live out a full life as a peaceful farmer, doing all sorts of things for your friends and neighbors. Naturally, living a whole life takes some time, and by the time you hit the credits, you’ll have done most of what the game has to offer.

Harvest Moon: Back to Nature – 80 hours

Harvest Moon Back to Nature / Victor Interactive Software

Given that they’re actually the same series under a different name, is no surprise that a Harvest Moon game and Story of Seasons game have similar runtimes. Back to Nature is a lot longer than all of the other Harvest Moon games though, at least in terms of mandatory content before the credits.

Persona 3: FES – 80 hours

Persona 3 / Atlus

Anyone who’s played a Persona game knows that they like to take their time with things, and since the FES version of Persona 3 has the most content, it’s the one that makes it onto our list, especially as many fans consider it the best version of an already well-regarded game.

Monster Hunter Freedom Unite – 100 hours

Monster Hunter Freedom Unite / Capcom

There are actually several other Monster Hunter games that clock in at the high 70/low 80-hour mark, but if we put them all on this list it would overwhelm it completely. Instead, we’ve just gone with the top dog of them all, Freedom Unite for the PSP. It’s not too dissimilar from other Monster Hunter games, and as you can see there’s just as much, if not more, content to keep you going.

Persona 5 Royal – 101 hours

Persona 5 Royal / Atlus

Persona 5 was already the longest game in the Persona series, but add on the extra story arch and characters that come with Royal edition and you push it over the edge as one of the longest games of all time. Still, when you’re surrounded by such lovable characters as the Phantom Thieves, what is there to worry about?

Kerbal Space Program – 115 hours

Kerbal Space Program / Private Division

Kerbal Space Program’s campaign has a lot of tough missions, but there is one mission that marks the end of the game, and it’s fittingly called The Ultimate Challenge. All you have to do is take one ship, land on all 14 planets in the solar system, and return home safely. The ridiculous science and engineering expertise needed to complete this may as well qualify you for a degree for as long as it takes.

Library of Ruina – 118 hours

Library of Ruina / ProjectMoon

Library of Ruina has a bit of anything, which might explain why it’s so long. Playing as a librarian, you must do battle with other guests in order to turn them into books and grow your library ever stronger, with the goal of finding the one perfect book. As well as in-depth combat, this game has extensive story scenes told in a visual novel style – that would explain why it takes so long to beat, even for the fastest of readers.