Shooting game that lasts more than 100 hours

Shooter game come in all shapes and sizes across a range of sub-genres, each with their own game loops, stories and action worlds. While many people's first instinct might be to think of the faster matches seen in multiplayer shooter games, there are actually quite a few examples of much longer titles that can easily stretch into triple figures. This huge completion time comes from the amount of additional side content and hidden extras that can either take several hours to find in the first place, or even several playthroughs to fully unlock. The individual stories in these games may only take players a couple of dozen hours to clear, but the time flies by quickly as players embark on the finish race that turns a 20-hour story into a 100 hours of travel.

Despite all having long playtimes, many of these games are quite different from each other in terms of gameplay and world building. Some focus on RPG mechanics and player choice, others on raw shooter action, and some strike a balance between multiple focal points, ensuring a variety of goals and objectives to pursue while offering a compelling gunplay loop at its core. Above all, these games show that a shooting experience doesn't have to be quick and over in a jiffy; they can instead become one drawn-out adventure that players sink into for countless hours without ever running out of things to do or see.

Cyberpunk 2077

The density of a real city

• Completionist Time: 108 hours

• Deep build and diversity of storylines keep things interesting.

Cyberpunk 2077 already has quite a long history for players to grind through, but their single playthrough can quickly turn into multiple, sending their playtime well past the 100 hour mark. This comes from the sheer density of Night City, as every alley, building, and structure is filled to the brim with contracts and gigs that offer plenty of additional content for those willing to explore outside of the main story. There's a heavy emphasis on organic discovery as well, where if players want to experience every drop of the story and the wider context of the world, they'll need to leave the main roads and delve into the dark underbelly that hides beneath the action.

Completing all that Cyberpunk 2077 has to offer means engaging with each district, each offering their own micro-stories and mechanical challenges, and even replaying the story multiple times to witness all possible endings. Because of how extensive the relationships and character arcs can become, it's common to see players work their way through the entire game and then jump straight into another run, choosing different dialogue options or focusing their attention on a new build to mix up the game and the experience as a whole.

STALKER 2: Heart Of Chornobyl

Slow burning survival thriller across a wide open wasteland

• Completionist Time: 131 hours

• Branching narrative outcomes and gradual exploration that reward patience and planning.

STALKER 2: Shadow of Chornobyl earns its long finish time by forcing players to slowly approach each encounter with patience and respect. The zone is hostile and resistant to rapid progress, with survival mechanics that slow exploration and require preparation, even when players think they've mastered the world around them. On top of this, the quests often require long treks through dangerous territory, with mutants and hostile factions constantly interrupting the momentum, adding even more time to a second playthrough.

The depth of the storytelling also contributes STALKER 2's length, as players will find themselves building long-lasting faction relationships and following branching storylines that can themselves take considerable time to complete. This refusal to rush the player ensures that no matter how hard they try, there's no way to rush to the finish, meaning much more time is spent taking in their surroundings and appreciating the amount of extra content available in the world. Fully experiencing the Zone means exploring every minute detail and diving into the darkest corners of the world, no matter how brutal the enemies and environment can be.

Destiny 2

Live service can never end

• Completionist Time: 193 hours

• Gear grinding and endgame content is constantly updated.

Destiny 2 is a particularly interesting case in the shooter space. While the base story only takes a few dozen hours to play through, the live service nature of the game can easily turn a short runtime into a monstrous one. Each expansion released brings a decent amount of additional quests, weapons, and even raids, giving players an incentive to come back time and time again to absorb the ever-evolving story. Due to the way the loot system works, single missions often require multiple playthroughs to drop the right gear, and even then, there are so many different options available that players often continue to grind after they appear to be maxed out.

Towards the late game, the game loop changes completely, and is all about hunting down good-roll weapons and completing high-difficulty raids, both of which increase playtime dramatically. Even as content rotates out, it replaces new goals, ensuring that full completion remains a moving target that die-hard players constantly strive to hit. That's why it's quite common to see individual saves reaching over 150 hours, without even taking into account the possibility of competing against other players in quick PvP matches. At its core, Destiny 2 is an MMO, and with that comes the promise of a sea of ​​content that stretches for about as long as players are willing to explore it.

Borderlands 2

Looting until the end of time

• Completionist Time: 130 hours

• Multiple play levels and DLC content provide almost endless content.

Borderlands 2 is considered by many to be the best game in the franchise, but reviews aside, it also stands as the series entry with the longest completion time. The 100-hour mark is easily surpassed through complete content overload, and despite a fairly modest main campaign, it's clear that the story is just the beginning. True completion requires multiple playthroughs, a complete clearing of all available side missions, fighting countless raid bosses, completing DLC ​​campaigns, and conquering the Ultimate Vault Hunter Mode, where each layer adds a new level of difficulty, and of course, plenty of new weapons to grab for a spin.

The looter-shooter structure itself encourages repetition without tiring the player. Weapon variety and character builds are constantly changing, even mid-battle, and it can take countless hours to find the perfect setup, only to find it obsolete a few sessions later. The final push for 100% completion requires a huge time investment from the player that at first seems borderline impossible, but the quest is easily worth it because of how well the game understands the addictive power of constant progression.

Fallout: New Vegas

Decision determines the length

• Completionist Time: 131 hours

• Individual choices can add dozens of hours to a playthrough.

Fallout: New Vegas walks past many other open-world games in the genre because almost no outcome has a single way to be achieved. The apocalyptic setting is packed with branching stories that can be approached from a variety of angles, ranging from aggression to diplomacy. The way different factions interact can vary greatly between playthroughs, giving players many chances to relive the same story from a completely different perspective. Completing it all requires managing several rumors perfectly and a much greater attention to the more obscure quests, many of which are hidden far away from landmarks or signposted locations.

The RPG systems also extend playtime dramatically, as single skill checks and dialogue options can easily unlock whole new adventures to follow, while also having the potential to lock them away forever. Because outcomes are never completely spelled out from the start, it's quite easy for players to make an avoidable mistake, leading to far greater and more devastating consequences that can never be undone. Add in four significant story DLC expansions, each with their own mechanics and endings, and New Vegas becomes a game where full completion is less about efficiency and more about absorbing every detail of the world and the people in it.