Open-World RPG with the best customization options

There are players who go into character creation and hit randomize or pick a preset and call it a day. And then there are players who spend three hours creating a character, and still aren't completely satisfied with how their character looks. If you belong to the latter crowd, welcome, you're in the right place, and I absolutely sympathize with your sentiments. There are some great character creators out there, and they deserve to be shared instead of gatekeeping.

So if you're in the market for your next open-world RPG experience, but character customization is a really big thing for you, look no further. Some have sliders and color wheels for days, while others only have aesthetically pleasing options worth noting, even if their systems are a bit more restrictive. Let's start creating.

10

Monster Hunter Wilds

These hunters are wonderful

If you haven't yet jumped into the Monster Hunter franchise, the latest installment, Monster Hunter Wildsis pretty decent despite some of the recent controversies and issues. At least the character creation is rock solid. There are a very respectable number of sliders to really customize your Hunter's face texture from top to bottom.

Every strand of hair looks beautiful, and thanks to color wheels, you have virtually endless options at your fingertips. Once you jump into the game, you'll also get your hands on some gorgeous armor sets themed around each boss. Fashion really is the end game here!

9

Baldur's Gate 3

Make your tav just the way you want it to be

If you're like me, you'll probably fall in love Baldur's Gate 3's character art and style immediately. Everyone just looks so beautiful and polished, and the character creator, even though it limits you to face presets and has no sliders, is great. You also have some restrictions on which race you choose, so some facial shapes may be unique to High Elves, Humans, or Half-Elves.

It's kind of cool to have these different looks though, and you can always enhance a character's portrait further with the crazy face paint and makeup options. Plus being able to make a Thiefling or even a Dragonborn is just the cherry on top of the cake. Camp clothes are pretty plentiful by the time you get to the third act, so get ready to abuse photo mode at every turn.

8

Cyberpunk 2077

Style is everything in the night city

Of course a game that Cyberpunk 2077 would have many options to create your own mercenary, V. Everything is styled around the theme of the game, so many of the hairstyles are wild and out there, but that makes it even more fun. You also get incredibly deep makeup options, tattoos, and even cyberware and nail length and color.

But my personal favorite? The eyes. You can choose some crazy looking ones including all white, heart eyes and more. And yes, there are some more adult things you can edit here too, but we won't get into that more than we have to. In-game clothing was reworked earlier, so you're not as limited by what you wear now, since cyberware is what gives you armor, not your rags. Get wild.

Old But Gold Bethesda Creator

Skyrim's character creation holds up pretty well today. Add a few mods, and it's practically as good as news. That said, even in vanilla the degree of freedom you have is impressive. All races have their distinct looks in the game, which makes the choice actually make sense, especially if you're going for something other than one of the human variants.

You have the cat Khajiit, three different kinds of elves that all look pretty unique, and the lizard Argonians. Skyrim's its strength is definitely in its abundance of controls, and you can easily spend hours crafting your perfect Dragonborn here. Once inside the game, you have access to tons of different armor sets, and of course Daedric looks the coolest.

6

Starfield

Detailed And Beautiful, In True Bethesda Style

Look, Starfield maybe wasn't the huge success it was meant to be, but that's okay, because creating a character in this game feels really awesome and fun. It improves greatly from the previous games, placing you in this white studio instead of a game world. Maybe it's just my Simmer side talking, but it always helps to have your character on a blank canvas when making them.

The sliders and facial asymmetry you can introduce make each character unique, which I really appreciate. Even though the game is grounded, you can still add some fun eye colors to spice things up. And makeup and tattoos too. The game also has some decent clothing options. The Ryujin drip and Freestar suits are some of my personal favorites.

5

Fallout 4

The iconic character Chreator of the sole survivor still holds up

Okay, one last Bethesda match and I'm done. Fallout 4's the character creator really deserves more love than it gets. First of all, what a huge improvement from Skyrim graphically! And secondly, the sculpting option was quite nice, similar to what they did with The Sims 4 to make character creation feel a bit more organic and practical.

Most of the time, I have no idea what “inner upper brow corner” or any other term even refers to, unless it's specifically highlighted, so I find myself having to wiggle the slider around. With Fallout 4I know what I'm editing every time. As for the clothes… I'm begging you, find the Nuka Girl outfit and give it to Paladin Danse. You will not be disappointed. But more seriously, there are some crazy outfits in this game. I love the red bandana and cowboy hat combo personally.

4

Dragon Age: Inquisition

BioWare's Deep Slider System is impressive

Dragon: Age Inquisition is another fantasy open-world RPG that really doesn't play around when it comes to character creation. As much as it pains me to say this, it has deeper customization options than that Baldur's Gate 3appearance-wise, simply because of the depth of controls at your fingertips. Here you can really go wild, even if you don't have many race options.

That said, having dwarves, elves, and the horned Qunari next to humans is already a pretty decent variety, and once you get into things like makeup, tattoos, and colors, there's no telling what kind of inquisitor will turn out.

3

Dragon's Dogma 2

The huge slider options make up for few runs

So speaking of restricted races, Dragon's Dogma 2 is the only game where I'm happy with the overall abundance of options, but feel a little sad that we only get to choose between Humans and Beastren. That said, the Beastren options are pretty cool and wild, and they remind me of some of the Oblivion-era Khajiit we saw in The Elder Scrolls games (but like, in a good, fun way).

This is a game that gives you so, so, so many sliders and options for every part of your body, and not just your face, that being in character creation will easily take you an hour or more if you really want to create the perfect character. Hair styles, tattoos, body proportions… I could go on, honestly.

2

Fire Ring

FromSoftware wants you to work with your Elden Bling

I was tempted to put Fire Ring higher, given some of the absolute abominations that floated around social media when the game first came out, but here it is, in second place. Still, there's no underestimating how much you can do with these sliders. We all remember the Shrek lookalikes and other purple beast-like Tarnished that creative players made, and to be honest, what could be more customizable than that?

It might not offer you ten different races, but you can definitely look like you're far from a normal human. And just wait until you get some of the more fun armor pieces in the game. There are gorgeous sets inspired by the bosses (essentially you'll be dressing up as them), and then there's… the Godskin Noble set.

1

Black Desert Online

It doesn't get more detailed than this

Imagine my surprise when someone told me that Black Desert Online actually has content beyond its character creation. Huh! Either way, it really doesn't get any better or more customizable than this, and if you like things that look aesthetically pleasing rather than weird and gritty, this is the game for you. Now, a small caveat: some of the customization options are reportedly locked to specific classes, which in turn are gender-locked.

But if you can get past that, you'll be impressed by how many controls there are in the character creator. It really gets more detailed than any of the previous games here, and since you can also customize your body, it's easy to make almost any character from any other medium in Black Desert Online.