I was browsing through the CRPG book by Brazilian blogger Felipe Pepe, and one section of the book mentions RPGs (and other games) from around the world, such as South Korea and Türkiye. He also frequently posts articles and tidbits of history about this topic on his personal websites such as https://crpgbook.wordpress.com/2025/10/31/the-video-game-history-expansion-pack-pitch-your-story/ . As such, I wanted to share some examples of videogames I sought out or enjoyed or just found interesting from other countries, some untranslated, and hope you fellows can also chime in with your own examples, especially from your own country.
My current attention has been hyperfocused on South Korea. Being a neighbor of Japan, it had some unique situations which led to a very self contained gaming industry. Until around 2004, Japanese media was basically banned in South Korea. As such, bootlegs and piracy became very rampant, consoles were expensive, and people mostly pivoted towards PC and competitive games. By the 90s, Korea was gaining a couple of successes locally with big budget RPGs for the PC such as Astonishia Story, War of Genesis, Arcturus: Curse and Loss of Divinity, and Magna Carta Phantom of Avalanche. However, by the end of that decade, the issue of piracy had to be tackled, and it was done by pivoting almost completely to online games, so many trends we now see in the "live service" genre originate from the Korean industry, some even before the terms were coined. MMORPGs as we know them now were coined by Lord English to distinguish them from MUDs (Multi user dungeons, early text based online games). However, what he was describing by the 2000s had already been done in Korea in 1995 through the game Nexus: Kingdoms of the Wind. You can actually still play it right now, making it one of (if not the) longest running online games. Another term is the "free to play" model, which was pioneered by the Korean MMO MapleStory. Korea was the first country to consider these live service online only games "real games" and there was a massive craze of them in the 2000s. Even licensed MMOs, such as FusionFall for Cartoon Network characters, were primarily developed in Korea. Some more information here: https://www.hardcoregaming101.net/korea/korea.htm
Examples of videogames from every country I can think of:
Syria: Quraysh (2005) by Afkar Media https://www.arabicgames.directory/en/games/quraish-2
China: Xuan Yuan sword series
Russia: Marauder
Cameroon: Aurion: Legacy of Kori-odan https://store.steampowered.com/app/368080/Aurion_Legacy_of_the_KoriOdan/
Philippines: Anito: Defend a Land Enraged
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anito:_Defend_a_Land_Enraged
Thailand: King Naresuan Online
Germany: Gothic
Türkiye: İstanbul Efsaneleri
Mexico: Kerbal Space Program
My current attention has been hyperfocused on South Korea. Being a neighbor of Japan, it had some unique situations which led to a very self contained gaming industry. Until around 2004, Japanese media was basically banned in South Korea. As such, bootlegs and piracy became very rampant, consoles were expensive, and people mostly pivoted towards PC and competitive games. By the 90s, Korea was gaining a couple of successes locally with big budget RPGs for the PC such as Astonishia Story, War of Genesis, Arcturus: Curse and Loss of Divinity, and Magna Carta Phantom of Avalanche. However, by the end of that decade, the issue of piracy had to be tackled, and it was done by pivoting almost completely to online games, so many trends we now see in the "live service" genre originate from the Korean industry, some even before the terms were coined. MMORPGs as we know them now were coined by Lord English to distinguish them from MUDs (Multi user dungeons, early text based online games). However, what he was describing by the 2000s had already been done in Korea in 1995 through the game Nexus: Kingdoms of the Wind. You can actually still play it right now, making it one of (if not the) longest running online games. Another term is the "free to play" model, which was pioneered by the Korean MMO MapleStory. Korea was the first country to consider these live service online only games "real games" and there was a massive craze of them in the 2000s. Even licensed MMOs, such as FusionFall for Cartoon Network characters, were primarily developed in Korea. Some more information here: https://www.hardcoregaming101.net/korea/korea.htm
Examples of videogames from every country I can think of:
Syria: Quraysh (2005) by Afkar Media https://www.arabicgames.directory/en/games/quraish-2
China: Xuan Yuan sword series
Russia: Marauder
Cameroon: Aurion: Legacy of Kori-odan https://store.steampowered.com/app/368080/Aurion_Legacy_of_the_KoriOdan/
Philippines: Anito: Defend a Land Enraged
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anito:_Defend_a_Land_Enraged
Thailand: King Naresuan Online
Germany: Gothic
Türkiye: İstanbul Efsaneleri
Mexico: Kerbal Space Program