5 of the Best Treasure Hunt Games We’re Still Playing Years Later

There are quite a few treasure hunt games on the market today. When I talk about treasure hunting games I am talking about those ones that have a storyline based around finding the bigger treasure throughout a campaign.

Titles such as Uncharted, Tomb Raider, Indiana Jones, and others. Whether the game is searching for a hidden treasure chest or a lost city, these types of games give us something to work towards. They give us a sense of exploration and discovery that other titles tend to leave out in their development.

Here are the best treasure hunt games that I picked for their playability, story, and overall fun. This is just a small list of some personal favorites, and keep in mind that only one game from some popular treasure hunting franchises is included.

Ducktales Kicks off Our Best Treasure Hunt Games

For our first title, we are going to turn on the way back machine and head back to the late 80s. 1989 to be precise.

Ducktales is one of the greatest cartoons ever made dealing with one rich old duck and his overflowing money bin. So there was no surprise when a game was created for the Nintendo Entertainment System involving Scrooge McDuck going all over the world looking for hidden treasures.

Originally released in 1989, our old rich duck keeps his wits about him as he travels through five exotic locales in search of treasure. His nephews are never too far behind as they go traveling.

Visit places like the Amazon and even Transylvania to find his legendary treasures. With a simple-to-learn attack system, you will pogo stick on enemies to defeat them and to move around the map, or just baseball swing away.

Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis Is a Fun Old-School Treasure Hunt Game

I remember playing this one as a kid growing up. Indiana Jones brought adventure and excitement to our living rooms as children watching him go on his journeys to find the Sankara Stones in Temple of Doom, the Ark of the Covenant in Raiders of the Lost Ark, and of course the Holy Grail in the Last Crusade. In each of these Indie had to go up against people that wanted to do nothing but stop him.

Set years before World War II, Indiana Jones once again finds himself in a race against time and the Nazis as he tries to find the Lost City of Atlantis.

It was an adventure where you had the option to take different paths to find your way to the ending. This was a big step in any early game to have more than one choice in a title. Finding your goal through choice instead of being blindly led down one path is the ultimate in-game design for any title.

Wild Arms Is an Underrated Rpg

Wild Arms is an underrated RPG that came out around the same time as Final Fantasy 7.

A title that has a treasure-hunting main character who meets up with two other people to try and save the world while also searching for treasure in the meantime. Your party excavates treasure and other items around the world in order to try and save it from the destruction that was started thousands of years prior.

Role-playing games, as a rule for me, are my favorite genre of games. Add in a good treasure hunt and some crazy enemies to fight and call it a party. With the normal turn-based battles having added 3D into the mix was a good move.

With cities that are still made with 2D art, it helps make the game more true to the time it was made.

Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End

There are a lot of Uncharted games now, in fact, there are four of them. Each of them has its own merits as to why they should be listed as one of the best. A Thief’s End is the best of the four.

With a great cast of characters joined together in one massive hunt for a hidden treasure, it is easy to see why it is beloved.

The search for Henry Avery’s lost treasure takes Nathan and his brother Sam on a worldwide trip together for the first time since Sam came back into his life. There are many steps that you take as you find hidden clues to the whereabouts of the hidden treasure.

The craziest level is the hidden city of Libertalia, which was a fabled pirate treasure hold. This is the best hunt and story out of all four games.

Tomb Raider Has Helped Define the Best Treasure Hunt Games Genre

Tomb Raider has a long and storied history. It tells the tales of Lara Croft as she discovers treasures and hidden mysteries around the world. With the new trilogy of games featuring a newer, younger Lara, we see so many things that have been remade.

With a change from the older style graphics, the newer more photorealistic environments and characters bring Lara Croft to a new generation of Tomb Raiders.

Lara has to go to an island where the storms come up and never stop. She soon finds out just how dangerous it was as her boat goes down. She discovers that the island is being ravaged by the vengeful Japanese spirit of Himiko. She stayed alive by stealing the bodies of younger women as she, herself, aged.

Explore the island trying to discover a way to get away while avoiding soldiers and cultists who want to give Himiko a body. See where this story unfolds.

It is difficult to pull a few good games out of such a huge list of titles, but I feel that these ones are the best based on story, graphics, and mechanics.

While they aren’t all next-gen console titles, they are some of the most fun ones from over the decades. If you haven’t played any of these titles I would highly recommend them to anyone who wants to get a little more experience with older titles and newer ones.

Do you have a favorite treasure hunt game or franchise that’s not on this list (again it’s not meant to be extensive), if so, let us know in the comments below.