What are the best parkour games? Walls suck. Sorry, we said it, walls are the worst. We would far prefer a world where we could just walk straight to our destination without having to navigate around buildings and houses. There are plenty of action-adventure games that agree with us, with many modern games allowing the player to traverse the world by scaling sheds, clambering over condos, and aggressively ascending architecture whenever it dares to get in our way.
Freerunning across a map, soaring over walls, and throwing in some neat-looking twirls and flips in a virtual space is what we’re all about. Some of these parkour games also happen to be some of the best PC games you can play right now. The art of movement can span many genres, from FPS games to action-adventure games, here are the best parkour games on PC.
Here are the best parkour games on PC in 2023:
Mirror’s Edge
Mirror’s Edge may be the name when you think about a parkour game. The seamless first-person freerunning, the tale of battling against a corrupt Orwellian power, and the pristine cityscape Mirror’s Edge has the lot. Although the game came out all the way back in 2009, it almost looks as if it hasn’t aged a day with its clean art direction, and some of the best parkour mechanics in any game you could play. The story is simple – an apparently utopian city has an overbearing regime pulling the strings and Runners are the ones leading the resistance. Faith has a target on her back, a sister to rescue, and she’ll have to do a lot of very fancy running to find out the truth.
Mirror’s Edge, of course, has the sequel Mirror’s Edge Catalyst, but we’ve got a place in our hearts for the original. You can try Mirror’s Edge through EA Play or through Steam.
Ghostrunner
Sure, Mirror’s Edge may be the most out and out parkour game, but if you’re looking for action-packed parkour, nothing does it better than Ghostrunner. You play as the most advanced blade fighter ever created, equipped with the monomolecular katana which can slice enemies in half with a single slash. With the ability to dash through the air, wall run, and slow down time for precision kills, this cyber ninja undeniably has the best tools for parkour.
Ghostrunner combines first-person platforming with high-intensity melee combat to create one of the best parkour games on this list. The cyberpunk dystopian setting is the perfect backdrop for an action game that has you darting around neon signs to destroy your enemies. Check out with we thought of the first-person parkour game by reading our Ghostrunner review.
Assassin’s Creed
It’s really hard for us to talk about parkour without mentioning Assassin’s Creed. The series travels through time and space so we get to experience eras from Ancient Egypt all the way to Victorian London. Each time there are new characters, new weapons, and new rules, but the one thing that stays the same is the parkour. Over the years Ubisoft has tweaked its freerunning to near-perfection, so only in very, very rare circumstances do you manage to accidentally steer your trained assassin off a ledge.
In every game, you’re encouraged to traverse the world through freerunning here, there, and everywhere while checking out the local history, and regularly interfering with a bad guy’s devious plan to steal apples and rule the world. To succeed in gathering information, or fighting your way to the top, your character must navigate the world’s architecture and landscape as creatively as possible, whether that’s to escape a pursuing guard or to find the perfect entry point for a stealthy assassination. Find out what we thought of Unisoft’s latest entry in the series here with our Assassins Creed Valhalla review.
Dying Light 2: Stay Human
Parkour, by nature, is pretty death-defying and scary, so why not add in the undead, too? Dying Light 2 is not without its problems, but the parkour at least is better than it’s ever been. During the day, running from rooftop to rooftop is a piece of cake, but as the sun goes down the limping undead become powerful enemies who are far more capable of hunting you down, killing you, and gnawing at your corpse.
Read our Dying Light 2 review for more on what we thought – while it does falter a little in the storytelling department, the movement system is something to behold. You can also check out some great Dying Light 2 weapons, how to repair those weapons, as well as where all the inhibitor locations are.
Titanfall 2
We’re not sure who thought of adding parkour to mech games, but we’d like to personally like to thank them. Titanfall 2 gives you hectic mechanized warfare and adds in freerunning for good measure so even the tiny pilots stand a small chance against war mechs.
If you’re already familiar with Apex Legends then Titanfall 2 is the stellar FPS that came before the hit battle royale game, so you can expect similar gunplay, slick movement, and styling – but even Octane can’t wall run as well as the pilots in Titanfall 2. The game’s multiplayer scene is still going strong, but the community has been hard at work perfecting the robust parkour mechanics in the years since it launched, so you can expect a steep learning curve upon arrival.
Regardless, the single-player campaign is among the best FPS games have to offer, so it’s well worth checking out if you love fast movement, robots, and clicking on heads. If you want to experience its electrifying combat, check out our Titanfall 2 review, then you can get it on Steam.
Dishonored 2
The Dishonored games are all about letting you choose between sneaking your way through its labyrinthine levels without harming a soul or slaying everything with a pulse. The game world will react depending on how many people you want to take down as you slaughter crooked politicians and ne’er-do-wells, filling your levels with more death, enemies, and variables for you to navigate the more chaos you sew. Such fun.
Either way, you’ll want some parkour to help you out. From Dunwall to Karnaca, this harsh, steampunk world has all sorts of neat ways to negotiate yourself to where you need to be and add some magic teleportation, and your maneuverability is unmatched. Check out our Dishonored 2 review here, but if you want blood, drama, and tension to come with your side of freerunning then you really can’t do much better. Check out our Dishonored 2 review if you want to know more.
Stride
How about a little virtual reality parkour action? Stride is a VR parkour game, so be careful not to look down if you have vertigo. Where all of the other games on this list just ask you to press keys to climb up walls, in Stride your real arms are directly pulling you up ledges and helping you soar through a complex of obstacles.
Throw in some enemies and a little pew-pew action (your arms and the weapon) and you have yourself an exhilarating freerunning experience. You can get Stride on Steam.
Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time
If we were all going to credit one game for popularising the idea of parkour in games, it has to be Ubisoft’s Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time. The 2003 classic took platforming games 3D and introduced many to the idea of vaulting and wall-running your way to victory and it continues to be a fan favorite – so loved that Ubisoft has announced an upcoming remake that will be coming to PC.
Prince of Persia is for people who want a little nostalgia or those who want to explore the origins of one of the most popular game mechanics of this generation of games. If you want to experience the original in all its polygonal beauty, then you can buy it from Steam, however, it might be worth holding out for the release of the remake as that will include the original Prince of Persia game, too.
Marvel’s Spider-Man Remastered
You could make the argument that Spider-Man is more of a web-slinger rather than a parkour master, but we’d like to think he’s an expert in both. Peter Parker relies on his parkour abilities to cartwheel through gunfire, run along walls to evade rockets, and just generally it helps him look cool while fighting. You can read our Spider-Man Remastered review to see just how well this PS4 classic holds up in this impressive PC port.
Those are all the best parkour games on PC! You’ll be leaping, flipping, and jumping for joy after you try them. If you fancy something a little more grounded, try our list of the best free PC games, best story games, or even the best open-world games if you still want to explore, albeit with both feet firmly planted on the ground.