The Best Independence Day Games to Celebrate the 4th of July

America’s Fourth of July celebration happens to fall on a Friday this year, which hopefully means you were able to snag a long weekend to get started on the festivities. But before you head to a pool party or BBQ and launch some fireworks, there are plenty of ways to beat the heat indoors and celebrate Independence Day with some classic video games. The following 10 titles are perfect to stay in the patriotic spirit, either featuring stories and gameplay that call back to important eras in American history, or featuring stories and gameplay that celebrate (and offer some thought-provoking examination of) the great experiment that is the United States.

• Release Date — August 20, 2013
• Developer — Volition
• Publisher — Deep Silver
• Genre — Action-Adventure, Open-World
• Review Aggregate Score — 86% (Generally Favorable)
• Platforms — PC, PS3, PS4, Nintendo Switch, Xbox 360, Xbox One

The Saints Row series started as an interesting competitor to the Grand Theft Auto franchise but eventually pivoted to become its own thing entirely, going fully off the rails by the third and fourth games in the franchise. The fourth Saints Row is one of the only games we can think of that lets you actually play as the President of the United States, and that he also happens to be a superhero battling off an alien invasion is just as ridiculous a premise as you’d expect from the Saints Row series.

• Release Date — October 27, 2017
• Developer — MachineGames
• Publisher — Bethesda Softworks
• Genre — FPS
• Review Aggregate Score — 87% (Generally Favorable)
• Platforms — PC, PlayStation 4, Nintendo Switch, Xbox One

Any game that lets you fight against Nazis is about as patriotic as it gets in my book, and one of the best shooters in recent memory to fit that bill is Wolfenstein II: The New Colossus. The interesting thing about New Colossus is that it puts the heroes on the backswing, imagining a bleak alternate history in which the Germans won World War II and then occupied America, and getting to take back this once great nation as the iconic BJ Blascowicz is precisely the kind of adventure to celebrate the American spirit.

• Release Date — October 30, 2012
• Developer — Ubisoft Montreal
• Publisher — Ubisoft
• Genre — Action-Adventure, Stealth
• Review Aggregate Score — 84% (Generally Favorable)
• Platforms — PC, PS3, PS4, Nintendo Switch, Wii U, Xbox 360, Xbox One

The Assassin’s Creed series’ examination into history was bound to eventually find its way to the American Revolution, and Assassin’s Creed III does a great job of telling an alternate version of those events while connecting it to the larger series plot. While Assassin’s Creed III is a little long in the tooth and takes a while to get going, once it does, it’s one of the most fun and interesting games in the “classic” lineage of Assassin’s Creed titles. Traipsing around colonial Boston and New York while taking out redcoats never gets old.

• Release Date — October 15, 2015
• Developer — Free Lives
• Publisher — Devolver Digital
• Genre — Action Platformer, Run ‘n Gun
• Review Aggregate Score — 83% (Generally Favorable)
• Platforms — PC, PlayStation 4, Nintendo Switch, Xbox One

The run ‘n gun genre thrived in the 80s by tapping into the jingoistic nationalism and military might of the United States and its military, much in the same way that the action movies of the era did. Broforce is a loving homage to both, tying in obvious references to the most iconic action heroes of all time while setting you loose against a generic “bad guy” threat that could easily stand in for any one of the US’ perceived threats at the end of the Cold War. Broforce is like if Contra and every beloved action movie merged into a single entity, and it’s as American as apple pie despite being made by a South African studio.

• Release Date — March 3, 2009
• Developer — Creative Assembly
• Publisher — Sega
• Genre — Turn-Based Strategy, Grand Strategy, Tactics
• Review Aggregate Score — 90% (Universal Acclaim)
• Platforms — Android, iOS, PC

Creative Assembly’s Total War series is one of the longest-running and best-loved strategy series out there, especially for how each entry focuses on a specific time period in history. The first game, Empire Total War (renamed to Total War: Empire), features the “Road to Independence” campaign that closely follows the battles of the Revolutionary War, which is a perfect experience to celebrate the Fourth of July and American Independence Day.

• Release Date — October 28, 2008
• Developer — Bethesda Game Studios
• Publisher — Bethesda Softworks
• Genre — Action RPG, FPS
• Review Aggregate Score — 93% (Universal Acclaim)
• Platforms — PC, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360

At its core, the Fallout series has always been uniquely American in its examination of a potential post-apocalypse, imagining a world in which the post-war boom of the 1950s carried the US to become a retrofuturist utopia with unchecked capitalism eating away at its core. The third entry in the series, though, is especially appropriate for Independence Day, as it’s the one and only game in the series to take place at our nation’s capital, Washington D.C. Fallout 3 is a great game regardless of when you play it, but there’s something special about seeing iconic landmarks like the Washington Monument or our nation’s Capital Building on the Fourth of July.

• Release Date — May 18, 2010
• Developer — Rockstar San Diego
• Publisher — Rockstar Games
• Genre — Action-Adventure, Open-World
• Review Aggregate Score — 95% (Universal Acclaim)
• Platforms — PC, PS3, PS4, Nintendo Switch, Xbox 360, Xbox One

The Wild West and the conquering of the American frontier are about as integral to the fiber of our nation’s history as our war for independence from the British, and few games tap into the spirit of “manifest destiny” and the untamed wilderness of pioneer life like Red Dead Redemption. There are lots of games that take place in the Wild West, but Red Dead Redemption‘s story of progress and modernity catching up to the West, and the fiercely independent settlers who fear it’s encroaching on the very fiber of what it means to be “American”, make Red Dead Redemption a special game.

• Release Date — March 27, 2018
• Developer — Ubisoft Montreal, Ubisoft Toronto
• Publisher — Ubisoft
• Genre — FPS
• Review Aggregate Score — 81% (Generally Favorable)
• Platforms — PC, PlayStation 4, Xbox One

The Far Cry series has traditionally veered toward exotic settings for its open-world FPS shenanigans, which is what makes Far Cry 5 so special. After visiting the South Pacific, Africa, Oceania, and Nepal, Far Cry 5 takes players right to the American heartland, cutting them loose to take down a fundamentalist doomsday cult in our very own backyard. The beautifully recreated landscape of Montana is a major selling point for Far Cry 5, but some of its missions (especially the Clutch Nixon quest line) are perfect for the Fourth of July, mostly for the fireworks.

• Release Date — February 8, 2024
• Developer — Arrowhead Game Studios
• Publisher — Sony Interactive Entertainment
• Genre — Extraction Shooter, Co-op
• Review Aggregate Score — 82% (Generally Favorable)
• Platforms — PC, PlayStation 5

At the core of the great experiment that is the United States are the concepts of individual freedom and democratic rule, but what about democracy in space? Helldivers II is about as satirical as a game can be when examining American imperialism and nationalism (similar to Starship Troopers), but it’s also an incredibly fun co-op game that lets you shoot wave after wave of bugs and robots to defend truth, justice, and the American way. Plus, it might be one of the best games on this list that you can play with a friend.

• Release Date — March 26, 2013
• Developer — Irrational Games
• Publisher — 2K
• Genre — FPS
• Review Aggregate Score — 94% (Universal Acclaim)
• Platforms — PC, PS3, PS4, Nintendo Switch, Xbox 360, Xbox One

Both BioShock and BioShock Infinite are arguably perfect games to play on the Fourth of July, but BioShock Infinite wins out in the top spot thanks to its uniquely patriotic setting and enemies that resemble America’s more iconic presidents. Columbia is a city teetering on the edge of collapse, buckling under the weight of xenophobia and fanaticism brought about by its corrupt leader, and Booker Dewitt is an instrument of justice aimed at bringing the whole thing down while surrounded by plenty of stars and bars.