Best Games With New Game Plus: When the First Playthrough Was Just Practice

New Game Plus at its worst is just "the same game but enemies have more HP." At its best, it's a fundamentally different experience — new bosses, new story branches, new endings, and the satisfaction of destroying early-game challenges with your endgame build. Here are the games that get NG+ right.

NG+ that changes the game

Chrono Trigger — invented New Game Plus in 1995. Carry your endgame stats into a new playthrough and access 13 different endings based on when and how you defeat the final boss. Some endings are only accessible in NG+ because you need endgame power to reach Lavos at unusual story points. The definitive NG+ implementation.

NieR: Automata — the first playthrough is Route A. NG+ is Route B — the same events from a different character's perspective with entirely new gameplay mechanics (hacking minigames). Route C after that is an entirely new story. The "real" game starts after your first ending. You need three playthroughs for the complete experience.

Undertale — the Genocide and Pacifist routes function as NG+ experiences. The game remembers your choices across playthroughs and permanently alters itself based on your previous decisions. Completing Genocide changes the Pacifist ending permanently — even after resetting.

Dark Souls — NG+ increases enemy health and damage while letting you keep your gear. But the real NG+ draw is trying different builds — a sorcery run vs a pure melee run vs an SL1 challenge run creates genuinely different games.

Elden Ring — NG+ up to NG+7 with escalating difficulty. New builds become the replay motivation — if your first run was STR, NG+ as INT/sorcery is a different game. The elden ring best weapons and elden ring best builds posts help plan alternative builds.

NG+ with new content

God of War Ragnarok — NG+ adds new armor sets, upgraded versions of existing gear, and Spartan Rage variants. Some of the game's best equipment is NG+ exclusive.

Resident Evil 4 (Remake) — NG+ unlocks the Chicago Sweeper (infinite ammo tommy gun) and other weapons that transform the gameplay from horror to power fantasy.

Hades — technically the entire game is NG+. Each escape attempt carries persistent narrative progress. The Heat system adds modular difficulty increases with specific rewards. You need many "playthroughs" to see the full story. The hades best builds post has more.

The Witcher 3 — NG+ at higher difficulty with carry-over gear. Scaled enemies and the opportunity to make different story choices (romance a different partner, side with different factions).

NG+ that tests mastery

Sekiro — each NG+ cycle removes the resurrection safety net (Kuro's charm) and adds a demon bell that increases difficulty further. NG+7 charmless with demon bell is one of the hardest challenges in gaming.

Hollow Knight — Steel Soul mode is permadeath NG+. One death and the save file is deleted. Every boss becomes a life-or-death encounter.

Baldur's Gate 3 — while there's no traditional NG+, the respec system and 12 classes with multiclassing make fresh playthroughs feel like NG+. Different class choices create entirely different combat experiences and unlock unique dialogue options.

NG+ as intended design

Some games are designed around multiple playthroughs:

Persona 5 Royal — NG+ carries social stats (Knowledge, Guts, etc.) making it easier to max all confidant relationships. The third semester content requires specific confidant progress — NG+ lets you reach it more easily.

Fire Emblem: Three Houses — three (effectively four) story routes. Each is a full playthrough with different characters, battles, and story. The game expects you to play at least twice.

Starfield — the main quest ending leads to a NG+ with a narrative twist. Bethesda designed the game around the assumption that you'd enter NG+ — some content only exists there.

What makes NG+ worth it (design perspective)

From our development experience on Granny's Rampage, NG+ is worth building when it offers at least one of: new content (bosses, items, story), new perspective (different character or abilities), mastery challenge (harder difficulty with earned tools), or narrative justification (the story makes replaying meaningful).

NG+ that's just "same game, bigger numbers" isn't worth the player's time. The best NG+ implementations make you want to replay — not because they gate content, but because the new experience is genuinely compelling.

For more replayability content, the most replayable games, best short games, and best video game endings posts have more.

The shortest version

Best NG+ ever: Chrono Trigger (13 endings) and NieR: Automata (the real game starts at NG+). Best NG+ for builds: Elden Ring and Dark Souls (try a completely different playstyle). Best NG+ for mastery: Sekiro charmless (the ultimate test). Best NG+ for story: Undertale (the game remembers and judges your previous choices). The rule: NG+ should offer a new experience, not the same experience with bigger numbers.