School can be pretty boring for most of us, no matter what level of education you’re receiving. It just loses its charm pretty early on whether you’re in elementary, high school, or even college. One thing that never gets old though is video games. There are so many out there that introduce you to new worlds, characters, and settings, each interesting and engulfing in their own way. It’s impossible not to get lost in them every once in a while. Even video game characters have to go to school, but they manage to have slightly more interesting experiences than we do.
Plenty of games take place in (or include) a school setting. With every school being different depending on the game, these places can get pretty imaginative. We’ve all wanted to go to at least one of these places at one point in time. On the flip side, some video game schools are just terrifying. Some of them are filled with monsters or worse — these places don’t seem like the best place you could go to to get an education. So let’s take a moment to look at 8 game schools we wish were real and 7 we would absolutely hate to visit.
15 Wish Was Real: Grissom Academy – Mass Effect 3
Andromeda aside, the Mass Effect games have always had a certain charm to them, which is one of the main reasons why they became so popular in the first place. A massive space adventure that sees humanity throughout their comparative infancy in the world of space travel, the universe has so much to offer. What could be better than an academy dedicated to humans located in the middle of space? No doubt a tough environment, Grissom is just the kind of school you’d need to survive in the Mass Effect universe. It also specializes in teaching students with biotic capabilities, meaning it could come in handy for those more inclined to solving their problems with their fists.
14 Hate To Visit: Wade Elementary School – F.E.A.R. 2: Project Origin
As you’ll come to see as you go through this list, elementary schools can be some of the scariest places in video games. Do you ever wonder why, when something weird’s happening in a video game, and it has to do with a school, it’s always a friggin’ elementary school? As first, Wade Elementary looks like a pretty normal place. It’s advertised as an academy for gifted young students, and that’s almost always a red flag in these scenarios. Once you look past the seemingly normal environment, the place is a damn hell hole. You have experiments being performed on children left and right, some with some pretty terrifying consequences. You’d be better off if you stayed away.
13 Wish Was Real: Knight Academy – The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword
The Legend of Zelda series has always been one of the most imaginative and creative game series out there. It would be great for us to experience any of the various timelines and lands introduced in them. Located in Skyloft, the Knight Academy is a boarding school that aims to transform its students into Knights of Skyloft. You’re bound to go on some adventures here. No boring curriculum at the Knight Academy, only hands on teaching and valuable skills learned in order to become a great warrior. It might be a bit of a daunting task once you think about it, but the world of Skyloft is filled with much to see, and the Knight Academy is the perfect place to start.
12 Hate To Visit: Hope’s Peak Academy – Danganronpa Series
Another private school, so you just know it’s going to be a bad deal off the bat. Hope’s Peak Academy is the crème de la crème of private schools. Incredibly exclusive, Hope’s Peak houses the best of the best, with no real curriculum except the expansion and betterment of an individual’s given talent. If you’re not one of those gifted few, you can still get in – though you’d have to pay an exceptional fee and deal with the ire of your fellow students. Aside from that, Hope’s Peak is also one of the more dangerous schools on this list due to the shady dealings going on behind the scenes. Anyone who’s played the Danganronpa games will know just how crazy it can get. Ever watch Battle Royale? Well, think that but in game form. No thanks.
11 Wish Was Real: Themis Legal Academy – Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney
Studying law not you’re thing? Well, you might want to reconsider it after you see the Themis Legal Academy. While you’d usually study Law in College or University, Themis is a high school, made available to a range of young students. Students can become anything from judges to prosecutors and defense attorneys. This might sound a little too vanilla for your liking, but what really makes this place so appealing are the classroom trials that take place. If you’ve ever played an Ace Attorney game before, then you’ll know just how exciting trials can be. Imagine having that part of your curriculum. Students can’t graduate from Themis if they’ve committed a crime. So while that might sound a little intimidating, keep your nose clean, and you should be fine.
10 Hate To Visit: Blackwell Academy – Life Is Strange
Blackwell Academy might sound like a great place to be at first, but it’s what lies beneath the surface that really serves as the place’s main turnoff. The school is dedicated to the Arts and Science, and so generally gets a lot of smart and creative students going through its halls. But aside from that, it’s just like a regular old high school, with certain cliques and school events and such. What really should worry you about Blackwell is that there always seems to be something shady going on there. From drug deals to intense bullying, corrupt school officials and even murder – this place is anything but mundane. It’s not exactly safe either, so why put yourself at risk?
9 Wish Was Real: The Heroes’ Guild – Fable
As kids, we all kind of wanted to be heroes in some way or another. It was a little fantasy that we lived out through games, television, movies, and the power of our own imaginations. So wouldn’t it be great if The Heroes’ Guild from Fable was actually a real place? Think a sort of Hogwarts type of academy except instead of wizards, you’re trained to be adventurers. One thing that might turn you off though is the low turnout rate. Many don’t graduate from the Heroes’ Guild due to the high amounts of stress, injury, unwillingness and sometimes death that occurs. But hey, no one ever said being a hero was for the faint of heart.
8 Hate To Visit: San Romero High School – Lollipop Chainsaw
At first glance, this might not seem like an all that bad place to go to school. Nice weather, cool campus, great looking girls. You could do much worse. But that changes pretty quickly, and what was once a normal high school campus is turned into the forefront for a zombie apocalypse. The usually quiet halls are abuzz with the undead, as is everything inside and surrounding the school. If you’re not already one of them, your chances of surviving are pretty slim. Maybe some people do want to be part of a zombie apocalypse, but in this case, you’d most likely be the damn zombie. No Walking Dead-style adventure for you, just a lot of brains and blood.
7 Wish Was Real: Gekkoukan High School – Persona 3
Located on the beautifully scenic Tatsumi Port Island, Gekkoukan High School is one of the more leisurely schools on this list. Fully equipped with dorms, a school store, and a number of extracurricular clubs for you to choose from, Gekkoukan High is really a great place for you to go and get an education. The Island is filled with various shops and areas to keep yourself occupied in your free time, and the school looks to be pretty damn nice too. The only drawback is that it turns into a massive, mysterious dark tower at night, so if you could overlook that tidbit, and remember to get the hell out of there by sundown, you should be good to go.
6 Hate To Visit: Bullworth Academy – Bully
You don’t really want to go to a boarding school if you have the choice to do you? Bullworth is no exception to the rule, especially given the kinds of students you’ll find there. Most of the kids there are either bullies or the bullied. It’s a dog eat dog kind of school. What’s worse is that you have to share a dorm with a lot of these terrible kids, risking a shot to the face every time you return home to get some sleep. Then there’s the incredibly strict faculty, which would probably make your time at the school less than enjoyable. Long story short, it’s better to stay away from this place.
5 Wish Was Real: College of Winterhold – The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
In the wide, seemingly endless world of Skyrim is a truly magnificent place located to the north of the city of Winterhold. The College of Winterhold specializes in training mages and is a school rife with history and tradition. The world of Skyrim is interesting enough on its own, but add mages, magic, and an entire association dedicated to the betterment of magic users skills and it all becomes that much more enticing. Regardless of your playing style, wouldn’t using magic be a useful too, regardless? The college might have a bit of a tricky entrance exam for the unprepared, but get your foot in the door, and you’d be open to a world of magic and wonder, with years worth of knowledge lined along the walls.
4 Hate To Visit: Midwich Elementary School – Silent Hill Series
Let’s start this off by saying that it’s not just Midwich, but the entire town of Silent Hill that you’d probably want to steer clear of. But among all the terrifying locations in the game, Midwich Elementary is probably one of the more disturbing. There are no classes, no teachers, just a bunch of weird, child-like monsters unnervingly wobbling towards you in an effort to latch on to your body and take you down. It has some pretty disturbing scenery as well, including empty hallways, blood stained, rustic rooms, and corpse-like figures hanging from the walls. Why are the scariest places always elementary schools? Could you imagine stepping inside that place? Well, one look at the place and you’d know it's bad news, so it would be best for you to just turn around and run.
3 Wish Was Real: Balamb Garden – Final Fantasy VIII
Final Fantasy games take place in some of the most enchanting worlds you can think of. There are even theories that some of these places are connected somehow, but that’s for another time. Final Fantasy VIII introduced us to Balamb Garden, a school that is known for training young people (and orphans), readying them for service in specialized military forces. That might sound like any old military school to you, but just picture it in the Final Fantasy universe. It’s infinitely more exciting and stands as a marvel of a facility. The place has a multitude of classrooms and areas to explore, and really teaches you the ins and outs of being a good soldier. It sounds like it could be pretty fun.
2 Hate To Visit: Heavenly Host Elementary School – Corpse Party Series
This could’ve been your normal, average elementary school, unremarkable and otherwise not worth mentioning in any conversation. But then the murders happened. Out of all the schools on this list, Heavenly Host is by far the worst, most hellish threshold you could possibly cross. The school was long torn down after a murder scandal involving some students and a school employee, but still exists within some sort of lost dimension, unaffected by time. Those who are transported there have almost no way of escaping, and must navigate through the decrepit, deteriorating, corpse-filled hallways and classrooms until they succumb to insanity or die – either by their hand, a friend’s, or one of the many vengeful spirits that roam the halls. The worst part — those who die within its walls are doomed to live on for eternity, experiencing the pain and suffering they felt throughout death forever.
1 Wish Was Real: Trainers’ School – Pokémon Sun & Moon
Pokémon has given us some incredible memories over the years and has introduced us to a wonderful world. The world of Pokémon is one that many of us have long dreamed of visiting. The beautiful scenery, friendly people, and hundreds upon hundreds of potential companions or you to take on adventures around the land make it one of the most desirable fictional worlds out there. The most recent entry in the series briefly brought us to the Trainers’ School in the Alola region. What could be better than going to school, learning about (and battling Pokémon) while living in a tropical environment like the Alola region? Out of all the schools on this list, this would truly be the best case scenario.