History Main / LoreCodex

* In ''VideoGame/PotionPermit'', your journal tracks every task, person, potion, ingredient, food, and monster encountered in the game.

* ''VideoGame/{{APICO}}'' has a few guidebooks to help you in your beekeeping career. Your grandpa's guidebook gives you the tutorial on how to gather resources and craft items, Abbee's Folio documents every flower, while Beelia's Almanac lists all the bee species you can find and breed on Apico Islands.

* In ''VideoGame/NoUmbrellasAllowed'', Darcy's manual provides you 30 years worth of everything you need to know in running his secondhand shop. It offers guides on how to use your appraisal tools along with the history of Mindlesia and information about various brands.

* ''VideoGame/EternalDarkness: Sanity's Requiem'' has the [[TomeOfEldritchLore Book of Eternal Darkness]], which not only has a section for explanations of lore but is the ''game interface''.

** ''VideoGame/GodOfWarRagnarok'': The Codex returns in the sequel with similar functions, with the main difference that it is written by Kratos, revealing his perspectives and thoughts throughout the path.

* ''VideoGame/GodOfWarPS4'': Kratos' son Atreus has a diary in which he writes down the player's objectives, information about the characters and enemies encountered - as well as tips about defeating adversaries -, tales told by Mimir, and records of the scriptures, treasure maps, scrolls, Jotnar shrines and lore markers found across the world. The Codex is always told in Atreus' point of view and often has additional commentaries about his feelings and opinions at the moment in each page. Notably, [[spoiler:it is Kratos who writes the objectives in the diary when Atreus gets ill until he gets better]].

[[folder:First-Person Shooter]]
* All mainline games of the ''VideoGame/SeriousSam'' series (with the exception of ''II'') feature NETRICSA, Sam Stone's head-implanted AI, which keeps track of all things Sam faces or discovers such as weapons, enemies, and missions.
[[/folder]]

* The main games in the ''Franchise/{{Danganronpa}}'' series have the backlog of the "e-Handbook" (called "Monopad" in ''VisualNovel/DanganronpaV3KillingHarmony'') in the pause menu, which, asides from including information about the characters, setting and cases the player has gathered thus far, also features tabs for items the player currently has.

* ''Franchise/{{Danganronpa}}'':

* ''VideoGame/PlantsVsZombies'': The Suburban Almanac (a reference to the real-life Farmer's Almanac) contains info about both the zombies and your own plants. In addition to useful information, each entry contains humorous FlavorText that gives more characterization to a game otherwise short on it.

* ''VideoGame/PaperMarioTheOrigamiKing'': As Mario progresses through the game, he comes across a great variety of things, which are recorded as he finds them in the Musée Champignon, which lists them alongside a short descriptive blurb. This includes a MonsterCompendium of origami enemies, as well as the various forms of origami Toads scattered around the world.

* ''VideoGame/{{Subverse}}'': Just like the Creator/BioWare games that inspired it (first and foremost ''Franchise/MassEffect''), the game features an expansive Codex that is populated with entries about characters, places, and historical events that get brought up in the dialogue and story. Owing to the game's irreverent nature, however, there is also quite a lot of silliness mixed in, such as a Codex entry on the Codex itself.

Lore Codexes are archives used by games to keep track of different things that a player has come across. Among other subjects, Codexes can list enemies, items and weapons, ItemCrafting recipes, major locations, and really any other major element of a given game's story and environment. In some cases, these are purely gameplay abstractions; other times, they're presented as in-universe diaries or logs that the characters fill out over time. While formats can vary widely, a typical entry usually consists of a picture and short bit of FlavorText, usually between a sentence and a paragraph. Where applicable, typical locations and crafting recipes may be included as well.

Supertrope to MonsterCompendium, which often appears as a subsection of the Lore Codex. A Codex may also be used to provide the player with StoryBreadcrumbs. Compare and contrast EncyclopediaExposita, a document or a collection of documents that exist in-universe, whereas a codex is a gameplay element primarily for the player's benefit. There can however be overlap between the two when a Codex's entries have in-universe author attributions.

!!Examples

** ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyXIII'' features the Datalog, a log that features [[ArcNumber 13 different categories]] of lore for the player to read including history, people, and a bestiary, among other things.

Lore Codexes serve a few functions. Firstly, they act as a reference guide for the player, who can refer back to them to check up on information about a desire subject without having to put down the game or resort to guesswork. They also provide additional worldbuilding, as their commentaries can contain bits of background information or trivia that mightn't easily be worked into normal gameplay. They also serve as a way to quantify and track game progress by keeping track of how many gameplay elements the player has encountered.

* ''VideoGame/BatmanArkhamSeries'': Each game lets you access the Batcomputer?s files in the pause menu to review the biographies of characters you?ve met, riddles the Riddler has tasked you with, and little short stories about the history of different places in Gotham.

* ''VideoGame/BugFables'': The game keeps track of a several things that the player runs into, including [[EnemyScan spied]] enemies, discovered recipes, and major areas and plot events, which are stored in the in-game logbook for the player's reference.
* ''Franchise/DragonAge'' has an extensive codex [[EncyclopediaExposita comprised exclusively]] of [[FictionalDocument in-universe documents]] equivalent to a nine-novel book series in length. Individual entries are often carried over game to game, with their in-universe authors making appropriate updates to reflect the events of the past installments.

** ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyType0'': The Rubicus serves as the game's lore codex. However, it can only be accessed either from the History option on the title screen, or in-game in the Crystarium building in Akademeia.

* ''VideoGame/{{Hades}}'': Achilles gives Zagreus the "Codex of the Underworld" for him to carry around and fill out while he escapes. Some things, like locations, weapons, foes, and artifacts, are filled out automatically. Others, like the Chthonic and Olympian Gods on the other hand, require some input from Zag in order to fill out their entries.

* ''VideoGame/Doom2016'' and ''VideoGame/DoomEternal'': The codex is a series of data entries which contain information about enemy monsters encountered during the campaign, in addition to weapons and modifications which have been acquired.

* ''VideoGame/YandereSimulator'': There is a Content Checklist in the main menu to inform you of how many elimination methods you have used to successfully beat your rivals. This takes different forms in the 202X and 1980's modes.

** In 1980's mode they are named Ideas because Info-Chan was not alive at that time to list Schemes. You start off with a fair amount. However, you can pay the hair salon manager for more knowledge, and this will add ideas to your pause menu notebook.

* ''VideoGame/XCom'': The [=UFOpedia=], which contains information on the enemies that you researched after capturing or killing them, as well as their ships, their weapons, their useless but interesting technology, and their society. It also contains information on ''your'' ships, weapons, items, and base facilities, making it the one-stop-shop for any info you're looking for.

* ''VideoGame/EternalDarkness: Sanity's Requiem'' has the [[TomeOfEldritchLore Book of Eternal Darkness]], which not only has a section for explanations of lore, but is the ''game interface''.