Comments on: Can games be too open world?

By: #Listmas2014: It’s not the (game) size that counts… | United We Game

Thu, 25 Dec 2014 18:00:50 +0000

[…] UWG, we’ve had folks (joshorne, Sam Leung) contribute lots of great and solid ideas concerning the perils of open world gaming — time, […]

By: Sam Leung

Sam Leung — Sun, 02 Jun 2013 18:18:08 +0000

Exactly! Games with huge maps that encourage exploration are great, but not when there’s no actual content in them and it’s just scenery. I haven’t played LotRo, but it sounds like an interesting game! I find having reasons to explore and genuinely unique areas are important to me, otherwise all the traveling back and forth gets old very fast. As you said, open world games only really work if it’s strong enough to support its size!

By: Wairuanor

Wairuanor — Sat, 01 Jun 2013 19:49:30 +0000

I mainly play role playing games and have been playing Lord of the Rings online for a few years (I guess, you’d count that as open world?). I enjoy worlds with big maps and many areas to explore, however, the maps have to be filled with content not just pretty graphics. LotRo does this pretty well. You always have reasons to be in certain areas and each area has a distinct background (Thanks Tolkien!) and there are so many fantastic story lines. And then there are other games in which you just run around, kill stuff and have no idea why. You walk from one area to the next and have no good story to back up your journeys – that’s where open worlds are a bad idea, i.e. if a game is so weak that it cannot support a big world!

By: Sam Leung

Sam Leung — Sat, 18 May 2013 17:35:38 +0000

It does seem like the term ‘linear’ has developed negative connotations in the gaming community and industry, which is odd considering how many amazing linear games exist.
That’s a very good point you made that many elements of a game will lose impact and not just the story. It’s true that many games with huge open worlds become less challenging, because of all the options that are thrown at you. Whereas more linear games force you to work with what you’ve got and allows developers to focus their creative energies into making a more challenging and interesting experience with the few routes that are available.
Much as I like a good open world game, I completely agree with you that the industry needs more refined experiences as well as innovation!

By: Hatm0nster

Hatm0nster — Sat, 18 May 2013 00:09:51 +0000

I personally don’t like how “Linear” has become akin to a curse word in gaming lately. I mean it’s fun to explore and everything, but when you give the player options, everything loses impact. Not just story either, but stuff like challenge. If you limit the paths available to players, it give you all the more opportunity to creatively challenge players along those routes rather than giving them lots of options and then having to account for them all by either throwing a few extra enemies at them or giving them some light platforming to do.

I guess what I’m saying is that you’ inevitably dilute the quality of each element in your game with every additional element you add. While the industry needs innovation, it also needs to offer more refined experiences.

Long story short, I agree. :)

By: Sam Leung

Sam Leung — Mon, 13 May 2013 14:49:39 +0000

Haha I’m glad my article wasn’t too open world. Your comment isn’t either! :D
Unfortunately, it does seem to be the case that the trend is for AAA games developers to use and abuse those two elements you mentioned, whether it’s appropriate to the game at hand or not! The frequent addition of multiplayer mode to games that are clearly unsuited to it, like those in an existing series that fans love for its singleplayer campaign is very similar in its issues to this trend towards open world games. If not implemented well or if it just doesn’t work with the genre/story then it’s not going to make the game more enjoyable. I’d much rather have resources channeled into make the game better, as opposed to making it bigger or simply adding more things to do.
I never played any of The Elder Scrolls games, because I admit I was a little put off by the mind-boggling sizes of some of them although they do sound generally like excellent games that I should check out at some point. I would definitely prefer a more compact and detailed world to explore though, then some gigantic open world that’s riddled with bugs or might lack direction.
That’s a great way to put it – it should definitely be quality over quantity! We buy games to enjoy them, not just to get as much content as possible!

By: Sam Leung

Sam Leung — Mon, 13 May 2013 13:14:02 +0000

Exactly! It’s all about whether having an open world format fits the game. I do think it’s harder to make a satisfying open world game than it is a linear game, for all the reasons you mentioned. You’re more likely to get fatigued from traveling or from all the thousands of sidequests you have to complete.
Even if they do find ways to keep you entertained and even if they do manage to fill up all that empty space with things to do, as you said, if there’s too much exploration compared to the main game, it’s easy to completely forget what you’re supposed to be doing in the first place, so it can lose some of that immersion or cohesiveness as a game.
I love being able to explore in games too, but I’ve found it can also turn me away from a game if it’s just there for the sake of being there. Halo’s a great example of a very linear game that’s fun to play. That’s why I find it so bizarre that so many devs seem to be trying to up themselves constantly on the size and openness of games, when it’s been proved that linear games will work just as well or better in certain circumstances!

By: iamspacegiraffe

iamspacegiraffe — Sun, 12 May 2013 21:18:22 +0000

“There seems to be an obsession with open world games or at least with having some open world elements. Personally, I think developers need to be more cautious and I don’t like the trend of simply making games bigger or having more options simply for the sake of it.”

Majorly agree with you. It appears that to be a truely ‘AAA’ game these days means:

1) Multiplayer mode (whether appropriate or not)

2) Open-world gameplay (whether attached to a linear story, or not)

This reminds me of the biggest change in the direction that The Elder Scrolls games took in their earlier days.
Daggerfall had an ever-changing, infinite open-world and coupled with its (Bethesda standard-issue) set off game-and-computer-destroying bugs, made it utterly overwhelming.
When Morrowind came out, we were presented with more of ‘dem amazing Bethesbugs (TM) but a compact, detailed world to explore, or not explore (!) at your leisure.

The rule should always, in all media be Quality over Quantity.

And with that, I shall close my too-open-world-comment by saying that I thought your article was the perfect length!

By: duckofindeed

duckofindeed — Sun, 12 May 2013 21:09:43 +0000

I prefer games that are open world and give me a lot to do and explore. But, I agree, I don’t like when games are too big. I don’t like traveling really far from place to place (like “Quest 64”, oh my gosh, the traveling, the traveling!). I don’t like large areas that you explore with no reward for it. I don’t like collecting tons of pointless items. “Final Fantasy XII” was one game I found to be way too open. It was enormous. The game did give you tons to do. But, you spent so much time exploring, you completely forget the story or even where you are supposed to go next. The game felt more like lots and lots of traveling because that’s mainly what I did. And “Spyro: Enter the Dragonfly”, while already not being a good game, had tons of these gems you collect, but you only need a tiny amount early on. What was the point of the rest of them? And that is funny when the characters say something is urgent, but you go on sidequests for weeks, and it’s fine. “Oh no, this evil person is on the verge of destroying the world! But, I have a few more quests to go on, so if you could just wait on continuing your evil plot, that would be appreciated.”

Basically, I don’t care much either way if a game is linear or not. It depends on the game, and I enjoy both. I like open better, but nevertheless, I enjoy both linear “Halo”, and I enjoy open “Zelda”, and I thought the linear “FFXIII” was great despite that being people’s main complaint about it. They just need to use what works for that game and not make games too linear or too open.