Open world games fatigue

Note: I should mention that I wrote this blog without taking Metal Gear Solid V into consideration. I have not played MGS V yet, but if Brad’s review is to be trusted, it sounds like it does some good things for the open-world genre. I only hope that doesn’t invalidate everything I’ve said in this blog.

I recently decided to start a new game of Saints Row IV on a whim and I quickly came to a conclusion I never thought I’d come to: I’m getting tired of open world games. This is strange because I’m usually a sucker for this genre. Traversing a sprawling landscape is still a novel concept to me, and I can usually tolerate the grind of playing through tons of ancillary content. Heck, on my first playthrough of Saints Row IV over a year ago, I remember thinking to myself, “Man, there’s so much fun stuff to do in this game!” Now, after looking at all the activity icons and collectibles scattered throughout Steelport, that thought has changed to “Man, there’s way too much stuff to do in this game.”

Don’t get me wrong, most of those side activities are actually pretty enjoyable, but it all just feels like filler that’s getting in the way of the ridiculous main story beats, which is what I really want from a Saints Row experience. The game itself even refers to this extra stuff as “diversions.” I just wish those diversions weren’t so prominent and integral to progressing through the game.

Maybe Saints Row isn’t the best example with which to express fatigue for the open world genre, considering how the open world itself is probably the least exciting aspect of those games (especially the last two). But this is definitely not just Saints Row fatigue: I’ve also thought about playing through Far Cry 4, The Witcher III, one of the Batman Arkham games, or Shadow of Mordor, or possibly starting a new character in Skyrim, but I never follow through, as the chore of sifting through all the additional quests and whatnot to get to the real meat and potatoes is a major deterrent.

It seems I’m not alone in this sentiment. With Mad Max having garnered tons of middling reviews, it looks like many others are also feeling that open world fatigue. This isn’t just a trend among professional critics either. This recent thread on the forums asked users what features they would like to see from a Grand Theft Auto 6, and several people expressed an interest in seeing Rockstar ditch the open world formula in favor of a more straightforward, story-driven experience.

What a strange phenomenon. Grand Theft Auto was one of the major players in popularizing the open world gimmick with GTA III in 2001, having spawned countless copycats over the next decade and a half. Now, the house that Rockstar helped build (among many other developers) is starting to crumble due to oversaturation, and it’s reaching a point where players want to see traditionally open world games shed their free roaming foundations. Developers have too often stuck with the tried-and-true formula of filling a big map with tons of quests and busywork to create the illusion of progress. Players are starting to see through that illusion, and the novelty of that formula is wearing thin.

Despite my own waning interest in the open world genre, I still think it has potential to serve as the basis for a compelling game. We really just need to retire the grindy formula(s) that have been so frequently used by Ubisoft, EA, 2K, Bethesda, and Warner Bros. among others. Here are a few suggestions...

First: Open world games should focus less on character progression and lite RPG elements and more on the progression of the world itself. The aforementioned “illusion of progress” issue is exacerbated by needless upgrade systems that usually don’t offer any significant changes to the gameplay beyond just making the game easier or removing arbitrary annoyances. Perhaps a system that focuses on changing the world around you would be more convincing. Red Faction Guerilla at least comes close to achieving this concept. Beyond the obvious destruction physics, Guerilla also featured an interesting control and morale system to represent changes in the world: as you completed missions and “guerilla actions” in each sector of mars, the EDF’s control on that sector would decrease and the morale of the Mars civilians would increase. Granted, this system mostly just amounted to progress bars going up/down and not much else, but I think it was an ambitious system whose illusion felt more compelling and satisfying than others.

Second: If neither upgrade systems nor world progression play a significant role in the game, make side content completely optional and just focus on the main story. I think Rockstar had success with this in Grand Theft Auto V. Sure, the three characters each have their own attributes that can be improved with practice, and there are plenty of sporting, property management, and stock market activities that you can partake in for extra money, but you can safely ignore that extra RPG stuff and play through all the main missions at your own pace. The only necessary deviation from the main quest (that I can think of at least) is a trip to Ammu-nation every once in awhile, and that’s maybe even a little overkill because you end up with so much ammo throughout the missions anyway. This works because the story, the dialogue, and the character interactions are the real incentive, and Rockstar clearly doesn’t want any needless filler interrupting their storytelling.

Third: Just make the open world a little smaller. Perhaps developers should stop touting the massive square footage of their sandboxes and be less afraid to bring the size down a bit. Grand Theft Auto V is arguably less successful in this regard. I appreciate the large size of Los Santos and the unparalleled attention to detail therein, but I’m never going to see everything that world has to offer, nor do I care to. The first examples of smaller worlds that come to mind are the early Legend of Zelda games. I recently started playing A Link to the Past (I know, I’m REALLY late to that party) and I’ve found the game’s relatively small representation of Hyrule to be more manageable and motivating than most larger open worlds. I know using a Zelda game as an example of a sandbox game is a bit of a stretch, but I think it’s still applicable because of its open, non-linear nature. I just think the series serves as a good example of smaller worlds that are more densely packed with meaningful quests and challenges that serve the gameplay well.

My suggestions and examples probably need a little work, but maybe YOU have some better ideas. What sort of things would you like to see open world games do to mix up the formula? Or do you think the industry should give the whole genre a break?

An interesting read with good points. I find myself getting bored in most large open world games because of how little there is to actually do. I always felt like GTA VC had the best size map for open world games, however, that game still didn't have a lot to do once you finished it (Aside from going to the mall and going ape.)
Mercs 2 had a lot to do even after finishing the game, but the unholy amount of glitches ruined the whole experience.

I've begun to realize that I'm having some of this open-world fatigue as well. Both The Witcher 3 and MGSV blew me away in certain ways, but I still found myself not quite falling in love with either of them, for a reason that I couldn't put my finger on at first. After some consideration, I now believe that it is the open-world nature of both of those titles (as well as some other games like Dying Light, Shadow of Mordor, and GTAV) that kept me from raving about them.

I'm TIRED of having to traverse huge maps just to reach the next objective or landmark. I'm TIRED of there being very little to do in the open-world, outside of quest necessities. I'm TIRED of repetitive side activities that add very little to the world outside of additional completion time. While the freedom and scope of an open-world can be mind-boggling, I find myself wishing that more of these games were linear, directed experiences that didn't pack in so much damn filler.

Personally, I think that open-world games absolutely need to mix up the formula or risk entering complete obscurity. There needs to be more of a focus on activities that mean something, not just pointless affairs that add more percentages to your completion rate. Developers need to remove the awful trekking from one objective to the next through boring, empty areas: either through speedy traversal (thank you Saints Row IV!) or smaller worlds. We needgames that aren't just the same annoying "reach towers to find side objectives to unlock the next story mission" structure.

I'm weird in that i like the traveling aspect. In fact i think it's the best way to present an open world because i feel like i get way more invested when i'm just going to the next area and run into some random event or location along the way, and thus get sidetracked and subsequently fall into a deep hole. This was one of the best things about skyrim. Plus i feel the travel helps lend some presence and scope to the game's world. I think mad max would have worked so much better if it were these harrowing long journeys between "safe points," where you'll get harassed by roving gangs or get involved in the minutae of a sidequest that you just happened on. It can get overbearing, but that kind of open world gameplay is just so much more interesting than hitting the checkpoint blips on a minimap.

I like your first suggestion as far as focusing more on the world. When they do that it's interesting. Another kind of variant that is interesting is AI being an aspect of this. Stuff along the lines of in Crackdown how taking out certain enemies effects what the gangs can do and the nemesis system in Shadow of Mordor.

As far as your Metal Gear questions, where Metal Gear differs in the open world formula is, in my opinion, fun gameplay, great mechanics, awesome and rewarding progression that ties right into all those mechanics, tons of freedom tactically, and fantastic AI that is fun to play against. The open world is certainly not filled with collectables or many missions. It's weakness as an open world is that it is lifeless in a ways but overall I am happy because it is avoiding the issues you bring up in your post and handles many aspects of its open world well even if it isn't so reactive. It puts lots of its story on tapes which you can throw on as you run around the world. I don't know about everyone else but a lot of times I do this out of game in open world games with podcasts or music so I find it a brilliant answer to giving you something to do in an open world game while you run around. You even find tapes with pop songs on them and you can put those on as you run around too.

But at the end of the day, I think the Witcher 3 this year did a lot of your typical open world things but did them very well with the depth of an RPG and was great. So I can't totally bash the old formulas. If they are executed well they can still work. For example, in a good driving open world game I don't dislike going A to B. In Just Cause 2 I loved traversing the world. I think in a of these games those aspects are just rather half baked and feel like they're in there because the developers felt they needed to be.

@ripelivejam: Speaking of The Elder Scrolls, I think the traveling aspect is exactly why people love Morrowind in particular. Encouraging that sort of free traversal seems to be a deliberate part of the design, considering the lack of fast travel options. I absolutely respect Morrowind in that regard, but the slow movement speed just made the whole thing frustrating for me. I guess I just haven't played enough games where getting from point A to point B doesn't feel like a chore.

@artisanbreads: I totally agree that the old formulas can still work well. I think the typical open world games usually do a good job of justifying their use of the open world structure, and I suppose that's really the key. We certainly don't want another Mafia II case on our hands.

You know, I thought I was feeling the same way. I almost always prefer a tight, lean and linear game to a big, bloated open world. I thought the witcher 3 was disappointing (mostly for story reasons, but the half-baked gameplay was a big issue), and I didn't think the open world did it any favours over the structure of the Witcher 2. GTA 5 was good, but tedious as I neared the end. This year I also played Assassin's Creed Brotherhood for the first time, supposedly the best entry in that series, and thought it so incredibly middling that I'm surprised I finished it. That's a game I truly do not understand the love for.

But something about Mad Max has clicked with me. The basics of that game just feel so good and fit together so well, that I don't mind it being open world, and I don't mind the repetitive side content. The melee, while derivative, I think is the best version of batman combat to date, and the driving is an absolute blast, especially when taking on convoys. Even though it's derivative, nothing about it feels half baked. Both vehicle and melee combat feel great, and the fact that both are good and present in equal amount makes neither one become monotonous, whereas I was pretty bored of the Witcher 3's combat about 30% of my way into that game. I guess that's my biggest issue with big open world games, is that the basic mechanics aren't often good enough to support the experience, and that they succeed on the basis of having lots of things.

So it's a weird situation where I dislike all the games Mad Max is derivative of, and haven't really liked a proper open world game since Red Dead Redemption, but Mad Max has really clicked with me, and I've probably had a better time with it than the Witcher 3. It doesn't help that the entire internet makes me feel like a crazy person for feeling that way, but it is what it is.

I get bummed out when a new game in a series says "going open world!!" The gameplay has to be really, really good. Like Infamous, MGS V, or Red Faction: Guerilla. The Witcher 3 is stellar because it nails the narrative hooks with some solid combat.

Anyway, a good open world game that doesn't excel in that stuff needs to be tightly packed. Smaller world, better side missions, fun traversal. It may be a shorter game but it'll be more memorable to me.

I hate open world games. It's an active turn-off for me. I think the very concept has become a festering cancer for the industry. Occasionally I'll play one, but over the last 3 years the only ones I've beaten are: Arkham Origins, Prototype 2, and Sleeping Dogs. I still haven't finished GTA V, although I guess I'd like to someday? Maybe? I have no interest in playing Mordor, Witcher 3, Saints Row, etc. I really don't give a shit about MGSV even though Metal Gear Scanlon turned me into a superfan and I beat all the previous games ahead of Drew.

Open world games just suck. But what sucks most about them is that they have become the default. It's as if you have to justify your big budget game not being open-world these days, which is absolutely disgusting to me. Maybe AAA games wouldn't cost so damn much to make if they didn't all have to be open-world for whatever arbitrary reason. Imagine if Arkham Knight went back to the formula of Asylum. Would've been cheaper to make, and probably a better game, but they can't do that because somehow that's going "backwards."

Anytime anyone mentions getting from point A to point B my mind instantly goes to Shadow Of The Colossus. For obvious reasons.

Man, I really have to finish that game. I think that's an interesting case because there's not a whole lot to do while traveling across that world, but riding Agro to the next colossus is sort of an intense experience in itself. It also helps that the world is goddamn gorgeous.

This is true, the thing that they did right was that getting to point B was SUPER rewarding. It really gives you a sense of how special the world you're in is.

I think its a case by case basis sort of thing. I love open worlds as long as they take me to somewhere I want to go, or make it a ton of fun exploring and getting around. I've always found GTA to be a bit of a slog ever since other games started doing it better. The Jak games have a scaled open world, but it branches off into smaller, more exotic areas. Zelda does this well, as does Darksiders and Brutal Legend. You're right, they're smaller and more densely packed with interesting things. Saints Row 3 and 4, Just Cause, and Burnout Paradise are open world games where getting from point A to point B is designed to be as fun as possible, and all of that resonates with me personally.

Places like Mordor and Los Santos are places I just actively don't want to be, and no amount of gameplay or story telling will help that.

I think one of the things missing from many of the more recent open world games is the idea of things being emergent and of telling your own story (to a certain extent anyway). Last gen I had such fun with Far Cry 2, Fallout 3 and Skyrim exactly because I felt like I was experiencing something unique to my play through that nobody else would ever experience the same way. When I came across a cave or building out in the world I had no idea how far that particular rabbit hole would take me and that was a huge part of the excitement. I didn't need a mission marker on the map to make it interesting.

Clearing the Dunwich Building of Ghouls and finding the story fragments of the shit that had gone down there was easily enough payoff for me. Brute force jumping my way up a mountain in Skyrim as a shortcut (only to then find some ridiculously powered yeti type thing on the other side that I had to pick off with arrows for 15 mins) was the same. It wasn't a scripted moment, it was just something that happened to me in my playthrough.

The problem is now, I boot up The Witcher or Far Cry 4 and the map is just full of icons. The joy of exploration is gone because it's all there laid out for you, and all those things are just repeats of the same basic things anyway. It's sad because clearly a huge amount of work and love has gone into those games, but they just leave me feeling hollow.

It's funny that people mention Shadow of the Colossus because, despite never having put more than a couple of hours into it myself, I know for sure it has everything that I want from a game. And I know this precisely because as recently as last year somebody had apparently found some little hidden secret in the world. There was no % meter telling people that there was still stuff to find, there was no ? on the map... it was just there waiting to be found. That's what I want from an open world game! I don't want to race buggies down mountains (well maybe once or twice). I don't want to go liberate an outpost. I just want an interesting world to explore in my own way!

In terms of story fitting in with these open worlds I have actually written a blog myself on it if you're interested. It's hardly groundbreaking writing or anything, but I'd appreciate the read anyway!

Anyway man, good read! Keep up the writing on topics like this. I always enjoy these types of discussions.

I'm definitely on board with smaller open worlds. Even though I absolutely adore The Witcher 3 I still see large portions of that world as superfluous and not needed. The whole north east and south east portions of Velen go almost entirely unused. I would've been happy if the whole map was Novigrad to Oxenfurt and their surrounding areas.

I think the open worlds need to be more dynamic and cater to a natural flow of player exploration rather than being designed with a specific structure in mind. Most modern open world games now give you a thousand blips on your map to go systematically work through. Those thousand blips however consist of around 8-10 different activities you repeat ad-nauseam making you wonder why there's even a vast expanse of nothing you have to cross to extract prisoner #5 or destroy armored convoy #12. This is where I think Bethesda games excel which is what makes up for how they fumble in almost every other regard. Their games are built for you to just wander and when you wander you naturally come across something interesting, whether it's loot, NPC's or a mysterious location the act of traversing the world becomes a fun thing in itself and not a stop gap between the primary activities.

Other games like the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. franchise use AI behavior to liven up their worlds. I still haven't seen another open world game have similar AI behaviors which is a real shame because what the AI does in that game (when it works) is really special.

I'm very interested to play Fallout 4 because this year has been a huge year for open world games (which I assume is what prompted this) and they all seem to be dealing with it in their own way.

I have said this before, but I think the solution to the Open World fatigue lies in games of the past.

It's time for big, non-linear levels of the late PC games era to make a return. A linear and controlled progression to the pacing of the story, but great freedom for the player when it comes to gameplay instances.

I thought I was fatigued/over open world games for a few years, and I was still feeling it early on this year. But between Witcher 3 and MGS 5, I've more or less come to terms with the fact that I'm not fatigued with open world games, I just didn't like any of the ones that came out before these two.

@lucifer: I think Deus-Ex had this down to a T! But the Deus-Ex world/hubs were still relatively small compared to some of the other open world experiences that have been put forward on here. I'm definitely with you on freedom of choice for gameplay style though!

I think the open world games are diversifying themselves in how they operate a bit more lately though. Sure you'll get the titles that just slap on a working formula and use a different coat of paint and call it a day (Mad Max), but the improvements to the general concepts of open world games that The Witcher 3 did is certainly not to be understated. The Witcher 3 was a big world and sure it had places of interest. But that game always made it worth your while to explore. I think it's the first open world game where I felt every square inch of that land was used with intent. There are places in GTA or Elder Scrolls that I always felt like "you're just an area to be an area". Because it was never on your way somewhere and nothing ever took place there. It was one of those odd dead zones. That game also scaled back on filler side content and made most of the side content worthwhile.

Another trend in the open world evolution is not far off from what @lucifer suggests. Take a look at Dragon Age: Inquisition and MGSV. You have a hub area (choppper/mother base and war room/skyold) and you take on missions within designated areas. MGSV has two big maps, sure, but I never feel like the game is telling me to free roam those (unless I specifically pick to do that) as much as they're telling me "the area of operation is around this camp/base/etc." and once that mission is done you get out. Especially if you don't have D-Horse. Likewise in Inquisition, there's a reward in staying within a path within an area. The use of an open world map is in that every place feels connected and there's a logic to everything. You could explore it, but you'll see most of it through missions anyway. So there's no real need to. But if they would have to travel to different mission hubs, it would probably feel a lot more disconnected.

I think the doom of the open world genre is everyone using the same mold. But at the same time, I have come to expect "shooter controls" in every game that has a gun. I think that's why Mad Max in some cases are so successful, it's a new look for a known quantity. What I have played of Mad Max is fun. But I also still love Assassin's Creed and those games are basically still the same routine every time.

So I suppose I'm optimistic. There are working formulas that people use and I think there are some changes in styles within the open world space. Some are not big, but they're there and they're enough to keep me coming back.

Games Developers and publishers need to stop confusing open-level design with open-world.

@kmfrob: Great blog! I especially like this part:

No, we know the reason why he does it. It’s because we, as consumers, demand that this beautiful world that CT Project have created be more than just an empty shell. We demand that we be paid recompense for spending the past 30 minutes of our humdrum lives trekking through dense virtual swamp and vegetation to the furthest reaches of the map. We want there to be a reason for us to get there other than simply the achievement of doing so. We quest for those question marks.

This is a perfect explanation of why developing modern open world games is so hard. If you give impatient gamers the ability to hike across a massive sandbox, they're probably going to want something, anything, to do during their journey. I'll admit that I sometimes fall into this impatient camp, which is probably why I haven't invested more than 30 hours in Morrowind (another game I should get around to finishing). If more developers could figure out how to make an engaging open world without having to rely on sprinkling minimap icons and sidequests on the way to the next objective, then this whole fatigue problem would be less prevalent. Of course, that's easier said than done in most cases.

@bizarrozorak: Thanks for the feedback man! But yeah I'd say most of us fall into that impatient gamer bracket if we're being truly honest. I think it's probably just an extension of the quest for loot. If you're not going to give us a new gun/sword then you better give us a new trinket to display!

Here's hoping Fallout 4 can deliver where other more recent titles have failed...

@lucifer said:

I have said this before, but I think the solution to the Open World fatigue lies in games of the past.

It's time for big, non-linear levels of the late PC games era to make a return. A linear and controlled progression to the pacing of the story, but great freedom for the player when it comes to gameplay instances.

So, more games like Crysis? I'm in.

I understand it, but I think the fact that I skipped a ton of them (mostly ubisoft titles) helps me avoid it. So far i've pretty much played Witcher III and MGSV, maybe once Fallout hits, i'll find myself starting to tire.

The less time I have to spend playing games, the less I enjoy open world games. I need to be able to teleport to a mission. One the best games last year was Wolfenstein. It was so refreshing to have a tight linear experience rather than an aimless open one. My GOTY is Witcher 3, so I'm definitely not over open world games completely. I just find myself overwhelmed or bored in most of them. It seems like a cheap relatively easy way to extend the life of a game, which is great if you don't buy a lot of games. I have more money and less time at this point in my life than ever before. I don't need the extra fluff. Having the option is fine, just give me ways to avoid roaming around. You should be able to fast travel to any spot on the map at any time.

They could do some amazing linear games with today's tech. Nice open and unique environments that don't feel claustrophobic. You can still give players a lot of freedom while keeping them on a path where interesting things can happen. I like what Tomb Raider 2013 did. The game felt relatively open, but it moved you along from mission to mission. It didn't sidetrack you with a bunch of other stuff. You were going to hit the next mission unless you went backwards. For something like Just Cause 3, of course I want an open world. It was built to be a sandbox. That's the difference. Too many games are open as an afterthought, and their openness fails to enhance the gameplay. I find myself often wondering why a game is open, most recently with MGSV. Fantastic game, but they could give you just as many options for your objective (if not more) without the open world. You can't leave the mission area without failing, so I would have preferred more unique environments for each mission rather than reusing the same outposts over and over. The game could have still been more open than other MGS games without being hurt by a lifeless open world.

I think the problem with open world games is that they all look similar to you the player. This becomes more apparent in side tasks like "go to point x to eliminate y" and sometimes mandatory yet boring tasks like "climb this tower to open a tiny portion of the world map and progress through the game".

I always see myself preferring semi-open level design which is exactly like what Arcane Studio have done with Dishonored, Since this type of design provide the attention to details we all love about linear games while providing different ways for the player to beat the mission.

Great blog post, you make some interesting points. I think the proliferation of the open-world genre is, in part at least, due to the backlash that often comes if a game isn't deemed to be "long enough". Some people measure a game's value in terms of how much content is in it, so "200+ hours" of gameplay becomes a selling point in and of itself, regardless of the overall quality of said content. That's why Ubisoft's open-world template consists of a map flooded with icons - this is meant to impress players whereas, to me at least, it's somewhat exhausting at this point, seeing as many of the offered diversions exist pretty much solely to take up time.

I think Skyrim was the first game to give me a major feeling of open-world fatigue. I may be mistaken here, but I remember it as being the first game to boast practically endless content, and this amounted to a great many underwhelming quests (including randomly generated fetch quests and the like), which diminished the overall experience in my opinion. I'd just become so bogged down in active quests that it was off-putting. I hope I don't feel the same about Fallout 4. More recently, whilst I think that MGSV is an excellent, truly enjoyable game, I am beginning to resent the way in which its open-world tropes have been used to unnecessarily pad the game out.

I used to love the big open world games but then I got a job that's nearly 50 hours a week and a serious relationship with someone who's not really into videogames. Suddenly the time I was able to sink into those worlds has been been taken away by this whole rubbish 'being a grown up' thing. Now, to be honest, open world games are pretty daunting. I just don't have the time to devote to MGS V and Witcher 3, games which I've had since their launches and have barely even started. It took me months to finish Assassins Creed 4 (by which time I'd forgotten what I was even meant to be doing and why) and I just fear that it'll be the exact same case with these two apparently brilliant games. I'm not even going to try and add Fallout 4 and Just Cause to that list. Right now, a compact, well paced linear experience or two would be very much appreciated.

I want open world games to be less linear. If I don't feel like tackling a mission or area, I want to be able to go somewhere else. In a game like GTA, your only choice is to go where the story takes you. I want more minimalist storytelling that does not rely on linear progression. I think open world games depend far too much on dialogue, text and cutscenes and that more game stories should be like Limbo and Portal. I'd also like to see more compressed open worlds, even if they have to be smaller. Compressed and vertical enough to make jumping a major gameplay component. Also, I'd like fewer games to focus on RPG upgrades and instead improve the animations and versatility of the controls. Provide temporary pickups, give me stealth options, let me jump and climb, give me more attacks... RPGs play kind of crummy and and have pretty basic controls because they have to accommodate different stats. Looting often translates to hoarding a bunch of junk you're never gonna touch. I'd rather wear the same equipment and watch it degrade through the adventure. Give me a punishment and reward system. In most games, there is no penalty for losing, so why be afraid of anything? I liked that in Demon's Souls your HP went down and that in Shadow of Mordor the enemies became stronger. I like death as a gameplay component. More dynamic enemy encounters would be nice as well. I want AI to be more random. Let the enemies explore their areas freely.

I LOVE open-world games... or at least loved them.

It's easily my favourite mechanic of the last 15 years but I whole-heartedly agree that this mechanic/genre has been around far too long for someone too have not developed a meaningful world-changing element to the formula.

If any open world game delivers similar quality to The Witcher 3 then I have no complaints. But that's just wishful thinking. After 50h of MGS V I uninstalled it. I asked myself " Why I am playing this with the though it could get better after one more mission? " It did not get better. I trusted reviewers and got burned. Serves me right. I think I do not like sandboxes at all.

I'm certainly feeling it. The past several games I've played have all be wide open sprawling adventures that all let you keep playing after the credits roll. I can't say that I didn't enjoy my time in those big sandboxes, in fact I really had a ton of fun going about hunting for upgrades or what have you. That said I am kind of itching to play a good linear game with certain momentum that you simply don't get when playing these wonderful toy boxes. It's very telling for me that when I heard the new Tomb Raider is really open ended I was almost disappointed. Obviously it's a good thing in the long run because open ended games tend to last longer, and I'm actually kinda happy that the release for PS4 is so much later because maybe it will give me a bit of a break with some more narrowly focused titles along the way.

I'm at a point where as soon as a game says "AND IT'S OPEN WORLD" I disengage somewhat. This happened for the last couple of E3s' with stuff like Ghost Recon, MGSV, The Division, Witcher 3, Dragon Age, Mad Max, all of which I have moved to an open world.

Now I like open world games. Sleeping Dogs, Crackdown, Red Dead and Far Cry 3/4 are all games I've had a lot of fun with. But being open world dictates SO much of a games vibe and tempo and it makes those elements so similar across wildly different games that it does all start to run the same for me. Frankly, it's a lot of downtime and it's downtime not authored by someone smarter than me. It's just a bunch of neat stuff that you happen to bump into, and that's cool but it's not what I want all the time.

'Linear' became a dirty word last gen and I always thought that was bull shit. But I feel like it's swinging back slightly in some places. I crave solid single player campaigns so much that a lot of this year and last year I've been replaying stuff on 360 and PS3. HOLY CRAP those games are good! Stuff like Dead Space, Bioshock, Vanquish, Uncharted 2 Bayonetta, Mass Effect are fantastic and we have nothing this gen that can hold a candle to them in terms of liner single player experiences.

TLDR: I just finished replaying Bioshock Infinite (plus Burial at Sea for the first time) and and currently totally in love with really well done linear games. Open world is good but it homogenizes games which might otherwise feel unique.

I see "open world" as less as a genre and more of a narrative structure. You could strip the "open world" aspects of both MSG V and The Witcher 3 and have something closer to previous entries. It's just different, and might not appeal to everyone.

I want them to be more systems driven. I want to be able to poke something in the game and watch the world react. GTA V only does this in one way, with police reacting to violence. Why not add destructibility with AI driven construction workers that will rebuild, give them a supply chain and HQ that you can fuck with. The greatest part of Shadow of Mordor is the nemesis system, an AI driven mechanism that players could experiment with and lended each player their own unique experience. Basically, I want to be able to affect the world on a larger and more lasting scale and I want to see the world react to my actions and I want to be able to mess with those reactions.

This is really pie in the sky, but I want to be able to nuke half the city in GTA and then see the post apocalyptic societies and systems dynamically emerge from the ruins and I want to be able to mess with the evolution of those societies. That's probably not possible but maybe there's some future Will Write out there that will figure it out.

I dunno. I like open world games. I like having a place I can explore and lose myself for hours in. But, and its important the stuff in there has to continue to be interesting and fun for the length of the exploration. A lot of people here are saying "make shit tighter or smaller" That doesn't work, bland shit is as bland at 5 hours as it is at 20, just look at Infamous second son and Mad Max. I like big open worlds for exploration, but I want to be rewarded for that exploration with actual meaningful experiences.

I would like more systems, and more unforseen results like Witcher 3.

I finished the story in mad max about a week ago and I felt nothing changed in that game after the tutorial, take bases drive fast, blow shit up. The story was negligible and ended on a pretty big downer, it felt like "Diversions the game" I went back to GTA online and went straight back to loving it.

Yeah, it kind of sucks, because there are parts of The Witcher 3 and Metal Gear Solid V: TPP that I absolutely love. On the other hand, the open-world aspects of these games can be a real buzz-kill. The Witcher 3 has very awkward combat and clumsy loot mechanics. I don't like having to trudge along through the dumb combat and then wait through load screens to teleport to the guy who buys stuff, then have to wait because he runs out of money. I don't know what else to say besides, "It's just not fun".

With Metal Gear, I was so impressed with every cutscene and story beat that came my way, but I couldn't stand tackling the same camps over and over. Then I figured I'd just use new weapons and freshen things up, but that requires that you keep taking down the camps so you have enough money to actually buy new weapons (then you have to wait 30 minutes to use the damned weapons!). It just seemed like an endless, uninspired loop in that game at times.

It's depressing, because I want to be able to rant and rave about how awesome these games are, but I can't do that in good conscience due to the inherent flaws they have being open world games.

Here's a tip that I didn't discover until late: Sell your excess resources namely biological materials, black carrots, wormwood, etc. as well as all those extra mortars and gun emplacements. If you have extra vehicles you don't need like trucks and jeeps, sell those as well and just keep a few in case you need to use them and they get blown up or destroyed during a sortie. You get A TON of money from selling those. The only thing I probably I can't afford to sell is fuel resources because those are really hard to come by and I always run out everytime I upgrade MB or FOB but in the case of the other resources, just don't touch or just sell a few of the rare resources (e.g. haoma, digitalis, etc.). Also that is the reason why when you send a combat deployment mission to gather resources, the GMP reward is low because the resources themselves sell for a lot of GMP. For example, you get 5000 bio materials after a successful deployment and only a 20K GMP but selling 200 out of the 5000 bio materials would get you 20K GMP instantly.

@bluefish:Oh man, I need to go back and replay some of those. I think the coolest thing about some of those games you listed was that, well yeah, they were technically linear, but they often felt bigger than they actually were. Developers used atmosphere, weapon design, flavor context, etc. to make their 'corridors' more than just confined, claustrophobic spaces. And when they did feel claustrophobic, it was used with the devices I listed earlier to enhance that feeling and make it feel intentional and unique.

@gaspower: Yeah I figured that out about halfway through, but the game never really brought that to the forefront with respect to how valuable the resources were to you, or if you should just sell most of them. As of now, I beat the game a few days ago, and I don't know if I'll go back to it. Maybe.

You're right in that it's not a genre, it's a narrative structure but it's more a content structure. An open world "action shooter" is the same genre as a linear "action shooter" but relevant or 'core' content is engaged with differently in terms of narrative and in terms of mechanically when you 'choose to do it'.

The mechanical and narrative moment of "go do the next step in world-ending conflict narrative" or "just fuck around and walk places for no reason" is not without value, I do like open world games quite a bit sometimes. But the issue is that that moment exists in every open world game, feels the damn same in every one and doesn't work into the narrative %99 of the time. Usually the choice of "fucking around for a bit" undercuts the tension of the narrative/setup and almost always involves a pleasant tedium of walking around for something casually content related to be found.

So yeah, in agreement, it doesn't appeal to everyone but I also think the current amount of them is unsustainable. As designed experiences, leaving so much of the play style up to the player leaves that player playing every open world game in a similar manner. I like games that go "now is a chill section" and "now is a tense section." Left to my own devices in a series of open world games, each falls into the same rhythm and it gets fuckin' boring.

I could definetly do with more linear, story-driven experiences as well. I traded off Phantom Pain because the gameplay didn't hook me enough, even if it was good (will probably buy it from a Steam sale again...). I played The Witcher 3 a whole bunch, but coming back to it after a break of 2-3 months seems way too overwhelming and I don't feel like starting the game over either. Mad Max's not particulalry exciting either.

With that said, I can still enjoy some open-world games. I can't recall having any problems with The Second Son, because it was fun to travel around that world with various abilities. Shadow of Mordor was slick as hell to play and I travelled around that world without getting bored either, because it was pretty much always a blast to hack 'n slash every orc you happened to bump into on your way to a mission (guess MGS V is technically the same, but maybe I just prefer brutally maiming orcs.). The mentioned GTA V also managed to hook me plenty enough with it's story and characters, making most of the proper side-missions fun to play.

So yeah, if you have to go with the open world formula, at least make it smaller in scale.

I dont really consider MGSV to be open world, its more like Destiny which not many considers to be open world. Instanced large levels which you return to many times in different arrengements. Its Peacewalker with larger levels.

With that said there are bad and good open world games, i thinkt we have an generic template fatigue not open world fatigue. Games like Mad Max, Watch Dogs, The Crew etc. should not be dismissed becouse they are open world but becouse they are medioker.

I've played like 2-3 open world games, I still like them.

I think the best place is a middle ground. As tired as I can get of running to the next marker to participate in the next event to finish the quest, I would rather games stick there than go back to super-scripted, super-linear Uncharted/Call of Duty-esque games. That's not to say that I want very linear games to go away, but I want them to continue to feel like games, instead of feeling like somewhat interactive action movies. Wolfenstein: The New Order is a pretty great game because it feels like I, as the player, am actually playing a game and not just moving an avatar to the next set piece.

Something where you're guided through the open world by the main story and quests would be best, with things to do off to the side. And by "things to do", I mean, "come up with something other than talk to this guy, run to this place, and do this thing". Give me some toys to play with, maybe a dungeon to dive in. Give me context without pulling me out into a cutscene or having some guy stand there and talk to me. Have some puzzles sitting around or something.

Or do the Dark Souls/Zelda/Darksiders/Metroid thing of having lots of different areas interlinked and interconnected so that the world technically is "open", meaning you really can travel wherever you have access at any given time, but players still have to figure out how to open up more of the world to progress. This isn't exactly an unknown method of designing a game and I seriously doubt that it's as expensive as designing an open world (side note: I bet this sort of game requires a far better understanding of level design than open world games, though, which means that it probably is just as time consuming - you can't copy/paste houses, structures, trees, etc., you can't put some rolling hills in this grassy field to differentiate it from that one, at least not to the same degree).

Don't get me wrong, I appreciate the impressive amount of work and ideas that went into The Witcher 3. There's a lot of worthwhile stuff in that game, but it boils down to an excellent version of something that's been done before, over and over again. I'm OK with one or two of these games a year, but there's no way I'm going to be able to play more than that. Witcher 3, Fallout 4, and Just Cause 3 are almost too much together, and I'm not even counting all of the Mad Max that I've played and the Forza Horizon that I played. Not a Metal Gear Solid fan, so thankfully I don't have any problems skipping that.

The biggest turn off in an open world game is when you first start the game up or get past the first intro/tutorial part and then you see the world map for the first time that's littered with side quests and there's a count for collectibles. I feel that for game design that's really bad because it's such an overwhelming thing to see and it really gives this kind of anxious feeling while progressing through the story of the game that the player needs to finish the side activities. It makes matters worse when Arkham Knight pretty much forces you to do every monotonous side activity to see the "true ending".

To me, the best part of open world games is being able to explore and interact in a living breathing world with as little hindrance and not feeling like there is a monotonous grind to the game. GTA is more of a city playground, Witcher 3 is a book come to life, and Elder Scrolls is your hero's epic journey in a fantasy world. They're all open world games, but I think most can agree that they might as well be apples and oranges when compared to each other. It's the other open world games that I have a real problem with because they all make the same mistakes at making boring side activity filled soulless worlds. There needs to be some sort of purpose for the player to experience in open world games to keep the fun factor up.

Open world can be done right or wrong, as pretty much everything else. IMHO, you and other people are not tired of the open world mechanics, but of the open world done wrong. For example, consider Kingdoms of Amalur, that game is famous for having an open world full of side quests that are very boring and take very long. On the other hand, consider Mass Effect. Discard searching for minerals and other pointless stuff around with the Mako, everything else was quite enjoyable. Think about Borderlands, awesome side quests. Searching for flags in Assassin's Creed? Who could enjoy that?

Therefore, asking Rockstar to ditch the open world formula for the next GTA is a huge mistake. What they should do is improve that formula, because it is great, it has always been great, we all like it, when done right. That's why many developers have started to use it sloppily, with negative consequences.

I don't think open world games outright suck, but I do agree that the industry seems to be oversaturated with them. It's a lot like what happened with shooters a little while back. I play open world games periodically, but my bread and butter is a more linear focused game. Putting me in an area that is more closed off, though can still be a sizable, that I have to fight through has always been more fun to me than putting me in a city or any giant area and telling me the skies the limit for how I tackle every objective, when in reality, there's normally an obvious best choice. I've watched my friend play the Witcher 3 (he loves the series), and every time I do, there always seems to be so much BS between things that I would actually care about doing in the game. I have nothing against it, but it's just not for me. I just wish there were more focused games than ones that just drop you in a huge area (sometimes too damn huge for it's own good) and just say, "Now go, it's up to you what to do next." I really hate that shit. I like having some focus and sense of direction. Give me games like Gears of War, Devil May Cry, God of War, Warhammer 40K: Space Marine etc. over The Witcher, GTA, Elder Scrolls, etc. any day.