Times when you've felt at one with traversal mechanics?

I was listening to a podcast about Gravity Rush's (or Daze's) music, and two things came back to me; how fun it was to zoom around collecting the XP orbs and just chill and have fun with the powers; and secondly, how not fun it was using those same mechanics in boss battles/with a time limit. I then realised that I'm not sure I've ever been just completely in the zone and had zen-like attunement with a game's traversal mechanics.

Sunset Overdrive? Loved going around for collectibles, but when sh*t hit the fan, I'd either grind back and forth on the same rail whilst shooting, or spamming the ground pound + boost combo.

Same with Infamous and Crackdown, great fun getting the collectibles, but once combat starts I'd just revert to the most economical movement, not really jamming with my full skill-set and unable to realise my dreams of a constantly moving figure of death and destruction

So have you ever just been at one with a game's traversal mechanics, in all situations, and wreaked kinetic havoc?

Loved the way the original Infamous's flow worked. Maybe it's just rose colored glasses, but it felt way more natural and easy to zip from point to point than in its sequels.

I'm also super fond of the way Saints Row 4 worked. Running from the streets to up a building to jumping insane heights into a slow glide was tremendously fun.

Infamous: Second Son's video power has some great traversal.

Fetch's neon powers are fantastic in Infamous: First Light, as well.

For all the things wrong with Brink, I really enjoyed the way the parkour-lite stuff sped up that game's speed of movement.

Mirror's Edge could have been this if the level design had taken much better advantage of the mechanics.

Spider Man 2 comes to mind. It's old and naybe this is nostalgia, but it was such a joy to swing around that city.

Spiderman 2's (I think I'm remembering the right one) on ps2 had great Web slinging. I felt like I always landed where I intende, and was able to do so with flair when appropriate. I'd also say Infamous and Crackdown (the latter portion at least) are agreeable in this sense. Also does Tony Hawk count for this conversation?

Arkham City's mixing of glide and grapple gun mechanics made it feel effortless to soar throughout the city.

Just Cause 2, grappling hook + parachute combo. It was great.

Red Dead. There wasn't any orbs or anything to collect but I pretty much exclusively rode my horse everywhere over fast traveling.

Spider-Man: Web of Shadows (swinging)

Saints Row 3 (driving)

Mirror's Edge

Destiny (slide and jump)

For me this is just immersion related. I can be immersed in any game's mechanics if the moment strikes me. There's some really great examples posted already that I have very fond memories of. Arkham City gliding, Mirror's Edge running, the old Spider Man games.

Same here.

Funny enough in The Witcher I rarely use the horse but I do run on foot every where rather than fast travel. Also, those little sail boats are pretty great.

Does Jet set radio count? That game was awesome. Also Tribes. Neither are open world games but I loved the traversal

Titanfall for me. I got reaaaaaaal good with the wallrunning stuff at one point. I haven't been able to get back into the game, so I'm really looking forward to the sequel in a few years.

Rocket/Sticky jumping in TF2, the basics are easy to learn but still has so much depth and nuance to getting around. The really good people can almost literally fly around the map.

Here's a bunch of crazy jumps

The Tony Hawk games are a good one to mention here I feel, and more specifically for me, Tony Hawk Underground. I seriously mastered that game's controls, and even though I haven't played it in years, I still feel like I could pick it back up and continue to dominate in it.

Playing as a Hunter in the original Left 4 Dead Versus mode (wall jumps and 35 damage pounces on POINT), and also finally "getting" bunnyhopping, surfing, strafing, and the 47 different kinds of jumps you can do in Counter-Strike. Being able to implement those skills into actual competitive matches is the most satisfying and rewarding feeling I've ever had in a game in regards to just traversing the environment.

Catman in Oblivion, got acrobatics to 100 quick, made a habit of jumping on top of those stone towers and raining down arrows on enemies, i also found an amulet with +15 acrobatics at the top of one of the highest ones, bumping me to 115. The height, distance, and directional control achieved would qualify today as 'broken' no doubt, add to that the top acrobatics perk of being able to jump on the surface of water and leaping from one thing to the next was pretty much the only way i got around.

down side was i used to get so carried away bounding across the land i often jumped too far out over too big a drop and fell to my death going 'oh shit i haven't saved in ageSPLAT.'

Mirror's Edge

Super Meat Boy. Super Mario 64. Super Metroid. Ori and the Blind Forest. Jak and Daxter 1.

Honestly, this is a fairly important subject for me. I make a pretty clear distinction between controlling a character, and telling my character to do something. Example. Mario has to jump over a fence. I use the jump button that is always the jump button, to make him jump and I hold the stick forward to move forward. Assassin's Creed guy has to jump a fence, I press the macro button that does whatever he needs at all times and he decides it's appropriate to jump the fence. It's a very clear disconnect. I always want to feel that I'm one with the character I'm playing and not just feel like some detached puppetmaster. Recently that has been one of the biggest reasons I stopped playing MKX and went back to SF4.

I felt that way about Jet Set Radio Future, which is why it's such a bummer that you can't get it on any modern platform, but Jet Grind Radio got released on Steam XBLA and everywhere else. It sucks all the fun out of skating around and enjoying the visuals and music and the scope of the city when you have to worry about a time limit and constantly interrupt your flow to do a dumb tagging QTE.

Using the ninja rope in Worms Armageddon (the original PC release, not XBLA game called Worms 2: Armageddon) in ways the designers never intended was a zen-like experience. Once you get kinda good at it getting around in that game feels amazing 100% of the time. Until you fuck up and accidentally fling yourself into the ground at full speed.

Not sure if it's what you mean by "traversal", but everything about the way your character moves in Spelunky, whether on foot or with the cape or jetpack, is transcendent.

was just about to say this one. You could seamlessly flow from traversal into combat and back again

I like the way it is a "faster travel" instead of just a straight up teleport "fast travel" too.

This is what I came to post, such a beautiful amazing open world and the best horse controls ever.

Infamous: first light felt good, but if we're talking zen-like, Tony Hawks Project 8. The grinding gets ridiculously easy and traversing whole levels on all 3 dimensions in one combo really was zen-like.

If driving games count, Burnout Paradise is a dream to saunter around in.

the Infamous games, especially First Light and Second Son had very good traversal. I only wish that Delsin had a flying power as Cole did in the Vampire DLC for 2 when you used his smoke powers =/

Gravity Rush, after getting used to it it just felt completely natural the whole time and incredibly fun.

As others have said, the THPS games (and underground), for what I assume are obvious reasons.

The Arkham games, just feels incredibly good gliding. Running around doesn't feel as good though, especially in Origins MP.

I'll happily say the Assassin's Creed series too, especially Unity. It just felt so good!

That's all I can think of for now.

JSR: Future took everything the original JSR did, and made it fun to actually control. Sunset Overdrive is probably a more recent example of extremely well done traversal mechanics, it's just a blast to run around aimlessly for no reason.

I want a new Jet Set Radio so bad. Just make a super slick playing one of those and I'd be content. Fuckin' Sega holding Smilebit hostage, making them crank out shitty Mario and Sonic Olympic games bullshit year after year is fucking depressing. God dammit.

Spiderman 2, Sunset Overdrive, Mirror's Edge, Titanfall

Surf maps in Counter-Strike

The Prince of Persia Sands of Time games were pretty good about traversal. Solving a platforming segment in one try was pretty sweet.

The first two that come to mind are Arkham City and Mark of the Ninja ... those two felt like I was able to exactly do what I wanted to do at any time.

I like the traversal mechanics in Dying Light. Good mix of parkour, combat, and gadgets. You get better as you level up. Kicking zombies off rooftops is fun.

Definitely Mark of the Ninja. They nailed it.

Titanfall, Arkham City, and Dishonored.

It's a really tough thing to nail I think. When simply moving in the world traversal feels best when its fast and fluid, something which doesn't necessarily work in a combat scenario. When in a combat situation fast movement often makes it difficult to hit your target without stopping and making the whole thing feel weird. I feel like Infamous: Second Son solved this with the 'slowdown' effects of certain powers which allowed you to be moving through the air but slowed down the action for a limited time to let you line up shots.

Surprised no-one has mentioned Splatoon yet!

Getting into a good rhythm of splatting ink and then squidding your way through it is really fun, especially when you start going up walls and things.

Yup! Was also thinking about the old Worms games before I saw your post. There was a way to kind of use a really short length of rope and pretty much hammer the ground with it to build momentum before launching off and passing over huge obstacles. Always good when you landed on a mine next to a barrel.

Also bonus points for the crazy jetpack.

Both of these a hundred times over (along with Arkham city and Jet Set Radio: Future.)

Though, reading the thread title I immediately thought of both Samurai Gunn and Smash Bros Melee (if you're familiar with wavedashing and ridiculous advanced techniques.) Most of the games mentioned are examples of maneuvering through large, open worlds - but the tight, fluid movement through smaller spaces that these games provide give them the best game-feel I've ever experienced. The Worms ninja rope and Splatoon movement capabilities are also relatively close-quarter examples that are definitely high on the list of best-movement-in-video-james category.

Ah yes. It was early autumn of 1972 when I first felt at one with a traversal mechanic. I was in Bruges, naturally.

I really don't like that all traversal is now "hold X and push up to freerun". I wish there was more depth to it than that.

I'm going to assume Distance and Nitronic Rush count, since they're much more than just driving games, so those are my picks. I pretty much just get into a trance while playing these games, and despite being some seriously tense, white knuckle business, it become extremely relaxing after a while.

Just Cause 2. It was incredibly awkward at first, but I soon began to learn and eventually master the grappling hook and parachute. It was extremely satisfying.

Sunset Overdrive and Titanfall are the two most recent examples I can think of where I really got into the flow of the traversal. Moving around in those games was just a total joy.

I'm not sure if they exactly fit, but everything about the snowboarding in SSX 3 and the more recent SSX really felt right to me.