Open world is this generation's equivalent to last gen's military shooter obsession

[chadachada123]

I prefer "open levels", like Medal of Honor: Airborne, where you're dropped into a level (in that game, with some choice as to where you drop in) and have to complete your objective(s) with several available routes.

Combined with destruction physics, there could be some amazing opportunities, if we had some devs with some balls (and funding).

Open world by itself, though, only works for certain types of adventure games, and requires a lot more work to make the world feel "alive."

 

[Stewie Plisken]

However, for the love of God, please. Just PLEASE, do not make another Dragon Age: Inquisition, game industry, I know I've bitched and moaned about that game to no end but seriously just never do that again.

Inquisition is interesting in its failure, because it's an RPG, not a GTA-like sandbox playground game. I think they were overcompensating for DAII and screwed up with rationing the content. Also, its open-world greatly suffers because of the combat mechanics. A lot of good ideas there, but it's almost crazy how they screwed up the execution in an RPG, of all things.

 

[sanquin]

I think people aren't sick/tired of open world. I think they're sick/tired of superficial open world. An open world is great, but if you make it very superficial like ubisoft's style of "fill the map with to-do lists", people will get bored/tired of it sooner rather than later. I think the Witcher 3 did it correctly. The world is fairly open, but still restricted enough to leave room for a solid main story and still personal feeling quests, along with plenty of rp opportunity.

As for DA:I as mentioned above. The open world in that game failed. But imo that's because they tried to turn it into a traditional mmorpg style of questing. Something that doesn't fit a single player rpg.

 

[The Raw Shark]

Inquisition is interesting in its failure, because it's an RPG, not a GTA-like sandbox playground game. I think they were overcompensating for DAII and screwed up with rationing the content. Also, its open-world greatly suffers because of the combat mechanics. A lot of good ideas there, but it's almost crazy how they screwed up the execution in an RPG, of all things.

Yeah that sounds like the most viable possibility. If the changes from Origins to II are any evidence BioWare does NOT handle criticism rationally.
Darkspawn look too much like orcs? Turn them in to the Putties from Power Rangers.
Combat too boring? Button-Mash the Bee-Jesus out of it.
Unpolished and repetitive content? Piss yourself and throw out even MORE unpolished and repetitive content.

As for DA:I as mentioned above. The open world in that game failed. But imo that's because they tried to turn it into a traditional mmorpg style of questing. Something that doesn't fit a single player rpg.

Yeah I was starting to wonder where the style seemed familiar. Frigging why this even became an idea for them is what baffles me.

 

[Adam Jensen_v1legacy]

Open world is mostly good. The problem lies in the fact that most AAA publishers that jumped on the open world bandwagon concentrate too much on creating a large open world, which means less unique locations. Some linear, level based games would benefit from transitioning into open world but only if open world was hub based and not something like GTA. That gives you the best of both worlds without compromising the core experience that people expect.

 

[Something Amyss]

*shakes fist at the sky* MAAAD MAAAXXXX

No no no, you're doing it wrong. It's:

I'm sorry. I'm so sorry.

OT: I like open worlds. What I don't like is large open worlds that are empty or simply filled with meaningless collectables.

However, I do recognise that not all games are suited to or need to be open world. The minute Tetris becomes an open world game, I walk.

 

[LostCrusader]

I agree completely. For most open world games, its just adding clutter with collectables and throwing any kind of pacing out the window. Really hard to care if the next village over is being burned down by a dragon when it doesn't matter how quickly I come to deal with it.

 

[Samtemdo8_v1legacy]

I'd rather have an open world game with nothing but fetch quests then a linear corridor shooter.

I like FarCry 2 alot and that game was barren and yet I still prefer it over something like Medal of Honor Warfighter.

 

[Naldan]

You wouldn't be bothered by open world features if it was done right. It could, in theory, enhance nearly every game. And in theory, if they would finally work on procedural generated content with excellence, it wouldn't be even as cost/time-consuming to create.

But yeah, for now, it mostly sucks after the first few massive waves of FarCrys and AssCreeds and its clones.


But just imagine a Daggerfall with procedurally generated content that wouldn't suck. Random quests that don't suck.

If there would be a joint effort by multiple companies maybe, working on an engine specifically for procedually generated content as a compliment to a game, open world would become something you couldn't even fathom today.

 

[Poetic Nova]

*shakes fist at the sky* MAAAD MAAAXXXX

No no no, you're doing it wrong. It's:

I'm sorry. I'm so sorry.

I approve of this because David Tennant.

 

[BrawlMan]

I'd rather have an open world game with nothing but fetch quests then a linear corridor shooter.

I like FarCry 2 alot and that game was barren and yet I still prefer it over something like Medal of Honor Warfighter.

I don't see the difference as either one sounds really boring. I never liked Far Cry 2, and I don't do COD or games that try to follow in its footsteps. I'm just glad we are getting more variety in games this console generation, on the PS4 at least.

 

[gmaverick019_v1legacy]

open worlds can be great, when done right...however I do feel like they are leaking into too many games for all the wrong reasons.

-repetitive fetch quests...we can only take so much of that, if that's what you are filling the open world with, then fuck off, that's not your strength, fuck it to hell and make something interesting and linear if it needs to be.

-the whole damn thing doesn't *need* to be open world, you can have hubs/areas that lead to more linear/narrative based events, you don't have to do one or the other

-unless you have extremely interesting gameplay mechanics, then we have seen it fucking all in open world, you need to make the damn thing interesting if anyone is going to care

-make it mod friendly, dear god, this is pretty much bethesda's bread and butter that get the games so much longevity and sales