With the genre seemingly expanding and some games switching to this style of gameplay, I wanted to discuss the potential pitfalls of open-world games and why I feel caution is needed when designing games of this nature.

Many of the most successful and memorable titles of the last 20 years have been open-world. From the groundbreaking GTA series to The Elder Scolls, games with a wide variety of gameplay mechanics have adopted an open-world layout in order to foster greater immersion, player exploration and often non-linear mission structure. There's no doubt that some games simply would not work any other way and that with the open-world template, were able to push the boundaries of gameplay to whole new levels.

When I was growing up some of the most jaw-dropping moments were derived from the freedom (or the illusion of freedom) that some games provided via this structure. Entering the World Map of a Final Fantasy game and realising that I could traverse the whole thing was mind-blowing. I have some very fond memories of less well-known titles like Gun on the PS2 that allowed me to travel large distances in an amazing vista. Shadow of the Colossus is a great example of a world where the desolate but often beautiful landscape creates a sense of loneliness that makes your situation all the more bleak and intruguing.

With all the positives of immersion and player freedom, there sadly are sometimes drawbacks to creating a large sandbox environment in games.

Tedium

Not many people would argue that Skyrim or GTA are boring games. I have loved both series in all their iterations, but there are issues with having bigger and bigger worlds. Setting off on horseback to a quest in Red Dead Redemption is great for the first few hours, but near the end of a game with a clunky fast travel system, I grew bored of seeking out 'horse highways' to get to annoyingly disparate locations. The same feeling had me desperately searching for a taxi in GTA 4 to get to a mission on the other side of town at the late stages of the game. This ceases being an exercise in immersion and starts becoming a repetitive drag when your world is either too large or your travel systems too cumbersome. This is precisely why Bethesda's open world games have benefitted hugely from great fast travel systems. A horse seems like a great idea for a while, but soon enough, you're pulling up that map and clicking your way around.

So when the new GTA boasts of being big enough to house the first three GTAs all in one map (correct me if I'm wrong), it doesn't get my heart racing. Apart from the impressive leap in technology, this fact alone fails to excite. This is personal, of course, and I know for some, this will be enough to garner a pre-order special edition. What encourages me more are differing mission structures and a great story. Innovation being reduced to sheer map expansion is not true innovation in my book. GTA is perhaps a bad example as they have talked a lot about switching characters and other gameplay additions which certainly do make me want the game (it's GTA, I mean come on!), I'm just using it as an example of huge worlds getting even bigger.

Story

Non-linearity has become a staple in many games of recent times. It's in my opinion almost always a good thing. It could be as simple as collectibles or weapon upgrades through side rooms, or as to make up the bulk of my playtime (TES, Fallout). Some of these side missions are the best parts of the game.

This is kind of my point. Some games lose focus on a main storyline or narrative if everything else in the world is more interesting. I loved Oblivion and Skyrim, but what do I remember most from those games? The Dark Brotherhood missions and silly little sidequests that made me smile or explored new lore.

It's a bit mad to criticize a game for having great sidequests, but it is disappointing when you have no urge at all to follow up on what is meant to be the most important thing in that game's universe. Fallout New Vegas' plot, I feel, was actually the strongest of the recent Bethesda RPGs and they created a story that genuinely had me intrigued.

Caveat: Making a game a linear experience however, does not guarantee success. Final Fantasy XIII had sidequests but the linearity in the first half of the game didn't help tell a more focussed story. I was still largely nonplussed by the time the map opened up.

Assets

"Does this game definitely need to be open world? Is there a clear benefit? Are we sacrificing anything by making it so?"

Developers should always ask themselves these questions when embarking on such projects. Only if there is a definitive enhancement of the experience should a game be made open-world, or that open-world be expanded. You can make the world 4 times bigger, but does that make me have more fun? Not necessarily.

It takes painstaking work to build a beautiful and huge world to explore. Work takes time and time takes money. If the bonus of having a larger world comes at the expense of presentation or developing new gameplay ideas, then it has to really be worth it.

The Witcher 3

Finally, what made me think of writing this post was the move to make the next installment of The Witcher series an open-world game. I absolutely loved The Witcher 2 for its incredible and complex story, great combat and wonderful world building. The move to open-world format seems to me to possibly jeopardise a gameplay experience that I fell in love with. With such a radical change, I have a few thoughts that worry me.

The story in The Witcher 2 pervaded many of the side missions and was strong throughout. I was compelled to explore as the game wasn't easy and any treasures and equipment you find are precious (especially in Dark Mode). The game was tight and very well polished, there wasn't much superfluous material as far as I could tell. If it makes the move to fully open-world (Skyrim style), we could lose the focus of the narrative which often requires concentration and engagement to be worthwhile. A handful of excellent sidequests in each locale could be sacrificed for a high number of repetitive fetch quests.

The distinct environments and lush level design were great to explore, but if expanded to a space much larger than Skyrim (which they report is the case), will we truly see this attention to detail across a complete world? I, for one, was wholly immersed in the world that CD Projekt Red created without the need to run through miles of countryside.

The relative linearity of The Witcher 2 helped the game enormously and certainly made it stand out as a mature and incredible adventure for me. What I'm worried about is that in opening the door to a larger world, will they sacrifice too much by stepping through it?

What do you think? Is it only a good thing to expand into an open-world structure or do we sacrifice some things in doing so? Any more examples of things they do better/worse than linear games?

Thanks for reading!