Good evening everybody! This is Aifos coming to you alive from the City Ruins! And, y'know, it's really weird to think about, but there's something really relaxing about hanging out in the wreckage of a fallen civilization, don't you think? But anyway, let's talk about open world games! If you know me, you probably know I'm not the biggest fan of them. Their open worlds simply come with far too many drawbacks, that ultimately make them inferior to linear games, which can still provide a perfectly fun sense of exploration if done right. That's not to say they're all bad, though, and that there's no solutions to the problems they have. Today, we're going to talk about one of these problems, possibly the biggest one; the sense of progression! So, what do I mean when I say open world games have a poor sense of progression? Well, when we talk about "progress" in the context of a video game, we usually mean one of two things; 1. Character progression. This is how your character starts of as a wimpy level one at the beginning, and an awesome level 99 warrior at the end. Pretty self explanatory. 2. World progression. This is your journey through the world, and all the cool things you see along the way. First, we're going to talk about why these things are usually lacking in open world games, and then we're going to talk about three open world* games that pulled them off really well; NieR: Automata, Gravity Rush 2, and Terraria. (*and yes, I know Terraria isn't technically an open world, but whatever, it's close enough) [b][u]Where open world games fall tend short in terms of character progression[/b][/u] In a linear game, the game can usually accurately guess your skill, and equipment level at any point in the game. After all, they know everything you've done up until that point. With that in mind, a linear game can confidently throw a completely new enemy at you, or give you a somewhat complicated power, and can assume you've got a grasp on the mechanics well enough to handle it. When it comes to open world games, however, that's not really true. It's completely possibly that by the time you first finish Skyrim, you could've been absolutely everywhere on the map, or you could've only seen the bare minimum. As a result, it's not uncommon for open world games to keep both the enemies you're fighting, and the loot your obtaining, at a very basic level. It doesn't matter what sword you have, it's going to control like all the other swords, and most of the enemies will follow really similar, basic attack patterns, and your sense of progression instead comes from a level up bar, and loot with bigger numbers. This works, it's fine, but it does get a little boring when compared to the growing complexity of your moveset in Ori, the increasingly scary baddies in Indivisible, or the wide variety of weapons you'll find in Bloodborne. [u][b]How open world games tend to fall short in terms of world progression[/u][/b] In linear games, world progression often comes from simply reaching new areas. Open world games, of course, can rely on that for a little bit, but one of the thing about having a big open map that you can explore freely is.. Well, it's a big open map that you can explore freely. If you're actually utilizing the open world, you'll be coming back to old areas again, and again, and again, and again. And that's not a bad thing in it of itself. However, it does sort of mean that after your first trip around the world, things kind of come to a halt a little bit. Sure, every now and then a new story beat might mix things up a little bit, but a lot of the time in an open world game, you'll be walking down the same road you've walked down before over, and over.. Or just fast traveling back to an old location, but if you're doing that the open world is kinda failing at its job to begin with. Even if the world is breathtaking, this will likely get old eventually, and with the usual "quantity over quality" approach most open world games take, that eventually will probably creep up on you pretty quickly. With all that said, though, I can't deny that sense of exploration is fun, and while something like a Metroidvania might also have a strong sense of exploration, it's something of a different breed than open world games, so they do have their place. So, rather than sit here and complain about them, let's take a look at three that actually managed to circumvent these issues! [u][b]NieR: Automata, and the progression of the world[/u][/b] (SPOILER WARNING! It's not huge, but it is still a spoiler, so you've been warned!) [spoiler]NieR: Automata's main quest will take you on a good loop around the world, and it keeps its sidequests contained within the areas you've already explored, so that you never stumble upon the desert, for example, until you've already been there as part of the more cinematic main story sequence. This is nice, but that's not actually what I'm here to talk about! See, once you complete your first loop around the world, something big happens! I won't say what, because spoilers, but after that big event, one of the areas you had formerly explored completely changes, by putting a huge hole in the ground. That might not sound like much, until you realize that big hole in the ground actually leads to several different areas, suddenly opening up a huge new portion of the world for you to explore. In other words, the world actually changes, and evolves as the story goes on. This isn't the only time it does, either! And it's important to note, that it's not just locked doors opening up, but the world actually changing, and evolving. This opens locked doors while also making it feel like the things you're doing are having an impact on the world![/spoiler] [b][u]Gravity Rush 2, and the progression of your character[/b][/u] (SPOILER WARNING! Once again, not huge.. In fact, you could read what I'm about to say on the back of the box, but still spoilers.) [spoiler]Gravity Rush's open world isn't made to support exploration, but rather it exists so you can mess around with Kat's crazy gravity powers in a free environment, so you're not suddenly stressed to figure it all out at once (though the exploration doesn't hurt!). And you definitely need it! As the story gets on, Kat winds up with, not one, not two, but three completely separate movesets! Each one lets you move around the open world in a completely different way, feeling new, and fresh! Each one has its own little tutorial section, sure, but the real fun comes from learning to use them to zoom across Jirga Para Lhao to reach your next set of quests! It never really lets you forget how far Kat has come from, because the gameplay by the end of the game is significantly different than that at the beginning.[/spoiler] And finally, [b][u]Putting it all together with Terraria![/b][/u] (SPOILER WARNING.. I guess? It's Terraria. It doesn't really have a story, but.. Well, whatever. Spoiler warning.) [spoiler]So Terraria sort of does both of these things. Its world will continuously change and evolve as you beat certain bosses. As the world changes, new sources of loot begin to emerge, and the new loot you can get significantly changes your playstyle. No Terraria player is ever going to forget first entering Hard Mode, or first triggering the Lunar Apocalypse, and in some ways these kinds of things even have more impact than discovering a new area altogether, because this is a place you know, and are familiar with, and that can hold more weight than stumbling upon a new big spooky castle. And going from walking around at a snail's pace, to being able to get pretty much anywhere on the map within a minute is an absolutely amazing feeling that I haven't seen replicated in very many games at all. And, it does it all without any arbitrary level up systems! Even though Terraria isn't technically an open world game (because for some reason I'll never understand we consider sandbox games separate), there's so much there that open world games could learn from. It's something I've wanted to talk about for a while, but if you can't tell by this clunkily paced little essay here, I've had a hard time putting it into words. Ultimately, I want to see open world games become good, and by pulling from the few that are, I hope it can become an amazing genre![/spoiler] [b]Tl;dr? Here's the point![/b] Open world designers need to learn from Terraria, a few have, and this is really just an excuse to talk about NieR and Gravity Rush! If you're too lazy to read how, this probably isn't the thread for you! :p But that's all for now, folks! Jambuhbye! (Disclaimer; I know this post isn't as good as the ones I used to make. It's been a while, I'm a little rusty.. Hopefully I'll git gud again!)