Are open world games typically mediocre?

[Franky Family]

What's your take on this?

I've only played BOTW and TOTK

My answer currently is, yes they are prone to being mediocre games and in a lot of ways can be mediocre when the scale is set towards a very large if not enormous overworld. It's a quantity versus quality dilemma that very few developers are going to be able to overcome imo

 

[Asmonius]

I wouldn't say they're inherently mediocre, but it adds so much effort to make the world believable that could be better used refining the core mechanics or making nicer art assets for smaller settings. Unless you have Rockstar money, there's always going to be a trade-off for scaling the size of a game's world. Batman: Arkham Asylum is way more fun to me than Arkham City because the levels just feel so intricate and perfectly-designed. One of the big reasons I love the Yakuza/Like a Dragon series is that the cities they're set in have so much character - largely because they wisely kept the scale from getting insane.

With that said there are certain genres where the open world 100% improves the experience. Part of the reason Monster Hunter World exploded is because you were able to hunt a monster freely in a large environment instead of having to chase them between tiny connected screens. Final Fantasy 1-9 also feel way better with more open worlds than the linear corridors you had in 10 & 13. The Witcher series became more and more open each time and it didn't impede the games from improving significantly.

 

[Zeta Dragoon]

No the problem is most open world using medicore game loop, stories, side quest designs when Elder Scrolls Oblivion, New Vegas, Red Dead Redemption, Witcher 3, Kingdom Come, Breath of the Wild and Elden Ring show different open world designs can absolutely be done right and amazing, that when good good game design is actually applied.

Heck Octopath Traveler has flaws, mainly the 8 side stories being disconnected at times but 1 and 2 are actually big open world JRPGS.

Witcher 3 is and is held as one of best games ever made, though main story of base game and its combat especially are often criticized as weak.

 

[Sean Mirrsen]

My answer is no. All games tend to be mediocre.

All games can't be excellent, and not all games are bad, so the most common example is somewhere in the middle - something not great, but not terrible. A mediocre game is the norm.


In my experience, open world games are rarely 'open world' for no good reason. If a game has been made with an open world in mind, it has no more chance of being forgettably generic than a non-open-world one. Exactly because the open world premise is so daunting, and requires effort to actually implement, the less experienced game developers aren't as likely to tack it on like they could some other gimmick or feature. Those devs that do go for an open world, usually have enough confidence in themselves to keep the quality of the games around the same median level as the others.

 

[DonDonDonPata]

Hard for me to answer. I love open world sandboxes and I always have (Star Control 2, Ultima series, Elite) but sometime shortly after the PS2 era it felt as though a separation occurred between sandbox games (e.g. Mercenaries series, Mount & Blade, Far Cry, Kenshi, Oblivion) versus so-called "open world" games like AssCreed. I love sandboxes. I'm not sold on "open worlds" where the big map is just a time-waster.

 

[Alcedor]

The problem with a lot of open world games is simply the failure to make them feel truly alive and lived in. I think some games that did a fairly good job of this were Mad Max and Grand Theft Auto III (the game which started the trend) but even those games still fell short of that goal in some ways. VR may be the only way to pull this off if the technology gets advanced enough.

 

[Optimus]

What's your take on this?

I've only played BOTW and TOTK

My answer currently is, yes they are prone to being mediocre games and in a lot of ways can be mediocre when the scale is set towards a very large if not enormous overworld. It's a quantity versus quality dilemma that very few developers are going to be able to overcome imo

How have you NOT played the Elder Scrolls games? Seriously...

 

[Kadayi]

I think it honestly comes down to the developer and how much effort they put into it. The big issue with open world is it is too expansive and being able to add enough engaging content. Recency bias be damed but KCD II is a perfect size in terms of being small enough not to overwhelm you, and interesting enough to explore with lots of memorable npcs to interact with, quests to undertake and secrets to uncover.

Still as the saying goes '90% of everything is crap', whether it's linear adventures or open world. At the end of the day though just enjoy what you enjoy.

 

[DonDonDonPata]

I think folks who grew up with PC or at least dipped into PC sometime before 2008 would understand where I'm coming from…

PC was always the place to play heavy simulation games. Consoles simply couldn't handle em. If you wanted "open worlds" with a big map and emergent systems underpinning everything, you played PC. This is still true to a large degree.

However, consoles have always tried to simplify and distill the PC "open world" into a console-sized game, with varying success. After GTA 3, the "simulation" was discarded by the mass-market developers in favor of high-content open maps populated by a high quantity of content to mask the lack of simulation undergirding the world. JRPGs also rode this wave of simplifying and imitating genuine "open worlds" with smaller, tightly-designed facsimiles of a genuine open world PC RPG.

That isn't a slam against consoles. Simply trying to use it as an illustration how "open world" split in half 20-ish years ago and how the term means two very different things depending on whether you're coming from a PC context or a console context.

 

[Alcedor]

I also think that side activities are a big selling point of the genre, so you have to make them fun. I really enjoy taking down enemy installations in open world games, and then seeing how that affects the surrounding region. I also really want my actions to have an effect on NPCs in an open world.

I want to see an open world change according to my actions. I want to run into an NPC and hear him say, "There's the one who slew the soul eater!" I like how in the Infamous games people will cheer or take pictures when they see you if you're playing as a good guy. You're basically a walking celebrity. I also like how when you take down an enemy base in Mad Max, NPCs will move into it and start providing you with resources from it.

 

[Optimus]

I think a lot of games from all genres trend towards being mediocre. Great games are the exception. If they weren't, would they still be considered great? There are magnificent open-world games. Look at Morrowind, Oblivion, and Skyrim. They're far from the only great open world games, too, but they're the ones that are among my favorites.

And I think I would rather call these sandbox games, because in sandbox games the world is an important element of the fun. You wouldn't call Half-life games sandbox games, so there is a distinction. Minecraft is a rather open world game, and it's a sandbox game.

Some studios just make mediocre sandbox games. Look at the recent Far Cry games. They're not bad. They're not great. I would say those are solidly mediocre once you get past the wow-ness of the locale and begin to notice the heavy amount of cut-and-paste content and enemy-spawners. Can't even go deep into the woods to take a shit without dudes on four wheelers showing up. WTF...

BotW and TotK are f'ing light-years better than that garbage, and yet you've discarded them as mediocre after gushing over these games for most of the past decade. Really?

 

[DonDonDonPata]

I also think that side activities are a big selling point of the genre,

I want to see an open world change according to my actions. I want to run into an NPC and hear him say, "There's the one who slew the soul eater!" I like how in the Infamous games people will cheer or take pictures when they see you if you're playing as a good guy. You're basically a walking celebrity. I also like how when you take down an enemy base in Mad Max, NPCs will move into it and start providing you with resources from it.

Yep! I just want that acknowledgement. The wrap-up tour of talking to everyone end game in Dragon Age Origins and hearing their final thoughts before rolling credits, or the ending sequences in the first two Fallout games, or the responsiveness from NPCs in infamous and Fable Lost Chapters are personal examples of where the game really made me feel like I'd impacted the world.

Building that responsiveness into the world itself with faction systems (something like Mount & Blade) really makes the world feel alive and menacing from the player's perspective.

 

[Neil Young]

You've ONLY played those two when it comes to open world? Well, whatever you do, don't play Assassin's Creed Origins or Odyssey because you'll say "Wow, these games do everything BOTW does, but BETTER! I wonder why Ubisoft gets shit on for producing a superior product?"

 

[Sean Mirrsen]

I think a lot of games from all genres trend towards being mediocre. Great games are the exception. If they weren't, would they still be considered great? There are magnificent open-world games. Look at Morrowind, Oblivion, and Skyrim. They're far from the only great open world games, too, but they're the ones that are among my favorites.

And I think I would rather call these sandbox games, because in sandbox games the world is an important element of the fun. You wouldn't call Half-life games sandbox games, so there is a distinction. Minecraft is a rather open world game, and it's a sandbox game.

Some studios just make mediocre sandbox games. Look at the recent Far Cry games. They're not bad. They're not great. I would say those are solidly mediocre once you get past the wow-ness of the locale and begin to notice the heavy amount of cut-and-paste content and enemy-spawners. Can't even go deep into the woods to take a shit without dudes on four wheelers showing up. WTF...

BotW and TotK are f'ing light-years better than that garbage, and yet you've discarded them as mediocre after gushing over these games for most of the past decade. Really?

I'd argue that sandbox and open-world are 'two very big differences', as the saying goes. A sandbox is a playground implying a lack of guidance - an open world merely implies a lack of demarcation, or 'levels'. A sandbox can be non-open-world, like Terraria, where every individual world is separate from the others. An open-world game can be non-sandbox, like the wholly story-driven Cyberpunk.

 

[Optimus]

I'd argue that sandbox and open-world are 'two very big differences', as the saying goes. A sandbox is a playground implying a lack of guidance - an open world merely implies a lack of demarcation, or 'levels'. A sandbox can be non-open-world, like Terraria, where every individual world is separate from the others. An open-world game can be non-sandbox, like the wholly story-driven Cyberpunk.

Perhaps they are different things with some overlap. What you say makes sense. I would place BotW and TotK in both the open world and sandbox categories. Minecraft, when I mentioned it earlier, gave me pause. I don't really consider it an open-world as much as I consider it sandbox since the entire world generates around you as you expand your exploration.

Elder Scrolls games are what I consider open world but not really sure I would consider them sandbox even though you can treat that world as a playground. Open world Zelda games you can definitely treat as playgrounds, though!

 

[WhatIsThis?]

I don't think so, and I don't particularly like open world games. Now that I think about it, "like" isn't the right word. "Seek," I usually don't seek out open world games.

I realized in 2024 that it comes down to the gameplay loop for me, because I had been avoiding open world titles for years. Some examples from this gen that made me realize this.

Games I thoroughly enjoyed
Ghostwire: Tokyo
Outcast 2
Rise of the Ronin
Elden Ring

Games I like but are kind of a slog
FF7: Rebirth
Sand Land

Games I thoroughly disliked
Horizon

In Ghostwire, Outcast 2, ROTR, traversal is fantastic. You're free to pretty much go where ever you want and it's really quick and fluid. The combat is also really fun. They all have great missions too but that's secondary. All of these have checklists but I didn't find them to be a slog. Elden Ring speaks for itself.

With Rebirth and Sand Land, great games but Sand Land is too empty, there isn't much to do but pew pew dinos in your tank and the melee is really simple. The story, music, visuals, and overall gameplay are all great but it's just kind of boring after a while. Rebirth is just too big and the character interactions I enjoyed so much in FF7: Intergrade require you to do the most boring stuff imaginable. The combat is also a mess IMO. It works and I understand it, I just don't think it's all that fun.

Horizon, what a shit game IMO. You can't do anything! You can only climb on stuff with paint and there's so many rocks and objects that Aloy should be able to climb. The combat is not fun to me in the slightest and all the enemies feel like bullet sponges. I could not give a less of a shit about the story, it was interesting at first but eventually I had no clue who was who. Guerilla went all in on creating tribes and factions and terms, I could not keep track of it all. A repulsive game if I'm being honest.

So yea, I came to the realization that the open world aspect is no problem whatsoever for me, it's all about the gameplay loop itself. That's why I don't think open world titles are inherently mediocre.

 

[DonDonDonPata]

I don't think so, and I don't particularly like open world games. Now that I think about it, "like" isn't the right word. "Seek," I usually don't seek out open world games.

I realized in 2024 that it comes down to the gameplay loop for me, because I had been avoiding open world titles for years. Some examples from this gen that made me realize this.

Games I thoroughly enjoyed
Ghostwire: Tokyo
Outcast 2
Rise of the Ronin
Elden Ring

Games I like but are kind of a slog
FF7: Rebirth
Sand Land

Games I thoroughly disliked
Horizon

In Ghostwire, Outcast 2, ROTR, traversal is fantastic. You're free to pretty much go where ever you want and it's really quick and fluid. The combat is also really fun. They all have great missions too but that's secondary. All of these have checklists but I didn't find them to be a slog. Elden Ring speaks for itself.

With Rebirth and Sand Land, great games but Sand Land is too empty, there isn't much to do but pew pew dinos in your tank and the melee is really simple. The story, music, visuals, and overall gameplay are all great but it's just kind of boring after a while. Rebirth is just too big and the character interactions I enjoyed so much in FF7: Intergrade require you to do the most boring stuff imaginable. The combat is also a mess IMO. It works and I understand it, I just don't think it's all that fun.

Horizon, what a shit game IMO. You can't do anything! You can only climb on stuff with paint and there's so many rocks and objects that Aloy should be able to climb. The combat is not fun to me in the slightest and all the enemies feel like bullet sponges. I could not give a less of a shit about the story, it was interesting at first but eventually I had no clue who was who. Guerilla went all in on creating tribes and factions and terms, I could not keep track of it all. A repulsive game if I'm being honest.

So yea, I came to the realization that the open world aspect is no problem whatsoever for me, it's all about the gameplay loop itself. That's why I don't think open world titles are inherently mediocre.

If this man didn't already have a tag, mods would need to anoint him as "open world expert"

Any open world game he says is good is gold.

Did you end up trying Atlas Fallen? I'd be interested in your thoughts.

 

[regawdless]

For me, kinda yes because they all tend to do the same low effort side quest shit, meaningless content for the sake of content being there, surprisingly static and non interactive worlds.

Just large environments filled with filler content.

What I expect from open world games is a good level of simulation and interactivity, and that's often not the case. Maybe next gen.

Games like Witcher 3 or Cyberpunk have very good side quests but most games don't, they just create "content" consisting of boring ass shit. In general, open world games are often engaging enough and I like exploring these beautiful worlds. But the lack of direction, the overwhelming amount of STUFF in them, the meaningless design of many elements cause me to bounce off after some time in most cases. Even games like Ghost of Tsushima, I dropped it because I played a lot but it became boring and tedious.

 

[Arkam]

I think there a lot of excellent open world games. But yes, like others have said, they pad the content with repetitive loops. Sometimes they are fun loops that keep you entertained....sometimes they are just annoying.

I personally like collecting and completing lists, so I am a sucker for what other would call filler content sometimes.

 

[Spiders]

Can't find the meme with the knight with a straight arrow to the castle/treasure vs. the knight with a big squiggly line to the treasure, but same basic point.

"Open world" just means a spatially contiguous game world, but it has gobbled up so many game design concepts along with it into the term, hard to know what we're even talking about. May as well call all games with a jump button jumping games.

That said, I don't like generally don't like "open world" game design. The general vibe is conflicting diegetic purpose with non-diegetic entertainment; it's a burlesque tease of game design, show enough skin to get the player to be sub-optimal. I can't think of too many example of games that both solve this problem for me and justify their open world… Crazy Taxi, BotW, XCX, Elden Ring, Divinity: OS, and (debatably open world) Subnautica.

 

[Franky Family]

You've ONLY played those two when it comes to open world? Well, whatever you do, don't play Assassin's Creed Origins or Odyssey because you'll say "Wow, these games do everything BOTW does, but BETTER! I wonder why Ubisoft gets shit on for producing a superior product?"

Assassins Creed never interested me so I wasn't planning on playing any of them. I doubt that they are better games than BOTW/TOTK but it also wouldn't surprise me the same. There is something about BOTW/TOTK that is, tbh, kind of sickening to me. They're both excellent games, but at the same time I feel like in so many ways they are both mediocre games; it's just that the good outweighs the mediocre by a great amount but that still leaves all those moments playing the game yearning for more or something better...

 

[JohnnyFlawless]

Batman: Arkham Asylum is way more fun to me than Arkham City

This is borderline heresy.

 

[Zeta Dragoon]

Assassins Creed never interested me so I wasn't planning on playing any of them. I doubt that they are better games than BOTW/TOTK but it also wouldn't surprise me the same. There is something about BOTW/TOTK that is, tbh, kind of sickening to me. They're both excellent games, but at the same time I feel like in so many ways they are both mediocre games; it's just that the good outweighs the mediocre by a great amount but that still leaves all those moments playing the game yearning for more or something better...

Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom are diamonds with jagged flaws running through them due to their sheer unrealized potential.

 

[Spiders]

I also think that side activities are a big selling point of the genre, so you have to make them fun.

That to me is one of the cons. I get survival and quasi-survival loops where the world is the resource with which you extract what you need to win the main objective, but I feel like it more often ends up being boredom driven if your doing "main" or "side", and that it most often is main and side, not a holistic world design. Witcher 3 is a perfect example of the side content and the main content spoiling each other by over leveling the player.

I want to see an open world change according to my actions. I want to run into an NPC and hear him say, "There's the one who slew the soul eater!" I like how in the Infamous games people will cheer or take pictures when they see you if you're playing as a good guy. You're basically a walking celebrity. I also like how when you take down an enemy base in Mad Max, NPCs will move into it and start providing you with resources from it.

Didn't Shadow of Mordor and Fable so stuff like that? In general it's kind of shocking how many games worlds are indifferent to to the player. Maybe why FROM's "world tendency" events feel so impactful; they happen so rarely in other games.

 

[bork]

YES

 

[Asmonius]

This is borderline heresy.

Arkham Asylum is a top tier 3D Metroidvania, Arkham City is so bloated by comparison that I've never been able to replay it. They're very different games beyond the shared combat mechanics, but City's level designs are absolutely a big step down from Asylum.

 

[Alcedor]

Asylum has shitty boss fights. Arkham City has more refined stealth and especially combat than Asylum. It also had better boss fights, more playable characters, and an arguably better story. I agree about the bloat though and losing the Metroid world design was a bit of a loss too. Every Arkham game has pros and cons. There is no "best" Arkham game. Asylum was unrefined and had awful bosses. City was bloated and had no Metroid elements. Origins had technical issues, an overly complicated leveling system, and a multiplayer mode that nobody asked for. Arkham Knight had...the Batmobile. Also, you want to talk about bloat? Knight had about a thousand DLC releases.

The cycle of pros and cons would carry over to Gotham Knights as well, but I won't get into that. And the Suicide Squad game isn't even worth discussing.

There has unfortunately never been a perfect Arkham game. Then Insomniac copied the formula and added shitty Mary Jane stealth sequences and woke writing. Spider-Man also had an overabundance of firearm wielding enemies that was annoying

The Middle-earth Shadow games from Monolith are better than all of the Batman AND Spider-Man games. The combat alone shits all over the Spidey and Batman games by refining it farther than they ever did

Personally, I kind of think that Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy from Eidos-Montréal was the best superhero game of the past several years

 

[JohnnyFlawless]

Arkham Asylum is a top tier 3D Metroidvania, Arkham City is so bloated by comparison that I've never been able to replay it. They're very different games beyond the shared combat mechanics, but City's level designs are absolutely a big step down from Asylum.

You may literally be the only human being in existence who feels this way. Asylum was great.....City was a masterpiece. Perfect open world size and they improved greatly on the combat flow. Traveling around the city with the grapnel hook felt smooth af. I've replayed city probably 4 times. Asylum I only did twice to get 100%. I never played Knight because I heard it was trash.

 

[TaySan]

Way too many open world games have way too much filler content just to pad its length. Most studios don't have the budget or the talent to make massive open world games with unique content. Give me a map the size of Saints Row 2 with some good side missions and that would be perfect

 

[HE1NZ]

Most Zelda games are open world so you've probably played more than 2. They just had loading between areas and little of sandbox stuff that modern open worlds have.

Also, you never played a GTA game?

 

[Pyrate]

You may literally be the only human being in existence who feels this way.

Not at all, I also agree that Asylum is a perfectly short, uncompromised masterpiece. I don't necessarily dislike City, but I have replayed Asylum far more than any of the other Arkham games.

I did get really into Knight that I replayed it 3 times, despite it being the most bloated by far.

 

[CAPTAIN RAINCOAT]

Ubisoft openworld games - Boring outside of the main missions
Rockstar - best in class

 

[JohnnyFlawless]

Not at all, I also agree that Asylum is a perfectly short, uncompromised masterpiece. I don't necessarily dislike City, but I have replayed Asylum far more than any of the other Arkham games.

I did get really into Knight that I replayed it 3 times, despite it being the most bloated by far.

Honestly have never heard the take that asylum is better than city. Not to take anything away from asylum, that game was amazing. City just improved on it vastly.

 

[HeresJohnny]

For me, kinda yes because they all tend to do the same low effort side quest shit, meaningless content for the sake of content being there, surprisingly static and non interactive worlds.

Just large environments filled with fillet content.

What I expect from open world games is a good level of simulation and interactivity, and that's often not the case. Maybe next gen.

Games like Witcher 3 or Cyberpunk have very good side quests but most games don't, they just create "content" consisting of boring ass shit. In general, open world games are often engaging enough and I like exploring these beautiful worlds. But the lack of direction, the overwhelming amount of STUFF in them, the meaningless design of many elements cause me to bounce off after some time in most cases. Even games like Ghost of Tsushima, I dropped it because I played a lot but it became boring and tedious.

Witcher 3 is absolutely amazing. But then there's also trash like Horizon Forbidden West. It's really like any other genre: amazing people make amazing legendary games, and woke, talentless retards make shit you want to forget.

 

[Spiders]

Witcher 3 is absolutely amazing.

I think in the early game the open world really shines, but once your XP leaves orbit the gameplay gets really boring and the lack of challenge makes areas blur together. Like I explored the swamp area early and it was like Dark Souls level burned in my brain, then the rest of the game is like "forest", "city", "witcher fort", "snow area". It really really comes down to the storytelling.

I think there are mods that reign in that XP and I'd be really interested if it fixes those issues for me.

Some kind of area gating and PONRs might have helped? Isn't Chapter 1 locked to one area? It's a pretty strong section if I remember correctly.

 

[mcz117chief]

Part of the reason Monster Hunter World exploded is because you were able to hunt a monster freely in a large environment instead of having to chase them between tiny connected screens.

I don't think most anyone knew about the loadings between screens as vast majority of Monster Hunter players never played the previous games.

The reason why MHW became so popular was because it finally released on a proper gaming console and pc, most of the jank that made the game "special" was removed and the whole experience became incredibly streamlined and simple.

I still prefer the older games because they feel far more unique and interesting, but I can't deny that MHW is far easier to get into and enjoy. Kind of like the fast food version of Monster Hunter.

 

[HeresJohnny]

I think in the early game the open world really shines, but once your XP leaves orbit the gameplay gets really boring and the lack of challenge makes areas blur together. Like I explored the swamp area early and it was like Dark Souls level burned in my brain, then the rest of the game is like "forest", "city", "witcher fort", "snow area". It really really comes down to the storytelling.

I think there are mods that reign in that XP and I'd be really interested if it fixes those issues for me.

Some kind of area gating and PONRs might have helped? Isn't Chapter 1 locked to one area? It's a pretty strong section if I remember correctly.

I actually got pretty lucky I think because right about the time I was getting OP I accidentally started the Hearts of Stone expansion and started getting a nice challenge again — a lot more enemies and typically 6-8 levels above me.

 

[ExpandKong]

Oh man if your vote is yes and the only open world games you've ever played are BotW and TotK then have I got bad news for you about nearly every other open world game ever made

 

[Stopped_Cold_29]

The problem isn't that open world games are bad. It's that they don't lend themselves well to certain aspects of games. I loved the original Halo. Many of the levels were sandboxes, but since the game itself wasn't "open world" there were levels that were much more linear. I think open world aspects to games are awesome. But when the entire game is open world, sometimes you sacrifice things like a cohesive narrative or more cinematic moments.

It can be hard to force a sense of urgency on the player, like in Skyrim when you're supposed to be actively worried that the world is about to end, but you could literally take a break for hundreds of hours roaming the wilderness if you want. That's fine because the game is fun. But it does take away from the narrative quite a bit.

Open world games are great for certain types of games, but I don't like how almost every game tries to force open world concepts. Individual levels allow for a lot more structure to the experience and can force variety.

 

[Asmonius]

I don't think most anyone knew about the loadings between screens as vast majority of Monster Hunter players never played the previous games.

The reason why MHW became so popular was because it finally released on a proper gaming console and pc, most of the jank that made the game "special" was removed and the whole experience became incredibly streamlined and simple.

I still prefer the older games because they feel far more unique and interesting, but I can't deny that MHW is far easier to get into and enjoy. Kind of like the fast food version of Monster Hunter.

The series did start on PS2 (which a lot of people forget), but didn't really hit its stride until it went portable. Console players not having the series certainly played a part, but MHW ultimately blew up huge because it streamlined the series' rough edges to make it more palatable for a wider audience. If they had stuck with the smaller map segments it certainly wouldn't have had the legs it did, even with the simpler monster tracking and moving while drinking potions. It's easily the most impactful change to garner a broader audience, which the producer and director openly spoke about in interviews.

How Monster Hunter World is streamlining a cult classic

And why cries of "they're trying to appease Western casuals" are nonsense.

www.vg247.com