Why Have Open World Games Become Boring

When I first played skyrim I was amazed by the sheer size of it. Bethesda's Opening was built to amaze the player. You are going through the hills not really paying attention to anything around you. After escaping and being inside of a small town to a cave you end up finding your way out. And there it is. The world of skyrim. When I was younger I couldn’t truly appreciate the way they made the opening but It is actually amazing when you think about it. It's what all great open worlds do. With the witcher 3 you are going around the area of in white orchard and think wow this is a decent size and then you find yourself roaming around the North of the Continent on Roach not knowing how far you’ll go but knowing around every corner you’ll have either an amazing view or an activity to do. In Elden ring you start off running around in this small cave doing the basics then open the doors and see the sheer size of the world. But not only does that look outstanding you’ll be wandering around and be transported to one corner and then another corner of the map and now you look at it and see how that one part you thought looked or felt massive is in fact miniscule in comparison to the rest of the game. What all these games have in common is that they are some of the best open worlds that have been made ever. Period. Now some games that I’ll mention as well as I know people will talk about are Breath of the Wild, Red Dead 2 and Ghost of Tshima. Currently I have two of those to play this year but I know of them and I’ve seen plenty about them.

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Time Stamps
Intro - 00:00-2:35
Reasons Open Worlds Are Boring - 2:36-12:09
How UI Effects An Open World - 12:10-13:53
The Ubisoft Approach: AC Valhalla - 13:54-19:16
The Bethesda Approach: Skyrim - 19:17-29:15
The Rockstar Approach: Red Dead Redemption 2 - 29:16-36:51
The From Software Approach: Elden Ring - 36:52-40:41
My Personal Favourite - 40:42-44:52
Revisiting the Reasons - 44:53-53:23
Are Open Worlds Boring? -53:24-55:00
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[camwad]

Ubisoft has played a huge part in making open world games boring it's the quantity over quality mindset that alot of developers have and it's sad

[_warismaqbool]

I played Skyrim almost 7 years ago and I still remember, there is a lighthouse where you discover the story of a sailor whose name I believe was Habd and his family through journals who were killed by those large insect creatures, and Habd gets eaten by one of them as you can find his skull in one of the insects. One of the journal says that Habd wanted his body to be burned in the fire of the lighthouse as he wanted to watch the ocean. If you burn his remains in the lighthouse you'll get an active effect.

[kotokrabs]

To experience the best what RDR2 can offer - turn off the map completely and don't activate it while not in camp/town. You'll be amazed of how it transform you whole experience. I hated this feeling of going from A to B all the time, it ruins the whole concept of open world and exploration. And when you don't have a map you'd be jumping off your chair seeing a familiar tree or rock. Try it and let me know what you thing about it after some hours.

[TheLoneReni]

The issue with open worlds right now I feel is that they dont treat the world as a place with a history and a point. Their worlds are just there to be big. The world should be a character just as much as the people around you. Its why lots of people like The Pizza Plex from Security Breach. Open worlds need personality and give the player a joy in exploration.

[ruckus]

The worst part about the bad open worlds is the lack of physical depth. No mountains, valleys, dungeons, secret tombs to explore etc etc. Most of them are just flat plains with enemies wandering around.

[almas]

As a Dungeons and Dragons player, I always felt that open world's true potential lies in huge scale cities and enormous monuments and of buildings you can actually enter, lots of lore you can uncover...
But in reality - most open worlds I've come across only offer big empty fields with side activities....

[predictorbibulous]

To a child, a bouncing ball is fascinating because the child is surprised by the ball bouncing back up. After a while the child begins to expect the ball to bounce back up in a predictable way and begins to lose interest. You can change the color of the ball or even the size but it doesn't make the action any more interesting.

[livinglifelazy]

What I’ve always liked about GOOD open world games is two fold:
1. Things going on around you and WITHOUT you e.g. passing by two people having a conversation or a battle going on in the distance
2. Non-horizontal or non-map-driven exploration - we’re so used to exploring horizontally across a map that things like vertical exploration can be really exciting, or just generally exploring something we wouldn’t expect (say the inside of a mountain that has a secret dungeon, or secret tunnels throughout the land, or even climbing trees lol)

These two things are always what keep me engaged. Give me an active world that I can choose to observe, and give me REAL exploration - secrets and things a map can’t really tell you.

While we’re at it, make the rewards actually rewarding 😂

[pghchaos]

RDR2 is so alive and beautiful I literally just explored by riding my horse around the map. It was so relaxing. This is easily a top 10 game of all time

[jovicamateric]

There's just too many open world games. I replayed the first three Uncharted games and it was honestly refreshing to play linear games with a well told story and good characters.

[Sick_Pencil]

My favorite open world is Fallout. There is always something there wherever you go and it's almost always something intriguing and sometimes bizarre (in a good way).

[gmo]

I’ve always wondered how much smaller a game like gta would have to be in ~25-50 percent of the buildings were enterable and had crazy little things going on inside, maybe you walk into a floor of telemarketers and they have you make calls and choose dialogue, and you earn a commission or something, the biggest bummer with open world games is like you said, it almost feels like the Truman show in most of them, everyone is waiting for you

[virumzzgaming]

Red Dead 2 is the last true world I've fully explored and the world was the bonus, the story was the headliner. Everything in the world developed the story or your character. The story was so good it made you explore to develop the characters and to add to their lore. A beautiful interactive world.

Great open worlds are dominated by their stories and the world is built around it. When the story or direction lacks, so does the world.

[Cody_b]

Got to say, Skyrims music deserves a shout out. Exploring the open world with those original themes playing give some real atmosphere.

[msjkramey]

I appreciate that you clearly credit the footage to the creators playing the games. It should be considered the bare minimum, but not everyone does it, so I'm glad you're helping change the YouTube culture and etiquette

[rubydoo]

I'm newer to gaming, and I started with Skyrim and you've just made me want play it again. Wonderful video!

[jordanwood]

The Yakuza games are a great example of how bigger doesn't necessarily mean better. RGG have taken the approach of building open worlds that are small but dense with lots of things to do and it works really well because every location feels alive.

[Diaisdumb]

This is why I like what the Yakuza series does. It's not a complete open world, but the open city kind of gameplay keeps you within the boundaries of a place that seems pretty small, but has so much to do.

[JS-rkvc]

I am currently playing Vahalla, going into it knowing that it was way longer than necessary, and so I play it in small chunks paced apart so it at least feels somewhat fresh when I come back to it. The only reason I am playing it is because I learned one of the side characters will be the focus of the next (shorter) game. Also, the Bethesda games have their AI characters interact randomly with each other, which makes the games feel so much more alive. You can run into bandits fighting guards fighting a bear fighting a dragon and all of it is happening even though you're not there. You're not prompting activities in the game outside of quests, you're stumbling upon them. It happens in the latter Fallout games, too. Thanks for this video essay. It was good.

[BrettOssman]

Your perspective on open world games has been very interesting.
It did make me realize why I felt some games were great, and some got tedious, and I "pulled the plug".

For open world or even long linear games, I want a game that is going to present something different as I go along. Most get VERY redundant. The characters and scenes may look different at times, but I'm still doing the same game play I've been doing all along. Make me change up. My approach, weapons, skills etc. that I've been using don't work anymore, or at least in the current scenario/mission. I can't just find one approach, and never change it.