Open-world games will always have a special place in our hearts. These huge worlds come packed full of stories, characters, quirks and quests that hoover up more hours worth of blood, sweat and tears than any other genre in the gaming space. The lack of a linear path means players are free to immerse themselves in these titles, customise to a greater extent than in other genres and play the way they like to. Nevertheless, thanks to a combination of expectations from publishers, gimmicky gestures and broken mechanics, there are a number of things open-world games absolutely need to stop doing. Join us today at Gamelevate as we run you through some of the most infuriating features of open-world games!
Bigger Isn’t Better
First off, it feels like developers are doing all they can to shout about how big their open-world games are these days. As advances in hardware allow for more and more space to be crammed into a game, ‘bigger’ feels like it is replacing ‘better’ when it comes to the genre.
One of the biggest pulls about open-world games is their ability to feel familiar over time, to identify where things are and to enjoy the feeling of knowing a location like your own hometown and for it to feel like it is actually lived in with people all of whom have their own lives and routines. Too often we’re encountering games like The Crew 2 and Just Cause 4 that are littered with long roads, uninhabited spaces, copy-and-pasted buildings and other features that feel like filler and not worth the hassle of truly exploring.
Launching Before They’re Ready
We know that open-world games are some of the toughest for developers to make. Bugs are to be expected. Unfortunately, as some of the most popular types of games in the world, publishers tend to want to capitalise on the hype, bring the release dates forward, and attempt to iron out these bugs after you’ve bought the game. It’s one of the most toxic elements of open-world games and is sadly a trend we’re seeing more and more frequently, especially with the big blockbuster hits.
If we were interested in gambling on a digital game, we would have gone over to Karavan Bet, not sunk $70 on a blockbuster title that may or may not be ready to play.
Unkillable Characters
A common feature of open-world games is unkillable characters. These are characters developers have selected as being unable to die, either through the player or any other means. This can be done either entirely throughout the game or up until a certain point. This is most commonly found with main villains who are supposed to be taken down near the game’s completion.
The problem with this is that many of these characters are out and about alongside a number of other NPCs that can be bumped off at a moment’s notice. If you’re able to take out a main villain earlier than the game expects you to, it’s something that should be applauded rather than cheaply ignored.
Forced Grinding
Allow me to paint you a picture that I’m sure any serial open-world player is sure to identify with: loading up a game, running through the main storyline, encountering a boss battle and being absolutely smoked by it. No matter your reactions, skills, items or strategy, the boss’ level is too high and you cannot beat it. What follows is you have to go back and boost your level, stats and attributes.
This ends up feeling like a cheap of inflating the game time and, perhaps more infuriatingly, there’s nothing else a player can do to progress past a certain point. Some developers have introduced features such as ‘Battle Speed’ that allow players to navigate a game quicker, which we think should be a mainstay in the genre going forward.
Gimmicky Side Missions
Unlike other types of games, developers of open-world games need to fill their titles full of things for players to do other than the main missions. Oftentimes, side missions can be a great means of flexing their creativity, building more onto their worlds and doing things that they wouldn’t be able to get away with in the main story.
Sadly, there are just as many examples of these side missions being cheap little add-ons a developer has put in just to say they’ve ticked a box and included them. Examples of these include races, collection missions, herding items or individuals etc. What’s more frustrating is the fact that all of these missions in a game usually need to be completed for the completionists out there to achieve their fabled 100% completion trophy.
