• thegameoverguy@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    I just want to know why everything has to be open world today. It seems like developers are just constantly increasing scope and making games almost too big now.

    • bigpphaver@lemmy.fmhy.ml
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      1 year ago

      Easier level design. I wouldn’t be surprised if 99% of open world games just had their landscape generated and then slightly tweaked afterwards.

      • nickajeglin@lemmy.one
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        1 year ago

        You can do open world right, oblivion and to a slightly lesser extent Skyrim. But a huge map with not much in it just makes for tedious travel times, or lots of fast travel loading screens. At that point, you basically have separate levels.

        Dark souls 1 was good too, but for a different reason: there’s nothing like opening a gate and going “WTF, how did I get all the way back here?” The way it folds in on itself makes it huge, but also gives it a very compact feeling when it comes to traveling around. I’d put it top 3 level design on my personal list.

        Far cry 3 was good too. Mostly because wing suit and helicopter thing. Now that I think of it, there’s a theme here. It seems like verticality (and a way to traverse it) really helps a map feel fun. Far cry 3, BOTW, dark souls, all 3 have these huge altitude variations.