>"It's empty and bland."
t. Sup Forums
So alright. What does it fucking take for an open world game not to feel empty? I ask this in every fucking thread but nobody replies except to say "ignore them."
Is that it? Shitposting?
No. I feel like some of this comes from a real fucking opinion, so let's hear it.
Its basically a non argument. And tehn when you point out things to do tehy just say
"So what, thats all shit lmaooooo"
I've always assumed it was something like making sure there was something in the environment to interact with at almost all times.
Best way to avoid such pitfalls would be to skip the whole idea of truly open "sandbox" world, and design detailed yet quite open, smaller "pen maps". STALKER is a great example of this; there's some relatively "empty" space as padding between clear setpiece areas, which makes each sector in the game feel exciting to explore, and memorable later on.
MGS5:Ground Zeroes did this well too.
in short, the maps should engage the core gameplay mechanisms. Not just be open for the sake of being big and open. One or two larger open fields can help creating feeling of large scale and work as neat breathers between action, but starting the development of the game with an empty landscape is a huge no-no.
Tldr open world is fine for capeshit, having a giant map with no content is pointless, ie mgsv
Oblivion/new Vegas had worlds that didn't feel dead, and had shit to do
Games like mgsv or ghost recon wildlands give you this huge map and it's like oh go to outpost and kill AI, thus making a shitty open world
Open world is also the best for capeshit
Even GTA makes you feel immersed in the world
Horizon and Zelda are both empty, Zelda has dungeons and story and horizon might as well just be Ubisoft open world, at least the graphics are nice
Right, but as far as I know that's present in all the games catching this particular critique. Like..
There's more shit to do in Horizon and Zelda than Fallout 3 or Oblivion and there's constantly systems to interact with. Like you have weather changes making you think about what you're doing, animals to catch and hunt, enemy camps and roaming monsters, NPC settlements and quest lines...
What would make Zelda less empty, for example? What are you seeing that's lacking?
Have levels interspersed that are big and filled with content. I think the problem with most Open World games is that they spread out all the content throughout the world to make it seem like its not empty.
The biggest offenders of this I can think off the top of my head is MGSV and Far Cry 3. Sure there is a shit ton of small stuff to do everywhere, but there isn't anything large or grand to visit in a singular spot.
Your mad that open game worlds... are open? Do you also yell at clouds for bringing rain and the sun shining like some sort of autistic?
Your problem doesn't seem to be open world density, but open worlds themselves.
You can hunt animals and go to enemy settlements in farcry 3
Alright. Define "Filled with content."
All of these gams have several landmarks and so many things to do, how much more does there need to be?
No I dislike that open worlds have nothing of value to find. Everyone makes such a big fuss about open worlds being empty and bland, but I think it's the opposite. There isn't enough empty space.
Let me put it this way, You know how WW has an island in every sector, but most suck, thus making the overwolrd lame? What I'd suggest is have some sectors completely empty while having some islands take up multiple squares.
I don't have a problem with density, I have a problem with spreading content to thin.
just post a picture of your dick please
You can't make an open world game not feel empty, they are inherently going to be largely filled with nothing,
>Define "Filled with content."
Something similar to the Imperial City in Oblivion. It had it's own districts and even an sewer system.
Meaningless, transparent repetition is the death of immersion. When you realize you're doing the exact same thing again and again and the reward is the same every time, it loses its flavor. There are setpieces spread out everywhere but none are memorable and if they are, it's because you only went there once instead of it being outpost 48 but it's still bullshit because you walk by a piece of nothing that does nothing because you already did the thing it did and it disperses no more treats.
Also I fucking hate the word immersion.
because "openness" doesn't actually make a game good. what makes a game good is intricate level design, but if levels have to be open and let players approach them in eight million ways it becomes essentially impossible to have this intricate design.
like, take a look at the worlds of LA, OOA, or OOS compared to Wind Waker.
I'll get memed for posting Skyrim, but outside of Sup Forums it is universally agreed upon as the proper way of doing an open world without it being "empty and bland"
Either:
Useless space given purpose thru quests, or
Crowd it with meaningless collect items
Try some of colon B try all of colon A
The only part of that game that isn't shit are the daedric quests.
still better than 100 copy+paste "shrines" which are ripped straight from Oblivion
If you can just remove the trees/rocks and it's an empty field, then its a shit world.
If your "points of interest" are shit, then it ruins the world too.
You can fuck up one and not the other, but if you fuck up both it's a boring game like Skyrim
it takes more than current hardware can deliver. it takes a good ratio of interactive elements per unit of distance traveled. it takes good world design to guide the player's explorations, using geography to guide the player.
Well I've personally always hated open world, even back when everyone was worshipping GTA and "open world" as a genre didn't exist. Precisely because I think the problems with modern open world are pretty much unsolvable with current technology.
>it takes more than current hardware can deliver
you mean "nintendo hardware?"
not even the median consumer pc isn't capable of delivering the best experience, if we're going to waggle our dingdongs and play game critic. AI needs to get a lot better and more comprehensive. that's the only way to build a living, dynamic world. things have to change over time, and the geography and inhabitants have to grow and change. it's less about how big the world is than how much it develops over time and how densely packed it is with content. See: Morrowind Solstheim expansion. it's small geographically speaking but it has a lot going on.