One reader suggested that the open world design was behind many of the game’s problems and that removing it would save time and money and improve the game.
Like other gamers right now, I’m very concerned about the direction the video game industry is headed, and I have little interest in Microsoft, and especially Sony, trying to calm things down or explain things. I’m frustrated that there doesn’t seem to be one. I’m particularly concerned that the amount of time and money required to make games these days severely limits the types of games that can be made. This is especially troubling because there’s one thing that could solve a lot of problems if you took it away: open-world games.
Open-world games have been around since the ’80s, and while they’re technically more of a feature than a genre, everyone knows what it means when it comes to open-world games. It’s an exploration game inspired by his Ubisoft games like Assassin’s Creed and Far Cry. The entire huge world is filled with dozens of repetitive side missions, radars full of icons, and towers you have to climb to fill the map.
Like anything else, they were fun when you started, but become annoying when you have too many of them. The problem is that publishers realized they were the type of single-player games that made money because people felt they were getting a lot of value for their money. They have generally been very receptive to DLC. But now they’re basically the bane of single-player games, responsible for squeezing everything else out and making bloat and padding, or too much content, a serious problem.
This includes Gears 5, Halo Infinite, Mirror’s Edge Catalyst, Metal Gear Solid 5, Mass Effect Andromeda, and even the recent Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth. None of these games need to be open world, and neither are most other games. The open world was just added because they thought it was a selling point and avoided the tricky level design that video games used to have to do.
The problem is that so many single-player games think they have to be open-world. This is obviously more expensive than creating a regular level-based game. Because there’s so much ground to cover and something has to fill it. to do. This takes even more time, and you’ll quickly understand why we’re having problems with games taking too long and costing too much to make.
A lot of people are saying that publishers should go back to making AA games, but no one puts up with intentionally bad graphics and systems. It’s not what they’re used to, and publishers have basically trained us all to expect more at this point. But if they stopped making their games open world, they would immediately save a lot of money, and I think very few people would complain.
Of course, I’m not saying everything should be eliminated. Obviously, the Zelda games were a win, but that should be the exception. Just like back in the Xbox 360 era, when every game had a big multiplayer mode, publishers now expect it, even if it wasn’t the reason people bought the game. It seems like they’re going to make the game open world for no other reason than that.
If the game is going to cut its budget, it’s going to have to do so in a smart way that actually benefits the game. I believe it’s important to get rid of the bloat and padding and not make everything a 60 hour long show. Good for everyone involved.
From reader AgentRed
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