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Best Open World Game overall, among these picks?
- Thread starter Rurouni
- Start date
the battle against RDR2 and Elden Ring is fierce, but i'll give it to ER considering how magical and special it is as a open-world experience.
as a game overall, it would have been Red Dead Redemption 2, but mostly for the narrative alone.
as a game overall, it would have been Red Dead Redemption 2, but mostly for the narrative alone.
This was my first thought as well. How much bloat, time wasting and dragged out the games on that list are. I haven't played all of them, so am not gonna vote.
Red Dead Redemption 2. It this elegant blend of hand-crafted content and dynamic world systems, buttressed by a rich, meaningful attention to not only detail, but the realization of a time, place, and way of life. Unlike most games, it doesn't call attention to its best stuff. You're meant to lean into that slow-paced wanderlust and soak in the world around you. No open world is more rewarding in that regard.
For me, it's between Elden Ring, Tears of the Kingdom, or Red Dead Redemption 2.
Elden Ring has the most interesting world by quite a lot, and the best story told in the most interesting and novel way that only a video game is capable of; but it's also the least dynamic and doesn't do quite as much in its 'open-ness.' It's a very combat-focused game with minimal interactivity. I'd say it uses the open world more like a technique to enhance what it does, but is not primary interesting as an open world game.
Red Dead Redemption 2 is the most detailed and realized world, with the most fleshed out characters to populate it. But unfortunately it's very historically inaccurate, more pretentious Americana than actual history, despite very much wanting you to believe that it's more than that. And since the actual gameplay is a complete bore, despite its achievements it really has little merit to stand on ultimately.
Tears of the Kingdom is kind of a middle-ground between both—neither as interesting as Elden Ring's world nor as detailed as Red Dead Redemption 2's—but it's also the most exhaustive in terms of having fleshed out systems to interact with. It doesn't aim at things it can't achieve and still manages to do a lot very very well. The scope and interactivity of systems on offer that all work in a fully open dynamic sandbox is polished to a level that still surprises me. So despite not being the strongest in story, narrative, or theming, I think what Tears of the Kingdom actually does with its open world mechanically and systemically is the most impressive to me.
But I'd rank Minecraft above all of these if it was an option. And while it would not be my #1 or #2, I think Metal Gear Solid V deserves honorable mention.
Elden Ring has the most interesting world by quite a lot, and the best story told in the most interesting and novel way that only a video game is capable of; but it's also the least dynamic and doesn't do quite as much in its 'open-ness.' It's a very combat-focused game with minimal interactivity. I'd say it uses the open world more like a technique to enhance what it does, but is not primary interesting as an open world game.
Red Dead Redemption 2 is the most detailed and realized world, with the most fleshed out characters to populate it. But unfortunately it's very historically inaccurate, more pretentious Americana than actual history, despite very much wanting you to believe that it's more than that. And since the actual gameplay is a complete bore, despite its achievements it really has little merit to stand on ultimately.
Tears of the Kingdom is kind of a middle-ground between both—neither as interesting as Elden Ring's world nor as detailed as Red Dead Redemption 2's—but it's also the most exhaustive in terms of having fleshed out systems to interact with. It doesn't aim at things it can't achieve and still manages to do a lot very very well. The scope and interactivity of systems on offer that all work in a fully open dynamic sandbox is polished to a level that still surprises me. So despite not being the strongest in story, narrative, or theming, I think what Tears of the Kingdom actually does with its open world mechanically and systemically is the most impressive to me.
But I'd rank Minecraft above all of these if it was an option. And while it would not be my #1 or #2, I think Metal Gear Solid V deserves honorable mention.
FFVII Rebirth for me. It managed to capture the appeal of open world gameplay while not sacrificing the appeal of a party-focused linear JRPG. Great balance of the two, where everything you do in the game is in some way about spending time with the characters.
Elden Ring second place tho.
Elden Ring second place tho.
lol Horizon ZD and Death Stranding sticking out like sore thumbs on that poll. B-Listers on the red carpet next to A-Listers. Anyways, it's Elden Ring or TOTK obviously.
TOTK is my top and only TOTK not BOTW which is not as good in any way, glad BOTW is not on this list.
My ranks are TOTK > ER > RDR2 > FF7 Rebirth > DS > Horizon FW > Witcher 3
My ranks are TOTK > ER > RDR2 > FF7 Rebirth > DS > Horizon FW > Witcher 3
I guess it's TOTK for me, but I haven't played every single one of these games. I've spent a lot more time with Elden Ring since it's highly replayable, but I think of it less as open world and more as big Souls game. The overworld is not especially interesting, and the non-combat activities (finding turtle ghosts, paintings, etc.) tend to be fairly weak. The star of the show is very much the legacy dungeons and story bosses.
Red Dead. Elden Ring might dethrone it once I get my Souls groove back but Red Dead is just on another level.
I loved RDR2, but honestly no idea how that is beating out TOTK.
I expected Elden Ring to because Era+FromSoftware lol, but RDR2 is surprising
I expected Elden Ring to because Era+FromSoftware lol, but RDR2 is surprising
I've essentially not played DS at all and maybe 20 hours of Elden Ring but I've beaten or played all the other extensively.
If we're talking about which open world game is the most "open worldy" by definition, it would be TOTK. The game has so much variance to its environments and how you can react to them on top of puzzles and all It's weird mechanics of creation ect and travel. No other open world game on this list comes close.
If this question is simply what game did we like the most then its Rebirth for me followed by RDR2 and W3.
If we're talking about which open world game is the most "open worldy" by definition, it would be TOTK. The game has so much variance to its environments and how you can react to them on top of puzzles and all It's weird mechanics of creation ect and travel. No other open world game on this list comes close.
If this question is simply what game did we like the most then its Rebirth for me followed by RDR2 and W3.
Best is hard and wholly subjective. Out of those(excepting TotK and Rebirth which I haven't played), I'd say Horizon Forbidden West is the most accessible in terms of gameplay and world, the one that most would find enjoyable without caveats, if that makes sense. Like if you were to offer someone who's never played those games one of them, Horizon is the safest bet. But that doesn't mean the other games don't do certain things better. Its open world is beautiful, reasonably varied, and is just a joy to cruise in.
Witcher 3 also comes close, but its gameplay is a bit more of an acquired taste IMO, since the action combat is jankier than Horizon. The world map is bigger and filled with more things to do, though the variety could be kinda lacking at times due to the setting.
Elden Ring, RDR2, and Death Stranding are all truly standout masterpieces that do certain stuff so well, but each of them might be lacking a thing or two that one might look for in open world games.
From what I read of Rebirth, Rebirth could very well be similar or better than Horizon in the criterias I mentioned.
Witcher 3 also comes close, but its gameplay is a bit more of an acquired taste IMO, since the action combat is jankier than Horizon. The world map is bigger and filled with more things to do, though the variety could be kinda lacking at times due to the setting.
Elden Ring, RDR2, and Death Stranding are all truly standout masterpieces that do certain stuff so well, but each of them might be lacking a thing or two that one might look for in open world games.
From what I read of Rebirth, Rebirth could very well be similar or better than Horizon in the criterias I mentioned.
my heart aches for rebirth and witcher 3, but as an open world experience i just dont think either comes close to rdr 2.
like rebirth and witcher both have amazing content and stuff, but the feeling of the world, the desire to explore every nook and cranny, the immersion is just way higher in rdr imo.
like rebirth and witcher both have amazing content and stuff, but the feeling of the world, the desire to explore every nook and cranny, the immersion is just way higher in rdr imo.
Once again, Red Dead Redemption 2 continues to be a masterclass not only in game design and world design, but storytelling, writing, and that sinewy, toothy, know-it-when-you-see-it seizing of genius, the kind you see once in a generation.
After that, of the list, the honor goes to TOTK though! ^^'
After that, of the list, the honor goes to TOTK though! ^^'
I've spent the most time in Elden Ring because I like it the best. Got another playthrough cooking right now! The only one on the list I haven't played is Rebirth, and that probably won't change unless it hits PS+
It always baffles ne how many votes Elden Ring gets. The game would have been even better without it.
Would have gone BOTW, so I'll go Rebirth. I know TOTK is the better game, but I just don't like building. Love getting on a chocobo and all the character moments while going through the open world in Rebirth, it's the best.
I couldn't disagree more. The open world is what makes it my favourite Souls game.
I couldn't disagree more. The open world is what makes it my favourite Souls game.
Tears of the Kingdom is peak gaming. That such an ambitious game even works is pretty mindblowing.
Elden Ring, Cyberpunk and RDR2 are pretty close though. They also are the best at what they try to do.
Elden Ring, Cyberpunk and RDR2 are pretty close though. They also are the best at what they try to do.
I generally don't like most open-world games since they suffer the same problems of being big for the sake of being big with a lack of truly meaningful content, and quite often the critical path section is at odds with the roaming around and collecting flowers stuff.
Of the games listed, Elden Ring would be my favorite by far and it's not even close. Yet it's still nowhere near my favorite FromSoftware game due to it still sharing many of the same problems the rest of the games do.
My second pick would be The Witcher 3, even though I think the second game offered a better experience overall. The Witcher 3 did a whole lot of things right, but the loot system was awful and there weren't really any legitimate dungeons to speak of.
RDR2 looks amazing, but I found it completely boring. It's just way too slow and deliberate.
Never played Forbidden West, and I'm not sure I will. Zero Dawn was great while it was first introducing new enemy types, and then later again with the expansion, but overall it was far too long, and outside of the combat it was pretty much another Ubisoft styled game.
Absolutely agree, but this is a poll about open-world games and it just so happens to be one.
That's how I feel on the subject as well.
Of the games listed, Elden Ring would be my favorite by far and it's not even close. Yet it's still nowhere near my favorite FromSoftware game due to it still sharing many of the same problems the rest of the games do.
My second pick would be The Witcher 3, even though I think the second game offered a better experience overall. The Witcher 3 did a whole lot of things right, but the loot system was awful and there weren't really any legitimate dungeons to speak of.
RDR2 looks amazing, but I found it completely boring. It's just way too slow and deliberate.
Never played Forbidden West, and I'm not sure I will. Zero Dawn was great while it was first introducing new enemy types, and then later again with the expansion, but overall it was far too long, and outside of the combat it was pretty much another Ubisoft styled game.
Absolutely agree, but this is a poll about open-world games and it just so happens to be one.
That's how I feel on the subject as well.
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strictly in terms of how they best use their open world design
death stranding > tears of the kingdom > elden ring > horizon forbidden west > final fantasy vii: rebirth > red dead redemption 2
death stranding is the most innovative take on the open world structure with its focus on moment-to-moment traversal that fits so well with the overarching narrative and the themes the game wants to explore outside of the main plot, which is unfortunately just gobbledygook that wastes amazing acting talent with some of the worst dialogue i've ever had the misfortune of hearing. but yeah, the simple act of navigating from point a to point b and all the dangers in between while making sure you and your deliveries make it intact is so compelling in itself that i can look past all the glaring flaws in the writing. add in all the infrastructure construction to alleviate some of the friction, and it becomes an even more rewarding experience to traverse the open world. death stranding is the best evidence that hideo kojima is in fact a great game designer that badly needs an actual writer and an actual editor if he wants to tell stories through more conventional means like cutscenes, dialogue and flavor text.
tears of the kingdom comes close with its toolset that allows for so much freedom to approach its open world, its temples, and its dungeons and the way all three layers of the world push the player to engage with each one in their own unique way. i do think however that the open world structure makes the delivery of its main story and important emotional beats real clunky with how the same points get repeated after every main dungeon and how it's so easy to see plot developments out of order that rob them of their impact.
elden ring does the best job of masking a more formulaic approach to open world design where you have a distinct set of activities that's repeated throughout different zones. you actually still go to "towers" to reveal more of the world map, and each zone has a set of catacombs, caves, churches, evergaols, ruins, walking mausoleums, minor erdtrees, erdtree avatars, dragons, etc. for the player to engage with to get rewards. elden ring just presents it all in a way that allows the player to naturally discover these elements, creating a sense of wonder and dread. it loses that feeling once you get deeper into the game and start seeing the patterns, but the rest of the game is held up by the stellar legacy dungeons and bosses.
horizon forbidden west and ff7 rebirth embrace traditional open world design with map and objective markers and in-game checklists for side activities, so exploration isn't really a factor. i still had a good time actually doing those activities and checking off those lists in these two games, so their open worlds are perfectly serviceable as delivery systems for fun and/or interesting gameplay, world-building, and character development. forbidden west does make its open world structure more integral to its main missions and side activities compared to rebirth where you can basically skip the vast majority of its open world if you really want to, so that's a point in favor of forbidden west as an open world game.
i don't think i've experienced as much dissonance in mission structure, narrative, and open world design than with rdr 2. rockstar really wants you in rdr2's story missions to follow its boring choreography step-by-step with its slow and shallow moment-to-moment mechanics or you instantly fail and have to start over, which is antithetical to the promise of freedom in open world design. oh and you largely do the same things for 60 to 80 hours!!! rockstar also really wants you to believe in the financial downward spiral of the gang, which is the key driver of the game's events, and the internal moral conflict of arthur, which is the game's emotional core, while letting you amass a fortune and act like an asshole while doing zany shit that's completely at odds with the story's tone when you do the open world side activities. gotta give it up the devs who got crunched for years to make the world visually impeccable at least. ultimately, i just really didn't care for whatever cowboy fantasy the game wanted to provide the player with its open world activities that i already had my fill of back in rdr1.
i have not yet played the witcher 3. played 1 and 2, so i should be ready to go, but i just haven't found time for it. maybe sometime this year.
death stranding > tears of the kingdom > elden ring > horizon forbidden west > final fantasy vii: rebirth > red dead redemption 2
death stranding is the most innovative take on the open world structure with its focus on moment-to-moment traversal that fits so well with the overarching narrative and the themes the game wants to explore outside of the main plot, which is unfortunately just gobbledygook that wastes amazing acting talent with some of the worst dialogue i've ever had the misfortune of hearing. but yeah, the simple act of navigating from point a to point b and all the dangers in between while making sure you and your deliveries make it intact is so compelling in itself that i can look past all the glaring flaws in the writing. add in all the infrastructure construction to alleviate some of the friction, and it becomes an even more rewarding experience to traverse the open world. death stranding is the best evidence that hideo kojima is in fact a great game designer that badly needs an actual writer and an actual editor if he wants to tell stories through more conventional means like cutscenes, dialogue and flavor text.
tears of the kingdom comes close with its toolset that allows for so much freedom to approach its open world, its temples, and its dungeons and the way all three layers of the world push the player to engage with each one in their own unique way. i do think however that the open world structure makes the delivery of its main story and important emotional beats real clunky with how the same points get repeated after every main dungeon and how it's so easy to see plot developments out of order that rob them of their impact.
elden ring does the best job of masking a more formulaic approach to open world design where you have a distinct set of activities that's repeated throughout different zones. you actually still go to "towers" to reveal more of the world map, and each zone has a set of catacombs, caves, churches, evergaols, ruins, walking mausoleums, minor erdtrees, erdtree avatars, dragons, etc. for the player to engage with to get rewards. elden ring just presents it all in a way that allows the player to naturally discover these elements, creating a sense of wonder and dread. it loses that feeling once you get deeper into the game and start seeing the patterns, but the rest of the game is held up by the stellar legacy dungeons and bosses.
horizon forbidden west and ff7 rebirth embrace traditional open world design with map and objective markers and in-game checklists for side activities, so exploration isn't really a factor. i still had a good time actually doing those activities and checking off those lists in these two games, so their open worlds are perfectly serviceable as delivery systems for fun and/or interesting gameplay, world-building, and character development. forbidden west does make its open world structure more integral to its main missions and side activities compared to rebirth where you can basically skip the vast majority of its open world if you really want to, so that's a point in favor of forbidden west as an open world game.
i don't think i've experienced as much dissonance in mission structure, narrative, and open world design than with rdr 2. rockstar really wants you in rdr2's story missions to follow its boring choreography step-by-step with its slow and shallow moment-to-moment mechanics or you instantly fail and have to start over, which is antithetical to the promise of freedom in open world design. oh and you largely do the same things for 60 to 80 hours!!! rockstar also really wants you to believe in the financial downward spiral of the gang, which is the key driver of the game's events, and the internal moral conflict of arthur, which is the game's emotional core, while letting you amass a fortune and act like an asshole while doing zany shit that's completely at odds with the story's tone when you do the open world side activities. gotta give it up the devs who got crunched for years to make the world visually impeccable at least. ultimately, i just really didn't care for whatever cowboy fantasy the game wanted to provide the player with its open world activities that i already had my fill of back in rdr1.
i have not yet played the witcher 3. played 1 and 2, so i should be ready to go, but i just haven't found time for it. maybe sometime this year.
Death Stranding doesn't feel like an open world game TBH. I feel like Tears of the Kingdom has the best open world out of these games but I also feel like I might have a different answer depending on how I'm sitting, it's just that close. Elden Ring and Red Dead Redemption 2 are phenomenal.
It's between Elden Ring, TotK and Rebirth for me. I never clicked much with RDR2, but I definitely can see why people would choose that.
I voted ER because you get rewarded for proper exploration and it has the highest highs in any of the list, but I will say it has some areas I didn't vibe with at all. Rebirth is probably the most consistent, but never quite reaches the highs of ER. TotK is overall very good and I love the Hyrule overworld and caves, but the Sky Islands and Depths let it down a bit.
I voted ER because you get rewarded for proper exploration and it has the highest highs in any of the list, but I will say it has some areas I didn't vibe with at all. Rebirth is probably the most consistent, but never quite reaches the highs of ER. TotK is overall very good and I love the Hyrule overworld and caves, but the Sky Islands and Depths let it down a bit.
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Of the ones I have played, Red Dead 2. By a huge margin. It's not the biggest open world but it is packed with so much detail and enough environment/NPC interaction that it absorbs you in.
Elden Ring felt like Dark souls 2 stretched out. Closer to something like Shadow of The Colossus. A large empty(ish) world between each dungeon/boss.
The Witcher 3 felt the same to me. It's world was basically a corridor to the next objective marker. I never felt the desire to explore. The missions also had forced Gwent sections so that knocks like 50 points of any part of the game. Combat, Music, Open World. You name it. The very idea of Gwent suddenly popping up took any element down a few pegs.
Forbidden West, I spent like 12 hours two years ago in and got to the second prologue (the satellite dishes) I can't say for the whole thing, but what I played certainly felt bloated and not very interesting.
Elden Ring felt like Dark souls 2 stretched out. Closer to something like Shadow of The Colossus. A large empty(ish) world between each dungeon/boss.
The Witcher 3 felt the same to me. It's world was basically a corridor to the next objective marker. I never felt the desire to explore. The missions also had forced Gwent sections so that knocks like 50 points of any part of the game. Combat, Music, Open World. You name it. The very idea of Gwent suddenly popping up took any element down a few pegs.
Forbidden West, I spent like 12 hours two years ago in and got to the second prologue (the satellite dishes) I can't say for the whole thing, but what I played certainly felt bloated and not very interesting.
A tie between Elden Ring and RDR2 for me.
The Witcher 3, Horizon Zero Dawn / Forbidden West, Days Gone and Death Stranding are also high on my list.
The Witcher 3, Horizon Zero Dawn / Forbidden West, Days Gone and Death Stranding are also high on my list.
