When will developers rise to the BotW challenge?

[random_polymath]

Super Mario 64 was a wake up call to all developers making 3D games. The challenge was given by Nintendo - I dare you to do better.

BotW did the same for open world games.

It has been over a year, how long do you think it will take for another developer to try to emulate, match, or exceed what Nintendo has done? Will it happen first outside Nintendo or will Nintendo one-up themselves prior to anyone else rising to the challenge?

Are there any current projects that have the potential?

 

[yumms]

Red Dead 2 is coming soon. Cyber Punk next year....so yes.

 

[Falconbox]

Red Dead Redemption 2 comes out in a month.

Checkmate.

Your move Nintendo.

 

[Lant_War]

Part of what makes BOTW great is how unique it is. I don't think every game should follow the same kind of open-world formula.

 

[Sir Guts]

So you say there isn't a better open world game?

 

[ClickyCal']

I don't want everything to be open world sand box.

 

[JusDoIt]

Next month.

 

[Jerm411]

Red Dead looks like it's going to take open world games to any even higher level and set the new standard....

 

[Curufinwe]

Hopefully never. The last thing I want is other games copying from BotW.

 

[Doskoi Panda]

Won't take long for this thread to go completely sideways.

Red Dead Redemption drops in exactly one month. That's the next open world video game that I'm feeling as much excitement for as I did for BoTW.

 

[Perzeval]

Yonder October.

 

[Ereineon]

how long do you think it takes to make a game? give them time after playing BotW to actually be able to use that experience!

 

[Strangiato]

It won't be all that amazing to make a better BotW. It's not even a top 5 Zelda game for me. It had a lot of glaring problems that have been well documented around here.

 

[udivision]

In 2035 Game Freak will!

 

[Stryder]

BotW has not trumped Witcher 3 which still has to have someone rise up to it. Seriously BotW is an empty world with nothing to do compared to W3.

IT's a great Zelda game. Bland open world title.

 

[Sephzilla]

Breath of the Wild wasn't even the best open world game upon its own release.

 

[Jiraiya]

What's the botw challenge and why does it need to emulated?

 

[Deleted member 29682]

I'm still waiting for any open-world game to rise to the Dwarf Fortress Adventure Mode challenge.

Call me when Zelda lets you wear 6 capes simultaneously and knock a cow's teeth out with a shoe.

 

[angel]

The thread premise is incorrect, botw didn't remotely have the impact of sm64. Also, lazy dev rhetoric in disguise.

 

[Pablo Mesa]

Red Dead looks like it's going to take open world games to any even higher level and set the new standard....

Click to shrink...

im looking forwards to how, at least in freedom of exploration, BoTW and Xenoblade X are the top of the pyramid so far

 

[GemmolSwitchPS4]

Zelda breath of the wild is one of the greatest games ever, I feel like a kid again playing nonstop, no other game can give me that same feeling. every other game I play and then I stop, but zelda I was sneaking more time out of the day to play it. I am not a big zelda fan, but if the next game similar, I will join zelda fans and be a fan

 

[Karateka]

Super Mario 64 was a wake up call to all developers making 3D games. The challenge was given by Nintendo - I dare you to do better.

BotW did the same for open world games.

It has been over a year, how long do you think it will take for another developer to try to emulate, match, or exceed what Nintendo has done? Will it happen first outside Nintendo or will Nintendo one-up themselves prior to anyone else rising to the challenge?

Are there any current projects that have the potential?

Click to shrink...

BOTW wasn't even close to SM64 in revolution to the gaming landscape.
Red Dead won't copy BOTW because it would make it a worse game, I don't even like red dead (not interested in Westerns) but its world looks a lot more interesting than BOTW's.

im looking forwards to how, at least in freedom of exploration, BoTW and Xenoblade X are the top of the pyramid so far

Click to shrink...

Why is freedom of exploration important?
Why does it matter how many barren mountaintops we can see?

 

[0451]

Kudos to any developer that can pull it off in a year and a half!

 

[DailyCalmSpirit]

Developers have been making games with awful stories for years ;)

 

[Calisupra2nr]

Witcher 3 & Horizon Zero Dawn do better jobs of environmental storytelling and use of open world ecosystem for gameplay. Combat in BotW is too dull, menus too intrusive, and subsystems like cooking too monotonous to be a standard to which ALL other open world game's should strive. RDR2 looks to take exploration and organic discovery a step further, taking the one mantle of open world design that BotW truly can lay claim to right now.

 

[a916]

Super Mario 64 did to 3D platformers was set the precedent... control was a huge thing too.

BOTW came in and built on some concepts already in other games. To say it's the same is really over valuing what BOTW did and undercutting how big of a shift Super Mario 64 really was.

That's not to take away from the quality... but there's things done in other open world games that completely clown BOTW.

 

[Pilgrimzero]

Breath of the Wild wasn't even the best open world game upon its own release.

Click to shrink...

This.

 

[Cassius Bright]

BotW has not trumped Witcher 3 which still has to have someone rise up to it. Seriously BotW is an empty world with nothing to do compared to W3.

IT's a great Zelda game. Bland open world title.

Click to shrink...

Damn straight.

 

[Deleted member 1413]

It came out a little over a year ago, for devs to learn from it, it'll take a couple years

Breath of the Wild wasn't even the best open world game upon its own release.

Click to shrink...

It's kind of hard to argue against.

Probably easy for someone to prefer a game that's technically in the same genre, but the open world part BOTW outclassed basically everyone

 

[Nassudan]

I put maybe 1/4 of gameplay time into BOTW than I ever did with Morrowind, New Vegas, Witcher 3, etc etc.

Seriously botw is good, but it doesn't hold an unlit candle to many of the other open world games out there.

 

[Phendrift]

Red Dead previews made it sound like they're taking kind of a similar approach. Lots of "felt like I was exploring the world instead of just following a mission marker" comments

 

[MillionIII]

Red dead is literally coming next month, are you living under a rock op?

 

[Daebo]

I'm so confused by this... it was only refreshing because Nintendo finally started doing it. also, the game had a lot of faults. It was fun, but nothing earth shattering or innovative

 

[zoodoo]

Botw style of open world wont work for every game. It would work for a survival game. Maybe like Days Gone.

 

[Deleted member 29464]

I always felt like while OoT was clearly influential for 3D game play, it's harder to see how its influential in terms of game design when it comes to stuff like dungeon and puzzle design. Part of me thinks the same thing will happen to BOTW, the big companies will still do the typical open world stuff we have come to expect.

 

[Deleted member 32005]

I describe BotW to people like this: When I was a kid playing LttP and you could see hyrule in the background when youre high up in certain areas, my childhood wonder helped me think that that was a real place. in BotW when you see the backdrop you don't need a childhood wonder to pretend that isnt just a 2d image, it's actually all there. and you can just start walking there at any time.

I've never experienced anything like it, truly a new standard in games. generation defining, as impactful to me as the original Legend of Zelda, and the revolutionary OoT. And as with those games BotW truly indicates we are in a new generation of video games.

to answer your question if my above statement is true BotW will be impacting the standard and direction of videogames forever, as its predecessors did.

 

[ODDI]

Who cares about 200 different wildlife types, you can't climb trees in RDR 2 checkmate.

 

[DassoBrother]

I'm constantly tempted to get BotW on Switch. I beat it on Wii U but I feel like I'd play tons in portable mode.

And I don't think the game will prove all that influential. A lot of what made it awesome is hard to copy.

 

[Saint-14]

There are other ways to do open world games OP.

 

[Wandu]

I hope not. I thought BOTW was a horrible game. Not a hot take, but I didn't enjoy my experience with it. Therefore, I don't want other open world games to follow in its footsteps.

 

[ShinUltramanJ]

Rise to the challenge of making empty worlds.

 

[Deleted member 4037]

This is all under the assumption that botw is infallible. Really I think there are numerous things botw botw can learn from other games, including those in its own series. I find the premise to be glossing over a lot of things

 

[Hero]

BotW is a revolution in game design, especially verticality and giving players the freedom and abilities to do almost anything they want in the game from the starting area. It is absolutely influential and there are several developers saying it is the next game that will be emulated or referenced.

 

[doodlebob]

Wow, I never knew that the video game industry was pro wrestling.

 

[Boiled Goose]

BOTW is not the best to everyone, but the innovations to game design is what the OP is talking about

Wow are people salty and defensive.

OP means:
nearly completely non linear structure.
Interconnecting physics systems leading to emergent gameplay
Lack of waypoints and markers and instead relying on good world design, landmarks, npc hints, etc.

This is what the OP means.

Witcher 3 better or not didn't do these things
Will RDR2?

 

[Crayon]

With the lead times for making games that big and the relative difficulty of building a game in that way, I expect a zelda sequel in the same mold to come out before anyone else can catch up.

A lot of people are saying Red Dead 2, but I'm not sure myself what Red Dead 2 is doing that's supposed to top botw. Maybe someone can clue me in.

 

[SENPAIatLARGE]

 

[Torpedo Vegas]

I loved BOTW, but I didn't see where it did anything ground breaking with open world gameplay.

 

[Deleted member 4346]

There have been several open world games better than Breath of the Wild. I think you have it backwards, I think Nintendo needs to look at the polish of a game like Horizon: Zero Dawn and figure out how the next Zelda can incorporate that while maintaining the great traversal and exploration of BotW.

 

[packy17]

BOTW has *a lot* of empty space.