It's kind of funny that in open-world games, especially ones of the fantasy variety, story is put on the back burner and exploration and going all stabby/ blowy-uppy gets the limelight. That's not to say that more linear story-driven games are superior, as my often relied upon example of Dragon Age 2 proved, despite my praise of the writing. However, in the final year of this incredibly long and epic gaming generation, it seems that story has been brought back to the forefront, at least thus far. It is only February after all.
Maybe it's that story mechanics make it easier for the developers to show off what they can do with relatively ancient tech. Games like DMC and Ni no Kuni show off particular styles and level designs while arguably providing some of the strongest story telling, among AAA titles, in the last few years. Both games also play very smoothly and look fantastic. As a side note, these are what consoles need to continue supplying in order to to survive: strong original story telling, pretty graphics and great game play.
Upcoming games such as Crysis 3 and Bioshock Infinite have the potential to continue pushing FPS' as not only ways to show off how good you are at head-shots, but as great means of telling great interactive stories. With the right creative teams and enough visual style (much like Far Cry 3's realistic, yet unique style) to make the games unique, these games could really help push game design, even high-budget titles, as a real art-form.
There are examples where open-world elements are put into story drive games. The Witcher 2 and Dishonored come to mind. The issue is these aren't neccesary open-world games. Far Cry 3 seems to have an intriguing story and hit most of the elements on the head, which could make it the prime example of what I'd want out of an open-world game.
I'm hoping developers continue to push the envelope on what to expect from open-world games and games in general. I want to have the shared experience of exploring the world with a great sense of purpose and to uncover a fantastic tale. For the most part, the two feel like either-or situations. It could very well be the limitations of consoles, or it could be a creative decision. Sounding like a broken record: I'm much more interested in a great narrative than having a seemingly random excuse to go and explore a world. Why can't the two be one?
you want a real good story telling in an actually open world try dragon age :origins (dragon age 2 is a shame on the rpgs in my opinion ) or la noire both are great
@yahia_hitman I liked Dragon Age 2, if mostly for its writing/ story telling. Sure the ending was abrupt and the limited exploration was a let down, but it did something a lot of franchise sequels don't do anymore and that's to be different. Dragon Age: Origins wasn't open world nor was it particularly engaging story telling.
1 Like I think its difficult to have great story telling in an open world game because of the lack of urgency. When you're able to complete various side quests and do other activities before you have to "rush" to the enemy base and stop them from completing their plot it takes a bit of the thrill out of that story mission sequence.
1 Like Id agree with Far Cry 3 having a good storyline for an open-world, but I think it didn't do an open-world justice...
...okay, yes, it was glorious fun to shoot everything in sight, craft items, and take on the pirates. But it had no setpieces that wowed me like Skyrim, no background interactivity like GTA IV. Nothing really stood out to me as great about the open world. It could have been linear for all I care and it would still accomplish what it did.
I guess I'm waiting for a good open-world/story-driven game. Skyrim is closest to that, only because it provides great side-quests and retains an amazing open-world. Now if only the main story was more than decent...
free roaming and storytelling will never come along together. they are mutually exclusive design elements. you can have either one or the other
2 Like I think a lot of the time it comes down to preference...games like Skyrim leave it up to the player to discover the story, it's there if you want it, or you can explore until there's nothing left. That's kind of the point, I think. I understand that some people prefer to have a story told to them, but I think there are great advantages to both sides. Metal Gear Solid (the series as a whole) is kind of the other extreme, where the creators use story in a very heavy handed way...and I have to say, both Elder Scrolls and MGS are some of my favorite games of all time. But there are indeed games out there that blend the two perspectives. Nice post.
1 Like Im suprised u didnt mention Red Dead, GTA or any of Rockstars open world masterpieces. I think Rockstar Games are at the pinnacle of game development whereby their games always combine strong storytelling and gameplay alongside a real sense of attention and care to detail.
1 Like hm...lets wait for metal gear solid: ground zeroes, its an open world game and kojima promising new method of storytelling
How came that you write about open world games and you dont even bother to mention gta series and red dead redemption,? the best games i have ever played. incredible!!
3 Like In games such as Red Dead Redemption and GTA series, the open world exploration and storytelling can seemingly go well together because the central storyline is focused on the character itself. However in RPGs it is a whole different ballgame as the storyline tends to be about the "world-saving" grand scheme which will lends its urgency to the gameplay by restricting exploration possibilities. Case in-point of a open world RPG with bad storytelling would be the Elder Scroll series, as despite the imminent 'disaster', you will never feel it as there are no cues whatsoever to highlight this. Players can still dilly dally go about their own business.
2 Like @ottumatic Agreed on Oblivion. As much as I like Oblivion and Fallout 3 (though Fallout 3 has a better story), I find it comedically ironic that the 'poor-man's equivelant', Divinity II, has a much better narative.
1 Like We are still awaiting the watershed moment that melds a true open-world game with an interactive, top notch and expansive story and until that game comes along and shows the publishers and developers that this kind of game can make a profit we are stuck without one.
2 Like I find just the opposite of the opinion that open world games story take a back seat. The Elder Scroll lore is so amazing and vast it is breath taking. I spent two and a half weeks going through and reading TES timeline. Once you understand the terms and events it is truly one of the most epic myths of our time. To live and take part of this world, it's people, and place( when and where you want to) it becomes something that no single linear game can touch.
3 Like @neroist The problem here is that you are dealing more with story lore than actual story. When you're reading about history in the game world, it's cool because it kind of draws you into everything, but at the end of the day that's not a story you're really actively taking part in when you play the game.
I am reminded of Metroid Prime, and the scan visor in that game. I thought that was a really nice touch, because you would like come to a room full of futuristic lab equipment and there might be a broken tube, and you'd scan stuff in the room and kind of put two and two together and be like, "Oh, that tube was an incubator, and a monster broke out of it!" I felt like that did a pretty good job of adding lore to the game while keeping it relevant to the actual story the player was experiencing as Samus.
I enjoyed learning about some of the lore of Halo, so I can kind of see where you're coming from, but then it's like it's just more geek knowledge for you that doesn't really matter in the grand scope of things. I guess I just prefer regular storytelling to lore.
I think lore really appeals more to certain types of players than others.
Well I don't think an open world game can have a great story just because you can do so many side quests and story quest in any giver order ... how can you tell a great story if you have the freedom to unveil the story in a different order ???
I know that story quest have to be done in the right order because anyway you can't access them until you have done the previous quest but still ... you could wander 10 h on side quests before attempting the story ... and even then ... you have done more side quests maybe you have better gears etc etc etc ...
I loved how FFXIII-2 did it. you have a story driven game but you have also the choice of going offroad and even at one point the game kind of force you into side questing. But at every start of the game you have a little reminder of what have happened.
I may add that I really loved Fallout 3 ... it is the only sandbox game that I ever enjoyed. GTA, Assassin Creed , Elder Scroll and all the other sand box game were always boring after a while, the story is forgettable and the pacing is kind of meh.
3 Like I have bit of beef with Sandbox games, i think Freedom in games is sometimes vastly overrated and would much rather a somewhat linear, story driven game. No like Final Fantasy XIII, just to be clear, there is linear and then there is Final Fantasy XIII.
4 Like I honestly think that at the moment the two are at odds with each other. To maintain a tight narrative and control the pace of a story you need to keep the game focussed and linear. This seems very unfashionable at the moment but the Half Life games are just this and although we are essentially walking down a corridor it never feels like it. A huge open world where you can take things at your own pace and do frivolous side missions would detract from the urgency of the story and overall immersion. I found the story missions in Far Cry 3 to be some of the best of the game but essentially they were played out in large set areas and anything outside them was redundant to the main thread. Playing the last 5 missions consecutively was a blast and made all the hunting and racing feel like timewasting.
I am worried for a game like The Witcher 3 where they are promising enormous playing areas but really, what's the point? Unless they somehow tie the locations together (with smart backtracking if needs be) they are a series of arenas stuck together. Perhaps user generated quests would be an amazing way to utilise a virtual playground for gamers.
A great compromise though is a game like Fallout 3 where the world itself is the story. The main quest was forgettable and it was the exploration that became a story that you kind of wrote yourself by playing it. It made the travelling around actually part of the game instead of using a quick travel option. This is like The Day Z where players have incredible stories that were never written by the developers.
I don't about you but most of the GTA series do have a decent story.The part of Assassin's creed story that somewhat sucked was Desmond's storyline.
1 Like Fallout 3 and Fallout New Vegas (mainly just Fallout 3) were good at this. I also thought TES:Oblivion had an interesting story. Skyrim's story has been kind of boring so far though. Dragon Age:Origins didn't have the most original story, but it was still really interesting. The Mass Effect trilogy (if you consider it open world) had a good story until it dropped a huge turd of an ending in the last minute. I don't know why, but I stopped caring about AC's story after the first game.
1 Like @thereal-15-cent Agreed.
Fallout 3's story is pretty damn good. Oblivion's story is decent. But once it goes into the all-too-cliche' power fantasy of being "the one", I start snoring. From what I hear, Skyrim does exactly that.
1 Like Divinity II Director's Cut (PC via GOG and Steam) blends open-world and story-telling very well. Some consider it a 'poor-man's Oblivion', but it gets alot right. Hell, it manages to have a better story than Oblivion and DII's combat hands Oblivion's ass back to it. And Larian Studios pulled this off with a shoe-string budget, might I add.
Here's a Youtube clip I created using FRAPS to show Divinity II during a major plot point: http://youtu.be/z7dKtncXnlE
2 Like It's a hard balance them out. Take the 2 games you most likely though about while writing this post.. Assassin's Creed and Skyrim. Both are open-world but completely different. Assassin's Creed was extremely story-driven and focused , but it was open-world. There were certain areas of the map which were locked because those areas were crucial to the story. In type this might sound solid but it is extremely flawed... nothing is much more frustrating than running from the law and turning a corner to hit a blue wall of mist where a street is because I ''haven't unlocked this story yet'' . Skyrim took this to the other extreme.. while exploring I would go into a dungeon , conquer it , and leave only to find out days later that it was part of a complex story quest. Skyrim's extreme openness often ruined the deep quests that went with it. If you're looking for a good balance Arkham City is a fantastic blend.
4 Like I think the last open world game that had a story I loved was Red Dead Redemption now that is just my personal opinion, but after the long quest with John Marston the way it ended sadden me but the game always told it is impossible to get out alive when you make a deal with the devil. I was sad because of the fate of one character and not because it was a disappointing ending or underwhelming ending, it was an excellent ending
1 Like I think you're more likely to get a really good storyline from an open world game that isn't also an RPG. So many publishers work on the basis that people like Suikogaiden below want to make their own story through their character which to me is a monumental cop-out.
FONV and Morrowind are the best examples I've seen. Maybe a future fallout game will deliver, Bethesda have released two of the worst main plots ever with Oblivion and Skyrim so I wouldn't rely on them ever matching what they did with Morrowind.
I haven't played much of Far Cry 3 yet though it seems to have most of what you're looking for or have you got further into it and been disappointed?
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1 Like @Suikogaiden Of course it can. Main plots in open world games are there to follow if you want to see how things pan out or ignore if you don't care and just want to explore.
1 Like Fallout: New Vegas.
Play it and then you'll rethink this post.
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt.
It was just announced as a fully open-world game that focuses on story.
@NeonNinja Started on New Vegas a couple months ago, don't know why I haven't picked it up again...
1 Like Sefrix had a pretty cool idea actually of having an open world where things happened regardless of whether you were there or not. The problem with that, much like in the real world, there would be reactions and then more reactions and I'm just not sure even powerful PCs or games developers are able to keep up with something of that caliber. It would rock if they did though :D.
From what you've said, I think the best way to do that would be to combine open world with some linear aspects. The strongest story telling needs to follow a more linear route, simply because trying to account for every possible action would be too much work for the developers. A story is made up of a few key moments, a few major events and the rest is merely filler. So if the major events were more linear but the filler part of it was free form play, perhaps you could get really close to what you want. An open world with a fulfilling storyline?
1 Like I am currently coming to the end of my first play through of the Witcher 2 and through out have thought that although the story is fantastic and the world very rich and full of character it is often hindered by as you mention not be a fully realized open world, however i think The Witcher presents possibly the greatest hope of marring the two with the announcement that The Witcher 3 will be a fully open world experience with a map a possible 40% larger than Skyrims which will take up to 40 minutes to transverse and so long as they keep up the quality character design and writing they you may be getting your wish answered fairly soon.
1 Like The two can be one, if there can be a way to make the in-game world feel like it's actually breathing and alive, as well with story elements that affect the world . I'm sure with a bit of experimentation and hard work, it would be possible to pull it off.
1 Like I have to admit, i kinda barfed a bit when you mentioned DmC (unless you meant the old games which is DMC). Sure, the story was messed up in DMC 2, because the original creator didn't know about the game before later.
Bioware is long gone as a story teller, so i think DA3 will be another example of that. Bethesda will attempt to do it again, but ultimately end up with another Skyrim.
My faith is in CDPR to do it with The Witcher 3. Not only is it a talented developer, but the attitude is definitely somewhere else, compared to other companies.
With that said, if you really want to support CDPR, buy the game through www.gog.com on PC.
4 Like What I really want to see is a truly persistent open world. By that I mean I want the story to happen whether I am present or not. It shouldn't wait for me to do a certain quest before proceeding as that can seriously break down the story. I think it would be amazing if the you heard about something that happened at another place at a certain time, then on a second playthrough you are sure to be there and actually witness it happening. This would also create more immersion as you would actively try and find out what was happening in that open world so you wouldn't miss something. In fact make it to where you can't possibly see everything in one go, with multiple things happening at the same time, just like it actually would if the open world were real. Something like that would have me incredibly excited.
2 Like @blueinheaven nonono I would want it like Skyrim or Fallout or GTA or whatever. I want to be in one city doing whatever it is I'm doing, and overhear someone talking about something some king did lets say in another city, so I head over to that city and it's been destroyed. Next playthrough I remember this and I am there at that city at the same time and the king attacks the city and I witness/take part/defend that city.
How games are now, the king would not act (even it would make no sense for him to not act for days or whatever) until I as the player character begin a quest. They fake this to a degree by placing triggers in locations so you can enter a location and make something in the world happen, but not to the degree I am talking about.
