The perils of having an 'open world'.

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The perils of having an 'open world'.

Haven't played Witcher 1 or 2 or Fallout 3? Some SPOILERS abound!

The perils of having an open-world. Exactly how open shall it be? This is a post regarding open-world exploration but also narration. This is NOT only about being able to get into areas you aren't ready to be in(getting pummeled by high-level monsters as a result). I am actually for that aspect of freedom and no level-scaling of enemies, but how free are we to be? Are we to be served an Bethesda-like open-world, or is CDPR going to keep true to some game mechanics of the previous Witcher games?

Let me tell you a story: Once upon a time in an open-world RPG called Fallout 3 I traveled far and wide in search for, well, a nice game experience that didn't end the game too soon. Being experienced in how Bethesda develop and build their open-world games, I knew for a fact that if the game's main quest pointed me in one direction, I would do well to go in the opposite direction. This instinct has actually served me well regarding open-world games(it served me well in Morrowind, Oblivion and Skyrim at least), and not completing them too fast. But lo and behold, I accidentally stumbled upon a location that, to my dismay, was the intended location in the main quest. Consequently all, and I do mean ALL, quests that led up to that point were cancelled. Quite logical of course, because as I've said, I've already found
Daddy
and needn't meet various characters and do their hazardous quests that would lead to that point. But I wanted to do those quests.

In Witcher 1, imagine immediately stumbling over
Azar Javed
, sleeping off the worst of a fisstech high in a fisstech-shack in Temple quarter, cancelling out all quests leading up to finding him. ALL the quests in Chapter 1 that I loved to do, leading up to finding him would have been cancelled. Of course, because of the player's limitation of freedom and the games narration obviously, you couldn't, which I as a player am thankful for. In that game the limitatons were various things, and explained and motivated accordingly = The Catriona plague-quarantine, and day- and night passes, people desiring favours for information gathering, as well as one of the best detective stories I've ever seen!
You simply couldn't stumble upon them(before it was time) as they were in hiding, and had better connections in Vizima than Geralt, as King Foltest weren't home.

Let me run the same scenario in Witcher 2, regarding finding
Iorveth
or
Letho
before it is time. You simply can't. They are in hiding. You can't get there. You simply can't. I tried, only to realise that the only road in getting to that place is, up until it is time, blocked by a faulty bridge. Faulty as in it is "out", and not in place to pass over, but I do like to believe that Geralt could jump or climb that small distance. I love CDPR and the Witcher games, but that, comparing to Witcher 1 wasn't, well...invisible walls in old games anyone? Couldn't the player be allowed to enter the region but not find anything instead? On a good note, you can't fight the Arachas there until it is time. Nor the Kayran for that matter, he simply won't show until you have prepared and done some quests, though you are free to explore his lair before that. Which is good in my book. :D

No matter. I trust CDPR will make a great game as they have before, but they are now dipping into 'open-world' exploration with Witcher 3, and I for one am curious how they will solve these matters.

My question is: How open should Witcher 3 be?
* A too 'open-world', or 'all out open', could lead to the possibility of cancelling out quests by discovering antagonists by chance, disrupting the intended narration.

* In a 'freedom-limited-world' it's like Witcher 1, you can eventually go everywhere, but because of narration and logical explanation you can't go everywhere in the beginning. Think of it as you cannot cross the seas without a boat. And the boat will only be available after a couple of quests.

* In a 'narrative-limited-world' you may go everywhere from the start, but can't stumble upon main antagonists until it is time, and you have done certain amount of quests.

There, if you managed to read this far, congrats! And thank you! :D

And to finish this topic, I am just going to say this: I only got to see Vergen in war-time.

Choices and their consequences...but that's for another topic. :rolleyes:
 
Sorry, there is a forum policy against posting spoilers in the general discussion, and it is there for good reason. Do not post spoilers except as they are strictly necessary and you can comply with this rule.

Use spoiler tags:

Code:
[spoiler]This reveals the name of the antagonist in Acts II-V.[/spoiler]
 
GuyN said:
Sorry, there is a forum policy against posting spoilers in the general discussion, and it is there for good reason. Do not post spoilers except as they are strictly necessary and you can comply with this rule.

Use spoiler tags:

Code:
[spoiler]This reveals the name of the antagonist in Acts II-V.[/spoiler]

Better?
 
GuyN said:
Sorry, there is a forum policy against posting spoilers in the general discussion, and it is there for good reason. Do not post spoilers except as they are strictly necessary and you can comply with this rule.

Use spoiler tags:

Code:
[spoiler]This reveals the name of the antagonist in Acts II-V.[/spoiler]

Hey, I'm grateful for the warning, and against spoilers myself, but I need some moderator action here. :D Is it okay now, or need I edit it further?
 
BellatorPiusGratus said:
Hey, I'm grateful for the warning, and against spoilers myself, but I need some moderator action here. :D Is it okay now, or need I edit it further?

The way you've edited your post is fine. Thank you for taking the time and care to do so.
 
GuyN said:
The way you've edited your post is fine. Thank you for taking the time and care to do so.

No, thank you for your immediate moderator action and for teaching me spoilers function! :D Sorry for posting spoilers, I never had the intention of ruining anyones gaming experience.
 
Well on the topic of finding people too soon, an open world game can still have locked doors. In TW2 for example I stumbled upon Lethos' cave pretty early in Chapter 2 while looking around the wilderness but there was a door and it was locked, that prevented that.

On the topic of open world it's a very tough call. I mean my perfect game in a perfect world I guess would be a fully open world with all the depth of TW1+2. That may be too tall of an order to work in reality. Although we are being promised something like that so who knows? Maybe this will be my perfect game.

I wouldn't mind if this game had TW1 style of world progression as a compromise though.
 
CDPR said that they have this new kind of non linearity where you can go to whatever region you want from the start and do storyline there and it sounds really awesome. They surely have designed it that you dont find things you arent ment to in the beginning though.
 
Red0oG said:
CDPR said that they have this new kind of non linearity where you can go to whatever region you want from the start and do storyline there and it sounds really awesome. They surely have designed it that you dont find things you arent ment to in the beginning though.

Ooh when did they say this? I must have missed it but that sounds great as well.
 
vincentdante said:
Ooh when did they say this? I must have missed it but that sounds great as well.

Yep, the natural limit will probably be the non-levelscaling foes that you will encounter. I really like it like that personally.^^
 
vincentdante said:
Ooh when did they say this? I must have missed it but that sounds great as well.

They mentioned it in a couple of articles I stumbled upon, also I think they said it in the dev video series they did for gameinformer aswell.
 
ViZ7 said:
Yep, the natural limit will probably be the non-levelscaling foes that you will encounter. I really like it like that personally.^^

I knew about this but I always support it :D

ViZ7 said:
They mentioned it in a couple of articles I stumbled upon, also I think they said it in the dev video series they did for gameinformer aswell.

That explains it then, I don't really follow anything game informer do. But I will have to dig out these videos now.
 
OP: I think what you may be failing to recognise is the brilliance of the Red Engine. In TW2 there were numerous times where, on separate playthroughs, you make minor choice alterations and yet something completely different occurs. I'm talking, without any specifics to avoid spoilers, about parts of the map opening or closing, NPCs appearing alive or dead.

Basically they appear to be able to transition from one state to another seamlessly.

I'm a computer programmer and a long time open world gamer, and I was astonished at times in the variation presented to me in my now 6 full playthroughs of TW2.

and that was a previous version of the Red Engine.

I have absolutely no doubt TW3 will expand upon this, and any fears you may have are utterly groundless.

:)
 
OP: you make a lot of good points. Doing Open World and getting the benefits of a limited world requires some pretty hard core problem solving. It's difficult, just as another example, to maintain a sense of urgency when the PC can get up and walk away. Suppose you have a few quests that occur in a burning village and then you leave and explore the map for several days before you come back. Should those quests be thrown away and counted as failed? What if one or more are important to the main story? What if the designers put a lot of effort into them and want them to be noticed? There are ways you can fix the problem: trap the player temporarily, explain that the consequences of leaving are huge, show an animation of the burning town being anihilated in the distance, etc. All of these things require thought and effort and I hope they get it right.

As for tough enemies being a barrier: yes that can be a lot of fun. It's great replay value when you play a second time and exploit tricks you learned from earlier playthroughs to get you places sooner than you otherwise would. The trouble is it has to be done right. The enemies can't be too hard or else it becomes obvious that they're really just a barrier. This is especially true if the enemies are much tougher than they look, or if there's just so many that you avoid going to a place because it slows your computer too much.
 
Thothistox said:
OP: you make a lot of good points. Doing Open World and getting the benefits of a limited world requires some pretty hard core problem solving. It's difficult, just as another example, to maintain a sense of urgency when the PC can get up and walk away. Suppose you have a few quests that occur in a burning village and then you leave and explore the map for several days before you come back. Should those quests be thrown away and counted as failed? What if one or more are important to the main story? What if the designers put a lot of effort into them and want them to be noticed? There are ways you can fix the problem: trap the player temporarily, explain that the consequences of leaving are huge, show an animation of the burning town being anihilated in the distance, etc. All of these things require thought and effort and I hope they get it right.

Yes, this is something I worry about. In RPG it is kind of hard to pull it off. In adventure games it is easier if it is explained inside a story. In AC games during quite a few sequences we simply can't leave a certain area without desynchronization, and in this case we have to start from the beginning in order to see this event to its conclusion. So exploration and side activities are mostly done between memories. Far Cry 3 used the same approach at certain points. I find it a good solution.

If I were to choose between a story without any urgent events, where everything can be put on hold, and a story flow be sacrificed in favor of free roaming, or immersion-breaking artificial story boundaries that make us to continue a main quest, I would prefer the second approach. Screw possible immersion breakers and restricted free roaming, I want a good story first, and everything else only second.
 
The game Gothic 2 is actually a good example to the 'all open world' notion. It has enemy scaling but if u are good enough in combat u can kill them(very hard though) and get the reward very early in the game, which could be a solution to a quest. You could also meet people that matter very much in the game in the beginning of the narrative which become very important in the future, but to that time they are simple interesting NPCs that u stumbled upon. The situation u are in as Geralt are the main triggers of the story and quest. For example, u could see a guy in the inn that has a grim look on his face, after a few conversations around the town u may get the idea that the guy described as a thief has matching characteristics with guy u saw in the inn. Then u revisit him and see that new dialog options are open and then find out he is the guy and deal with him, the quest is solved and reward is collected. Your might as-well killed him in the inn just because he looked at u, but why would u do it and get yourself involved with the guards and stuff. I mean the knowledge of the environment and situations play the key role in the development of the narrative and open-world experience.

Sorry for the long text but ideas escalated rapidly.
 
I guess our efforts here will be fruitless because cdpr already figured out how they want to create their open world.
 
Hey, look at all these great posts! :D

Now to some answers:

Vincent dante said:

"but there was a door and it was locked, that prevented that."

Really? I assume it’s the same cave we’re talking about. What version did you play? On which platform I mean?

"I wouldn't mind if this game had TW1 style of world progression as a compromise though."

Me neither, that’s why you may vote for more than one alternative in the poll. :D


Red0og said:

"They surely have designed it that you dont find things you arent ment to in the beginning though."

I’m sure you’re right. :D


Kudos said:

"I think what you may be failing to recognise is the brilliance of the Red Engine…I'm a computer programmer and a long time open world gamer, and I was astonished at times in the variation presented to me in my now 6 full playthroughs of TW2.
and that was a previous version of the Red Engine. I have absolutely no doubt TW3 will expand upon this, and any fears you may have are utterly groundless.”

No, I’m actually a long time fan of RED Engine, but regarding the extent of the games brilliance I realise now what you’re saying is right. I take your word for being a programmer, and you’re right, CDPR really know how to design and provide material for many playthroughs. It’s incredible when you think of it. I am sure they will continue to do just that. =)
 
Thothistox said:
OP: you make a lot of good points. Doing Open World and getting the benefits of a limited world requires some pretty hard core problem solving. It's difficult, just as another example, to maintain a sense of urgency when the PC can get up and walk away. Suppose you have a few quests that occur in a burning village and then you leave and explore the map for several days before you come back. Should those quests be thrown away and counted as failed? What if one or more are important to the main story? What if the designers put a lot of effort into them and want them to be noticed? There are ways you can fix the problem: trap the player temporarily, explain that the consequences of leaving are huge, show an animation of the burning town being anihilated in the distance, etc. All of these things require thought and effort and I hope they get it right.

As for tough enemies being a barrier: yes that can be a lot of fun. It's great replay value when you play a second time and exploit tricks you learned from earlier playthroughs to get you places sooner than you otherwise would. The trouble is it has to be done right. The enemies can't be too hard or else it becomes obvious that they're really just a barrier. This is especially true if the enemies are much tougher than they look, or if there's just so many that you avoid going to a place because it slows your computer too much.

Thank you kindly for your words, I thought about the points I was trying to make for a long while. =)

I of course realise the devs trapping you in a boss fight, and you cannot escape from your advesary, or walk away from a burning village you need to save in a quest. It would logically be best explained by the PC being surrounded by flames. Right? And it would provide a barrier and a reason for the player to remain in the area until the flames or other burning matters have been thourougly doused. :D I'm sure the devs get it right, but these posts might give them some feedback, eh? ;)

Regarding enemies I recommend you play Gothic 1 and 2(and Risen 1 and 2). Many doubters or haters that can't play any of them but for me, if you remain unhindered by game bugs(Risen), they are great games, and exactly what you talk about. If you're good enough you find strategies to fight very overwhelming monsters(one hit = your death) and as your character level you wonder why you felt so overwhelmed in the beginning. As for too tough enemies as a barrier, play Fallout New Vegas. I tried to run(north) to New Vegas just for laughs in the beginning of the game. Just for laughs, but you can make it. The world is open for you to try anyway. :D
 
vivaxardas said:
Yes, this is something I worry about. In RPG it is kind of hard to pull it off. In adventure games it is easier if it is explained inside a story. In AC games during quite a few sequences we simply can't leave a certain area without desynchronization, and in this case we have to start from the beginning in order to see this event to its conclusion. So exploration and side activities are mostly done between memories. Far Cry 3 used the same approach at certain points. I find it a good solution.

If I were to choose between a story without any urgent events, where everything can be put on hold, and a story flow be sacrificed in favor of free roaming, or immersion-breaking artificial story boundaries that make us to continue a main quest, I would prefer the second approach. Screw possible immersion breakers and restricted free roaming, I want a good story first, and everything else only second.


Thank you for contributing! AC and Far cry 3 = great games! And yeah, you are open to explore both at whim but they are fairly narrative-restricted, you cannot go everywhere from the start. You cannot go everywhere from the start, but the areas you may roam in are huge. And then the rest of the game opens up. Great! :rolleyes:

I know I'll be glad with whatever CDPR does, as long as they don't "mess up" like Bethesda did with Fallout in my example. But that's just little me. In Skyrim, that little location where the game wants you to go? I didn't, and remained dragon-free as long as I wanted. And that was just what I wanted, a choice to choose main quest progression speed. :rolleyes:
 
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