MGSV is room by room, there is just a big fat emptiness between each room.
no, it's really not. the virtue of being open world means it is not a fragmented environment like the room-by-room games. mgs4's tailing mission was a tedious experience because of the disconnect in environments, where mgsv's tailing mission(s) in an open environment removes this problem.
and there are still threats/opportunities for player engagement between the main larger outposts/villages. smaller guard posts and roaming foot patrols occur on the stretches of roads, not to mention a few side-ops off the beaten path. but that's not the point. mgsv's open world is not like the witcher 3 or gtav. it's a world you can actively jump out of if you want. don't like travelling across the map and haven't unlocked the fast travel for the place you want to go? hit the pause button and go back to the acc to be dropped in closer. the option is there for a reason. it's not an open world you have to exist in actively 100% of the time to get around.
pretty much all open worlds have stretches of fuck all, at least mgsv has the courtesy of not making you exist constantly within the world to the point you can't just get plopped where you need to be without being at a fast travel point.
don't like having to run a little bit sometimes to get closer to the mission area? that's the trade off for picking a landing zone where your chopper doesn't get immediately spotted, or gives you a chance to reach a vantage point to survey the area. run, use d-horse, d-walker, a jeep, a tank, a truck, slide down a hill in a box. the options are all there.
'where do the bees sleep' is one of the best missions in the game even though the mission objective is sooooo far from the start point. the fun of that mission is making it past the guard posts, then that great bridge area, and onwards towards the hamid fighter base and then into a catacombs within it. it's conical game design, it funnels you in closer and closer the further into the mission you get. it builds the tension by giving you the advantage of open space at first before it takes that away from you.
that's applied to the open world as well. don't want to fuck around with road patrols and smaller guard posts? you're given ample space to avoid them most of the time, but when you get closer to a base you better be on your goddamn guard. that's the point. the space is a player advantage when needed.
