One outpost was great, then it got rinsed and repeated ad nauseam.
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Anyone else feel they've outgrown linear experiences?
- Thread starter daninthemix
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More_Badass
Member
Eh, I enjoyed trying different approaches, setting up kill chains, etc. Each one was a new mini sandox to test out new abilities and weapons
This.
I mean, "outgrow" linear experiences? That's purposely limiting your catalog A LOT.
I can enjoy all kinds of experiences, linear or open.
EatinOlives
Member
I used to think I had a problem with linear games, but I've come to realize that I don't.
I don't have a problem with a linear game overall, I have a problem with un-challenging, linear minute-to-minute gameplay. That particular combination is way more common than I'd like, but it's there.
Linearity that I don't mind:
-Games like Super Mario 3DW. There's clearly just one way to finish a level and you almost always follow the same path. Far less "freedom" to go wherever you want because the game's level design pushes you forward. However, the game's emphasis on platforming and execution of acrobatics and new level ideas being constantly thrown in keeps things fresh and engaging.
-Twitch games based on execution. I like Super Meat Boy, Super Monkey Ball, Trackmania, etc. They're games that can get really difficult and they're VERY linear but the games engage me by challenging me to perform very well on them.
Linearity I dislike:
-"Setpiece", "cinematic" games. Just about the only games in this sub-genre I can stand is the Uncharted series. The vast majority of single-player shooter campaigns, the Metro series, etc. bore me to death. They're not hard enough for me to feel engaged in terms of executing the right actions with the right timing, and the stories certainly don't give me a reason to keep playing. Things happening despite me just because I pressed "forward" don't do anything for me unless they're done like once per game in a very short sequence.
Ultimately I think the lack of player agency is what bothers me most about these kinds of games. If the game can properly communicate that the game moves forward or not depending on whether I do something, great. If the game's idea of player agency is "walk to up to object and press A to awesome" then no, it's guaranteed I'll be bored within 20 minutes.
If I still feel "in control" of the overall experience then I don't mind linearity. If all I'm doing is "being along for the ride" it's going to lose my interest.
I don't have a problem with a linear game overall, I have a problem with un-challenging, linear minute-to-minute gameplay. That particular combination is way more common than I'd like, but it's there.
Linearity that I don't mind:
-Games like Super Mario 3DW. There's clearly just one way to finish a level and you almost always follow the same path. Far less "freedom" to go wherever you want because the game's level design pushes you forward. However, the game's emphasis on platforming and execution of acrobatics and new level ideas being constantly thrown in keeps things fresh and engaging.
-Twitch games based on execution. I like Super Meat Boy, Super Monkey Ball, Trackmania, etc. They're games that can get really difficult and they're VERY linear but the games engage me by challenging me to perform very well on them.
Linearity I dislike:
-"Setpiece", "cinematic" games. Just about the only games in this sub-genre I can stand is the Uncharted series. The vast majority of single-player shooter campaigns, the Metro series, etc. bore me to death. They're not hard enough for me to feel engaged in terms of executing the right actions with the right timing, and the stories certainly don't give me a reason to keep playing. Things happening despite me just because I pressed "forward" don't do anything for me unless they're done like once per game in a very short sequence.
Ultimately I think the lack of player agency is what bothers me most about these kinds of games. If the game can properly communicate that the game moves forward or not depending on whether I do something, great. If the game's idea of player agency is "walk to up to object and press A to awesome" then no, it's guaranteed I'll be bored within 20 minutes.
If I still feel "in control" of the overall experience then I don't mind linearity. If all I'm doing is "being along for the ride" it's going to lose my interest.
InsaneTiger
Member
I feel the opposite. I am getting tired of every damn game being an open-world especially when the story tend to suffer because there are to many damn side-quests and stuff.
Yeah this. Open world collect a thons are gross. Would much prefer a linear experience.
Absolutely not. Just coming off playing Crimson Clover I was reminded of how much I love the purity of a linear, focused, skill-based game. If anything I've been gradually moving away from branching epics. The open world formula is getting a little tired and is need of something different to shake it up. Greatly looking forward to No Man's Sky for this reason.
SonyToo!;156878743 said:
I outgrew sandboxes years ago
This never gets old
A good linear game generally has so many benefits over openworld/sandboxes, they are generally paced better making much tighter experiences, they are also better at repetition imo. Openworld's have you repeating the same tasks over and over for XP or an item but a good gameplay focussed linear game can use score attack / time attack that forces the player to use their brain and be more creative rather than grinding away.
A good sandbox is awesome, but the open world games we've been getting in droves lately have been pretty far away from good sandbox material. In fact, I wouldn't even call them sandboxes, but rather checklist simulators.
That being said, I agree that linear games can be great, too.
geordiemp
Member
The problem with open world games is the dev wants to direct you to every inch of the map and spend some time there.
Hence cometh the collectathons...
I like multiple ways to traverse a map, lets have different battles and enemies in different areas, but no need to be collecting all the bloody time.
TLOU was excellent, linear but had multiple routes and ways to approach, each map had a start and end but 20 different ways to get through it....and story between maps.
Hope this does not go way, ever.
Dragon age inquisition was good, could of been excellent with more enemy density and less collecting side missions. Could of been OMG best ever with a coop option for the main quest (somehow). Also it was too easy.
Hence cometh the collectathons...
I like multiple ways to traverse a map, lets have different battles and enemies in different areas, but no need to be collecting all the bloody time.
TLOU was excellent, linear but had multiple routes and ways to approach, each map had a start and end but 20 different ways to get through it....and story between maps.
Hope this does not go way, ever.
Dragon age inquisition was good, could of been excellent with more enemy density and less collecting side missions. Could of been OMG best ever with a coop option for the main quest (somehow). Also it was too easy.
NullPointer
Member
Pretty much.
For my part I love open worlds and think they're the greatest thing to happen to this medium, in theory. But a lack of persistence (why did my car just go poof?), a preponderance of small return-to-mission-area boundaries, and shallow, by the numbers side-quests that are the tiniest of repetitive gameplay-snacks -- yeah, that has gotten way old.
There are bad ways to do linear games and open games, but so many open world games feel like they're filled with chores and unlocks and long term resource gathering rather than striking any new or interesting ground. Shadow of Mordor bucked this trend a decent bit but still falls squarely into the one-size-fits-all open world template for most of it. The games all start to blend into each other. Oh I found the tower for this region and cleared the fog of war away to reveal a shitton of side-quest and collectibles icons.... great...
You will note the carefully chosen phrase "almost universally" in the post you quoted. Super Mario Galaxy was a great game despite that approach, but I wouldn't say the same thing about every Mario platformer.
And no, I'm not conflating it with anything else, although "designed by committee" might not have been the best way to describe it. Maybe "Auto-Tune for game design" is a better way to describe that over-reliance on playtesting. What you seem to be calling "artificially difficult" is what I'd argue is the more genuine, honest, and (to me, anyway) more enjoyable experience, and the experience that is always "usable" and efficient and otherwise "smooth" is the one that I find feels artificial and much harder to enjoy.
I want the developer to build the game and then to leave me to it, potholes and all, instead of feeling the relentless guiding hand of the big capital GD Game Design nudging me through everything at what it thinks is supposed to be the perfect ease and tempo of the game.
bobbychalkers
Member
The opposite really. I burn out on most open world games rather quickly. The second I feel that I'm no longer having fun and I'm just check-listing I'm out. Depending on how you interact with the game world and it's narrative, linear games are A-Ok in my opinion.
"Open world design" is stagnant as fuck. It's the same shit, every single time, repackaged slightly different. When's the last time a game actually did something different with an open world? Shadow of the Colossus ten years ago?
OldSkoolFool
Member
No.
I far prefer 'corridor' games.
Open world games bore me if I'm honest.
I far prefer 'corridor' games.
Open world games bore me if I'm honest.
I've played SR3 and while those challenges were fun especially the game show obstacle courses I didn't have the slightest inkling to replay them once I'd beaten them unlike say a game of pinball, CoJ: Gunslinger or Bayonetta which are designed and focussed around score attack and have chaining and multipliers.
I will change my assertion to current openworld/sandbox games aren't as good at score attack compared to linear games, however I will leave a big ? over If it's possible to create true open world score attack games in the future in the same way Bulletstorm and Xotic brought score attack into the FPS genre. TBH given the way these score attack hybrids fail to set alight the sales charts it's unlikely we will see anyone make a worthy attempt at such a game.
I haven't outgrown linear experiences at all. Really, a game is a game, and all that really matters is how fun it is to play. A linear experience can be great, but so can an open world one. Sometimes after playing a lot of open world, I actively seek linear games to play, and it works the other way around, too.
Im waiting for open corridor design or open level design to comeback....basically linear experiences with medium sized open playgrounds..... ie. Crysis level design
You should really play Yakuza 4 if you want to see a unique spin on open worlds
"Open world design" is stagnant as fuck. It's the same shit, every single time, repackaged slightly different. When's the last time a game actually did something different with an open world? Shadow of the Colossus ten years ago?
You should really play Yakuza 4 if you want to see a unique spin on open worlds
"Open world design" is stagnant as fuck. It's the same shit, every single time, repackaged slightly different. When's the last time a game actually did something different with an open world? Shadow of the Colossus ten years ago?
Open world really isnt such a descriptive term. Its not that a game is open or linear, but more that its a sliding scale of linearity to openess. A six point sliding scale.
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/SlidingScaleOfLinearityVsOpenness
Most complaints I see here are targeted at games that are on the far right of this scale, open world sandbox games.
These are the easiest open world games to make, as you literally just have to extrude a large map, and drop shit in it, and as such has been abused heavily by large publishers for the ability to rapidly crank out large games using this method, to the irritation of many people who quickly grew tired of the samey feel.
3-4 (and sometimes 5) is pretty much my favourite design style in existence, and is also depressingly rare to find in large 3d games, being it takes a lot of time and effort to craft them, and the players path and experience through them.... And AAA aint got time for dat.
Dropping below 3 tends to make me feel like I am being constricted, and more on a rollercoaster ride than an actual adventure, and going too far into 5 and into 6 makes things to loose, I feel like I am wasting my time collecting doodads for no reason, doing pointless crap, and that nothing I do really has an effect on anyone or anything in the sandbox.
They have the freedom of open world games, as well as the hand designed structure of linear games, and are just plain awesome.
Its basically this:
More_Badass
Member
I'm hyped as fuck for Rain World. The open world here is more Metroid than GTA - a 2D interconnected world where you travel room to room - but the dev's vision and art design is so fucking strong. No text, no stated objective, the gameplay is the story. You're prey in a living ecosystem that thrives in the industrial ruins of an abandoned civilization. Explore, survive, gather food. The final map will be 12 regions and 700+ rooms
"Open world design" is stagnant as fuck. It's the same shit, every single time, repackaged slightly different. When's the last time a game actually did something different with an open world? Shadow of the Colossus ten years ago?
KyanMehwulfe
Member
If anything, I'm the opposite lol. Usually I'm too busy and distracted by work/company for great non-linear or sandbox games... On one hand, if I do have significant time, linear games do often leave me wanting more. Whenever I play a great linear game, I get a urge to play a big sandbox MMO with exponentially more freedom. But truth be told, as I've grown and matured, I rarely have time for that -- and even if I do have time, I'm either too OCD or too easily immersed, and I get addicted to those type of games too easily. I tried Minecraft for a while and I uninstalled it because I knew I would sink far too much time into it...
So actually as I've grown, I've become to really appreciate shorter focused linear story games. They serve a similar purpose as a movie for me. I still prefer non-linear games vastly but often they just don't suit me anymore. So in that sort of way, while I enjoy them vastly more if I ever had a month with 100% free time and no responsibilities, I've sort of outgrown being able to actually enjoy and appreciate a game like that.
Something like The Order IN CONCEPT is actually something that I like the idea of.... I stress, in concept, because I would still need far better gameplay and I want good value, too. If a game is movie length or twice movie length, the price should be similar. But I like the idea and concept behind it.
But any time I have vacation time, I always have 1 much bigger non-linear game that I've been saving that I can really immerse myself into haha. Mass Efffect 2 and 3... Deus Ex HR... GTA V and Dragon Age INQ... maybe one or two more. All of those I saved a long time until I could play them un-interupted for 1-2 weeks and really engross and immerse myself in their open worlds, epic stories, or whatever. I felt like if I played them in 2 hour sessions a few nights a week, while also preoccupied about business, just wouldn't be able to give them the attention thy deserve. Well worth it IMO. But sadly, I find my lifestyle outgrowing being able to accommodate games like that. But I definitely prefer them.
So actually as I've grown, I've become to really appreciate shorter focused linear story games. They serve a similar purpose as a movie for me. I still prefer non-linear games vastly but often they just don't suit me anymore. So in that sort of way, while I enjoy them vastly more if I ever had a month with 100% free time and no responsibilities, I've sort of outgrown being able to actually enjoy and appreciate a game like that.
Something like The Order IN CONCEPT is actually something that I like the idea of.... I stress, in concept, because I would still need far better gameplay and I want good value, too. If a game is movie length or twice movie length, the price should be similar. But I like the idea and concept behind it.
But any time I have vacation time, I always have 1 much bigger non-linear game that I've been saving that I can really immerse myself into haha. Mass Efffect 2 and 3... Deus Ex HR... GTA V and Dragon Age INQ... maybe one or two more. All of those I saved a long time until I could play them un-interupted for 1-2 weeks and really engross and immerse myself in their open worlds, epic stories, or whatever. I felt like if I played them in 2 hour sessions a few nights a week, while also preoccupied about business, just wouldn't be able to give them the attention thy deserve. Well worth it IMO. But sadly, I find my lifestyle outgrowing being able to accommodate games like that. But I definitely prefer them.
This is how I feel. They're too simple. The ones in Blood Dragon are significantly better because they can be bigger and more outlandish in layout. I haven't played Far Cry 4 yet though and I hear bases in that game get bigger. The one thing I miss from Far Cry 2 is how the actual main missions were open-ended. The bases in FC3 and 4 are just a substitute for that, and they're really the exact same concept as the bases in Assassin's Creed.
This is the main point right here. Games that do linearity well push you forward with the level design, not by taking control away from you.
This is spot-on too.
GTA is still a sandbox. It has a central gameplay loop built around vehicular mayhem combined with on-foot action to give it a sense of scale. This depends on taking place in an open world. Far Cry 3 and 4 are games that contain sandboxes. Those sandboxes are based around a gameplay loop of clearing bases and encountering enemies out in the wild, but Ubisoft forced a checklist simulator on top of it. Assassin's Creed IV Black Flag also has a sandbox gameplay loop that's about raiding ships and finding treasure, but Ubisoft forced a checklist simulator on top of that game as well.
The other, on-land Assassin's Creed games though, don't really have a central sandbox gameplay loop outside perhaps parkour. Even the first game was centered around main missions. It trued to use GTA-style sandbox technology to convey something more like a medieval Hitman game, and it didn't have enough variety. Subsequent Creed games stuck even more towards the main missions, de-emphasizing the sandbox but adding a shitload of other bloat. Ubisoft managed to stumble upon a unique sandbox gameplay loop with AC3 and 4.
Eh, Open world vs linear doesn't matter that much to me. They're just different ways of delivering content. All that matters is that the content is fun. I've played open world games that felt extremely small and limited. Like they just take a forgettable map and sprinkle stuff around it.
Choice in games doesn't matter to me much either. When I'm playing Xenoblade, it's not the fact that I have a choice of where to go on the map that's so engaging. What matters is that Xenoblade makes me WANT to explore its world thanks to its gorgeous, imaginative design. I remember one of A Link Between World's selling points was that you could choose which dungeon to go to next. Then, when I played the game I was like, "Well...guess I'll go that way." The fact that I could choose really didn't matter. What mattered was wherever I went was filled with awesome dungeons, fun hidden puzzle rooms and minigames.
Choice in games doesn't matter to me much either. When I'm playing Xenoblade, it's not the fact that I have a choice of where to go on the map that's so engaging. What matters is that Xenoblade makes me WANT to explore its world thanks to its gorgeous, imaginative design. I remember one of A Link Between World's selling points was that you could choose which dungeon to go to next. Then, when I played the game I was like, "Well...guess I'll go that way." The fact that I could choose really didn't matter. What mattered was wherever I went was filled with awesome dungeons, fun hidden puzzle rooms and minigames.
Astral Dog
Member
As long as its well executed, engaging and well designed it doesnt matter to me.
Many of recent linear games have been good: Revelations 2, Mario 3D World, Bayonetta 2,DmC DE, Last of US, etc.
Many of recent linear games have been good: Revelations 2, Mario 3D World, Bayonetta 2,DmC DE, Last of US, etc.
"Open world design" is stagnant as fuck. It's the same shit, every single time, repackaged slightly different. When's the last time a game actually did something different with an open world? Shadow of the Colossus ten years ago?
Minecraft.
HyperCubed4
Member
I haven't bought a mainstream AAA game since Watch_Dogs. I can't remember the last linear game I played. I think it was Wolfenstein a few months ago. But because I haven't played many linear games, I feel like I haven't really been playing much games. I need those linear games to pad out my time before I start playing the next one. Otherwise, I just default to TF2 whenever I'm bored. And TF2 is great and all, but I want to expand my horizons.
I want to expand my gaming horizons with linear games, if that makes sense.
I want to expand my gaming horizons with linear games, if that makes sense.
There seems to be a distinction between linear and railroaded. Linear is fine - the game has a particular path necessary to progress and complete it - you as the player have to figure out each step along that path. On the other hand when a game is railroaded, it guides you along and takes away the challenge. That diminishes the gameplay experience.
I remember feeling this way when I first played Morrowind.
As long as a game can do linear progression right, totally fine with me. I have found myself playing more open world-ish games. While the objectives are still there to progress the story, I can do side quests or something in between the story. Xenoblade for example.
I'm really looking forward to MGSV though, handling several story missions at a time, then going for side ops for recruitment/build up Mother Base, etc.
I'm really looking forward to MGSV though, handling several story missions at a time, then going for side ops for recruitment/build up Mother Base, etc.
Even the most linear experience gives the single players a wide array of options to clear the game in a mannerr that suitts them best, considering that everybody wants different things even from the same game. I still think that it's necessary to have both and to learn from these varying levels of involvement in the minds of more than one genre or rather the persons who made that experience possible in the first place.
This. I have no time and patience for open world games. I never get far in them because i grow bored of whatever grind they offer. I only achieve anything in linear games these days.
When i do play an open game, i must remind myself to stay the course and get the story over with. Or i never will.
the black pearl
Member
No. There's always room for an Uncharted, or even something like Bioshock. Alien was somewhat linear but might not be what your talking about.
Some games are going too open. I thought Arkham Asylum had the best level design in that franchise, I'm ambivalent about MGS going open world, and I hope there are some more claustrophobic, rat in a maze type levels.
Some games are going too open. I thought Arkham Asylum had the best level design in that franchise, I'm ambivalent about MGS going open world, and I hope there are some more claustrophobic, rat in a maze type levels.
But open world games are basically multiple games. It only boils down to your creativity.
texhnolyze
Banned
People seem to think that non-linear is always open world. It's not, according to OP. Few choices and branching paths here and there would be a nice addition to these linear games.
I agree, but that doesn't mean that you have to outgrow the entire experience. Just because you don't know about the environment surrounding your own adventure, you don't have to deny the genre in and by itself its entire existence.
PdotMichael
Banned
I prefer a combination of both. Games with a clear direction and goal but with parts where you can mess around and play at your one pace.
Maybe the main reason why I like the Yakuza games.
Though in my experience pure linear games are general better than pure open world games.
Maybe the main reason why I like the Yakuza games.
Though in my experience pure linear games are general better than pure open world games.
Why do you think so? Open world games include linear games in a way, even though I understand that they would not seem as "sophisticated" as an experience entirely dedicated to the principle of linearitz.
More_Badass
Member
Remember when linearity was a dreaded word? I remember it always being used in reviews as a negative.
