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Does fast travel trivialize open world games?
- Thread starter Scrabble
- Start date
Lysander91
Banned
I hear that elitist BS is fantastic too.
Mr.Wreckless
Banned
I know the definition of the word appeal.
It should probably be noted that a game with certain badly designed mechanics isn't suddenly devoid of fun. Calling a game out on bad design doesn't suddenly mean "Anybody who enjoys this is wrong and stupid for having fun with that game."
I don't think Skyrim is a very good game, but I still had some fun with parts of it.
I don't think Skyrim is a very good game, but I still had some fun with parts of it.
Freedom = $1.05
Banned
That speaks more to how far cry 2 was designed than it does to whether fast travel is a detriment to games or not.
Escape Goat
Member
unless there is fun things to do while Im traveling it reallyy shouldn't matter. I hate when MMOs would advertise how big their worlds were but when you were in the game and explored these vast zones they were largely empty and devoid of interesting encounters.
Apparently you don't if you think that sales numbers looked at in a vacuum can be used to establish the amount of appeal something has as a product.
ihearthawthats
Banned
i'm confused. why do people keep mentioning ds in a context that seems to argue against fast travel? it has fast travel.
Oh i know.
The best part about it was trying to broke the game as soon as you landed in Seyda Neen, by going around stealing over powered gear (Glass Armor and such).
Mr.Wreckless
Banned
Here is an example of something that can easily happen in an open world game like Skyrim that makes fast travel a huge benefit.
You start exploring a mountainous area around Riften and you see some caves and ruins on the mountain you want to explore. Its a total pain to get up on top of the mountain where you see the ruin but you eventually make it and have fun exploring the area. Weeks later you are doing a quest for the Dark Brotherhood and you find out some bandits with an important artifact have moved into those ruins and if you kill the leader you can get a reward and the artifact. Now i had a hard enough time getting up that mountain the first time and i already explored the immediate area so there is nothing new for me to find there. What benefit is there for me to not be able to fast travel up to that ruin and get on with the quest?
You start exploring a mountainous area around Riften and you see some caves and ruins on the mountain you want to explore. Its a total pain to get up on top of the mountain where you see the ruin but you eventually make it and have fun exploring the area. Weeks later you are doing a quest for the Dark Brotherhood and you find out some bandits with an important artifact have moved into those ruins and if you kill the leader you can get a reward and the artifact. Now i had a hard enough time getting up that mountain the first time and i already explored the immediate area so there is nothing new for me to find there. What benefit is there for me to not be able to fast travel up to that ruin and get on with the quest?
It's even better while listening to the latest Justin Bieber album. Truely the best artist of the decade.
Because it's a game that doesn't strictly need it for the most part, just for those who want to speed things up when the world's opened up enough like if you just want to forge something quickly. As noted no one's really against fast travel period, just using it as a design crutch rather than a game aid, and for Dark Souls it's absolutely a game aid 90% of the time, the other 10 percent either because they threw you in a place you literally can not leave without fast travel (end game bosses) or because it's just a pain to leave a certain place but if they designed that a bit better it wouldn't be TOO big of a deal, not like some of the walks in Skyrim.
Works fine in Fallout 3/NV.
No, it absolutely needs it in the late game. And it was much better when they added more fast travel points.
No, it absolutely needs it in the late game. And it was much better when they added more fast travel points.
What is making it so difficult to get up to the entrance of those ruins? Goofy geometry that makes it difficult to traverse or difficult enemies?
Yep, there is appeal and then there is awareness. Skyrim had more awareness -- but after the success of Dark Souls, I am sure that Bandai will put more effort into marketing the series. It will be interesting to see how it takes off with Dark Souls 2.
It's surprising to find out that "casual gamers" enjoy good challenge and design when playing games. Regular people enjoy them as much as "hardcore gamers" do. Since they are not enthusiasts, they don't know the specific terms, but they're definitely capable of telling in some form. I think a lot of GAFfers really underestimate regular people.
Ask Bethesda to design better worlds instead of making bumps and turning on SpeedTree.
littleworm
Member
After playing DayZ for hundreds of hours, it's made me appreciate fast travel in other games. Developers need to focus on making worlds that are dynamic and full of interesting shit to do everywhere you go, if they want to cut down on fast traveling, not remove the feature entirely.
Mr.Wreckless
Banned
No, enemies werent the reason it was hard to get up the mountain. It was hard to get up the mountain because its a mountain and they dont have numerous paths that allow you to climb them easily. The bandits have chosen that spot specifically because its hard for someone to reach it.
Also your herb example makes it even worse. What if i didnt make contact with the person who is willing to teach me the spell i need those herbs for yet? Now i have to climb that mountain a third time once i meet that quest giver.
If you mean after the last game bosses? I addressed that. If you meant beyond that? It's at the point where it's very useful, but usually you didn't NEED to zip around the world too much unless you ran low on supplies or wanted specific gear, though there's something to be said for the covenants. But despite the game's length and difficulty I imagine you could treasonably travel from one of the game's world to another end in a similar amount of time as it'd take to walk between a city and a somewhat distant cave in Skyrim.
But this is part of why I was talking about the playtesting angle: in Dark Souls it'd be annoying if all you had was a warp out from boss areas, but Skyrim would be literally unplayable without fast travel, so by putting it in Dark Souls you get a nice boon, whereas Skyrim's something I don't want to even think about without it being there to some extent.
EDIT: Actually, yeah, I think the speed run kinda proves just how fast you CAN travel in Dark Souls, given it's technically beatable in half an hour. Takes abusing shortcuts via the master key, but that's actually another angle where fast travel type mechanics could be minimized in favor of better design, just creating shortcuts that you unlock that'll make traveling much faster. Not that that's really relevant in Skyrim though since you can literally go in a line between many places.
What is wrong with their worlds? Skyrim is both ascetically beautiful while simultaneously providing a looming sense of tension. And I said this in the op but Bethesda is probably the best at making a player feel like their in nature. In fact I don't think any one else even comes close to nailing that aspect. And something like Fallout 3 goes in the complete opposite direction and made for one of the more interesting settings this gen.
IHaveCandy
Banned
Oldschool Final Fantasy games had the best fast travel system with airships.
LQX
Member
Playing Stalker now and holy fuck it is getting tedious. The joy of discovery wears off after you have seen most of everything and have to keep seeing it as you have to run or walk past it over and over. IMO it is necessity as it is still a game. Also, you do not need to use it so I don't see why anyone would want a feature like that cut or half-assed.
On that note Fallout 4 really does need to implement cars and/or motorcycles. Just SOMETHING to move faster, that's part of why we'll just jam to fast travel, whereas with a good vehicle we might skip it in less extreme instances just for the fun of driving around the world.
If the mountain is a well designed platforming challenge that can be conquered with skill, and you're given the choice to skip the climb and travel to the entrance of the ruins, that's fine. It's up to you.
If the mountain is a badly designed piece of geometry that involves walking up cliffs at a 90 degree angle, or the game informs you that you need to climb that a well designed mountain 50 more times, then it's a problem with the game.
CornBurrito
Member
Dark Souls has well done fast travel. Limited to where you can go, and unlocked fairly late in the game.
famousmortimer
Banned
It's hard out here for a casual pimp.
Starbuck2907
Member
As someone has already stated, Morrowind did it right. You could pay for traveling services or use a specific spell to travel to a specific spot.
Eventually, you got these boots that could let you travel long distances very quickly, but by that point, you had explored the entire map anyway.
The thing that made Morrowind fun was that you were forced to explore the world and find all sorts of cool stuff. I see people now who are "done" with Elder Scrolls games simply after they get the achievements, and I think they're crazy. Those worlds are really fun to explore. I also liked the added challenge of limited fast travel...it makes the game more strategic in a sense, and you actually HAVE to spend time thinking about how to approach situations. ...the biggest two steps backwards in those games have been unlimited fast travel and enemies that level with you. It was always fun in Morrowind, sneaking around someplace where the enemies were WAY above your level and could kill you with one hit...yet managing to get by with your wits and a skill other than just brute strength/magic. It gave the game a lot more life.
Eventually, you got these boots that could let you travel long distances very quickly, but by that point, you had explored the entire map anyway.
The thing that made Morrowind fun was that you were forced to explore the world and find all sorts of cool stuff. I see people now who are "done" with Elder Scrolls games simply after they get the achievements, and I think they're crazy. Those worlds are really fun to explore. I also liked the added challenge of limited fast travel...it makes the game more strategic in a sense, and you actually HAVE to spend time thinking about how to approach situations. ...the biggest two steps backwards in those games have been unlimited fast travel and enemies that level with you. It was always fun in Morrowind, sneaking around someplace where the enemies were WAY above your level and could kill you with one hit...yet managing to get by with your wits and a skill other than just brute strength/magic. It gave the game a lot more life.
Freezasaurus
Member
For me, it often depends on the size of the game world. If it's really huge, where it would take me 20 minutes or something to traverse the distance, then yeah, fast-travel it is.
Mr.Wreckless
Banned
Thats easy in an rpg that isnt open world. If the game is open like Skyrim then i can receive quests in an almost infinite order. I may not have 3 quests at once that take place in the same area. There may be quests in Markarth, Dawnstar, and Winterhold that have portions that require travel to Riften and if i do those quests as i get them that travel will become tedious. Oh and before you say its bad design, they could be related to the thieves guild which is located in Riften and not just a random shack or cave there.
Some of us like the fast travel option. If you dont then there are plenty of games that dont have it. Because you dont like something doesn't mean it should be removed so the rest of us who actually enjoy it will miss out.
You sound like somebody who's had some especially bad encounters with nature. Nature is beautiful and distinct at every turn. Bethesda's worlds are covered in automatically generated trees.
SoulUnison
Banned
Not when the fast travel causes a realistic amount of time to pass during the loading screen, assuming the game has a day/night/time system.
Ideally, fast travel would present a fast forwarded version of riding a cart down the road or flying a spaceship through space, etc., and there would be random chance event that could interrupt your travel and cause you to need to overcome the and/or possibly need to hoof it the rest of the way "on foot."
Maybe your carriage is attacked by bandits, or the horse was sickly and unreliable to begin with, or the car gets a flat, or *space pirates!*
We're not arguing for the removal of fast travel, stop saying that. We're arguing for a different or better implementation of it and better designed game worlds that are more than just pretty to look at.
I would be up for a limit on fast travel. Not being able to travel from end to end to the map, but on limited ranges a few times before depleting a "fast travel counter" or something. That way, you'd use the time waiting to get the "fast travel counter" to refill doing missions, or using those to being able to fast travel.
Sorta confusing but there you go.
Sorta confusing but there you go.
bigace33
Member
Man, this thread has slowly turned into a Skyrim bashing thread. It really has me thinking twice about playing now. I kind of dislike open world games at this point in my life, but I will make exceptions for exceptional games. Sleeping Dogs was great. It didn't overstay it's welcome, but has enough content for the gamer who wants to spend 30+ hours in the games world.
Tension is not something I would use to describe Skyrim's world due to level scaling and broken RPG design. There's rarely any true risk of running into something that can kill you easily.
I'd say go ahead and try it. There are lots of people who love it, and lots of people who don't. Valid criticism and praise on both sides. I got bored with it pretty quickly, but there were still parts of it that were fun. Should be cheaper now too, which makes it less of a "risky investment."
K
kittens
Unconfirmed Member
I probably wouldn't play some of the larger open world games if they didn't have fast travel.
I'm no purist. I play games to have fun, not backtrack for hours.
I'm no purist. I play games to have fun, not backtrack for hours.
D3RANG3D
Member
Risen, Nehrim poop on Modern TES in terms of world design and exploration.
I didn't have fun backtracking in Skyrim either, the world felt pretty empty to me, so I stopped playing it. Not even fast travel made it more fun to me. Nobody is arguing in here saying mindless backtracking to the same static locations that never change over and over is buttloads of fun. It sucks.
Mr.Wreckless
Banned
Id rather fast travel directly to the location than go through the moon gate and have to walk the rest of the way. I dont want to keep walking through areas i have already been. Nope. Thats me though. Everyone isnt going to like the same things.
Id rather be able to travel directly to my location instead of using Silt Striders and recall. I felt that way all through Morrowind.
If the backtracking is somehow manipulated to add on new encounters with enemies etc and level up as you go, it would make the walking worth it. It's more like developers design the game to be played from point A to point B, and when you're backlogging through that, you're essentially playing the same encounters in reverse.
Should be there be fast travel? Depends on the game and your mission design. For later in games it does get a bit tedious to constantly travel to every location (remember Assassins Creed I??!?), but if done right you can force a gamer to appreciate the option that it's there, but not always have a hot button to ALWAYS use it.
What if the backtrack had new encounters?
Should be there be fast travel? Depends on the game and your mission design. For later in games it does get a bit tedious to constantly travel to every location (remember Assassins Creed I??!?), but if done right you can force a gamer to appreciate the option that it's there, but not always have a hot button to ALWAYS use it.
What if the backtrack had new encounters?
ElectricKaibutsu
Member
I don't have infinite gaming time like I did when I was in high school and college. If I have a half hour to play I don't want to spend that time walking. I agree it cheapens the experience but it is a very worthy trade for me.
This has been addressed to death ;_;
What if it was a smaller more dense world that didn't take forever to go through, and offered more to do along the way? The reason I'm asking is because I feel like people would be less inclined to swear by fast travel if the game worlds weren't as huge and sparse as they seem to be these days. Smaller is okay, just put stuff in it! Make that smaller world accessible through fast travel as well, that's fine too! Just don't forget to put stuff in it for the rest of us!
Maybe I'm naive! Who knows?
But Ninja Gaiden Black has an extensive amount of backtracking too...
Fine Ham Abounds
Member
As long as you've reached the location once, I don't have an enormous problem with it.
Having said that, if you want to know what a game completely built around unlimited fast travel is like, go play Skyrim. Single best argument in favor of putting some kind of restrictions on it I can think of.
The real solution of course is not to have your open world game be a boring, empty slog in the first place. Traversal, even direct backtracking, doesn't have to be dull, tiresome, repetitive shit.
Having said that, if you want to know what a game completely built around unlimited fast travel is like, go play Skyrim. Single best argument in favor of putting some kind of restrictions on it I can think of.
The real solution of course is not to have your open world game be a boring, empty slog in the first place. Traversal, even direct backtracking, doesn't have to be dull, tiresome, repetitive shit.
Yeah, but the optional stuff is still good. I think that aspect of the game is really underrated. It's a fun world to traverse.