Open world game

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Open-world games ( English openworld , open world ' ) are a type of computer games , where the player has an above average number freedoms and opportunities to play the game. The specialty of open world games is the unimpeded freedom of movement from the start of the game. Thus, the player himself decides what he wants to explore when and how in the game world.

The course of the game, which is usually linked to the development of the plot, is not determined by a predetermined order of successive levels. In open world games, the player is not necessarily bound by that order, but has the choice of which missions he wants to play. The game world is often even expanded by separate levels, which opens up additional space for exploration.

Furthermore, it can contain a simulation in which both characters and objects can react to the actions of the player and thus increase employment opportunities.

Games designated as sandboxed have the specific property that the player can act on the existing virtual game world and influence its simulated physical structure. For example, objects can be created for the inventory - this is called crafting - which does not necessarily have to affect the progress of the game.

features

As with many genres of creative products, an exact definition does not exist, but open-world games have some characteristic features:

  • The basic common ground is the open game world, which at least in part can be explored from the start.
  • In-game tasks can be divided into three categories in many games.
    1. Primary tasks have a direct influence on the plot of the game. In order to maintain the impression of an open game world, an attempt is made to avoid a fixed sequence even with this type of task. A completely arbitrary order is not possible due to the underlying plot of the game.
    2. Secondary tasks ( English. Side Quests ) do not directly affect the plot, but create advantages that make it easier to complete the primary tasks. These advantages can be new items , money, weapons or experience points .
    3. Tertiary duties have no immediate beneficial effects. This can be, for. B. are so-called "mini-games". For the player, these tasks increase the play value.

Both secondary and tertiary tasks are usually optional, as they do not have an immediate effect on the plot, but the actual plot may require that the game character is sufficiently experienced or well enough armed, which is only possible through the secondary tasks. Since the player does not know a priori which tasks are to be assigned to which category, the situation that only tasks that drive the action are carried out hardly arises.

Another feature is the free availability of means of transport. These are more or less numerous and can be used free of charge or for very small amounts of the in-game currency. This is a consequence of the open game world, otherwise it would take too long to cross the game world on foot. If vehicles are not planned due to the general plot or other reasons, the character can be placed at the desired destination using a "fast travel function", such as in Far Cry 3 . Other games offer both options, such as The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim , where the fast travel function can be used between known areas, the paid to areas that are still unknown.

Representative

Depending on which of the features or degrees of freedom are viewed as a prerequisite, there is a different representation of the history of the open world games. Even with higher requirements, games that only meet the criterion “freely accessible game world” can be viewed as predecessors to “real” open world games.

The first open world game is the text adventure adventure , which was published in 1975 or 1976 by William Crowther in the Arpanet and, according to Ars Technica, " basically hardly differs from today's GTAs , Elites and Minecrafts ". Another early game with an open game world is an adventure game by Warren Robinett from 1979. The player has to fight dragons in a maze-like game world, find keys and bring a goblet to a palace. Optional tasks and the like were not included.

With stricter criteria, Elite by David Braben and Ian Bell from 1984 results as the first open world game. The player can be used as spaceship captain piracy drive or commercial hunting pirates or asteroids for raw material deposits are looking for. The game world consists of several hundred planets spread across eight galaxies. However, the game does not offer a coherent, graphically modeled game world. Freelancer from 2003 and (to a much larger extent) Elite: Dangerous from 2014 are based on the same principle .

Both a graphically modeled game world and optional tasks were offered for the first time by The Legend of Zelda (1986) and Pirates! (1987). In pirates! the game world is the Caribbean Sea , which is open to the player from the start. The main objective is to conquer enemy ships and cities. However, the player can instead trade by buying and selling various goods from multiple cities. Other optional tasks include searching for buried treasures or finding lost family members. In the remake of the game released in 2004, even attacking cities and ships is optional because of other peaceful tasks. Pirates! is similar to the game Seven Cities of Gold , published in 1984 , in which the discovery of America is the theme. The game also offers a coherently modeled game world, but only the opportunity to peacefully exchange goods for gold or to conquer the indigenous settlements by force. However, the game world itself cannot be changed, for example by building roads or settlements.

The best-known representatives are the series The Legend of Zelda and Grand Theft Auto . Both games offer the player a game world with optional tasks, the fulfillment of which is rewarded with improving finances or equipment. The Legend of Zelda , whose freely explorable game world is called the “upper world” as is customary in computer role-playing games , extends the gameplay with levels called “ dungeons ”. In these dungeons the tasks that are necessary to solve the game are waiting. In Grand Theft Auto , the tasks for solving the game are placed in the same game world as the voluntary tasks.

Further (older) representatives are, according to John Harris in an essay on Gamasutra Landstalker , Pitfall II: Lost Caverns , Metroid , Super Metroid , Castlevania: Symphony of the Night , Crazy Taxi , Metroid Prime , Dragon Quest III , The Goonies II .

Newer games also rely on the open world principle or are advertised with this characteristic. So the racing game was Fuel from Codemasters as "open-world racer", and advertised. The idea of ​​running races on open tracks, however, already existed in older games such as Midnight Club: Los Angeles and partly in Need for Speed: Underground 2 , although these games were not referred to as "open world".

In 2008 Ubisoft Montreal developed the "open world first-person shooter" Far Cry 2 . The game differed from previous first-person shooters in that it dispensed with levels and thus enables new solution alternatives and thus approaches the gameplay of the GTA series. Due to the lack of barriers to the mission locations and the free choice of weapons, the missions can be solved in different ways: Either, as is usual in first-person shooters, through open combat with all opponents or rather with stealth elements , such as B. the use of a sniper rifle and the subsequent escape from the mission area. A shooter with similar freedoms is Just Cause , released in 2006 , and its successor Just Cause 2 .

In 2009 the Swedish programmer Markus Persson published the independent game Minecraft , which is based on a completely changeable world. The paid full version consists of the survival mode, in which items such as B. Tools can be made by processing raw materials, and the creative mode, in which the player unlimited amounts of blocks and objects are available.

literature

Web links

Wiktionary: Open world game  - explanations of meanings, word origins, synonyms, translations

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c Castles made of sand: A look at the open world genre , areagames.de
  2. ↑ ArsTechnica.com: Roam free: A history of open-world gaming. Retrieved September 30, 2019 .
  3. ↑ a b Gamasutra.com: Game Design Essentials: 20 Open World Games. Retrieved June 13, 2016 .
  4. ↑ gamesradar.com: The roots of open-world games ( Memento from October 5, 2013 in the Internet Archive )
  5. ↑ Paidia.de: simulation and documentation of the "New World" in Dan Buntens strategy classic The Seven Cities of Gold. Retrieved September 30, 2019 .
  6. ↑ Spieletester.com: Grand Theft Auto History ( Memento from January 22, 2009 in the Internet Archive )
  7. ↑ Test about "Fuel" , cynamite.de
  8. ↑ Eurogamer test about "Fuel"
  9. ^ Far Cry 2 Test , PC Games
  10. ↑ Open-World Africa FarCry 2 , de-bug
  11. ↑ Top 10 Games 2010 on Gamasutra
  12. ↑ UK Game of the Year on PCGamer