On 22nd October 2001, Grand Theft Auto III was released into the wild.

Upon its appearance, it unceremoniously grabbed the gaming world by the throat and dragged it, kicking and screaming, into the new age of video games. The open world crime thriller was condemned by parents, banned by governments, praised by critics and became one of the most influential games of all time.

However, GTA III’s untold influence didn’t come from its Hollywood narrative nor its graphical fidelity. How could it have done? The plot was a bad gangster movie and the character models all looked like they were carved out of clay by someone with no thumbs. None of this mattered though. It was what happened outside of the game’s linearity that made GTA III truly special.

Its open-world and sandbox styling was unequivocally enticing, offering up a truly inconsequential sense of freedom. It gave the player a sense of escapism like no other that came before it, providing the rawest form of “play” to be found in gaming. You could pick up hookers, drive a tank through the streets of Liberty City or just count how many pedestrians you could mow down in your knock-off Hummer before the authorities caught up with you. It was brilliant, extremely successful and genre defining.

Jump forward two generations (and many bloody console wars later) and the open-world genre has become more prevalent than ever before. Developers seemed to have cracked the technological hurdles of an open world and are rolling them out quicker than we could have ever dreamed of. The genre is becoming so ubiquitous in fact, that even the smallest of indie developers are attempting it themselves. Hello Games, developer of upcoming title No Man’s Sky, is attempting to build its very own galaxy that houses a total of 18 quintillion planets (yes, that is a real number) with a development team of only 15 people – an absolutely baffling challenge in itself.   

However, in all of this open world chaos that promises bigger numbers and even bigger things to do, the true heart of the genre that GTA III once conceived, seems to have misplaced some of it’s soul along the way. It would appear that there are now two conditions of the open world experience:

There is “The open world game” and then there is “The game with an open world”.

The former makes the open world it’s main character, sometimes utilising it as the driving force of the game’s narrative. This kind of world is often a marvel of craftsmanship, painstakingly detailed to the point where the simple act of moving throughout the world is a joy in itself. The gameplay is built to compliment and work within the environment, fully submerging the player.

The latter lets the open world take the backseat. It still remains unmistakably “open” but it’s used in a more passive sense. It’s there only to provide an environment for the game’s objectives to be accomplished within. There’s no heart, no soul to the world. It’s a bit like a shopping list and the player is just the biro pen, moving further down the page, tediously ticking off the tasks in a dull trance. Ultimately, there is a disconnect between the gameplay and the game world, hindering the player submersion.

Now, before this gets a little too heavy and a little too “final year dissertation” let me give you some examples and attempt to shine some light on what I’m trying to get at:

EXAMPLE(S) OF AN OPEN WORLD GAME (The Good)

Any GTA Since GTA III 

Liberty City, Vice City, San Andreas, Los Santos – all of these places that various GTA games have explored, you know of and you know well. Why? Because they are a character in themselves. Every street, every car, every pedestrian, every radio station, every in-game ad and even every business name all contribute to the facade that GTA has created. There is a sublime ridiculousness to it all, where the player is encouraged to not take things too seriously and just fuck shit up. It’s refreshing, engulfing and, above all else, downright fun to play.

Fallout 4

Fallout 4’s open world, “The Commonwealth”, has been constructed by Bethesda to allow the player an experience of the environment from their own personal perspective. The streamlined RPG levelling, the weapon/armour modifications, the settlement building, the inter-weaving story quests and side quests, even the companion mechanic, can all be ignored at the player’s discretion. Nothing in this game is forced upon you. The player is merely introduced to certain mechanics and given the choice whether or not to pursue them. You pick and choose how you want to survive the wasteland, in complete control of how you wish to explore The Commonwealth. Fallout 4 just does a brilliant job of not getting in the way of itself. It lets the spectacle of The Commonwealth take centre-stage allowing players a freedom to experience it any way they deem fit. It is a true “Open World”. 

EXAMPLE(s) OF A GAME WITH AN OPEN WORLD (The Bad)

Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain

Now this game is quite a dilemma. The gameplay of MGSV is truly outstanding. The open-ended approach that it allows the player is like nothing seen in gaming before. It drops you into situations with very little guidance other than your main mission objective and how you choose to complete that objective is entirely up to you. MGSV really does provide a level of player agency like no other has done before it BUT (and this is a big but, a very big but – the kind of but MC Hammer raves about) the “open world” in MGSV is abysmal.

All of this superb gameplay takes place in the open world of Afghanistan, where all the enemy bases that you’re tasked with infiltrating are scattered. The only problem is that in between all of these bases, in the “open world”, there is absolutely dick all to do. Outside of some equestrian endeavors and practicing your gardening, collecting herbs, there’s nothing of any interest. A serious black mark on an otherwise wonderful game.

AND THEN THERE’S ANYTHING UBISOFT EVER DOES (The God Awful)

Now, Ubisoft are by far the worst culprits for creating “games with an open world”. They are the undisputed champion when it comes to making perfectly okay, eye-wateringly boring “open world” experiences. The list of their offences is endless – any Asssassin’s Creed title, WatchDogs, Far Cry 4, Far Cry Primal, The Crew, The Division – all of them suffer the same problem. There seems to be a cookie cutter mentality when it comes to their open worlds. See, Ubisoft spreads its uninspired open world mechanics across all of its properties. You’ll always find another radio tower to climb/find or another heavily armed enemy compound to clear out, no matter which of Ubisoft’s open worlds you attempt to take on. In theory, this does makes perfect sense though. Preserving and reusing resources like this cuts production costs and also gives Ubisoft’s games a recognisable link to the developer – it’s just good business. In all reality though, it makes Ubisoft’s titles lose any sense of submersion and completely strips the open world of any identity it should be trying to establish – and that’s just bad craftsmanship.

Unless…

So, what does all this really mean? Where does this ubiquity of the open world leave us? Is it really all that harmful that there is an abundance of sub-par open world titles? Aren’t we just getting what we always wanted? Well, in a way, we are – but we are getting it at cost. The countless cookie cutter Ubisoft open worlds and the quasi open worlds from the likes of Destiny and MGSV cause a fatigue in the industry. Players become sick of the genre and tired of seeing another game with an “open-world” for the sake of a selling point. It let’s things like Ratchet and Clank make a successful return – a title that has no place in the contemporary game space, yet finds one as a palate cleanser simply because we are so sick of the same old shit. Seriously, the only reason I played and enjoyed Ratchet and Clank is because The Division had left a such a bad taste in my mouth that a re-hashed 3D Platformer (from over a decade ago) seemed appealing.

The unfortunate truth is that the success of the Grand Theft Auto franchise attracted many impostors, yearning to make a quick buck on a rapidly growing medium. Back in the early 2000’s “open world” was the next best thing, and we gamers pay out the nose for the next best thing. Publishers saw this and capitilised on it, so much so in fact that now, 15 years later, we groan at the “unique open world” marketing material. We’ve been jaded, forcing us to snap judgements on games we dismiss far too quickly. No Man’s Sky could be that next best thing we have been looking for – possibly being the most open of open worlds we could imagine. But we’re afraid of the hype, afraid to give them the benefit of the doubt because we’ve been burnt so many times before on the very same empty promises.

The open world genre was once great, revered by gamers as the holy grail of all interactive entertainment. Now though, thanks to the business of games, the genre has depleted into a misused, passive game mechanic. And that friends, is nothing short of tragic.