INTRODUCTION
When we play open world games, what are we playing?
If the world’s first open-world game, Ultima I: The Beginning of Darkness, was so far away that we needed to buy a mid-1980s IBM XT 5160 computer to ritualistically experience Genesis-like openness and freedom, then modern technological advances and breakthroughs have made it possible to nearly Feel free to sit on horseback and watch the sunset and sandstorms of Westworld in Red Dead Redemption, fly a fighter jet back and forth between Sin and Free City in GTA, or step on a shield and raise a sword and fly straight at the Daemon in Zelda…
On the one hand, as an open world game, it contains a very rich game mechanics, game play and various game elements, under different game rules, players can even set their own game goals, to create their own challenges and sense of achievement.
On the other hand, the open world as a “simulator” provides us with a way to understand the world, that is, by creating a virtual environment to better understand the rules and logic of the world we are living in, and at the same time, driven by curiosity, to help us constantly to discover and create new times.
So, what kind of game can be called an open world game? What exactly are players playing when they play open world games? What is it that allows us to have such profound experiences and feelings? This research will be discussed in three parts.
- Definition and composition of open world games
- History and Development of Open World Games
- Future possibilities for open-world gaming
I. Definition and Composition of Open World Games
Before formally describing and discussing “open-world games”, and in accordance with analytic philosophy, in the contextual exploration of relevant meanings, we will first and foremost focus on the meaning-prescriptiveness of the contextual factors in current verbal expressions, i.e., we need to approximate the definition of an open-world game in order to minimize the cognitive biases caused by the different contexts.
1. Approaches in different perspectives
In the study of “Game Rules, Mechanics and Play”, we also pointed out that a game mechanic is a method invoked by players to help them interact with the game; it is not only a method, but also a game behavior, a pattern, a skill, a state, etc. It is the product of all the explicit and implicit systems in the process of achieving game goals, coordinating game goals, methods and rules and at the same time subject to the role of these three.
In most games, developers consider and define the core gameplay and mechanics first, then the game systems and game elements, but in open-world games, we often see the order of thinking reversed, i.e., the open-world designer defines the main goals and rules of the open world, then chooses the most appropriate game mechanics and gameplay to fit the system.
This order of thinking is more from the perspective of the gamer. For example, if we want to make an open world game, we first think about what kind of open world we want to make, what the background and story is, and then we think about what kind of role the player plays in the world and how to explore the world and experience the story or create something.
As gamers, we get to know an open-world game by looking at its worldview, characters, goals, and other “narrative categories” to get a macro sense of it, and in the process, we naturally recognize what the goal of a game’s content is, whether it’s to unify the kingdom or to defeat the Demon King and save the princess…
Then when the player enters the game, through simple manipulation and familiarity, we quickly learn what the rules of the world are in this game and whether they are linear or non-linear goal attainment …
As for the method of achieving the goal under such rules, one would start to consider what mechanism and playbook to use to achieve it? It’s here that we really get to the game designer’s perspective, which is to design “what are the actions and behaviors the player is allowed to do” and “what is the path for the player to immerse themselves in the content of the game.”
2. The Definition from the Player’s Perspective
Strictly speaking, there are two ways in which we can understand the world: one is by interacting with information about objects that already exist, and the other is by creating new objects in the process of interaction. Returning to the term “open world”, by definition it is an open world, and the measure of openness is based on the two ways mentioned above: one in which we can explore openly, and the other in which we can create openly.
Another point that needs to be discussed is an implicit concept behind “openness”: freedom. According to Lord Acton (John Emerich Edward Dalberg-Acton), there are more than 200 definitions of “freedom” by philosophers and thinkers. If we were to discuss the term extensively and in depth here, we would in fact not only be going off-topic, but would also be limited by space to the point of incompleteness. Therefore, when discussing the scope of video games, let’s use a “vague but reasonable” way of narrowly describing “freedom in video games”.
At the same time we note that absolute “freedom” does not exist, and that metaphysical ways of describing it are not helpful for the discussion here. So we will additionally emphasize that freedom in video games is expressed in a variety of arbitrary internal and external choices that are constrained by “the rules of the game in a specific world context”. In other words, the player is restricted by the fewest possible obstacles to be able to act in accordance with his subjective will in a given situation.
However, we also need to consider that video games, as a virtual experience, require technology to support both the openness of the virtual world and the subjectivity of the player’s will. The degree of technological sophistication directly determines the degree to which these two properties are experienced by the player as immersive. However, as a supportive function, it can in fact exist by default as a hypothetical premise for the definition of an “open world game”.
Beyond that, returning to the game itself, and with reference to Bernard Suits’ best definition of “playing the game” in Grasshopper: Game, Life, and Utopia: “voluntarily overcoming non-essential obstacles”, we also follow the above discussion with a definition of “open-world game”.
“In this kind of game, the player (with some technical support) is able to obtain as few obstacles as possible within the rules set by the story, and to explore and create virtual scenes openly, according to the subjective will, in (these technically supported) specific ways”.
3. Composition: Mechanics, Gameplays and Structures
Following the order of thought above and the previously proposed “rules, mechanics and gameplay”, we start on the more player-oriented side by discussing the multiple ways in which open-world games are played to bring out their core game mechanics and the interesting combined effects due to the inclusion of various gameplay elements. We start with the definitions we have just attempted to summarize, step-by-step dismantle their gameplay possibilities, and conclude with a discussion of the ways in which technology helps and limits gameplay and mechanics.
(1)First, “under the rules of the story setting” refers to what the player is allowed to do in this world. Narrowly speaking, what are the actions and behaviors that the player is allowed to perform?
- Basic multi-directional movements such as standing, running, sitting, jumping, and accelerating. Other details of movement are “pretended to be shown” through visual and pictorial effects corresponding to the execution of the action.
- Specific movements that can be executed, such as shooting, swinging, snatching, picking up, and talking, are shown. These actions can be directly manipulated by the player through interactive devices, some games are implemented through different buttons, and some games, like Wildlands 2, have multiple actions “implied” into a single button. When the player is in different scenarios, the same button can be used to interact with multiple and different actions.
Due to technological development and interaction constraints, except for wearable devices that can display graphical effects when the player performs relatively detailed actions, on other existing interactive devices, the player is strictly unable to directly operate and perform detailed actions outside of basic movements and behaviors, such as lifting hands, shaking feet, and bending fingers on keyboards and joysticks.
(2) Secondly, “according to the subjective will” refers to whether or not players can put their arbitrary ideas into practice through permissible interactions in an open-world game. Obviously, we can’t do our will arbitrarily in the real world either, but the virtual world of the game offers us the possibility of such an “approximate” experience.
Game designers can set the rules of the game, and in the process they think like a creator: what subjective will can be carried out by the player, and in what way. Through such rules, the player can be better and more permanently immersed in the game experience.
For example, for exploring the world, are players able to “instantly shift”? For creation, can the player “ create objects out of nothing”? For life, can the player “boil water and cook”? For communication, can the player “talk to any character in the world”? For combat, can the player “kill in one hit” or “use any move or skill”…
Of course these subjective intentions may be too “capricious” and instead fail to reflect the important characteristic of the game: allowing the player to be drawn in and voluntarily overcome non-essential obstacles. Therefore, it is a necessary and important way for game designers to select the subjective will that matches the target world from an almost infinite variety of subjective wills to show the characteristics and differences of the game.
(3) Based on this filtering and matching, the content of the “particular way” is gradually expressed. In game design and development terminology, this means that the specific mechanics and gameplay of the game are specified.
Almost all open games will have character mechanics, as this is where the game developers want the player to explore immersively as a character in this world. While using, for example, dimensions such as life, physical strength, attack, defense, etc. to describe the character image, in order to better interpret the character image to which the character mechanism corresponds, specific action and behavior mechanisms are often added to reflect the realization of the subjective will mentioned above; If a game designer wants to show openness to skills and combinations, they will introduce skill-based and portfolio mechanisms as well. At the same time, the opening up of the item and prop levels is actually one of the elements of the open world, which we also call the item and prop mechanisms…
Compared to game mechanics, which are at a more “implicit” level, gameplay, as an “explicit” form of interaction between the player and the game, is more accessible and experienced by players.
Based on the core gameplay we discussed earlier, open-world gameplay will involve role-playing, action execution, skill use, item use, strategy combinations, resource gathering, free exploration, and mission completion. In the case of a multiplayer world, it will also include both matching and confrontation gameplay. This type of game, due to its highly free and open-ended experiential goals, naturally includes very much core gameplay, allowing the player to explore and create with as much subjective will as possible.
With the support of the gameplay, players can perform actions by freely manipulating the corresponding characters through interactive devices, explore surprises in the extensive map, talk to NPCs to learn about the story taking place in the world, learn about the plot through quests, and acquire necessary equipment and items to make their characters stronger.
The plot elements mentioned here are also presented differently in the open world, or rather, because of their unique openness and freedom, the plot can be perceived and experienced in more ways than one. Whether it’s linear, non-linear, or emergent narrative, open-world games are well suited to any of these.
- The earliest open-world concepts were intended to distinguish them from games based on “linear narratives” with strong plot guides, such as the Call of Duty series and the Resident Evil series.
- Open worlds tend to use a “non-linear narrative” as opposed to the “cinematic” directional guidance and experience that a linear game provides to the player, with more emphasis on the “plot space” provided to the player while defining a main thread. A strong sense of agency is created by the player’s autonomy to pace the narrative experience and the freedom to explore and discover the wonders of the world. These different narrative and plot experience paths are also important features of non-linear narratives.
- In addition to that, another type of narrative is called “emergent narrative”. In fact, it’s not a brand new concept, but players can experience a whole host of interesting and meaningful choices in Wild Dart. Generally speaking, content-driven games rely heavily on the game designer’s mastery of the game, and a lot of work, time, and money is often spent to achieve the effects in Wild Dart.
The content of the level-based narrative lies more in the richness of the levels themselves, with rules and mechanics that make it take longer for players to break through the levels and gain a sense of excitement. However, due to the gross inequality between the efficiency of content production and consumption, game production teams need to produce new content before players consume it, and often the quality and depth of the content has a serious impact on the player experience.
For open worlds, emergent narrative is an option, but more game designers will still use non-linear narrative to create open worlds. Emergent narrative content is more likely to shift players’ focus from content richness to content creativity, while emergent gameplay is based on rules to “creatively experience” the content as it emerges from one link to another.
For example, players can combine different abilities to create new battle effects and life skills; they can use different items to combine new items to achieve different goals; they can even create their own plots and stories by talking to NPCs…
(4) Finally, “open exploration and creation” in fact encompass two different will-driven purposes and behaviors. Exploration is the act of discovering something new, or something previously unrecognized; creation, on the other hand, is the act of bringing into being, in a particular way, something that was not there before.
In 1934, Einstein published his famous philosophical paper On the Method of Theoretical Physics, in which he argued that scientific theories are free inventions of the human mind (invention), and that the word discovery is not even in the fundamental method of theoretical physics.
In other words, “discovery” in Einstein’s mind is a technical matter, and its role in science is second nature. What we often hear as the “first principle” was first proposed by Aristotle and refers to a fundamental proposition or hypothesis that cannot be omitted or deleted, nor can it be violated. From a scientific point of view, a “logical system” is an invention, and the use of reasoning to find logical relationships is a discovery.
Returning to the game domain, when we describe the difference between exploration and creation in terms of the game experience, we understand that the content that the player explores is designed in advance by the game designer, and that the game designer also wants and guides the player in various ways to discover this predetermined content.
As for the content that the player creates, the game designers simply set the rules to which the player is subject, without a very clear content goal for the player to achieve. If there is a goal at all, players are expected to create their own goals based on those rules.
In fact, these two different actions are not contradictory and can be experienced by players in the same game at the same time. On the one hand, they can experience the content that the game designer has crafted in an exploratory way, but they can also create their own counterparts. The game My World, for example, is a combination of this: the player can explore a map with existing objectives, or he can create his own tools and objects to do so.
4. Comparison: Sandbox vs Open World
Games based on emergent gameplay, on the other hand, are represented by sandbox games, which are often discussed together with open-world games. While the two types of games often feature elements of each other, there are in fact some differences between the two.
Perhaps creation itself will be more appealing to people than exploration, and often an open-world game that incorporates a creation element, where the player can create anything based on the most basic objects, we’ll preferentially call it a “sandbox game.” Also, most sandbox game worlds are open and can be seamlessly explored, and that’s when we fill the “open world” label for it.
To put it simply, a “sandbox game” focuses on the word “sandbox,” which, like sand, can be shaped into any image and then modified or pushed back to start all over again. In fact, the word “sandbox” can be understood in this way: a sandbox is sand and a box, with the sand representing the basic units that can be combined, and the box representing the spatial constraints that allow manipulation and interaction. In such a world, the player gains the ability to change the world into whatever he or she wants. At the same time, the “sandbox game” is more about creating your own goals to achieve, within the confines of certain rules.
Whereas an “open world game” would focus on the word “open” and would be more oriented towards continuity and openness with the explorable space, the player could explore a huge, open and continuous map and go anywhere he wanted. In order to keep the player continuously interesting and immersed in the grand world for a longer period of time, open-world games need to be accompanied by a rich plot, story and exploratory interactions. Therefore, another emphasis of open world games is on rich narrative content.
But it seems that all “sandbox games” have now become aliases for “open world games,” and manufacturers have found a way to attract players to a set of things they’re good at, to make an open world, and it automatically becomes a sandbox. A true sandbox game is something like My World. The kind of sandbox games that bleed through the blood of the genre, like Ark, are also being labeled, one by one, as adventure survival and real-time strategy. And maybe because the word “sandbox” sells itself so well, it seems that if you add the word “sandbox” to it, gamers will pay for it.
II. History and Development of Open World Games
In the discussion above, we have been approaching the definition of open worlds from the fundamental theory that generations of video games have been built from these principles. And in the process, more and more designers have developed a relatively sophisticated methodology for making open world games. With the emergence of more and more open-world games, we are always witnessing one magic show after another.
As mentioned in the movie “The Prestige”, there are three steps of magic tricks:
- The first part is called “The Pledge”. The magician shows you something ordinary: a deck of cards, a bird or a man.
- The second act is called “The Turn”. The magician takes his ordinary something and makes it do something extraordinary. And you want to find out the secret but you can’t, because you’re not really watching, you don’t really want to know the truth, you want to be tricked by the magician. It is not enough to make something disappear to make the audience applaud, you have to make it come back.
- The third part is called “The Prestige”. This step is extremely crucial, where the magician has to do the unimaginable thing and bring back what has disappeared in an unexpected way, thus gaining the audience’s amazement and admiration!
Although the creation of any magic can not escape these three steps, it does not limit the innovation of magic, we have witnessed the birth of one magic classic after another. Therefore, for game developers, game development is like creating a magic show. Even with a relatively mature game production methodology, it still needs a continuous enrichment of the content to bring new feelings to the players.
1. Looking for the origin of the open world
In this section we want to go back through the cycle of game history to a time when open world game methodologies weren’t as well established to find the first open world game.
Based on our definition of “open world game” above, we believe that the world’s first open world game was Ultima I: The First Age of Darkness. It was a pixel-styled RPG, limited by the technology of the time. Why do we consider it an open world game today?
In fact, it’s a question of dynamic perspective: are our perceptions of open world games today the same as they were in the past, before they existed?
Because history moves forward and video games are constantly changing, so are some of our definitions of what they are. Now when we look back at previous games, we are defining and describing them from a current point in time, did game developers know they were creating an open world game based on the technology they were able to implement and their understanding of the game at that time?
Garriott, the producer of the Ultima series, said in an interview that it was difficult to convince people around him that it was a good idea when he started working on it, because it was so far removed from what was “popular” at the time. So it must have existed in a way that was way ahead of its time.
Also, looking back at Ultima I: The First Age of Darkness, we can see that the story carrier was separate from the game carrier, i.e. the game used text to carry the story and plot of the game, while the PC was used as the medium to carry the gameplay of the video game. So in the context of that time, the game graphics that the players saw, the seamless open map sections that they experienced, and the diverse game mechanics that they felt were all under the meaning given by the textual plot.
During the exploration in each map, monster kill, etc., the player is required to combine the narrative presented in the text with their own imagination, in other words it is this format that frees the player’s imagination and allows for endless exploration in the game world created by the developers.
2. The 40 Years of Open World Games: 1981–2020
As history always brings us experiences and surprises, we have compiled a list of representative works of open games from 1981 to 2020. At the same time, we have given a very brief overview of the characteristics of each of these works, in an attempt to help us gain a better sense and understanding of the logic of the development of open world games.
In fact, over the past 40 years, there have been so many great titles released each year that we’ve selected “open world games” and “sandbox games” as representative in the list. It is important to emphasize that this list is not intended to be a ranking exercise, nor does it mean that the games not listed are not representative or representative of open world games, but simply cannot be listed in detail for reasons of space.
A few things are evident in this timeline listing of games.
- Role-playing is one of the most common styles of gameplay in open world games. Players are able to participate more fully in characters’ development and growth in this way, and are immersed in the opening experience of the game world.
- Seamless open maps are increasingly becoming a must-have in open world games. Increasingly larger maps and spaces provide players with richer opportunities to explore, while also allowing them to spend more and more time in the game.
- Open world games are highly compatible with a wide range of mechanics and gameplays. Whether it’s first-person / third-person perspective, shooting, racing, role-playing, action, or building, open worlds have an extremely strong ability to blend experiences together.
- The combination of different narratives and the open world creates differentiated experiences. With the open world, linear storytelling provides a tight and action-packed experience, non-linear storytelling allows the player to freely pace the story, and emergent storytelling fully engages the player’s attempts to create a story.
In addition, we have also included a portion of online games. Compared to single player games, MMORPGs such as World of Warcraft also provide players with a very wide space to explore. At the same time, this type of game naturally has role-playing and multiplayer related gameplay. Without a relatively open world, players will not only be more restricted in terms of plot experience and space exploration, but also in terms of interaction with players, such as a fixed battle space and a single method of multiplayer confrontation.
At E3 2019, game makers brought out a very large number of new games, many of which included open-world content, such as Death Stranding, Cyberpunk 2077, Darksiders Genesis, Dying Light 2, Watch Dogs: Legion, Fable 4 and more.
If we look at it on a longer time scale, from GTA 5 to RDR 2, from The Witcher 3 to Cyberpunk 2077, open-world games with their unique gameplay experience and charm are accelerating to draw more and more players into exploring different virtual worlds.
III. Future Possibilities for Open World Games
With the emergence of games with the label “open world”, we often see players commenting on open world games, and one of the most heartfelt comments is that the game is not fun.
In the process of analyzing and studying open world games, we find that there are two ways that open world games drive players: one is through tasks, and the other is through the game system, which contains goals, rules, and methods.
- Task-driven open worlds give the player the experience of being in a fixed multi-venue space, where the game designer prepares the player for different experiences in different rooms, and whether the linear or non-linear plot and narrative is simply a matter of deciding which room to go to first, and then which room to go later; then, if they don’t go to which room to accomplish something, they can’t get access to xx rooms; and where the keys to the rooms are…
- Whereas in an open world driven by a game system, if you also take the example above, what the player would be told would merely be: information about the different rooms and their goals for coming to this place, and nothing more. As for what the player can do and what needs to be done to achieve the goal, it will be reflected in the game system.
Specifically, maybe the game won’t tell you that the key to open chest A is on a boss, and that your job is to kill the boss before you can open the door to the next level, or that it’s over. You could make a “lava launcher” that just melts the iron gates, or you could ask for help from a “wise man” in town and let him give you something so you can go through the wall…
The purpose of discussing this example is to highlight the impact of the game’s overall system on the interactive experience of the open world, and how it can truly engage players in changing the game world?
It is important to acknowledge that to achieve such an interactive effect would require not only a major technological breakthrough, but also an update of the player’s perception of the game.
As we mentioned earlier, the current “sandbox” has become a commercially successful label, manufacturers no longer bother about the difference between the game mechanics and gameplay of open world games and sandbox games, just put together the standard configuration that represents the “open” experience, and then decide how the players pay, design the values, an open world game “without a mistake” is born.
If we really look at open world games from the perspective of “simulators” or virtual worlds, the fact is that with the exception of a few games that have very good game systems, such as GTA 5, RDR 2, and The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, most open world games today are as unintelligent as marionettes.
As for the factors that drive players to explore and create in open-world games, most of the extrinsic factors are derived from in-game tasks, rarely because of the game system or game mechanics; the intrinsic factors are mostly derived from the sense of accomplishment of completing specific tasks and objectives, and if the plot is done better, some of the sources will resonate with the emotions.
But the only way to really explore and create due to “curiosity” and thus satisfy the needs of the curious player seems to be to add more “sandboxing” elements to inspire constant exploration and creation of the virtual world.
However, in order to truly allow the player to explore and create based on “curiosity”, it seems that only the addition of more “sandboxing” elements will inspire the player to keep exploring and creating in the virtual world.
So we also believe that more and more “sandboxing” elements will be added to future open-world games. Just like the “face moulding” now, we will be able to see the similar effects in future games: concrete dents and “disfigurement” will exist when a character’s face is struck; the “construction” of buildings will really affect whether or not a specific character will frequent appear in a certain area; the “dialogue” of virtual characters will no longer be fixed and repetitive text, but a way to really give birth to different stories, goals, gameplays…
In the future, a truly open game experience should be an experience like the “butterfly effect”: Every behavior of the player will be a part of the changing world, and he or she will really feel that the world in front of him or her is highly relevant to him or her.
Only in this way will the virtual worlds we create become increasingly open, dynamic and free.
Reference
Einstein, Albert. “On the method of theoretical physics.” Philosophy of science 1.2 (1934): 163–169. https://www.svg.com/130675/whatever-happened-to-the-ultima-game-series/
Design of emergent games: RDR 2 and the Future of the Open World. https://zhuanlan.zhihu.com/p/52440574
About rct
rct was founded in 2018, a member of Y Combinator W19, and is comprised of talents across AI, design and business. The team is passionate about using AI to create next generation interactive entertainment experiences. Our mission is to help human beings know more about themselves. So far, rct is backed by YC, Sky Saga Capital, and Makers Fund.
See our official website：https://rct-studio.com/en-us/
