The Hot Topic Returns

[shinymcshine]

Maybe a big open world GTA V style version of The Punisher including those fatality/interrogation moves from the 2004 PS2 game. Make it a bit like (or better version of) Saints Row 2 or Mafia 3 where you takedown different crime syndicates in each area.

[Nag]

An uber violent Punisher game would be cool.

[Sly Reflex]

Not really into comics, but a Punisher game would be really nice. Also from the little bit of Moon Knight I've seen, I think he'd be perfect game fodder. Something like Arkham Asylum, yeah? That'd do, no big thing to ask.

[DANGERMAN]

I never played it but I think there was a Punisher game a few years back that was supposed to be good and brutal 

 

I could see Daredevil having some possibilities, where you could only see where there was sound 

[Maf]

I was thinking Daredevil as well but it’s so close to the Batman games? Even with the fact he uses his other senses to see I wonder if it would be like just playing with detective vision on all the time. DD is my second favourite superhero so I would still play it, though. 
 

There was actually a cancelled Daredevil game that was supposed to come out for the PS2. Looks sick. 

 

 

[shinymcshine]

Here's a bunch of the special kill/interrogation scenes from the 2004 version of Punisher:

 

https://youtu.be/zKVXEKEltqE

 

[Maf]

3 minutes ago, shinymcshine said:

Here's a bunch of the special kill/interrogation scenes from the 2004 version of Punisher:

 

https://youtu.be/zKVXEKEltqE

 

Jeez I’m glad they pan away from some of those they look really brutal. 

[Nag]

 

Quote

GameCentral readers discuss their favourite open world environments, from Zelda: Breath Of The Wild to Fallout: New Vegas.

 

The subject for this week’s Hot Topic was suggested by reader Talon and follows debate over whether open world games are becoming too predictable and too bloated with filler content. Is that something you agree with and what do you think are the best and worst examples?

 

A lot of people tried to avoid mentioning Red Dead Redemption 2 and Breath Of The Wild but although they were the most popular choices there were also more obscure picks, including Trails Of Cold Steel and Just Cause.

 

[OCH]

Hmmm. It isn't really a sub-genre that I like and I've always been a bit confused as to whether "sandbox" titles also fall under it? As such, my answer is split between two  - Shadow of The Colossus and Destroy All Humans. I love the central concept of SoTC. A boss rush set in a vast forbidden land. The antithesis of other open world games, wherein there is nothing to do aside from your core objective. Without all the fluff, the game oozes atmosphere and in some cases, tension. often without saying a word. In my view, it works because of that. 

 

Destroy All Humans (and to a lesser extent, Hulk: Ultimate Destruction) took the open world of something like GTA and made it fun. I like the idea of taking fully realised 1950's B Movies farming towns and cities. That seem so vast on foot as Crypto. Then you get into your UFO and annihilate them! So cathartic too.

 

Oh and on that note, honourable mention to Blast Corps. A game wherein the open world itself was the enemy not just the backdrop.

 

21 minutes ago, Nag said:

too bloated with filler content.

Perhaps controversial choices, but I'd throw Breath of the Wild and Skyrim here. Didn't like either because of it. Sometimes, making something too "video game" pulls you out of the immersion. 

[DANGERMAN]

New Vegas is the one that springs to mind in terms of interesting things to do. You'd have to mention Witcher 3 for the same reasons 

 

One thing I will say for Skyrim is its a very pretty environment, a lot of that world just looks nice. 

 

A bit left field but Everybody"s Gone to the Rapture was a really good looking world. I'm not sure I'd want to live there though, the people seem like pricks 

[one-armed dwarf]

Breath of the Wild. It pulled open world back away from boring MMO checklist style ubisoft stuff. The reason that game is great is cause of how the landscape itself funnels you through Hyrule and the fun clockwork-like nature to how its systems interact. It perfectly encapsulates a feeling of wanderlust that in my opinion Skyrim completely fails at cause your main motivation in those kinds of games is to complete quests and get loot. Not just to look around and explore which is fundamental to BOTW

 

The way I tell people to play that game is with Pro hud mode and to not just open a big checklist of tasks and tick them off. It's like seeing the Matrix, when you realise how genius the designers of it are

 

Only Nintendo game I've liked besides Pokemon gen 1 and 2 (which I only mention cause ppl always say the game is only praised cause it's Nintendo, bs)

[mfnick]

Really fallen out of love with open world games but I have amazing memories of GTA 3. Getting a PS2 and playing that will be forever one of my all time gaming experiences. I still think of that map really fondly and it’s one of the only ones I actually memorised. 
 

Honourable mentions to GTA IV and Sleeping Dogs too. While not the very best games, the physics engine of IV is my favourite to have fun in and Sleeping Dogs’ violence, combat and free running stuff made all the difference to exploring and having fun in that world. The setting was a real breathe of fresh air to the usual too. 
 

Lego Forza Horizon is also amazing. It’s the perfect size - not too big like the rest. And the aesthetics are perfect. 
 

Also regarding last weeks question, my choice has already been done - X Men Origins Wolverine. That’s the perfect super hero video game as far as I’m concerned. I’d be happy with just that again with higher production values. 

[OCH]

21 minutes ago, mfnick said:

Also regarding last weeks question, my choice has already been done - X Men Origins Wolverine. That’s the perfect super hero video game as far as I’m concerned. I’d be happy with just that again with higher production values. 

Oh yeah, I wasn't here for last weeks question. It is crazy how much better the Origins game is than the awful movie. In contrast, that other PS2 Wolverine game (Logan voiced by Mark Hamill) was just weird. I'd paraphrase you exactly here, but throw in Hulk Ultimate Destruction instead. Basically the best games for their respective characters.

 

@one-armed dwarf I think BoTW would have been better, if it wasn't a Zelda title. The least I've been engaged in a LoZ for a long time. Well the last two have been on a declining scale anyway. I think Aonuma should step down at this point.

[spatular]

never really been a big fan of open world stuff, still enjoy some open world games though, but i think, despite the open world not because of it. think zelda botw is the only open world game i really liked because of the open world, not sure i can explain why, maybe because it was fun to explore, loads of cool stuff to find, i don't know. gravity rush and sunset overdrive were both great in a large part due to how much fun it was to traverse the world too.

[HandsomeDead]

I guess Breath of the Wild is gonna get mentioned a lot since it's a recent and noticeably different approach to open worlds which is hard to argue with.  I think Monolith Soft deserves kudos for it too.

The Xenoblade games, while not strictly open world, do inform the design and layout of these areas.  They're just big but also do funnel you around in a way that feels natural, where the natural landscape is the obstacle.  But with BotW you can interact with this environment a lot more and it still gives that feeling.  At least until you get abilities that make traversal so much easier.

 

BotW is basically the open world haters open world game so I guess it's always going to be notable.

 

Is there any Death Stranding players? Because from what I've seen that has this sort of thing going on too.

[one-armed dwarf]

The way Death Stranding funnels the player is that the map is often times literally a bunch of tunnels connected to wider areas. At least in the beginning, later on it does open up a little bit but it is not full fledged freedom either.

 

DS is good moreso cause of how its controls and systems pushes against you and makes you want to develop the terrain in a way to reduce the friction between deliveries. It's way more about systems than the open world. It's like an intrinsic motivation simulator or something where progress is measured by how much easier A to B becomes over time.

 

It's a very good game either way, you've got to be a glutton for punishment with it tho and doesn't mind when a game tries to be boring on purpose

[Maf]

The two best open world games I’ve played in recent years is BotW and RDR2 but for the opposite reasons.
 

BotW is pure player agency. So many open world games say the promise of “Do what you want, when you want, how you want” but it’s never been clearer a game has not delivered on that actually until BotW. A lot of open world games are really dull because you have to run across the map to get to the activity but really in BotW getting to the point is the activity. It’s a game that keeps the player thinking, deciding, planning and trying all the time. Every time you try to scale a mountain you have to look and visualise it first instead of just jumping on and going. Everything about that game is the perfect balance between hand crafted content and real player freedom. It is remarkable what they did. Honestly worried about the sequel because it’s such a magic trick I don’t know how they do it twice.

 

RDR2 is completely different. It is a purely authored experience that is in control, not you. Yes you can abandon the story and do hunting, fishing, and gambling, but it’s still all cowboy/western stuff. You have no say over the type of experience you are going to have. It is purely a very serious, cowboy/western simulation experience and the game will not let you have anything else. As similar as it is to GTA it’s also nothing like it because GTA you can turn in to what you want. You can do all the stuff you like and ignore all the stuff you don’t. Every system and idea in RDR2 is about giving you the most authentic, slow, old Wild West experience possible. Even the way the game makes you open and close every draw if you want to search a house is amazing. Such detail and commitment to the world, atmosphere, pace and authenticity they are striving for. RDR2 is the best version of that type of setting ever done in a game and it will not let you fuck with it. You ‘re either here for as close as an authentic Wild West, cowboy experience or you’re not. Not just the fun action parts but the whole world and era. And I’m all the way in I love the experience they give in that game. 
 

BotW feels like a game designed around the player, RDR2 feels like a game designed around a specific experience not the player. I think this is why BotW is generally really well liked but RDR2 is very divisive. 

[radiofloyd]

I would pick San Andreas, Fallout 3 and The Witcher 3.

 

Eastshade which I played this year was a lovely open world game on a small scale.

[Nag]

I reckon for sheer spectacle GTA V takes it for me when it released last gen, I honestly couldn't believe what I was seeing running on a 360... it was amazing. Just going to that fairground on the beach and seeing all the npc's going about their business and then going postal and watching the chaos that follows, excellent.

[OCH]

Part of the draw of the open world game for me was what you couldn't do before. For example, at the top of Death Mountain, in Link to the Past on the SNES. There was a forest area, only visible through the clouds. I used to think "I wonder what is down there?". Likewise in OoT, there was a canyon on the right hand side of the Goron City. That led off to other lands and I thought the same then.

 

GTA, like BoTW, Skyrim etc did all look really nice but I just didn't find it all that immersive. Their answer to those questions of wonder was: rocks, another hill or skyscraper.