Exploring Worlds Gets Better and Better

What a time to be into video games! Open world games were awesome, then they got stale, and I am happy to announce they are awesome again! With Horizon Zero Dawn and Zelda: Breath of the Wild being released so close together we have hit peak open world. I can honestly day that these are the two best open world games I have ever played and for entirely distinct reasons! I feel bad for those that must come up with a Game of the Year with all the good stuff that has come out this year. Oh, right.

Today we wander and fight then wander some more.

Horizon Zero Dawn is an exercise in the hand-holdy game design we have been subjected to for the last couple console generations. Who knew such a tight, curated experience could be good. The map isn’t quite as big as other titles that boast millions of square miles of (mostly) empty real estate, it’s densely packed and it doesn’t take too long to travel anywhere. The environment and everything in it look amazing. Collectables are present but rather than 100 treasure chests and 1500 points of interest there are 6 figures, 30 flowers, 12 mugs, and 12 vistas. There are also maps that are easily obtainable that show you the general area of the items, this is great because it cuts out the middle man because you were going to look them up anyway. The main story stars a strong female lead that could have just as easily been male and doesn’t feel like they are pandering. It also makes sense and is better than anyone thought a game with robot dinosaurs would be and the side quests don’t feel like filler and are just as interesting. It’s like they played a recent Bethesda game and decided the main quest should be more than just a reason to put the character in game. We haven’t even gotten to the gameplay yet. It is so satisfying to blow crap up in HZD. Guerrilla nailed the third person action with emphasis on bow and arrow; they have been wasted churning out Killzone properties. Shooting a precision tip arrow into the exposed side of a Thunderjaw is as satisfying as blowing off their own disc launchers that you can pick up and pelt them with. It’s not perfect. The climbing is kind of uninspired. You are trained early on to look for certain color hand holds and rocks that Aloy effortlessly hoists herself up. This part of game design hasn’t changed, quit slowing down time when I make a long jump to make it more dramatic; she will make it because the engine let her and no one is on the edge of their seat. I would have liked to have the other weapons take more of a front seat. Other than a few cases I could rely on the three endgame bows because they covered all the ammo types I needed. Go get it! I rarely platinum a game but had a blast filling in all the blanks of Horizon Zero Dawn’s world.

Breath of the Wild. This is going to be a talked about game all year and will likely end up on almost every “Best of” list. There is good reason. Everything that makes HZD such a wonderful experience is done in the exact opposite way. BotW is equally a modern game and throwback to the original Legend of Zelda. The graphics have a more understated elegance to them somewhere between Windwaker and Skyward Sword. You get around by climbing things. <Everything>. Then you jump off a cliff and glide as far as your stamina gauge will allow. You fill in your map by climbing large towers and synchronizing with them, they only fill in your map and don’t tell you where points of interest are. You have to look for those and use a proximity locator to find them. The entire world is open to you early on. There are generous fast travel points that reduce the “GPS follow” time that plagues open world games and make getting somewhere feel like an accomplishment. Some have criticized the weapon durability system but I like that it promotes the use of varied weapons and how you approach a given situation. There are secrets to be found all over the overworld just like the original Zelda had something on almost every square of the map. Bombing, push/pull-ing, burning, and scaling everything is just as awesome as it was thirty years ago. Shrines dot the map and are small, contained puzzles for you to solve and every fourth gives you an increase to your health or stamina. The entire point of BotW is exploration and every minute of it amazing. I only have small complaints about this one. The weather can be a pain because there is nothing worse than a downpour that makes you slip while climbing or lightning that will toast you if you are equipped with metal. Generally, you solve this by waiting for the weather to change or leaving the region. You don’t need a shiny Nintendo Switch to play it, Breath of the Wild is on Wii U and is exactly the same. I you have either of these systems you are doing yourself a disservice by not playing it.

There you have it. Two games released so close to each other in the same genre doing completely different things and being excellent at the same time. The real issue here are that everything is going to be measured against these titles. Ubisoft is the self-proclaimed king of open world gaming and yet they haven’t innovated it in any way since Assassin’s Creed II (okay, I’ll give you Black Flag because sailing your pirate ship was cool). The icing on the cake is the lack of game crashing bugs! I think I got completely stuck on level geometry once in HZD and have yet to see anything game breaking in BotW. The line has been drawn and I like where it is; this should be the bench mark in quality AAA gaming releases should strive for.