When it comes to open-world games, getting items is boring.
And this is a bummer because it should be one of the most rewarding parts of a game,
as, ya know, items are the actual reward for doing things.
However, obtaining new stuff is often only exciting in the early parts of open world
games.
Receiving those first few weapons or pieces of armor can make a character feel far stronger,
and because players’ will be low on supplies, every little bit helps.
However, over time as acquiring items becomes more common and players create a nice little
stockpile of resources, the excitement that comes from getting items fades away.
There are a handful of reasons as to why getting items in many open-world games isn’t as
fulfilling as it could be, and the easiest place to start is with presentation.
When I think about games where getting an item causes me to feel excited, the ones that
have some sort of fanfare stick out the most.
Opening a chest in Zelda and hearing *DUNANA* hard wires the player’s brain to think,
“Yeah, I just got something cool.”
And even when it isn’t something that cool, the mental association tricks our dumb brain
into thinking it is.
It feels like an achievement, it feels important.
This is what getting an item is like in most open-world games.
It’s efficient, yes, but it isn’t exciting.
Now, obviously, a fanfare like the one in Zelda would not really work in an open world
game as there are so many more chests to open and items to get, so having it stop players
to watch the same animation over and over would get tiresome quickly.
But there is a huge gap between *DUNANA* and *take all and walk away*, so finding a middle
ground could help make these moments feel a little more important.
I know this sounds like a surface level complaint, but being reinforced with visual or auditory
flourishes can make a positive connection between the player and whatever caused it
to happen, turning something that would otherwise seem flat into a much more exciting experience.
Aside from how items are presented to the player for the first time, I also think it
is important for games to present items in interesting ways once they are actually in
the player’s inventory.
I find myself feeling far more engaged with an item when it seems to take up physical
space inside my inventory.
Games in series like Diablo, The Witcher, and Resident Evil, do a really good job of
this.
Being able to see items as physical objects in a set space makes them seem a little more
tangible than just having them be a name written on a long list.
What I like even more is when these types of grid systems have a limited amount of space,
pushing players to find the optimal way to organize it.
Admittedly, this is something I hate doing in real life, but playing inventory tetris
in games is something I find a surprising amount of joy in.
Players have to pay attention to what is getting put into their inventory and decide what is
important versus what can be tossed; it also rewards players for clever organization by
freeing more carrying space.
Resident Evil 4 takes it one step further by having equipped items take up space in
the inventory instead of there being a designated spot for a weapon, making it so players had
to decide how much they really care about the massive weapon that takes up the majority
of their space.
The answer is a lot.
For me, this made any new weapon that I decided to keep feel more special, because it came
at the cost of space for other things.
And this ties in with my next point: for items to feel important, games need to make encumbrance
systems that actually...work.
Honestly, encumbrance systems in most open-world games, especially ones made by Bethesda, are
pointless.
The starting limit of what players can carry is typically super high, and when it is reached,
there isn’t a real consequence.
Sure, movement is slowed to a crawl and the ability to fast travel is taken away, but
players still have the option to drop items to get just below the threshold, fast travel
to a town, sell their stuff, fast travel back, pick up whatever they missed, and fast travel
back to the town again.
It ends up taking five minutes, and no interesting consequences are given for being nearly over-encumbered.
And as soon as I mentioned fast travel, I could already hear some people saying, “well,
don’t use it then,” but it’s not that simple.
Fast travel is a band-aid for bigger issues in a game, like stale movement mechanics and
boring world design.
So, even if the player decides not to fast travel, they most likely will have a long,
tedious walk, and really only make the player lose some of their time.
In my opinion, unless time is a key mechanic in your game, losing time is not a good consequence;
it is just padding.
I think transporting items in open-world games would be far more interesting if fast travel
was only usable in specific locations, like the signposts in The Witcher 3 or the carriages
in Skyrim, and if encumbrance systems had more gradual status effects.
A solid example of this is from a relatively unknown RPG called
Dark Souls.
Depending on how much the player character is wearing, their overall speed and the types
of rolls they can do change.
I’d like to see something similar to this be implemented in more open-world games, but
instead of things just being dictated by what the player has on, ideally they would be affected
by everything in the player’s inventory.
Changing the gameplay in this way would create a risk reward system where players can take
more stuff, but it would make things like combat become more difficult.
The consequences for hitting different encumbrance limits could range from making the player’s
stamina recovery a bit slower to them not having their full range of motion in combat,
leading to them being less effective than when they are unencumbered.
There could even be some positive side effects, like if a character gets hit really hard while
carrying a lot of stuff, they may be less likely to get knocked back because they are
just that heavy.
This would create conflict between whether it is better to collect a lot of loot or have
full access to a preferred play style, creating a connection between players and the things
they carry.
With all of that said, even if items are presented in interesting ways and players are constantly
asked to make decisions about if something is worth it or not, a huge problem with items
in open-world games is that most of the things players pick up are boring in and of themselves.
For instance, I’ve noticed a trend where games will have items with the sole purpose
of being sold.
While I can appreciate developers wanting to add flavor and a level of realism to a
game by having things other than just coins be in chests, it ends up being a detail most
people ignore and it adds an extra step to getting that money.
Items like this work well when there is some sort of strategic value to holding on to them.
For example, in a game like Hollow Knight where dying puts players at risk of losing
all of their coins, items that can be turned in for cash force players to consider when
it would be best to sell them.
This heavily relies on Hollow Knight’s death mechanic, which I can’t imagine many open
world games adopting, although I do think having players lose something upon death that
they could go back and get would be a really neat mechanic for open world games to have.
It would not only give more value to the materials you don’t lose on death, but it would also
add a new layer of tension, making traversal across the world more interesting.
An easier approach for developers would just be adding better ways for players to lose
their cash while they are out travelling.
Maybe NPCs could be able to pickpocket the player or there could be more scenarios where
paying a fee is more viable than just killing everyone in the way.
However, this really only fixes part of the problem; the more effective solution would
be giving each item multiple in-game purposes.
The game that handles getting mundane loot better than any other I’ve played is Dungeons
and Dragons.
If a player finds an old wooden pipe with strange runes engraved on the side in almost
any video game, they’ll probably sell instantly, but in DnD players hold on to items like that
because they can interact with them in meaningful ways.
For instance, in DnD the player could use the pipe to fit in with a group of snooty
nobles who could prove to be valuable allies or they could develop a smoking habit that
might give them temporary relief, but have consequences in the long run or they could
hold on to it as keepsake to show how far they’ve come since the start of their adventure.
Due to it being a tabletop game, the only limit in DnD is imagination, so it is way
easier to do this sort of thing than it would be in a video game.
However, I think a lot of games would benefit from incorporating a simplified version of
it.
There doesn’t need to be infinite possibilities, but having a handful of uses for any given
item a player can use would give a greater importance to everything the player finds.
If they find a rabbit’s foot, have a function where they can rub it and every once in awhile,
it will give them some sort of luck bonus.
Also, if a superstitious person sees them with it, they will be more inclined to like
player.
This may be the sort of thing that doesn’t interest a lot of people, but for me, it would
get me to actually pay attention to the more mundane items I pick up.
It would also make way for giving the player character a more defined personality based
on how they interact with things in the world.
As for more substantial items, like weapons or armor, more often than not, players are
just looking at the numbers to see if they are higher than whatever they have equipped.
It definitely feels good seeing those stats go up, but often times, they don’t really
change up gameplay that much, so players are really just met with a barrage of weapons
with slightly chances to crit or do damage.
Personally, I think a lot of games would benefit for having less of the same types of weapons.
I like Bloodborne’s approach; they focused on creating a handful of super interesting
types of weapons that improve through upgrades instead of finding more powerful versions
of them.
I understand the philosophy behind the gameplay loop of grinding and then getting a more stronger
weapon, but it is more interesting to be rewarded with something that changes gameplay opposed
to something that just makes you hit a little harder.
Whether this is done through status effects or just how the weapon handles, it creates
a more memorable and noticeable change.
I find that stat upgrades are too gradual and hard to notice to really be effective.
However, having a new weapon open up an entire new way to play the game is the sort of change
that sticks with me.
Admittedly, pretty much any aspects about a game will lose its luster after enough playtime,
but I do think these ideas would help extend the amount of time it takes to get there.
When the major mechanics and systems of a game do not interact with each other in interesting
ways, it often leads to them not being very effective.
So everything from travel to encumbrance to combat to money to health should be connected
to each other in various ways.
Clearly, open-world games and I don’t really get along, and that mostly stems from the
fact that on paper, they should be my favorite type of game, but in practice, they bug me
more often than not.
These suggestions are almost certainly not for everyone, and it is mostly an effort for
me to lay out what an open-world game that is perfect for me would look like.
And that is a game that gives importance to the various elements that comprise it, and
makes everything from a stone the player finds on the ground with a smiley face carved on
it to a giant sword that only a true hero could wield, feel special.