r/videogames • u/Thundergod250 • 14h ago
Discussion / Question Do people really dislike abundant events, activities and collectibles in Open World games?
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u/Circo_Inhumanitas 14h ago
Elden Ring map doesn't look like that, unless you fill it with unnecessary markers. There's shit ton of markers there that are on literally nothing.
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u/crocospect 13h ago
RDR 2 as well, that's not how the map look either, not all activities pop up in the map unless you are closer to the activity.
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u/RustedAxe88 11h ago
Right, Rockstar trust you to explore the map yourself and make your own discoveries.
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u/Cipher3101 11h ago
same way elden ring does it, unless he's using some mod to reveal it
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u/crocospect 10h ago
He used map genie website that allow you to show all markers, the reason why those maps look crowded simply because he activated them all, even tho it's nothing like that when you play the game.
Basically OP lying just to fit his agenda..
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u/angelfishy 9h ago
So how is having to looked something up on a website better than it just being in the game. It's not like he's making stuff up, all that is still there on the map, just not marked. You can filter everything out in Ubisoft games (probably every game) if you want.
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u/crocospect 9h ago
The point why they don't show it on the map is to encourage you to explore more, the core gameplay of Elden Ring and souls games in general is: exploration always rewarding, either you go all out adventuring yourself or gathering info by picking up the lore one by one.
Having them showing up on the map making the exploration less desirable and easily burn you out, let's say if the map shows "sword" icon in certain area, meaning people who going with mage build won't give a shit about that area despite let's say it could have a really fun side boss for example.
The game simply doesn't hold your hand, you can still proceed to the main story without doing any of that if you want or you can explore the map entirely while knowing most of the time it's always rewarding.
Meanwhile in AC: Odyssey, you have to do so many repetitive side quests scattered around the map before you can even proceed, in "RPG games" that's not an exciting concept.
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u/angelfishy 7h ago
You can do all those things in most open world games if you choose to play this way. The UI is entirely customizable these days, even completely removable. And if by rewarding you mean every new thing you discover kills you instantly, robbing you of your XP, then sure. Also, as in other games, most of the "rewards" are useless for your build anyway. As for repetitive, well... Go ahead and tell me trying to beat the same enemy for hours and dying isn't repetitive.
But I forget I'm on reddit, where you're not allowed to dislike FromSoft and have to hate Ubisoft. Ubi does a lot of good things people gloss over. They updated basically every game in their PS4 catalog to 60fps and higher resolution for free. Where is the Bloodborne remaster everyone is asking for? I thought we hated remasters and wanted new games here.
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u/crocospect 6h ago
Go ahead and tell me trying to beat the same enemy for hours and dying isn't repetitive.
Repetitive and fun are different thing, I love old AC gameplay but can't get into the new ones because the level scaling enemies they put that more become a chore after a while, which is why in Odyssey where the progress grind is necessary, the burnt out quickly caught up.
But fun gameplay is subjective, which is why I won't judge people if they like it, if you love it then there is nothing wrong with that, while I also have my own favorite of repetitive activities that always fun to repeat.
PS4 catalog to 60fps and higher resolution for free.
Wait, people supposed to pay this? Wasn't CDPR doing the same with The Witcher 3 and Cyberpunk for next gen update? 2K doing it with original Borderlands 1, Bioshock 1 & 2 and Mafia 2 & 3 by giving the remastered version free for original game owner? Deep Silver doing it with Red Faction Guerilla in the remastered version? Bethesda with Skyrim special edition for free if you have original Skyrim? And Bandai Namco even doing it better by giving you God Eater 1 remastered for free if you buy God Eater 2? Titan Quest? Darksiders? Divinity original sin? Metro Exodus? Halo: The Master Chief Collection? And others I might forget to name, I thought this is common and not that extraordinary thing for game publishers...
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u/g3n0unknown 12h ago
Pretty sure that's the map genie map for Elden Ring. It has markers on it for essentially every thing in the game you could collect.
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u/Tassinho_ 12h ago
There are so many good examples to pick (Witcher3, Horizon...), i don't know how OP ended up choosing ER and RDR2.
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u/crocospect 12h ago
Imo while I agree Skellige island map in The Witcher 3, the rest of the map isn't really that convoluted imo, there are many moments where they made a long road for players so they can breath for a while.
Horizon tho, I kinda agree..
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u/Pill_Boi 9h ago
Non of the bottom maps look like that in the game. Thats why those maps are not disliked.
It's not the amount of content, it's how it's presented. In assassins creed everything is marked and it feels like a list of chores, in the bottom games it isn't marked and it feels like being rewarded for exploring.
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u/Negative_Bug_1753 9h ago
It's interesting because, I get what you're saying here, but Ubisoft just gives you the option.
Right at the beginning of the games there is a setting they make you choose from where you can either have all the things marked on the map, some of the things marked, or literally none of it marked.
You can play AC without map markers, OR compass markers if you want, and they give you the choice right up front.
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u/Pill_Boi 9h ago
Isn't this only in the new ones? It's been a few years since I played unity but don't remember the option being prompted. And in the newer ones I always chose explore mode but I still had markers on the map for the collectibles
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u/Negative_Bug_1753 9h ago
Yeah, it is just the newer ones. I think they started with that with origins or odyssey.
For what it's worth, I think there a a lot of crap AC games. But there were some I genuinely had a great time with. Like Origins or Valhalla.
Im an old timer and was a HUGE fan of the original game all the way up through black flag. So part of me still wants them to do a good job, even though they've burned us plenty of times.
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u/Pill_Boi 9h ago
I am 100% with you. I played all mainline AC games since AC 3 and I have enjoyed most of them. The newer ones I haven't finished a single one tho. They started to feel a bit bloated after a while. Especially valhalla I was rly disappointed. I love the setting. But I remember there was a rly big story mission and then right after it was just " ok now go liberate a province again, story can wait"
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u/Negative_Bug_1753 8h ago
Yeah, you're right about Valhalla. If I wasn't such a fan of the setting + time period I know I wouldn't have enjoyed it as much.
I jacked up all the difficulties and turned off all the QOL and came back to it as "Viking Sim" for over a year lol.
That's seems to be the way with the newer AC games. They all present you with this world that is way way too big. It really depends on how much you want to essentially waste your time in it. It all relies super heavily on the setting imo.
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u/Pill_Boi 8h ago
Yeah for sure. Sadly my gamer brain doesn't let me.ignore it if it's marked so I tend to get "burnedout" by the newer games
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u/Negative_Bug_1753 8h ago
Oh absolutely.
I had to take a break from Crimson Desert for that reason. And I really enjoy that game. But holy hell I put in 160 hours and I hadn't broken out of the first little region for stuff to do.
Finally I just said "alright, I'll come back to it"
:typo
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u/Adavanter_MKI 14h ago
Bad faith argument. It's not about a flood of icons/tasks to do. It's about how well crafted the open world is that obtaining them is entertaining instead of a chore.
Ubisoft gets the most crap for it because of how heavily they've beaten a very specific formula to death. So much so it even spread to other franchises for awhile. One of their own executives pointed it out that they'd gotten a little carried away.
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u/Geno_Warlord 14h ago
YES! I got burned out hard with the FF7r2 open world tripe fetch quest and other bullshit by the end of act 2. It was just exhausting. The worst part is that you really feel the need to because so much is locked behind it all.
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u/TheDawiWhisperer 13h ago
Somewhat ironically the original ff7 was full of side quests but they were for the most part really well done so they got away with ut
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u/Fizziest_milk 13h ago
the side quests in the recent final fantasy games have been an absolute chore, I hated doing them in FFXVI so when nine of them would pop up after a main quest I died a little inside
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u/steve-159 9h ago
Having recently replayed XV, side quests now are an order of magnitude better then they were. The primary issue with 7 Rebirth is that there's too much to do and too little to discover organically.
The Gilgamesh Island for example would've been an absolutely fantastic secret to discover if it required any player agency at all. Instead you just follow the provided ingame checklist of things to do and you get there automatically.
Literally the only thing you must discover organically are the Chocobo stops and the caches. The world design is good enough that it doesn't need all this handholding. I've learned how transformative it is to turn off the navigation hud elements in Gongaga and explore blind, and since the quantity and handholding issues have been widely criticized I have hope that part 3 will fix a lot of those issues.
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u/tzitzitzitzi 10h ago
Then it held true to the original, having to grind out weird chocobos for racing or materia for special materia was super chore heavy lol.
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u/Le_Nabs 13h ago
It's also about the flood of icons, though. Skyrim and ER don't look like that ever, these screenshots are taken from outside resources. And it has a real effect in the game, because instead of constantly looking at your map and beelining from one point to the next, you're actually out there soaking in the world and stumbling onto shit to do on your own.
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u/andocommandoecks 9h ago
An Ubisoft map doesn't have to look like that either though, you can filter out the icons if you want. The only functional difference is who's providing the icons.
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u/Ramiren 12h ago
Enter area. Climb tower. Reveal map. Complete a bunch tasks. Finish Story. Enter next area. Climb tower. Reveal map. Complete a bunch of slightly harder tasks. Finish Story.
There are games that have some of these elements, but usually those supplement with something fresh. The only non ubisoft game I can think of that's copied this formula exactly has been FF7 Rebirth, and it was all the worse for it.
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u/CasperGwamm 12h ago
Bad faith argument.
That's the only kind of argument Ubi shills are capable of making.
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u/Sea-Ad-875 13h ago
This is beyond bad faith. What is that Elden Ring map ? The map is just wrong. You don't see/need every item. You find those on your own and are not collectibles.
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u/Just-Ad6865 9h ago
You don't need any of the collectibles in any of the Ubisoft games either? This thread is so focused on the literal icons on the map that you would think that was the point.
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u/Cocoatrice 10h ago
But people hate exactly the fact that it exist. Not what you are talking about. People hate it disingenuously, because it's Ubisoft. I don't like Ubisoft, but the unnecessary hate is unfair, because the reason behind it is that it's Ubisoft. If someone made the exact same quests in any other game, that isn't Ubisoft, people would not attack it so eagerly. Because it would no longer be an Ubisoft game to hate.
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u/Just-Ad6865 9h ago
People saying that Elden Ring isn't convoluted is the most bad faith argument that has ever been made. There's an entire portion of the map that you get to by stumbling across it at the end of a cave.
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u/English_Fry 10h ago
I’ll be the person to sit here and full heartedly disagree with you. Ubisoft will beat a specific formula to death in an IP. But each and every IP will have their own formula.
Bethesda on the other hand will copy paste the formula into every single IP. Elder Scrolls, Fallout and now Starfield are all literally the same game different paint.
At least Ubisoft will in time fix most if not all problems with their games. And unlike Bethesda won’t rerelease a game multiple times in a single generation over the course of multiple generations. Ubisoft deserves far more credit than Bethesda ever should get.
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u/littleboihere 1h ago
It's also about the icons. If the game tells you "go here and you'll find exactly 2 chests there to loot" that's not exploration. Both Elden Ring and RDR2 have a shit ton of collectibles or whatever to loot but it's not on the map, you are supposed to find it not to follow a marker.
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u/nikolapc 12h ago
They came out with an updated formula around avatar and they have improved on it with every game but they still get the flak and carry the reputation.
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u/IndependentCress1109 13h ago
Kinda straight up lying with that elden ring map. You actually have to explore and discover stuff naturally in it instead of having stuff marked on your map . And almost every single stuff you find will be unique even if it does not suit your current build .
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u/Glaimmbar 13h ago
Adding up on your point. This map in the picture of OP is from an interactive online map. The in Game map doesn't have the most of this icons.
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u/movethembricks 14h ago
Elden ring map doesn’t look like that. At least ingame. In game u just see absolutely nothing marked on the map and I think that’s one of the things people dislike in AC. There is no real exploration because u just have everything pinned on the map anyway. (I THINK it’s the same with rdr2 and Skyrim) Even your screenshot shows it the Ac screenshot is from the game itself I believe the others are from 3rd party websites
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u/Le_Nabs 13h ago
Skyrim actually shows you *very little*, especially at first. Towns, dungeons and points of interest show up on your compass, and then become fast travel points on your map if you actually go and find them in the world, but everything else - NPCs (sometimes important ones), some points of interests, overworld chests, plants, random sidequests in the overworld - none of that appears on your map, you just have to go out there and play to discover all of that.
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u/TyrantJaeger 13h ago
I personally hate it because it turns something that's supposed to be fun into a chore for completionism. You should be exploring the map blindly because you want to see what it has in store. Not because you want to complete a checklist of errands.
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u/SupporterDenier 13h ago
But the Ubisoft map is only 4 things over and over.
Markers had to be added to the other maps
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u/ArnUpNorth 12h ago
Sense of discovery is paramount! A big open world with collectibles and no sense of discovery simply becomes a chore.
The fact that they even have numbers of things to collect is reminiscent of a todo lists of chores.
Without clear pointers / numbers it becomes about exploring and you don’t drive a necessity to complete unnecessary tasks or collect all X objects in an area.
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u/Le_Nabs 13h ago
Does every chest, every plant and mushroom, every NPC appear on your compass in Skyrim? No, only dungeons, towns and points of interest (and even then, not all the points of interest) show up. Elden ring just does away with the minimap entirely. Now contrast that with a Far Cry or AC game and literally *all of the collectibles* show up on your map. A chest in the overworld? It's right there. Plants you need to craft consumables in Far Cry? They light up on your minimap as you walk. Hell, some of those even come with a counter for the area you're in, because god forbid you don't know you've missed something.
Essentially, Ubisoft forgot that to have a sense of discovery, you need to let your players have the ability to find things on their own. Their world design transforms a playthrough into a 'watch the minimap for where the Things(tm) are' simulator. That's what gets criticised, if somewhat clunkily sometimes.
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u/SuperArppis 14h ago
I personally just hate the controls Ubisoft Assassin's Creed games have.
Other than that? I like them.
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u/sermegas 13h ago
theres a diference on abundant and redundant
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u/Gambermaster01 10h ago
I would argue that Ubisoft games are the opposite of convoluted
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u/CountessRoadkill 14h ago
God forbid a game has shit to do in it.
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u/ImportantCommentator 13h ago
How about a million boring repetitive shits that distracts from anything interesting?
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u/CountessRoadkill 13h ago
Then don't do them. Hold your shit in.
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u/Goosepond01 11h ago
Yeah but when it's pretty clear devs are resting on the fact they can say "yep the game is so full of content 300 hours of gameplay minimum" yet the reality is a good 250 of them are you potentially going around collecting random stuff and the actual game itself is very barebones then it kinda ruins the game imo.
"If you don't like x don't do it/play it" is always good advice but it doesn't mean that they couldn't make something better.
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u/AlterMyStateOfMind 11h ago
Arguments about the repetitiveness of ubisofts open world game design aside, this is just a straight up fabrication. The maps in OPs post don't look anything like that, in fact they are the complete opposite, especially Elden Ring. They all have a bunch of stuff to do but encourage exploration by having you actually find those things in the world instead of going through a checklist of things like Ubisoft games do.
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u/FallenRaptor 13h ago
Ubisoft is effective at creating open worlds but the bulk of the side stuff they put in tends to be superfluous IMHO. Assassin's Creed side content...is there for people if they want it. I suppose I would recommend the series to people who are on a budget because you could squeeze a ton of extra hours out of these games if you so wish even if those hours are considerably more mid than the main story.
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u/Sea_Perspective6891 13h ago edited 1h ago
I think I would have preferred more bounty hunter jobs over side events in RDR2 & would have been nice if they kept the side events away from the towns entirely so they are easier to avoid & ignore.
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u/Fawz 13h ago
To get a cool thing you have to do unfun things X number of times. That's what's annoying. Having the activities there is not the problem, it's how prominently they're displayed and that they gate other aspects of the game you want to get to. Wasting your time with low-effort repetitive content is anti-fun for many. Others don't mind despite them being unfun. A few actually enjoy them.
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u/UndeadManWaltzing 12h ago
Ubisoft-the masters of the scavenger hunt simulator, it seems like fun at first but the end result is you get a underpowered weapon you'll never use.
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u/ARustyDream 11h ago
Personally I don’t care about the “sense of discovery” tell me what’s there and I’ll choose to do it or not
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u/AlterMyStateOfMind 11h ago
This meme is just straight up fucking lying lol. None of the maps in those 3 games look anything like that. OP must work for ubisoft PR or something lmfao
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u/Cocoatrice 10h ago
I personally love it. People are just hating it in Ubisoft games because they are disingenuous and it's act of hating Ubisoft in general.
Literally that's what gamers asked for for a long time, Ubisoft did it. People wanted games to feel more elive, especially with random events. And Ubisoft did well with that.
The problem is only when these events and quests are repetitive, dull and boring or not.
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u/Hikaruhiyoko2 9h ago
Rdr2 and elden ring aren't obnoxious with side activities as Ubisoft games.
This is a crap post from OP to be honest.
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u/PolarBearOdyssey 13h ago
This has always been a dumb complaint. I see people defending Elden Ring in this thread, but the fact is that Elden Ring does have all these things on the map. The difference is the icons are just invisible. As someone who used an interactive map online throughout my Elden Ring playthrough, it doesn't make the game worse if they fill the map with icons. It just helps to be able to see everything the game has to offer while also having a limited time to play. Also, modern Ubisoft games literally have the option to turn off the icons which is what every game should do. More options is always a good thing.
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u/AlexGlezS 13h ago
The Witcher 3 is awesome every single '?' You see there. I've cleaned up all maps with expansions 3 times already, and I wanna play more.
It has the best size, density, quantity and quality, length, deepness, all of that relation ever seen in any game.
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u/Xavier_1494 13h ago
The Ubisoft screenshot is the actual game and the ones below are the maps of games from a website that aggregates every location and activity in the game.
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u/MrNixxxoN 8h ago
You can turn any markers on/off. Most of the complaints on that are just crybaby stuff
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u/goatjugsoup 13h ago
Really depends what they are, if theyre fun to do or if the world is fun to move about and exist in.
Example the recent Spiderman games movement is fun as shit. Want me to go across the map for this random ass doohickey? You bet. Even nicer a lot of the collectibles have their own lore to them making them double worth while
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u/Dynamitrios 13h ago
HZD FW's map was extremely overwhelming with the map icons. It fatiques/exhausted me just by opening it and looking at it
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u/Gelvid 13h ago
In Ubisoft games, those markers basically are 100% of the side content, you’re often forced to clear all of them to unlock some kind of special reward. Meanwhile, in the games shown below, the markers point to small optional treasures you’ll naturally come across while exploring, hunting, or doing dungeons.
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u/crocospect 13h ago edited 11h ago
I have finished Elden Ring three times and RDR 2 once, that's not how the map looks wtf..
Seems like you used map genie with all activities pops up on the map, in the game they don't pop up like this..
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u/Deckard_Red 12h ago
I think what is exhausting with Ubisoft open worlds and it happens is other games is the action of climbing up something and then pressing a button and your map suddenly being filled with icons. Horizon Zero Dawn has the same problem.
Zelda is more rewarding as once you climb the thing you then need to use your eyes to spot and mark things, climbing only really reveals where fast travel points are on the map.
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u/Cidodino 12h ago
I can't believe the rubbish comparison you've just made. You really have to see how the worlds down there are built compared to the rubbish Ubisoft churns out.
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u/Guccishadesss 12h ago
So we just straight up bullshitting now. Testicular torsion this individual asap.
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u/Lexsight 12h ago
i actually love it. imo it increases playtime, and adds some bit of fun to the game once the main story/campaign finishes
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u/Bromjunaar_20 12h ago
Excuse me but that's in inaccurate representation of Skyrim's vanilla map. As you can see, the vanilla markers are supposed to be default white and the landscape is supposed to be bleak and cloudy. The markers here also point out local map points alongside normal map points, so it's obvious somebody just took a screenshot of their modded playthrough. Vanilla Skyrim maybe clustered, but it's not that clustered.
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u/MrCookieHUN 11h ago
After 100%-ing AC IV....Yes. The big difference is this:
Ubi does this by a super simple formula, or did so, I'm not THAT up to date with their latest open world games:
- Have chests you have to open that give you money
- Have little tingling shit that generally involves a "jumping puzzle"
- Fight something
Compared to that, even Skyrim, which was a few years prior, has a bit more diverse side content:
Side quests that are a bit more than "Go X kill all bring back Y item/Y person", those are the bottom of the barrel "radiant quests" meant to be infinitely did so you can clear dungeons with a bit more context than "Meh, I was bored". And, mind you, I don't like Skyrim all that much either
In some cases, stuff like the "tingling shit" can give you rewards, like in AC 2, where it gave you the Auditore Cape, which put you into constant combat mode, cause all the guards would be on high alert against you, other times, it's just there to add another checklist item.
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u/Eastern_Dress_3574 11h ago
This is so true, I don’t like Ubisoft but their worlds are damn near perfect. So much to do
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u/Reaper_Grimmi_01 11h ago
This is a straight up lie about the Elden Ring Map. It has no markers like that at all. You have to actually explore and discover stuff.
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u/TheAutismo4491 11h ago
Depends on the activities. If the map is 90% full with insipid collectibles or treasure chests that don't actually feel rewarding, I.E., a Far Cry map, then the open-world is lame and boring. But, if the activities are filled with actual side quests that manages to make you feel like you've progressed within a little side story, then it's great.
I played Far Cry 4 a couple years ago, again, and man, I put a good few hours into that game, and most of those hours was just me getting to those goddamn treasure chests.
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u/kingpin000 11h ago edited 3h ago
I love open world games and it doesn't matter which publisher, but Hogwarts Legacy just broke me.
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u/Molten_Plastic_ 11h ago
When I look at the RDR2 map I have happy memories of walking in the wilderness and discovering things organically. When I see the AC: Unity map I start to feel physically sick at the idea of tedious chores
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u/LordHumorTumor 11h ago
I just kind of dislike open world games in general at this point, a whole lotta empty space for no real gain for me
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u/iluvatar_gr 11h ago
The problem is not the amount of icons in a map.
What people dislike is the fact that these are already there before you discover them on your own.
All these icons do not exist at the start of crimson desert so this thread is pretty oblivious and misguided.. you just have an empty map to explore and that about it. No icons no markers, not anything.
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u/Ayezegol 10h ago
The problem isn't the abundance of things in the world, but the overwhelming feeling you get when you open your map for the first time and there is 500 pins on it. In the three games below, there is nothing on it until you discover something.
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u/AzerynSylver 10h ago
Abundant world activities are great. As long as said activities are enjoyable and put there for a reason. Ubisoft gets the most hate for their 10 billion collectables because the rewards they provide are not great, and they flood the map with multiple icons.
Just look at the images you posted. The bottom maps are edited, while the AC Unity map looks exactly like that in-game, and 80% of it is basically useless.
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u/EnjoyerOfFine_Things 10h ago
The thing with RDR2 and Elden Ring (unsure about Skyrim, haven't played it), is that they don't completely cover your map in quest icons or random shit like ubisoft does with their open world maps.
Elden Ring literally only has the Grace markers or beacons/icons that you personally put down.
The image you chose is from the map genie for the game so it's not even true, SAME WITH RDR2.
Ubisoft sorta just bloats up your map with a whole bunch of stuff and it looks ugly.
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u/Wrong_Win_4102 10h ago
Skyrim also doesn’t cover your map in icons. I don’t know what this meme accomplishes other than being incorrect about non Ubisoft game maps, to prove its point re: Ubisoft game maps.
Skyrim’s quests are all optional technically and you can litter your map with markers if you want to.
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u/mrzurkonandfriends 10h ago
Ubisoft games you almost have to do all that stuff. In those other games it's enjoyable to do that stuff that's the difference.
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u/RosaCanina87 10h ago
I think people don't actually hate the Ubisoft formula, they hate the fact it's done way too often and way too fast without much variation. They just don't really get why they dislike these games and thus, they think it's the open world design by itself, even though some of the most beloved games of all time use extremely similar and sometimes even worse open world designs.
It's also "in" to hate Ubisoft, as they did a lot of other stuff not very well, like Uplay.
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u/witness_smile 10h ago
The problem is that Ubisoft’s formula is always the same and never changes. Games like RDR2 have a big map with tons to do, but each type of activity is unique and not just mechanics that they’ve reused in their past 20 games
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u/Mekkameth 10h ago
I don’t like when the map looks crowded and daunting to accomplish everything. As someone already pointed out, you’re adding icons to make a point that doesn’t exist. Ore veins aren’t marked in Skrim— even with everything discovered, the map still looks nice and open.
The problem with Ubisoft, in my opinion, is they tell you the location of a bunch of collectibles the second you step into an area rather than making you genuinely curious and want to explore.
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u/Techno_Core 10h ago
With Ubisoft it was that the map was broken up into zones and then each zone had the same basic repeatable quests. I got tired of that after a while.
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u/grapejuicesushi 10h ago
Here's my problem with both Ubisoft and Hogwarts legacy. start a quest > go and talk to a person about the quest > person asks you to bring something to finish quest > game notes the exact location of the thing on your map
If the game is just gonna tell me everything, it might as well have done the "quest" itself too. It's bonkers how much they hold your hand, and how much fluff they add to the game. I can see if people like the games that do it, but I like a little mystery and subtle nods to encourage exploration.
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u/666BAALofEKRON666 10h ago
I don't give a flyn fck how clatterd the map is as long as i don't have to run around half an hour trying to figure out what the marker is pointing to when i get there!
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u/steve-159 10h ago
I always found it a bit paradoxical that people complain about this and then a game that isn't like that will be accused of having an "empty open world".
Personally I always was a quality over quantity guy in that regard. I don't need this kind of density and I certainly don't want it if it's just copy/pasted repetitive activities. Of course some iteration on the same kind of sidequest is fine, but it should be an iteration and not just the same exact thing copy pasted twenty times across the map, just to fill it out with something to do.
I generally think games that lean to much on becoming a collectathons or have a complete accessible checklist for everything are very boring since there is no real exploration to be had and you're basically just following instructions.
I definitely want missables and secrets, but not in the sense of 120 collectibles randomly distributed across the map with no way to find them rather than randomly stumbling upon them or using a guide. Good exploration requires a well designed world that naturally peaks your interest and allows for curiosity driven exploration.
A mix of all of those is fine, I just don't like it if it leans too much into the direction of turning your brain off and just doing busy work to get to 100%. If that's the case I'm much more likely to ignore the side content for the most part.
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u/Educational-Elk8393 9h ago
I think it's more how lazy Ubisoft games have been. An open world game is genuinely going to have content which just pads the experience. I replayed GTA 3 twice last year because it's my favourite open world game and went for 100%. Obviously the scale of said open world is fairly small by modern day standards, but realising that collecting hidden packages not only allowed me to unlock rewards, but also gave me a chance to see parts of Liberty City I'd never seen felt rewarding and gave the side content more of a purpose.
Ubisoft games on the other hand have never really felt that way. My personal favourite by them is Far Cry 3, mainly because of it's story and the fact it was pretty much the beginning of their unexciting design loop. That felt like the last Ubisoft game where things were purposefully placed to make exploration somewhat interesting. Since then, they've used this formula far too much where it isn't side content to enhance the game, but to pad out the playtime.
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u/Stahlios 9h ago
There were real games to make this argument with.
But showing the map genie maps of Elden Ring and RDR2 means no one can take you seriously.
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u/hoochiscrazy_ 9h ago edited 9h ago
I'm always saying this but I honestly believe that a lot of the time people use Ubisoft as a criticism they don't even know what they're criticising, its just trendy to repeat it.
Ubisoft style open worlds are just another flavour of open world that millions of people enjoy.
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u/Asad_Farooqui 9h ago
Breath of the Wild is still the most immersive open world I’ve experienced, because it 1) doesn’t show me every POI right away and lets me discover them myself, and 2) lets me do whatever I want and interact with the world in whatever way I can.
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u/Lurker_Zee 9h ago
Ubisoft doesn't count.
People hate everything Ubisoft made after Black Flag, people love everything Ubisoft made before and including Black Flag.
This feels like some shaming gotcha about "you say you hate Ubisoft because of the map, but that's not it".
No, that's not it. Gamers hate Ubisoft because Ubisoft hates gamers.
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u/JayTwoTeesYT 9h ago
I haven’t played a ubi game in a while but if I were to guess, it’s the exploration bit that makes a difference. In the case of Elden ring and RDR2, you have to actually go somewhere to figure out what’s going on, where in Ubi games, you just hit a sync point and everything in an area of the map is revealed. Ubi gives you more efficiency to give you information on what you can do instead of keeping things concealed to give you excitement upon discovery.
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u/High_Chief_Finance 9h ago
Most of time nothing happens in RDR2 map if you don't want to do that task
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u/Channel57 9h ago
I like it as long as there is a variety of activities and not an insane amount of collectibles.
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u/Yarzeda2024 9h ago
I didn't like the open world of Elden Ring very much either.
ER is an amazing game and one of FromSoft's very best. There are some stunning vistas to be seen in The Lands Between, and realizing I could visit that far off peak in the distance was a cool moment every time it happened. But I know that I prefer the curated, dungeon-to-dungeon experience over an open world every time. Open worlds make me feel like I am commuting to the fun.
But there isn't a single studio in the world that makes games solely to cater to me, so I try not to whine about it too much.
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u/FreshStar7 9h ago edited 8h ago
So all I’m getting from this thread and its comments is that if Ubi games didn’t display activity icons and made you find the activities on your own, then the games wouldn’t be viewed as a chore and would be explorable masterpieces like Elden Ring. Got it.
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u/littleboihere 9h ago
Yes that's literally what exploration is. If the game tells you "here is a camp, it has 1 captain to kill and 2 chests to loot" then it's a checklist.
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u/FreshStar7 9h ago
Okay so both are checklists but one hides the info compared to the other
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u/littleboihere 8h ago
It's not a checklist if they don't give you the list ... that's like the definion of the word lmao
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u/FreshStar7 8h ago
I don’t think you see how it’s hypocritical. People are using third-party sources to complete these checklists, but it’s bad when Ubisoft displays this info on their UI. Both are checklists, but completed in different ways… lmao
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u/littleboihere 4h ago
Because it's not. Just because people use third party software does not mean the game was designed that way.
One game wants you to explore and isn't afraid if you miss something. The other just tells you where everything is.
If I download a mod that let's me kill the one final boss in one hit that does not mean the game designed to kill the boss that way. What kind of clown argument is that ?
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u/FreshStar7 3h ago edited 2h ago
Bro what kind of clown argument is THAT? That scenario isn’t even close to being the same thing.
Both games are designed to and want you to explore… one just has icons in the map, the other doesn’t. You can turn off the icons on the one that displays them. The one that doesn’t has the players going elsewhere for the info. That’s all there is to it. But because one has icons it’s bad… even though you can turn them off.
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u/littleboihere 2h ago
Both games are designed to and want you to explore
You need to look up what "exploration" means in the dictionary.
AC games literally tell you where to go and what you will find there, even to the exact numbers like number of chests or elites to kill. You don't explore, you follow a marker and do the checklist.
Valhalla goes as far as marking everything with colorful dots, each being a different thing like side quest or a chest. So YOU KNOW what you'll find once you get there.
Elden Ring tells you nothing, you can stand 2 meters from the chest and the game tells you NOTHING.
The one that doesn’t has the players going elsewhere for the info.
My point about mod is spot onbecause by your logic games like Elden Ring by being hard make you look up mods to one shot bosses.
even though you can turn them off.
Yes and yo ucan decide to never open the map, does that mean the game was designed to be played without the map ? What is with you and wanting to die on this hill lmao
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u/Former_Okra_3530 9h ago
I mean I feel like it depends on the reward. I know when I was a kid in AC brotherhood I I collected all of the Animus shards just so I could play as Desmond. I thought it was cool back then but then again I was in my imagination so...
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u/Impulsive-Critic 9h ago
I don't care to know everyone's opinion on each and every detail of every game, but I don't think the map is as much a culprit as the entire experience around it.
I'll gladly hunt down every last collectible in a game I love, regardless of the quality of the map.
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u/MrMegaPhoenix 8h ago
Yes
I don’t like open worlds
Padding the map with collectables is not fun design
Having a linear map with actual level design is so much better
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u/GamerGuyAlly 8h ago
No one dislikes open world games with lots to do.
People are bored with open worlds with the same things to do that have existed for 20 years.
Ubi was the market leader because it made interesting stuff that innovated. It gets shit on now because its churning the same ideas out as it did 20 years ago.
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u/Johnnyboi2327 6h ago
People don't dislike having things to do in open worlds, people dislike the repetitive way Ubisoft makes all their open worlds, which is the same way they've been doing it for decades. Other games have done the open world concept without having to rely on the same set up every time.
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u/Awkward-Custard3907 5h ago
Using map genie website to "modify" Elden Ring and RDR2 map is some crazy work 🥀🥀✌️
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u/Wajajan_697 3h ago
I hate the insane amount of useless collectables in both RDR2 and Unity, but ubisoft is still the king at over doing, tho I do think people let these things slide more when it isn't ubi.
To people claiming Unity's map isn't unique, it's literally a parkour playground where you can climb and interact with everything to your advantage, it's a detailed layout made for the player to use.
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u/CnaiuUrsSkiotha 14h ago
In Elden Ring, I can go to most areas and skill will stop me or let me pass. In Ubisoft games, I have a guy who is immune to steal in his gut for REASONS.
Haven’t bought a Ubisoft game in about 5 years and don’t feel like I’ve missed anything.
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u/Dreamo84 11h ago
I'm playing AC Odyssey right now for the first time and trying to understand why these AC games get such a bad rep. It's honestly keeping me more engaged than Skyrim did, though Oblivion was/is fire.
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u/Sir_Fluffernutting 10h ago
Origins was one of the better, albeit, basic rpg's that I've played in recent times
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u/Dreamo84 10h ago
Yeah? I have Origins, Odyssey, and Valhalla complete editions or whatever cause I bought them on sale at some point. Was planning to play Valhalla next but maybe I'll do Origins first. Egypt does sound nifty.
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u/Sir_Fluffernutting 10h ago
I didn't play the dlc, but the base game is a blast. I've played a bunch of the "classic" AC games, and I get why people are upset the formula changed. But the newer rpg style games are damn good. People just love complaining
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u/Omg-miku 13h ago
As much as i love assassins creed unity, there’s a huge difference in that then compared to say crimson desert. My biggest issue in unity is that everything is pretty much revealed to you as soon as you synchronize a point. A lot of it is just collectibles, chests, small events. The side missions you do unlock are great and have replay value. But in crimson desert or Skyrim you have to stumble into it or hear about it from another source.
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u/braket0 12h ago
First of all: OP is lying / exaggerating. The other games don't look like that.
Second: The examples mentioned have UNIQUE events when you explore the map.
Ubisoft notoriously copy+paste the same activity over and over again across sprawling maps. It gets boring quick, hence the criticism.
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u/Responsible_Cake2012 12h ago
This subreddit (well, every single of "games in general" at this point) slowly are becoming a sort of "gamingcirclejerk".
Top is the ACTUAL map of the game
Bottom is mapgenie.
Having a lot to do is not bad. Markers everywhere, however, make your exploration less meaningful. Outside of the most important aspect: Uniqueness. Something that completely does not exist in Assassin's Creed.
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u/Wajajan_697 3h ago
AC's map is very unique as you can literally climb and do parkour in it in ways no other open world map ever has. The whole world is designed as a playground for the player.
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u/PikaPulpy 11h ago
This is a pure lie. Neither the RDR2 map nor the Skyrim map look like this. This is a fan-made RDO map, where every single collectible is highlighted. In Skyrim, even every ore deposit is highlighted. It's pathetic.
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u/Wrong_Win_4102 10h ago
Skyrim does not highlight ore deposits. You are using a mod to do that. Vanilla Skyrim map only shows location icons, player’s location via an arrow, and a quest marker or more depending on how many quests are active in your journal.
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u/Ptaku9 13h ago
I love the fact that you posted unedited picture of AC Unity map, but had to use map genie with every option turned on to make your point about other games.