Very interesting! Just subscribed, I'm curious to watch them eventually :)
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I don't disagree that it is not a typical open-world game. It does have some free roaming though, with elements such as side-quests, which is why I added it.
There certainly are some still cool games from before 1999. But yeah, it would be outside the scope of this series, which picks up on 3D gaming (and PC hardware for it) having become more common in the mid-90s, with games such as Descent.
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Hmm, I started watching a couple vids and I noticed the videos are not "smooth", like they seem low framerate and jittery, especially noticeable on fast moving scenes.
For example: https://youtu.be/97_w9K87MiE?t=2024
I looked at "stats for nerds" from youtube and I didn't see any dropped frames, so I don't think it's an issue with my connection... Have the videos been transcoded or something?
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Thank you for pointing it out. Yeah, the video (before upload) has a frame-rate of 48.88, which is why YouTube shows i.e. 1080p50 as option. I recorded it at 60 FPS, but downsized it after recording and before upload - and during that process it dropped some frames (and not evenly spread out apparently). And I did that downsize process with a number of videos, where I could have told it to keep 60 FPS, but I didn't, to not have the background too blurry for the videos where I wanted to showcase the game world.
Certainly something I need to improve for future videos. Already i.e. for the Borderlands 2 video I ended up with a video frame-rate of 30 - which may not be perfect, but it seems to give a better viewing experience than some odd 49. It just didn't occur to me sooner that a video frame-rate of 30 FPS may actually be quite fine for a gaming video (while being able to push the bitrate down), sorry about that.
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Yeah, I overlooked Omikron: The Nomad Soul. I found it in the depths of my library, so I added it to the list. Thanks for mentioning it. Wheelman and Driver are not available. Hard Truck Apocalypse I will check out.
I updated the thread with mentioning not covered games, which could be part of the series (as far as I am aware).
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driver is a series, parallel lines is on gog and steam and I'm pretty sure you could activate san francisco if you ran into a retail copy, it comes with a uplay key. I also remembered true crime: streets of l.a. and new york, also not available but the amazon marketplace or ebay might still have retail copies.
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Great idea! I love open world games.
I hope you will expand the series covering open world games on other platforms.
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Thanks!
It would certainly be nice to have the open-world games from other platforms covered as well. I know that e.g. for GameCube and Wii an emulator exists. But I would still need a physical disc of the game to be able to make a legit copy for the emulator. So at this point I'm like: "Well, if e.g. Nintendo wants to see e.g. Super Mario 64 or The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker as part of this playlist, then they ought to release a PC version, as Sega did with several games." :)
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Actually, it was originally released as "Arcania: Gothic 4". And there is some free roaming possible - with "sections" such as the city in the north - see map for the game world.
It sure isn't as open as Gothic 3, with parts of game world locked until the main quest line is advanced, and in particular the stand-alone expansion Arcania: Fall of Setarrif is linear.
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It takes place in the same fictional universe, on an island there, with characters such as Diego, who can be met straight at the beginning. The name was changed after the original publisher JoWooD went into insolvency.
But thanks for making it clear that I had you by mistake among Blue Hearts. And I am sorry that I don't meet your standards - not that I would really care with a tone like that though. / Ale děkuji za vyjasnění, ze jsem Tě měl omylem mezi Blue Hearts. A je mi líto, ze nesplňuji Tvé požadavky - což mi však nevadí když Ty takhle.
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bro, u miss the point. Many games here are not open world, you forget many
I saw Divinity 2 here. It doesnt belong to open worlds, BUT if u want it here add Pillars of Eternity, Pathfinder and many more isometric rpg games...
You added FC3 but you forget about FC4/5/6/Primal/New Dawn
Borderlands 1/2 here, but no prequel and 3
AC3 here but no Origins/Odyssey/Valhalla? Those are massive open world games...
And if you really call platformers open world....
Nah bro, sorry to say but you must learn deeper meaning of open world...
Following your games-of-choice, doom eternal would be open world for you...
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ok then
bvut anyway u put games which are not open world here
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Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel will be one of the next videos (with Ultra HD texture pack), as I am now doing the 2014 releases for this playlist.
I mentioned in the first paragraph that I am doing a playlist for 3D open-world games. Isometric ones I may cover in the future, but not at the moment.
And as far as I am aware, there is no academical definition of what an open-world game is. For me, the Doom series clearly isn't open-world, as I can't walk back in the game world (without reloading a mission) to pick up a collectible, and similarly. Whereas e.g. in Rage I can do that.
Not that I wouldn't understand an argument of: "If you can't pick any direction to discover plenty of side-missions and side-activities, then it is not an open world." And technically not a problem to make another playlist where I would add only "real open-world games". But then there would be questions such as whether Skyrim is not open world then, since there is a loading screen when entering a dungeon?
In any case, I am open to suggestions. But to just convince me that i.e. ArcaniA is not open-world, that is not going to change that e.g. the Steam-community tag says "Open World". And an open letter to the community, where it is laid out what the real definition of "open world" ought to be, with a solid argumentation that may actually bring some results.
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steam community is tagging children games as 'xxx' or '18+' or 'sexual content'
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I am not saying that the Steam tags are a perfect system. My line of thought was about providing a video "to have a look for yourself". And someone might have a look e.g. at the ArcaniA video and be like: "Wait, what? You can actually enter houses and caves without a loading screen? I find that to be way more open-world than some Skyrim."
And then there may be someone who is like: "ArcaniA is not open-world at all, because you don't have vast spaces of pretty much nothing there as you can encounter e.g. on the planets in No Man's Sky.". And fair enough. I wasn't trying to dictate a definition of what an open-world game is - just meant to provide something original and a bit different than some other videos, where someone is talking for 15 minutes while sitting in the menu and talking while there is a cutscene with dialogue.
And I may have been a bit too lenient with what I included in the playlist, with some of these games sure being somewhat "semi open-world". The gameplay still is different to some "All this game has is to go from A to B, and to kill everything inbetween." - and also, covering early releases here, where developers were facing quite some constraints in regard to what gamers at the time actually had for hardware at home.
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Happy New Year!
For the newest video addition, Watch Dogs, I changed the settings for the recording quite some. It is now consistently smooth even while fast driving. And the visual quality is high, albeit not 100% as during gameplay, due to the file size issue. In this case, even after having scaled it down, the uploaded file size takes around a 20 Mbps connection for the 1440p version to be watched without buffering. Not something I am completely happy about, as I am aware that many do not have that much bandwidth. But after running some test recordings, this file size is the lowest I could get it to without an impact on smoothness and without the visual quality dropping into easily visible blurs. On the other hand, while i.e. the 480p version is not as sharp, it is still possible to recognize what is going on there. And there is the possibility to preload a higher resolution, while e.g. making a cup of tea. So this is the recording standard I am at now.
Next step for me will be to get used to a lower mouse sensitivity, as turning the camera around abruptly while just cruising, that doesn't look good. And after these "technicalities", and after a few more 2014 releases, gonna try some different formats - such as possibly a game-run on the hardest difficulty, which may actually be quite exciting to watch, when it isn't clear at all whether I will get through the prologue, and so on.
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Playlist is now completed, with 70 releases covered. A few titles missing, which I may add eventually. But the general idea, to provide an overview of what the early releases of the genre were, with which type of story, setting and game mechanics, that is done.
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Hello,
the number of video games released in particular on Steam has increased quite some over the years. In example, in 2012 there were 434 games released on Steam, and in the year 2022 the number of game releases was 10,963.
Meanwhile, e.g. gaming publications didn't really catch up with such a reality, covering just a tiny fraction of all releases. And even Steam's storefront seems to fall short, at least for me. E.g. when I go to "open world", I get 3,963 matches, and narrowing it to singleplayer I have 1,904 matches. And Steam then lets me narrow it more, based on Steam community tags such as action and adventure. But even if I would be interested just in a particular sub-genre, that's still hundreds of store pages to go through (without letting me filter out VR-only games or DLCs), with many reviews to read to eventually learn something about the game other than marketing say. And myself, I am not a big fan of spending quite some time on that, nor of getting pushed the same top sellers in the lists, etc., and perhaps some of you are in the same boat in such regard.
Long story short, I thought I'd provide an overview and individual previews of 3D open-world games, to help some with orientation, sorted by release day (something Steam doesn't seem to offer).
So far, I covered nearly every such game released 1999 - 2014, and available for PC, in this playlist, sorted by release date.
And currently, I am adding videos to a playlist of such games released 2015 - 2021.
Or if you prefer an overview here, with direct links to the videos:
2021 - 2015
In progress
2015
Vendetta: Curse of Raven's Cry
Fallout 4
Need for Speed
Assassin's Creed Syndicate
Mad Max
Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain
Batman: Arkham Knight
The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt
Yakuza 0
Saints Row: Gat Out of Hell
2014 - 1999
2014 - 2013
The Crew
Far Cry 4
Dragon Age: Inquisition
Assassin's Creed Unity
Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel
Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor
Risen 3: Titan Lords
Watch Dogs
Sir, You are Being Hunted
Lego The Hobbit
Goat Simulator
Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag
Batman: Arkham Origins
Saints Row IV: Re-elected
State of Decay: Year One
Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon
Dead Island: Riptide Definitive Edition
Lego City Undercover
2012 - 2010
Far Cry 3
Assassin's Creed Liberation Remastered
Assassin's Creed III Remastered
Lego The Lord of the Rings
Euro Truck Simulator 2
Borderlands 2 with Ultra HD Texture Pack
Sleeping Dogs
Darksiders II Deathinitive Edition
Risen 2: Dark Waters
Lego Batman 2: DC Super Heroes
Assassin's Creed: Revelations
Saints Row: The Third
The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim Special Edition
L.A. Noire
Batman: Arkham City GOTY
RAGE
Dead Island Definitive Edition
The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings
Way of the Samurai 4
Two Worlds II HD
Fallout: New Vegas
Arcania: Gothic 4
Mafia II Classic
Just Cause 2
Deadly Premonition: The Director's Cut
S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Call of Pripyat
2009 - 2007
Divinity II: Developer's Cut
Assassin's Creed II
Borderlands GOTY Enhanced
Brütal Legend
Risen
Red Faction: Guerilla
Yakuza 3 Remastered
Saints Row 2
Prince of Persia
Gothic 3: Forsaken Gods
Fallout 3 - GOTY Edition
Far Cry 2
S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Clear Sky
Grand Theft Auto IV
Viking: Battle for Asgard
Assassin's Creed: Director's Cut Edition
The Witcher: Enhanced Edition
Two Worlds: Epic Edition
S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl
2006 - 1999
Yakuza Kiwami 2
Bully: Scholarship Edition
Gothic 3
Just Cause
The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion
Driver: Parallel Lines
Yakuza Kiwami
Hard Truck Apocalypse
Beyond Good & Evil
Gothic II: Gold Classic
Mafia 1 Classic
The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind GOTY Edition
Shenmue II
Gothic 1 Classic
Crazy Taxi
Shenmue I
Omikron: The Nomad Soul
Outcast 1.1
And yes, here is a remake of one of the first 3D open-world games.The games are sorted by the original release date, and in some cases the footage is from a later version. I.e. Yakuza was released for the PlayStation 2 in 2005, and the PC port for Yakuza Kiwami was released in 2019 - and I opted to add it to the playlist based on the original release, mentioning it in the video description.
Games not included (so far) for 1999-2014::
Way of Samurai 3
Prototype 2
Yakuza 4 and 5 Remastered
GTAV, GTA III, San Andreas and Vice City
True Crime: Streets of LA and New York City (not available)
Wheelman (not available)
and in these years, there were also some Spider-man games with open world, published by Activision (not available)
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