• Open World Conudrum: a CRAP poll

    From Spalls Hurgenson@21:1/5 to All on Mon Mar 27 11:44:17 2023
    Another Completely Random And Pointless poll! It's been a while since
    we had one.

    So, welcome to your newest video game, "Super Open World Adventure
    XII: The Opening World of Ultimate Openess"! You've been waiting to
    play it for months and now here it is!

    You've dutifully gone through the character generation and tutorial,
    and now the game's vast virtual world has opened up in front of you.
    So here's the question: What Do You Do?!?

    a) Follow the main quest! That's what I'm here for; I've
    got to save the world! Sub-quests are for low-tier
    betas who Can't Get Things Done.

    b) Follow the main quest as far as I can until I get
    stuck by the difficulty, then grind away at the filler
    material to get the gear needed to kill the Boss
    monster blocking my way.

    c) Dutifully seek out all the sub-quests, helping all the
    pitiful villagers (and collecting all that phat lewt!)
    I can until I get to the point of the game where I /have/
    to take a main-quest to proceed

    d) I'm a happy butterfly, flitting to and fro! Whatever
    adventure I encounter first - be it main quest or side
    quest - that's the one I'll do first, and then its back
    to the random wandering until some new shiny quest
    attracts my attention.

    e) Aieeee! Quests! Run away, run away! I'm just here for
    the random encounters/exploring/crafting, and anything
    that smacks of Questiness I avoid whenever possible.

    f) Open-world games? I wouldn't soil my RAM with such
    filth. I'm sticking with Pac-Man! ;-P


    Of course, all methods are (or should be) equally valid, so whichever
    makes you enjoy the game the most are acceptable. But which one do you
    fall into?

    AS for myself, I definitely fall into Category C (with a touch of
    Category D). There's a variety of reasons for this; because of a fear
    of missing out (since main quest adventures often lock you out of
    missed side-quests), or because side-quests are often more interesting
    than the main adventures (the former tend to be very black-n-white;
    side quests often have more shades of grey), and simply because I get
    joy from wandering and encountering what the world has to throw at me.
    Very rarely do I side-quest solely to level up or acquire better gear.
    But it's only after I do most or all of the side-quests that I even
    start thinking about the main quest adventures.

    So how are you going to finish this game?

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Justisaur@21:1/5 to Spalls Hurgenson on Mon Mar 27 12:07:04 2023
    On Monday, March 27, 2023 at 8:44:27 AM UTC-7, Spalls Hurgenson wrote:
    Another Completely Random And Pointless poll! It's been a while since
    we had one.

    So, welcome to your newest video game, "Super Open World Adventure
    XII: The Opening World of Ultimate Openess"! You've been waiting to
    play it for months and now here it is!

    You've dutifully gone through the character generation and tutorial,
    and now the game's vast virtual world has opened up in front of you.
    So here's the question: What Do You Do?!?

    a) Follow the main quest! That's what I'm here for; I've
    got to save the world! Sub-quests are for low-tier
    betas who Can't Get Things Done.

    b) Follow the main quest as far as I can until I get
    stuck by the difficulty, then grind away at the filler
    material to get the gear needed to kill the Boss
    monster blocking my way.

    c) Dutifully seek out all the sub-quests, helping all the
    pitiful villagers (and collecting all that phat lewt!)
    I can until I get to the point of the game where I /have/
    to take a main-quest to proceed

    d) I'm a happy butterfly, flitting to and fro! Whatever
    adventure I encounter first - be it main quest or side
    quest - that's the one I'll do first, and then its back
    to the random wandering until some new shiny quest
    attracts my attention.

    e) Aieeee! Quests! Run away, run away! I'm just here for
    the random encounters/exploring/crafting, and anything
    that smacks of Questiness I avoid whenever possible.

    f) Open-world games? I wouldn't soil my RAM with such
    filth. I'm sticking with Pac-Man! ;-P


    Of course, all methods are (or should be) equally valid, so whichever
    makes you enjoy the game the most are acceptable. But which one do you
    fall into?

    AS for myself, I definitely fall into Category C (with a touch of
    Category D). There's a variety of reasons for this; because of a fear
    of missing out (since main quest adventures often lock you out of
    missed side-quests), or because side-quests are often more interesting
    than the main adventures (the former tend to be very black-n-white;
    side quests often have more shades of grey), and simply because I get
    joy from wandering and encountering what the world has to throw at me.
    Very rarely do I side-quest solely to level up or acquire better gear.
    But it's only after I do most or all of the side-quests that I even
    start thinking about the main quest adventures.

    So how are you going to finish this game?

    Either C or F. I HAVE to do it all. Elden Ring is definitely a downgrade to me from DS3. Far too much junk and retreads, and far too long if you do/collect everything. I didn't really realize I didn't like open world games until I played it. I tried to get through it again, but I just chucked it again yesterday at the 10 yard line at like 160 hours, I couldn't stomach another 3rd person platforming moment.

    Meanwhile I see glitchless speedrunners finishing the game in somewhere
    around an hour, but they don't touch the majority of the game.

    I've come to realize I like having a definite path, and tend to start looking up walkthroughs when games give me multiple possible paths.
    Though that may also be because it's so easy to either miss or screw
    up questlines in From Games.

    I also generally don't like crafting which tends to go with "open world."

    H:ZD about 3/4ths of the way through I stopped collecting things,
    and I never really did the 'hunter challenge' areas either as I found
    them too finicky. I don't like games telling me I have to solve problems exactly the way they want me to (i.e. take down 10 razorbacks with
    electric traps) or whatever. I like to figure out what works for me.

    - Justisaur

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From JAB@21:1/5 to Spalls Hurgenson on Mon Mar 27 20:47:24 2023
    On 27/03/2023 16:44, Spalls Hurgenson wrote:

    Another Completely Random And Pointless poll! It's been a while since
    we had one.

    So, welcome to your newest video game, "Super Open World Adventure
    XII: The Opening World of Ultimate Openess"! You've been waiting to
    play it for months and now here it is!

    You've dutifully gone through the character generation and tutorial,
    and now the game's vast virtual world has opened up in front of you.
    So here's the question: What Do You Do?!?

    a) Follow the main quest! That's what I'm here for; I've
    got to save the world! Sub-quests are for low-tier
    betas who Can't Get Things Done.

    b) Follow the main quest as far as I can until I get
    stuck by the difficulty, then grind away at the filler
    material to get the gear needed to kill the Boss
    monster blocking my way.

    c) Dutifully seek out all the sub-quests, helping all the
    pitiful villagers (and collecting all that phat lewt!)
    I can until I get to the point of the game where I /have/
    to take a main-quest to proceed

    d) I'm a happy butterfly, flitting to and fro! Whatever
    adventure I encounter first - be it main quest or side
    quest - that's the one I'll do first, and then its back
    to the random wandering until some new shiny quest
    attracts my attention.

    e) Aieeee! Quests! Run away, run away! I'm just here for
    the random encounters/exploring/crafting, and anything
    that smacks of Questiness I avoid whenever possible.

    f) Open-world games? I wouldn't soil my RAM with such
    filth. I'm sticking with Pac-Man! ;-P


    Of course, all methods are (or should be) equally valid, so whichever
    makes you enjoy the game the most are acceptable. But which one do you
    fall into?

    AS for myself, I definitely fall into Category C (with a touch of
    Category D). There's a variety of reasons for this; because of a fear
    of missing out (since main quest adventures often lock you out of
    missed side-quests), or because side-quests are often more interesting
    than the main adventures (the former tend to be very black-n-white;
    side quests often have more shades of grey), and simply because I get
    joy from wandering and encountering what the world has to throw at me.
    Very rarely do I side-quest solely to level up or acquire better gear.
    But it's only after I do most or all of the side-quests that I even
    start thinking about the main quest adventures.

    So how are you going to finish this game?



    Like you I'm mainly c) with some d) and also for similar reasons. With
    side quests you never quite know what you're getting and they are also
    short enough that they don't overstay their welcome.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Dimensional Traveler@21:1/5 to Spalls Hurgenson on Mon Mar 27 15:33:15 2023
    On 3/27/2023 8:44 AM, Spalls Hurgenson wrote:

    Another Completely Random And Pointless poll! It's been a while since
    we had one.

    So, welcome to your newest video game, "Super Open World Adventure
    XII: The Opening World of Ultimate Openess"! You've been waiting to
    play it for months and now here it is!

    You've dutifully gone through the character generation and tutorial,
    and now the game's vast virtual world has opened up in front of you.
    So here's the question: What Do You Do?!?

    a) Follow the main quest! That's what I'm here for; I've
    got to save the world! Sub-quests are for low-tier
    betas who Can't Get Things Done.

    b) Follow the main quest as far as I can until I get
    stuck by the difficulty, then grind away at the filler
    material to get the gear needed to kill the Boss
    monster blocking my way.

    c) Dutifully seek out all the sub-quests, helping all the
    pitiful villagers (and collecting all that phat lewt!)
    I can until I get to the point of the game where I /have/
    to take a main-quest to proceed

    d) I'm a happy butterfly, flitting to and fro! Whatever
    adventure I encounter first - be it main quest or side
    quest - that's the one I'll do first, and then its back
    to the random wandering until some new shiny quest
    attracts my attention.

    e) Aieeee! Quests! Run away, run away! I'm just here for
    the random encounters/exploring/crafting, and anything
    that smacks of Questiness I avoid whenever possible.

    f) Open-world games? I wouldn't soil my RAM with such
    filth. I'm sticking with Pac-Man! ;-P


    Of course, all methods are (or should be) equally valid, so whichever
    makes you enjoy the game the most are acceptable. But which one do you
    fall into?

    AS for myself, I definitely fall into Category C (with a touch of
    Category D). There's a variety of reasons for this; because of a fear
    of missing out (since main quest adventures often lock you out of
    missed side-quests), or because side-quests are often more interesting
    than the main adventures (the former tend to be very black-n-white;
    side quests often have more shades of grey), and simply because I get
    joy from wandering and encountering what the world has to throw at me.
    Very rarely do I side-quest solely to level up or acquire better gear.
    But it's only after I do most or all of the side-quests that I even
    start thinking about the main quest adventures.

    So how are you going to finish this game?

    D with a willingness to simply drop a quest and do something else if it
    turns out I'm not powerful enough currently for it. I (usually,
    depending on the game) can come back and finish it when I'm ready.

    --
    I've done good in this world. Now I'm tired and just want to be a cranky
    dirty old man.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From JAB@21:1/5 to Justisaur on Tue Mar 28 09:36:30 2023
    On 27/03/2023 20:07, Justisaur wrote:
    On Monday, March 27, 2023 at 8:44:27 AM UTC-7, Spalls Hurgenson wrote:
    Another Completely Random And Pointless poll! It's been a while since
    we had one.

    So, welcome to your newest video game, "Super Open World Adventure
    XII: The Opening World of Ultimate Openess"! You've been waiting to
    play it for months and now here it is!

    You've dutifully gone through the character generation and tutorial,
    and now the game's vast virtual world has opened up in front of you.
    So here's the question: What Do You Do?!?

    a) Follow the main quest! That's what I'm here for; I've
    got to save the world! Sub-quests are for low-tier
    betas who Can't Get Things Done.

    b) Follow the main quest as far as I can until I get
    stuck by the difficulty, then grind away at the filler
    material to get the gear needed to kill the Boss
    monster blocking my way.

    c) Dutifully seek out all the sub-quests, helping all the
    pitiful villagers (and collecting all that phat lewt!)
    I can until I get to the point of the game where I /have/
    to take a main-quest to proceed

    d) I'm a happy butterfly, flitting to and fro! Whatever
    adventure I encounter first - be it main quest or side
    quest - that's the one I'll do first, and then its back
    to the random wandering until some new shiny quest
    attracts my attention.

    e) Aieeee! Quests! Run away, run away! I'm just here for
    the random encounters/exploring/crafting, and anything
    that smacks of Questiness I avoid whenever possible.

    f) Open-world games? I wouldn't soil my RAM with such
    filth. I'm sticking with Pac-Man! ;-P


    Of course, all methods are (or should be) equally valid, so whichever
    makes you enjoy the game the most are acceptable. But which one do you
    fall into?

    AS for myself, I definitely fall into Category C (with a touch of
    Category D). There's a variety of reasons for this; because of a fear
    of missing out (since main quest adventures often lock you out of
    missed side-quests), or because side-quests are often more interesting
    than the main adventures (the former tend to be very black-n-white;
    side quests often have more shades of grey), and simply because I get
    joy from wandering and encountering what the world has to throw at me.
    Very rarely do I side-quest solely to level up or acquire better gear.
    But it's only after I do most or all of the side-quests that I even
    start thinking about the main quest adventures.

    So how are you going to finish this game?

    Either C or F. I HAVE to do it all. Elden Ring is definitely a downgrade to me from DS3. Far too much junk and retreads, and far too long if you do/collect everything. I didn't really realize I didn't like open world games
    until I played it. I tried to get through it again, but I just chucked it again yesterday at the 10 yard line at like 160 hours, I couldn't stomach another 3rd person platforming moment.

    Meanwhile I see glitchless speedrunners finishing the game in somewhere around an hour, but they don't touch the majority of the game.

    I've come to realize I like having a definite path, and tend to start looking up walkthroughs when games give me multiple possible paths.
    Though that may also be because it's so easy to either miss or screw
    up questlines in From Games.


    Well horses for courses and all that but I try and avoid walk-throughs
    unless I'm really, really stuck. Does that mean I miss out on side
    quests, oh absolutely but for me the big draw of open world games is
    just finding something without knowing what it's going to be beforehand.
    Even guides in general I tend to avoid unless they are one of those the
    basics for beginners ones. It may mean I don't have the most optimal
    character build but that's what the difficult slider is for!

    Then again I did know someone many years ago who wouldn't play a game
    unless there was some sort of god mode patch.

    I also generally don't like crafting which tends to go with "open world."


    Very much agree on that as I don't find it really adds anything to the
    game beyond a time filler. It would be like playing D&D and enforcing
    the need for spell materials even if they are mundane.

    H:ZD about 3/4ths of the way through I stopped collecting things,
    and I never really did the 'hunter challenge' areas either as I found
    them too finicky. I don't like games telling me I have to solve problems exactly the way they want me to (i.e. take down 10 razorbacks with
    electric traps) or whatever. I like to figure out what works for me.

    - Justisaur

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Spalls Hurgenson@21:1/5 to JAB on Tue Mar 28 22:34:34 2023
    On Tue, 28 Mar 2023 09:36:30 +0100, JAB <noway@nochance.com> wrote:

    On 27/03/2023 20:07, Justisaur wrote:
    On Monday, March 27, 2023 at 8:44:27?AM UTC-7, Spalls Hurgenson wrote:

    So how are you going to finish this game?

    Either C or F. I HAVE to do it all. Elden Ring is definitely a downgrade to
    me from DS3. Far too much junk and retreads, and far too long if you
    do/collect everything. I didn't really realize I didn't like open world games
    until I played it. I tried to get through it again, but I just chucked it >> again yesterday at the 10 yard line at like 160 hours, I couldn't stomach
    another 3rd person platforming moment.

    Oh yah, that's definitely an advantage to side-quests; they tend to be
    short. While some are awesome, some are sub-par, but who cares if
    they're done in ten minutes? This doesn't lead me to want to do the
    sub-quests first (again, FOMO is more of an issue) but it makes the
    pain of subquesting less.

    Meanwhile I see glitchless speedrunners finishing the game in somewhere
    around an hour, but they don't touch the majority of the game.

    I don't want to say I don't respect speedrunners unless they do 100%
    speedruns, because I recognize the skill it takes to finish a game
    that quickly. They've got skills and usually a lot more love and
    knowledge of a game than I will ever have. But I definitely have more /interest/ in those who 100% a game more than those who wall-hack
    right to the end of a level.

    Which isn't to say I have /a lot/ of interest in the 100% speedruns
    either. Just more interest in them than those who do the minimum
    effort to get to the end. ;-)

    I also generally don't like crafting which tends to go with "open world."

    Very much agree on that as I don't find it really adds anything to the
    game beyond a time filler. It would be like playing D&D and enforcing
    the need for spell materials even if they are mundane.

    Hey! I resemble that remark!

    Well, within reason. For common material components, I just allowed
    the magic-user to spend some time searching the wilds (or shoppes) for
    the necessary weeds and knicknacks. I only really enforced the rule
    for spells that required expensive components (e.g., 100gp diamond
    dust for Greater Restoration spell), and even then I went on the
    player easy if the price seemed a bit high. Still, the player did have
    to make /some/ effort to ensure he had material components - mundane
    or otherwise - or I'd forbid the spell.

    I also made them take into consideration things like food and shelter
    when travelling overland, but then I always preferred outdoor
    adventuring to dungeon crawls. Rarely did the players just get to
    travel several days without, you know, actually playing out that
    journey. You missed out on too many role-playing and world-building opportunities otherwise.

    (that's right, even when GMing a tabletop game I put the side-quests
    ahead of the main quest ;-)

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Dimensional Traveler@21:1/5 to Spalls Hurgenson on Tue Mar 28 21:17:11 2023
    On 3/28/2023 7:34 PM, Spalls Hurgenson wrote:
    On Tue, 28 Mar 2023 09:36:30 +0100, JAB <noway@nochance.com> wrote:

    On 27/03/2023 20:07, Justisaur wrote:
    On Monday, March 27, 2023 at 8:44:27?AM UTC-7, Spalls Hurgenson wrote:

    So how are you going to finish this game?

    Either C or F. I HAVE to do it all. Elden Ring is definitely a downgrade to
    me from DS3. Far too much junk and retreads, and far too long if you
    do/collect everything. I didn't really realize I didn't like open world games
    until I played it. I tried to get through it again, but I just chucked it >>> again yesterday at the 10 yard line at like 160 hours, I couldn't stomach >>> another 3rd person platforming moment.

    Oh yah, that's definitely an advantage to side-quests; they tend to be
    short. While some are awesome, some are sub-par, but who cares if
    they're done in ten minutes? This doesn't lead me to want to do the sub-quests first (again, FOMO is more of an issue) but it makes the
    pain of subquesting less.

    Meanwhile I see glitchless speedrunners finishing the game in somewhere
    around an hour, but they don't touch the majority of the game.

    I don't want to say I don't respect speedrunners unless they do 100% speedruns, because I recognize the skill it takes to finish a game
    that quickly. They've got skills and usually a lot more love and
    knowledge of a game than I will ever have. But I definitely have more /interest/ in those who 100% a game more than those who wall-hack
    right to the end of a level.

    I'd personally be more impressed if they did those speed runs the very
    first time they ever played the game.... *evil grin*

    --
    I've done good in this world. Now I'm tired and just want to be a cranky
    dirty old man.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Anssi Saari@21:1/5 to Spalls Hurgenson on Wed Mar 29 12:44:22 2023
    Spalls Hurgenson <spallshurgenson@gmail.com> writes:

    So how are you going to finish this game?

    It depends a little on the preceding Super Open World Adventures
    I-XI. But assuming the series got into a bad place somewhere around
    incarnation VIII and back on track after incarnation X... But it might
    also be I got bored by III already and can hardly believe it's still
    going on but taking a look at XII because it had favorable reviews.

    For me it might well be A. If I need to level up then grinding side
    missions is fine so possibly B too. Or if there's delicious l00t and XP available. Possibly even low hanging fruit from DLC (looking at HZD
    here.)

    Likely not C unless I'm replaying and skipped most or all of the side
    missions because the main quest was so interesting. Or even D if main
    and side quests are all available then I might pick whatever seems
    interesting.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From JAB@21:1/5 to Spalls Hurgenson on Thu Mar 30 09:58:54 2023
    On 29/03/2023 03:34, Spalls Hurgenson wrote:
    Very much agree on that as I don't find it really adds anything to the
    game beyond a time filler. It would be like playing D&D and enforcing
    the need for spell materials even if they are mundane.
    Hey! I resemble that remark!

    Well, within reason. For common material components, I just allowed
    the magic-user to spend some time searching the wilds (or shoppes) for
    the necessary weeds and knicknacks. I only really enforced the rule
    for spells that required expensive components (e.g., 100gp diamond
    dust for Greater Restoration spell), and even then I went on the
    player easy if the price seemed a bit high. Still, the player did have
    to make/some/ effort to ensure he had material components - mundane
    or otherwise - or I'd forbid the spell.

    I also made them take into consideration things like food and shelter
    when travelling overland, but then I always preferred outdoor
    adventuring to dungeon crawls. Rarely did the players just get to
    travel several days without, you know, actually playing out that
    journey. You missed out on too many role-playing and world-building opportunities otherwise.

    (that's right, even when GMing a tabletop game I put the side-quests
    ahead of the main quest 😉


    I'm more of the type that thinks it's best to just abstract away the
    mundane unless it adds to the game. So food, unless there's some sort of constraint from say time or location then just assume that yes you do
    get to eat.

    Something I like about Call of Cthulhu is that it streamlines a
    character's inventory into only listing the unusual and not items you'd
    just expect to have. So no going to investigate a house late at night
    and everybody says, but I thought you'd bring a torch.

    Even money is abstracted into an overall credit rating which gives you
    am idea of purchasing power so you don't have to worry about keeping
    track of it.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)