Breath of the wild is one of the best games of 2017 with reviews that exceed almost all the versions before it. The reason for this is its seamless open world and an area that seems to keep growing every time you pick up the controller when you leave that area. This effect starts on the first area the game introduces you too. The game gives you all the tools/mechanics to go through the world with in this area and some basic combinations between the two. The player will often go around and test what they can and cannot do in regards with these mechanics throughout the game, but the game teaches you just the right amount to continue to create their own combinations. This leaves the player with the realisation that the game has limitless combinations. This illusion adds to that open world feel as open world games try to emulate as many possibilities as real life.
When leaving the introduction plateau the world starts to open up, as well as the mechanics. Leaving the main plateau teaches you one of the more interesting mechanics, that being movement around the open world. Many open world games often need to have this mechanic as traveling around these open areas can become boring and monotonous, as you will usually come across these areas again. The game designers for Breath of the Wild wanted to emphasise the climbing mechanic. Whether it was a tree or a mountain, jumping off the things you climbed was arguably the most exciting part of the challenge. They wanted to emphasise these moments, and the way they did it was by adding a glider that allows the player to travel long distances when they have spotted something off a mountaintop. Another mechanic based on movement was jumping on your shield and surf your way down to the bottom. Both of these options are equally fun but unfortunately, if you used your shield to get down, the shield would lose durability and could potentially break while doing so. Also added to that, when it broke the player would usually die, as the mountaintop would usually be excessively steep. I personally used the glider most of the time as this you would: cover more ground, avoid combat and the sense of flight while also looking at the beautifully crafted landscape beneath you was remarkable. The climbing mechanic and the combination of shield surfing and gliding, really hit their audience where that little kid lived climbing up their trees in the backyard. How did the game developers get the player to climb these mountains? Often the player would look at mountains and would not bother to climb them as it would usually take time and become quite boring. To drill in the fact that climbing led to the most advantageous part of the games design by having watchtowers that would reveal the area surrounding it on the mini-map; the game would also place a Kurok seed or shrine. Both of these things included a wide range of small puzzles, mini-games or challenges that the player could that would add to their completion stats. |
World design theory (WDT)DevelopersThe goal of this blog is to relate current and past attempts at world design to further improve our understanding. Archives
October 2017
Categories |