Titanfall 2 – “Into the Abyss”

Navigation

Take this with a grain of salt since I’ve not worked on an open world game, but I feel like games like Witcher 3 and Horizon may not have exploration as the primary focus. Witcher’s quests are vehicles for telling amazing stories. Horizon focuses on awesome combat and a crafting loop. Neither really requires players to get lost and explore too much. Those navigation aids get players to important areas quickly to experience the primary focuses of each game.

Also, Witcher 3 and Horizon are both gorgeous realistic looking open world games. That means realistic terrain, tons of foliage, etc. It looks AMAZING but it can blend together making it hard for things like landmarks, paths, etc. to stand out. The waypoint markers make it easier to navigate those busy environments. By comparison to those games, the stylized world of Zelda: Breath of the Wild is pretty barren. Every rock and patch of grass stand out. That negative space highlights things like landmarks and points of interest so you can see them from a distance, be interested, and want to go check them out. It was fundamentally designed to encourage player curiosity and exploration rather than completing quests or fighting monsters.

Don’t forget you are free to turn off these navigation aids (in some games). I did for both Zelda and Horizon so I could really get really immersed, distraction-free.

