I was trying to think of which games created certain mechanics that became popular and copied by future games in the industry.
The most famous one that comes to my mind is Assassin’s Creed, with the tower climbing for map information.
The first ones I can think of is legend of Zelda and final fantasy, but I think there was also Adventure for the Atari before those even. The first Assassin’s Creed was 2007, Adventure was 1980
Which Zelda games were open world (before BotW)? I’ve always found them annoyingly linear.
The original Legend of Zelda. You had a large open overworld to explore, and IIRC could do many of the dungeons in any order.
That’s cool, I haven’t played any of the 2D ones (as you’ve probably guessed!), are they worth playing now for someone with no nostalgia goggles?