3 big ones recently, this year was God of War Ragnarok, FF7 Rebirth and Jedi Survivor
Back when 3d games were new, tomb raider, prince of persia etc the traversal was the challenge, the gameplay.
Eventually they got watered down and simplified, now they are cleverly disguised choke points while the open world or boss ahead loads.
You’ll notice the squeezing between narrow walls to separate 2 areas or a simple climb against a flat wall just before a boss. I think Uncharted was the first to do this as they moved away from climbing and focused more on combat and puzzles.
There is no reason to actually have the characters climb anything if it’s not fun or there are better ways of traversal, GoW being the biggest offender here
Jedi Survivor embraces traversal more but still locks you out with invisible walls and floors that kill you
I think I might prefer the elevator loading screens from Elden Ring, at least you get to stretch out your fingers when waiting
The annoying thing is they don’t really need to. PS5 SSD loading is near instant. They’re still using techniques that I first noticed in Soul Reaver.
Still we’re a long way from San Andreas and it’s miles of open country between cities to hide the loading.
Eve Online pioneered this approach to loading screens like 20 years ago.
I think the only game you mentioned on that list which is actually open world might be Final Fantasy. None of the other games are open world.
Open world games are The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, The Witcher III: Wild Hunt, Conan Exiles, The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, Forza Horizon, Shadow of the Colossus, Eden Ring, Insomniac’s Spiderman.
Some of these have unique traversal mechanics, some of these use only generic kinds, such as walking.
Might be an unpopular opinion but I feel like complaining about loading screens being hidden in gameplay is pretty much just looking for something to complain about. The game has to load assets. That’s a fact. Is it not better that it’s done in the background than giving you a generic loading screen every time?
People gave Starfield shit for all of the loading screens during travel. Now OP is complaining about them finding ways to make it more immersive. The gaming community is ridiculous.
At least Starfield has pretty screenshots to look at during the loading screens. And if you use photo mode, it’ll shuffle your pictures in with the default ones.
It is more that the people who act like these opinions come from the same person are ridiculous.
“You say your favorite ice cream flavor is strawberry but yesterday someone else said his favorite ice cream flavor is vanilla. Humans are ridiculous!”
That is why I used the word “community” in my reply ;-). Community means multiple people. You can look it up on dictionary.com if you need to confirm the definition.
Try reading more carefully next time. Maybe read slower or try to pay more attention.
Thanks.
I say this alot when referring to the Minecraft community, but it’s really a blanket statement.
You can’t please those who have no desire to be satisfied.
Edit: Oh, and even when there are loading screens everywhere cough cough BOTW, it doesn’t even come close to being a deal breaker.
I have been playing death stranding recently and the gameplay (= traversal) is surprisingly fun. It’s challenging and the characters acknowledge that too.
