I've said elsewhere that I really loved Fez. The combination of the platforming, puzzles and exploration was just spot on. It used your curiosity to lure you in, and I'd play through just one more door, one more area until it's 3 in the morning and why am I still playing this? I really enjoyed decoding all the hidden messages, too. Gave a feeling of a world that was bigger than what you could see. Also recently finished the Tomb Raider reboot. It had its moments too - exploring the map was a pleasure (none of the awkward jumping of older installments), and the game rewarded you for it in the form of additional backstory about the island. Even the few tombs were optional, but the puzzles did just enough to satisfy - I just wish there had been more of that. On the other hand, some games have left me cold - the Elder Scrolls series offers wide open worlds, but there's no real reason to explore (other than to gawp at the scenery). Ruins don't have names or stories, and are just lootable hack-n-slash dungeons with trolls or something within. So, does anyone know of some games to scratch my exploration itch? Bonus points if theyre fun to get around in (makes the in-between bits when you're covering old ground a bit more interesting). Was thinking about Proteus, although this is mostly a gawp-at-the-scenery type game. Any more suggestions?
You could try Fallout 3 or New Vegas, but they may end up being too much like the Elder Scrolls games for you. You could also try Batman Arkham Asylum. Lots of nooks and crannys to discover, and the gameplay is lots of fun. If you want a truly HUGE and lush world to explore I can recommend Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning. Sadly my save corrupted 70 hours into it, but up till then I had been loving the game and exploring the world. There was plenty I never got to see. Massive game and highly underrated IMO. Farcry 3 is also worthy of your attention. Big map and lots to do. Darksiders II is surprisingly large and fun to explore as well. Secrets to find, puzzles and so on. If you wanted to get oldskool I'd suggest the Baldurs Gate games. Soo much exploring to do and classics!
Dark Souls. If you approach each fight like it could be your last you shouldn't suffer too much frustration. The world you are given to explore is like nothing else. Can't recommend it enough.
Oh my goodness, Spirit looks fantastic. Wonder if it will make enough to get funded... Arkham Asylum is going on my list given the reviews. Always enjoyed games in that style (see also: Tomb Raider, InFamous, etc) Baldur's Gate (and I suspect Dark Souls) tended to smack you down hard if you went too far off the beaten track. It was understandable (it's a quest with low-level characters) but the world required prior knowledge of what you'd encounter so you would only go there when you were ready. Trouble is, you never knew when you were ready. As such you tended to explore, get stuck, then have to go back to a previous save from an hour or more previous and go level / buy enchantments. Plus, moving around was so tedious! The characters walked so slowly and the scrolling, endless scrolling... I was glad for the sprint feature in Planescape: Torment as it sped things up no end. Also the writing was better...
Have you taken a look at Journey on the PS3? It's not exactly what you are looking for but the whole game is focused on exploring a strange land while knowing almost nothing of the reason for doing so or the final destination itself. Its a stunning looking game and at only a couple of hours long at best it can (and in my opinion should be) played through in one sitting. I won't ruin it for you but it has some of the most unique and intriguing multiplayer elements I've ever encountered too and for the record I typically hate multiplayer games. If you can get it cheap and you have a PS3 its such a good game it would be a shame to miss it. Just a thought.
Fair enough. You do need to approach the battles with care and compared to games now the getting around is tedious in Baldur's Gate. I added in Darksiders II as you mentioned Tombraider. It has the puzzles and secrets and jumping all over the place ect.. The big difference would be the world size and it's fighting style is hack n slash. If you like Diablo style games you could try Path of Exile. It's free and pretty decent, though the only thing that really makes it stand out is the skill system, which is quite impressive.
I never played elder scrolls, but I did play Skyrim. But I loved the Fallout games so much more, they were more immersive for me and the backstory was so well thought out.
Brilliant game. As you say, not so much about exploring, but it was beautiful in its own way. Thanks for the suggestions all. Keep 'em coming
TBF to Fallout3/NV they arent quite the same as skyrims stuff. I do agree that skyrim has generic dungeons but fallout does not have that random spawn thing skyrim has. So Fallout you can come across something and geniunly go "Ohh whats this" and find something cool etc. Like a vault and normally there is holotapes or something that gives a backstory. I loved that about fallout, pick a direction and just go that way until you find something. I stumbled upon the garden world place in fallout 3 thanks to doing that. (where that tree is making the grass grow, its been a while!). But I would defo say the Fallout games are a good one.
I was going to mention the Myst series, especially as realMyst: Masterpiece Edition has recently been released which visually looks lovely, if your not familiar with these games, they are all about exploration, discovery and above all puzzle solving and the puzzles can be tough but you rarely if ever die or fight. Cyan fixed initial problems with their optimization patch.
Two that I am interested in are; 1) Unclaimed World - http://unclaimedworld-game.com/ Isometric survival/exploration game where you have survivors from a crashed spacecraft on a planet. 2) TUG - http://nerdkingdom.com/ A kickstarter game that has multiplayer and procedurally generated worlds, akin to Minecraft in a sense, but they are implementing more character development and social sciences into how the player can interact with the world and the other players. It's a very incremental development thus far, but it's been coming on leaps and bounds in the last couple of months.
Reminds me of "Another World" and I never knew there had been a 20th anniversary remastered edition released, what a classic and just for nostalgia, Oh, dat intro...
Yep, I immediatly thought about Another world and Flashback when I saw KRZ. I have great memories of those two games on my Amiga ..... and both had great introz
I think KRZ is more about atmosphere than real exploration though, but I'd still recommend it to the OP (and anyone else) anyway. Great game.
You perfectly summed up why Oblivion was such an unsatisfying and directionless experience. I do think that Fallout 3 escapes this problem, though, because the environments and ruins you find really do tell their own history just through their design, and often contain awesome living stories too. They're also less cookie-cutter than the Elder Scrolls dungeons, which really are all interchangeable and without identity. Far Cry 3 is a bit of both. The environs are so gorgeous, realistic and organic that I really enjoyed just rambling around for hours, but the bases themselves suffer from the same problem as Oblivion's dungeons - identical and pointless. Once you've visited every high point (and paraglided off it) and seen every exotic species (and flayed its skin off), there's not much point to carry on playing. How far back did you go with Elder Scrolls, though? For my money, Morrowind stood out as the exploration king because every corner of the maps was uniquely designed, interesting and had quirky history written into all its design details. The game was also full of odd characters with interesting stories that directly tied into the locations and the politics/history.
