I’ve recently found that big (mostly open world) games tend to overwhelm or even intimidate me. I’m a big fan of the Rockstar games and absolutely adored Breath of the Wild, but my playthrough of Tears of the Kingdom has been a bit rocky from the get-go.
As soon as the game let me explore all of its content and released me from the tutorial island, I was able to roam the lands of Hyrule freely as I once did in Breath of the Wild, but I’ve come to a sort of paralysis. I feel like there’s such an enormous amount of content to see that I’m constantly anxious to unintentionally skip content or to not make the most of my experience. I did not feel like this back in Breath of the Wild, and I’m not really sure why. I did, however, have this same sense of FOMO when I first played Skyrim. That game also made me feel like I was constantly missing stuff which left me kind of unsatisfied.
This is not a big problem and all of the games I listed are great games. I’m posting this because I unconciously took a two week break from ToTK in order to alleviate that feeling but when I came back to the game today and still felt the same, I thought of posting here and maybe hearing your opinions on this thing.
Have you ever felt the same in big open world games? Do you feel like this in more linear games with multiple endings? (I do) Do you think I’m an overthinker and should just rock on? Looking forward to your comments!
i remember this overwhelming feeling when first playing Witcher 3. At some point I just said f it, ignored the thoughts and had a blast
The game would be better with 75% less of the random map markers. I find them hard to ignore even though they’re often not worth getting.
Hehe I know exactly that feeling! Honestly I found the same with Skyrim, GTA5 and Witcher 3 - I can’t imagine spending 100+ hours on a game like that, knowing I’ll probably not finish it! I know it’s irrational but I’m the same. :)
I loved Disco Elysium and Life is Strange 1 because I truly did feel that I left no stone unturned in my playthroughs - it felt very “complete” and had such a satisfying ending that didn’t leave me wandering around a progressively more empty hand world.
I guess that’s a type of game preference - I love watching other people play big games like that, but can’t do it to myself as I feel it’s never “done.” :)
And yet… I’ll play a wrestling game for probably hundreds of hours, knowing fully beyond unlocking everything, there’s a game I can’t “finish” - weird really! :)
Funny you should mention Disco Elysium and LiS! I loved Life is Strange because it felt very purpose-driven and really led you into a clear direction story-wise. On the other hand, I feel like I’m one of the three people who didn’t bother to finish Disco Elysium :D I tried and tried to like it for more than 15 hours of playtime, but in the end I had to admit that its dialogue is too lengthy and that it felt a little too slow story-wise, for my taste at least!
I don’t feel this way about open-world games because they do usually have an end and you can skip a lot of the open-world filler content. I get this anxiety about sandbox games. I hate it because I really enjoy games like Cities Skylines and I’d love to get into Dwarf Fortress, but I can’t play them anymore because I could spend 1,000 hours in one of them and never finish. That open-endedness keeps me from playing.
Oh, that’s interesting that you feel that way about sandbox games. I get that it can be irritating to not have a clear goal or end to the game. They’re more about making up your own challenges and by that your own gameplay experience on the way. Reminds me of Minecraft!
Somehow, sandbox games don’t induce that kind of anxiety for me because I never feel like I’m “missing” something if I tackle a challenge one or the other way because there’s always another playthrough up next to explore the other route.
I can certainly understand that! I kind of am the opposite though; I like not knowing the exact extent of the game, or where everything is, because to me it then feels more like a real place that I’m really exploring. I don’t need to see everything, and honestly I hope I never do see everything because then the magic is gone. I like feeling like a small fish in a very big ocean.
I guess I’m an anti-completionist in that way.
Anti-completionist! I like that. That makes a lot of sense, I think it really might be my inner completionist that wants me to see every nook and cranny of a game. But you’re right about that taking away the magic. Similar to when you replay a game you played as a kid and realise that there’s a lot less to the once magical game world than you thought.
Better not play Elden ring
