Open world is a mixed bag. Some of my favourite games are open world and I love exploring game worlds. But the current trend of making every single game open-wo

Open world is a mixed bag. Some of my favourite games are open world and I love exploring game worlds. But the current trend of making every single game open-world usually backfires. I'd reather have a carefully designed closed spaced with backtracking (Metal Gear Solid, Metroidvanias) that an open world with a dozen of hand-designed places. The biggest contrast I found was between Arkham Asylum and Arkham City. In the former you are contantly traversing the old places and trying out stuff with your new abilities. On the latter, you just fly in a straight line to your objective. AA is better at gauging your curiosity while in AC, you must actively explore stuff.