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[Ben_Hurr]

And then we have games that have wide open empty expanses to pad their length, and the designer slaps "EXPLORATION!" on it to cover their ass.

[s0]

Without having read any of the other replies, I feel inclined to post about two of my favorite exploration-based games and why I like them:

In Noctis, exploration is the only real "game mechanic", apart from some very tame resource management. The draw here is finding rare and unusual phenomena in a massively huge procedurally  generated (but fixed) universe, and sharing your discoveries with the community (or keeping them to yourself). Interestingly enough, the fact that there are probably still things in this game no one (including the developer himself) has ever seen gives it more of a sense of simulating a "living, breathing world" than all your Oblivions ever could. You really feel like you're mapping out an unknown galaxy.

The criminally underrated King's Field series is heavily based on figuring out yourself how to progress and where to go next, making it inherently exploration-based. Here the exploration becomes part of the challenge. The games are extremely hard and being overly curious and careless in your exploration will likely result in getting yourself crushed to a bloody pulp by a rock golem twice your size, so evaluating the danger of your current situation and deciding whether to forge ahead or retreat and try a different route is paramount. Ycould say that King's Field's unforgiving gameplay and dismal, harsh atmosphere enhance each other. You wouldn't get the same sense of constant danger and dread if it wasn't exploration-based.

[ஒழுக்கின்மை (Paul Eres)]

And then we have games that have wide open empty expanses to pad their length, and the designer slaps "EXPLORATION!" on it to cover their ass.

that's true. however, the original post wasn't talking about those. look at this. just look at this quote:

I roll my eyes whenever people wax sentimental about how certain games or genres encourage exploration, because most of the time. I don't understand how people can say things like 'Sometimes, I don't just kill enemies in x game -- I prefer to walk around and immerse myself in the world and explore'

in other words, he's not complaining about games padding length and claiming exploration to cover it, with nobody enjoying it. he's complaining about *the people who enjoy those games* -- he's saying they should not, in fact, enjoy those games, that it's wrong to do so. that's not something i think is a reasonable opinion.

[SidM]

And then we have games that have wide open empty expanses to pad their length, and the designer slaps "EXPLORATION!" on it to cover their ass.

I think Ben_Hurr has understood the original poster right, as the Original Post also mentions:

Whenever I'm traversing a large, semi-large environment in a game, I don't feel as if I'm exploring -- I feel like I'm navigating a giant empty box painted with semi-interesting scenery.

[ஒழுக்கின்மை (Paul Eres)]

yeah -- but as i read it, he's not just saying that he doesn't enjoy exploring that stuff, and that if others do it's okay, he's implying that there must be something wrong with people who say they enjoy that stuff, either that or they're lying and don't really enjoy it. in other words, i read it as him saying that if he doesn't enjoy a particular type of game, that type of game shouldn't be made, even if there are people who enjoy that type of game (and he rolls his eyes at those people).

[deathtotheweird]

I enjoyed the exploration bits in Shadow of the Colossus, which is exactly the type of game the OP is referring to.

Am I deluded? Has my life been a lie? Have I been brainwashed by those evil and extremely lazy game developers? Help me OP. I am lost and I need help.

[s0]

Only semi-related, but I find the notion of the "bad" game that "tricks" players into thinking it's good really weird. If a game sucessfully manages to do that, it's a good game in my book. I think questioning your own motives as to why you enjoy a particular game is a waste of time.

[BlueSweatshirt]

Only semi-related, but I find the notion of the "bad" game that "tricks" players into thinking it's good really weird. If a game sucessfully manages to do that, it's a good game in my book. I think questioning your own motives as to why you enjoy a particular game is a waste of time.

Touché!

I think that it's definitely worth it for someone who makes games. That is, questioning your own motives as to why you enjoy a particular game. Because by doing this you'll probably learn more about yourself, and you'll also learn more about game design theory by identifying such.

Also, I do agree that exploration is simply another marketing tool. In a game like, say, Pokémon, you're exploring the world, you're even told that your motivation is to explore. But why isn't that fun, why don't you get that feeling of exploration? Personally, I think it's because you have a world map, you know where everything is, there's no unknown. I think a vital part of exploration isn't seeing things you haven't seen, but seeing, finding, discovering things that previously haven't been. This is where I think many, many games go wrong with something so simple as a world map.

[s0]

I think that it's definitely worth it for someone who makes games. That is, questioning your own motives as to why you enjoy a particular game. Because by doing this you'll probably learn more about yourself, and you'll also learn more about game design theory by identifying such.

I guess so, but that's a bit different. I was talking more about the "I shouldn't be playing that" syndrome, letting an abstract concept of "good taste" dictate what you enjoy.

[unsilentwill]

Damn fine point about maps. Once you think you have seen everything, you stop looking. But, you just need one breakable wall and sudden the feeling of exploration comes rushing back.

[Shambrook]

I found the exploration in WoW really well done. I know the game gets a lot of flak from all directions, but some of the best moments I had in that game were just finding new things. I'll always remember being in Tanarias and cresting a sand dune to find a massive gorge on the other side full of slime with giant tentecalls sprouting out of the ground and just being shocked by it. Or finding the entrance to MC the first time in the massive hollowed out cave with a giant suspended temple in the centre.

They did end up having quests around them but when I found them I was completly oblivious to them and they were impressive in there own right.

[JasonPickering]

alright so I have been toying with this idea for a while and I posted something about it a long time ago. basically you drive a sub around and explore screen to screen knytt story style. you can exit the sub as a diver. the original idea was to ahve enemies and all thsi other stuff but this was making things too complicated. I recently remembered playing Tanaka's friendly adventure (would you guys consider this a strict exploration game) and i remember the fun of just exploring. A couple points given by people so far

- I plan on having no map. a journal is used to "record" each specific "item" you locate, but the object will only have a description and grid coordinates. but the journal will have like 30 pages so the player will know when they have found everything.

- is the idea of just finding things to see enough for the player or do they need the metroid power ups as a reward.

- do you think a world with exploration as an only goal will actually be enough for a player or does the average player need more.

[ஒழுக்கின்மை (Paul Eres)]

it's funny you'd ask this in this topic instead of making a new one (perhaps in the devlogs section) since the specificity of what you're asking is a bit off topic from whether exploration games are rubbish or not

anyway, my thoughts/advice:

- make the games you want, who cares about the audience. if you find exploration games fun, do it. even if it's just as an experiment to see if you or they like it. if you let doubts about whether people will like a game keep you from making it, that isn't really in the spirit of indie development, where people make whatever type of game they want, games they want to see made, not games they imagine others want to play. and certainly don't let haters like some in this thread (especially the OP where he says he rolls his eyes at people who say they enjoy exploration) keep you from it. so who cares if the average player needs more? if the average player needs shooting, would you add shooting? that's a ridiculous way to make games.

- there are already many games where exploration is the only goal which did okay. yume nikki and the path come to mind as almost there. those didn't have goals per se, but there was a  way to 'complete' the game, and get endings. for games with absolutely no goals other than exploration, and no endings / no way to end the game, those are rarer, but endless forest may qualify (and a lot of people enjoy that game, although it's an mmo exploration game rather than a single player). perhaps the closest analog to what you describe would be small worlds, which has a root world and four other worlds to explore, and after you've explored them all the game ends. but the exploration in that game was linear: there was a clear path through each stage to the end, and that may not be what you're going for. seiklus also had exploration, and collecting little floating things, but you didn't need to collect them (it was kinda optional, just there to tell you where you've been before or not). so if those games are any indication, exploration games usually find some optional indirect way to motivate the player, so you could do that, or not do that, as an experiment.

[tim_the_tam]

i personal hate games that rely on storytelling and at the same time have a exploration aspect in it because the exploration aspect tend to distract players from to plot and makes its hard to retain tension in climactic events. you all know that in zelda you can just run around, tossing chickens and cutting up grass for hours while your suppose to be saving the world. yes i know zelda does not have the greatest story but it shows how the simplest of story struggles with key moments. if that doesnt satisfy can give another example. ff10's story is considered by most "great" (but not me =P). yet as something big is about to happen and you to travel to one place to another, even with the game being linear there are paths joining the main route that almost forces you to explore that path because there are usually items to be found along it rewarding your ability to explore. however it makes the plot a lack urgency making it a distraction.

i understand the reason for exploration allows another option of play for the player but well, i know im repeating myself but it distracting them for other key aspects of the game as well as the artistic values of the game.

[JasonPickering]

you make a good point. also most RPGs have that last guy who says "are you sure you want to continue on and save the world? you might not be able to come back." in a more realistic situation he should be hurrying you right along, but would you feel okay if you were hurried along through this world without being able to even take a look around.

[jcsymmes]

One of the issues with any type of exploration game-actually any game is that i have never seen a game world that could actually function as any type of real world space.

Theres the issue that WOW azzeroth is actually about the size of detroit-everything is much more compact then when you walk around, spaces that are suposed to be contents are actually just a hop skip and a jump.

theres also the functional world. Most economies make no sence what so ever. There are no rug shops or shops that sell massonary equipment, or welding supplies or grocery stores that specialize in local produce. A lot of them are money issues have no reality. in 30s new york guns cost 100,000-they did in the first god father game. You can't buy real estate or after dinner mints.

The minute you walk out of a town in an rpg you get attacked by monsters-in a real world space you would need agriculture-lots of fields-borring fields but fields none the less. I rarely see any farmland unless its important to the plot.

Which is the big issue-if something isn't important to a plot you won't see it-there maybe one farmers house but rarely a 100. There maybe 10 villages with intresting stories but not 1000's. The world is a big messy space that a game designer couldn't hope to create in any kind of realistic detail. If they did it would loose the through line.

i like exploration games sometimes in there vairous forms-however its a problematic gentre which i can see-one that if your not into i think you could walk away from.

[ஒழுக்கின்மை (Paul Eres)]

that's the worst reason not to enjoy exploration games that i've ever seen (that they aren't as realistic or as complex as the real world). the very reason they're fun to explore is exactly because they aren't as complex or realistic as the real world.

[SirNiko]

Games like WoW create their own logic. Certain zones are attractive for farming, and so players flock there. Other zones are empty. Back when I played ages ago, the elven capital city was constantly empty, simply because it was inconvenient to reach and removed from any important locations.

Stranglethorn vale became a gank zone, not because the developers decreed it so, but because of the proximity to high-level dungeons and the convenience of the shipyard and blimp for transportation.

Attempting to force the population to behave the way you want by locating useful things where they realistically should go doesn't create any sort of exploratory element. You're just obeying the laws sent down from on high.

-SirNiko

[Chris Whitman]

Well, that's just because people are goal-driven, and WoW-the-game wasn't actually made with WoW-the-story in mind in the slightest.

Jon Blow's oft-repeated perspective on that is a positive one, I think. If the goals set out by the gameplay motivate people to behave in a certain way, and the story says they ought to do something else, they're going to follow the former and ignore the latter. It just shows the importance of a design that works as an entirety.

If you want to motivate people to explore in an MMO setting, why not hand out more than token experience awards for reaching a new place. Moreover, make areas difficult to get to (at least for the first time). Why not place an area behind a difficult instance? There's no reason beyond habit MMO structure has to be at odds with exploration.

[jpgray]

Noctis

Yes!  Awesome example.  Landing the little sphere on an alien ocean for the first time was amazing--the effects and scope the author wrung out of C are quite impressive.

Another one I would give as providing perhaps the ideal mix of unbounded exploration and fixed story would be Starflight.  Huge galaxy to explore, plenty of awesome and exciting things to do, great plot backing it all up.  The only problem with it is that replayability is nil, since if you've gone through it once, there's little left to see (even though you've likely only seen 10% or so of the gameworld).  The first-time feeling of landing on a strange world full of weird life, ruins, messages and artifacts, or exploring a strange and hostile region of space, though, is incredible.  It's perfectly designed so that you're -bound- to catch up with some piece of the plot just through exploring, and it feels incredibly organic and nonlinear.