Going for a stroll or drive around the world

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mikey_boson

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The other night, me and my brother were reminiscing about old games (as you do) and I started talking about GTA: San Andreas. I enjoyed the game a lot but I was more of a Vice City fan myself - however, this isn't my point. What I really liked is just getting in a car and going for a drive around. I loved getting outside of the big cities and driving round in the country for no other reason than just to drive around. My absolute favourite area to go was on the second island as the country roads winded their way around the hills and mountains - it was best if it was raining!!! :)

Anyway, my point is, on games such as GTA and nowadays Oblivion, Fallout and Skyrim, how many of you just 'go for a stroll' around. You weren't on a mission, you were just travelling round and enjoying the scenery? In these types of games it's so easy to fast travel from place to place just to get missions completed as soon as possible so I really enjoy it when you just go out for a wander into the big wide world!

Do you guys like going for a stroll and which is your favourite game for doing so?
 
Red Dead Redemption was a game I really liked to just stroll about in. I'd ride my horse around and just look at things.
I thought the scenery was really nice, and I liked that there was always something going on no matter where you went.
Sometimes the little scenes in the world repeat but it still felt really alive and there were always animals and stuff running around. I dunno, I just really liked everything about that game and really liked riding my horse about.
 
Like Bowie, I really enjoyed riding my horse around the world map in Red Dead Redemption. I found it extremely rewarding as there were always new things to discover - people on the road, people in obscure villages, horses in fields. Everything felt so alive. If that's not enough, the landscape was utterly gorgeous! :gasp:

When I first played Morrowind (in 2004/2005), I loved wandering around that map too, but too often found that I was underlevelled and couldn't access the places I wanted to visit without getting attacked by powerful monsters. :lew: This could have been due to my lack of personal skill at the time, but these games do require one to build their character first, which can make strolling more difficult as you run into trouble. :hmmm: Oblivion felt less alive than Red Dead... The landscape was GORGEOUS, but in terms of people, there weren't a great number of personalities. :sad3: Skyrim was pretty nice, but the characters still lacked personalities. :hmm: Consequently, I didn't enjoy wandering around these as much. :/
 
Very good thread.

I also loved GTA: San Andreas for this. It was my first real sandbox game on a large open world.

I used to drive around in the country listening to the Country Channel (whatever it was called) on the radio. It was incredible to me. It was very relaxing. Every now and then if I was by a road I'd kill a few people, explode their car. Then I'd get back in my car and calmly sit there to a good country tune. Sometimes it was so far out the police wouldn't arrive. If they did, I'd knock their car off a cliff and drive away. :woot:
The scenery and weather effects were quite good for the time, if I recall correctly.

I also enjoyed doing this on Red Faction Guerrilla.
The Martian landscape was truly stunning, and the soundtrack was fairly quirky and atmospheric. Sure a lot of Mars looked the same in some parts, but they did try hard to mix it up quite a bit. The actual landscape of the planet was mindblowing. My only disappointment with the game is how the settlements were mostly boring. There were a few settlements that were interesting and gave the impression of culture, but the rest of it was boring shell-like buildings with no personality. I hope if we ever colonise Mars we'd develop a culture and not just build concrete blocks.
Still, it was good to be able to drive through buildings, or to pick up your hammer and knock the foundations out of a building and watch it fall down on top of everyone. :woot: Red Faction in this way was very, very fun. I wish they'd do another sandbox Red Faction as I much preferred it to the FPS Red Factions.

Like Toni and Lirael I do also adore Red Dead Redemption... Both the classic game and Undead Nightmare!
Red Dead Redemption got it right in terms NPCs and random events. There were lots of things that would happen as you rode around the world... You could find yourself knocked off your horse by a cougar and mauled to death. You could find yourself sharing a campfire with a cannibal. You could find yourself rescuing a troubled girl only to find out that it was an ambush. There were lots of things that could happen. They did repeat after a while, but it often felt as if it had been a while since the last time, and hence that isn't too bad. There were also lots of games you could play with people in saloons. Don't forget also that you could also be a bit naughty yourself. I often lassoed people and put them on the back of my horse, never to be seen in their hometown again. :woot:

And for Undead Nightmare.... That just upped it once again. This is a rare gem. I've gone off the zombie genre as a whole, as it tends to be overdone... But this was done well. Cowboys and zombies mixed together seemed to work well. The random events for this while wandering around the open world were good as well. There'd be lots of zombies, and sometimes you'd get to rescue people from zombies who had set up gun posts. Sometimes you'd meet people out in the wilderness who had a camp, and some people had family members that had been turned and they couldn't bear to kill them so they just tied them up. I once saw one person mourning over a dead friend only to see the dead friend come to life and eat his mourner. :O

The magical horses were great on Undead Nightmare too... I used to like riding around on War... However a zombie bear knocked War off a cliff and it died. :sad2:

It sounds insane, and is, but it is a lot of fun.

What I didn't like as much for Red Dead Redemption is how the open-map free-roam online worked... They got rid of most of the NPCs... The towns were empty and none of the random events seemed to occur. That sort of thing made online quite boring after a while. Very good idea though, and I hope that something similar is done and improved on in the future.


Red Dead Redemption would probably be my favourite for this, then. Followed closely by the much overlooked Red Faction.
 
Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas has to be my favorite GTA game, loved it so much. I would put my own music on and drive around all the time. So, to answer the question, yes, I do like to go on strolls on games that allow it, like Skyrim and GTA. I haven't played Red Dead Redemption yet, but when I do, I will do the same. The scenery -- and though I've only seen people play it -- is very beautiful, so it will be enjoyable, or so I hope. The water looked absolutely amazing, though its probably because you can't go in it.

I really loved playing GTA:SA in the country side listening to to "Queen of Hearts" on K Rose. Most of the time, though, I collected all the bikes I could and just rode them around everywhere. I hardly ever did the missions, got distracted way too much. lol

On Skyrim, its not exactly the same. I don't intend to, but I see some nice scenery and I end up following it, until it eventually leads me to towns and other places. :x3:
 
I played Wild Arms 2 on the original Playstation as my first RPG, and the whole concept of a world map was very different in that game than most. The locations didn't simply show up as you wandered. You had this search function (via the square button I believe), and it would make items and locations appear at predetermined spots on the world map. You could even find optional dungeons if you strayed off the preset path, though a lot were too much for your level at the time. Having a dungeon with level 70 monsters and a level 85 bonus boss at the end was a little too much for my level 12 characters. :lew:

The best part about the exploration was you got vehicles to explore further areas. You got a hovercraft that could land in specific areas and a boat that could dock on any shore, as well as orbs which could teleport you to the outside of previously discovered dungeons and towns. Later on the hovercraft would get upgraded so that it could land anywhere, and the boat got upgraded so that you could summon it anywhere near a body of water. There were even underwater ruins and giant ruined sky cities you could discover completely by accident. And the best part was each dungeon you discovered was so full of life it was insane.

There would be journals of previous adventurers who had discovered these dungeons, unique dialogue between the characters, bonus bosses, more of the equivalent to Limit Breaks for your characters to use. Hell, by getting this malfunctioning teleportation gem (again, completely by accident) you would land in a small hut out at sea which had a mage who would teach your mage character new spells. A lot of dungeons also gave you extra summons.

I suppose the real open world example from this game comes from the fact that around halfway through the game, you can get an entirely optional sixth character by going through an optional dungeon. She would get lines in the story, places in any FMVs, and she herself would become capable of unlocking even more optional dungeons. The open nature of this game was ludicrous.

Skyrim too I suppose, but most of the above posters have already mentioned that. :lew:
 
Guild Wars 2 just became my favorite game to stroll through. There is just so much to see and do that you never get bored. You could be completely lost in it, and still never run out of things to do. The art direction is great and the graphics are amazing. I always find myself getting lost just looking at things or finding things to do. The world map is so large that it seems that you will never run out of things to find. Even with all the exploring that I did, I never once ran found any of the secret jumping puzzles. It just goes to show that the world is still full of secrets that I may never find them all.
 
Glad everyone else likes strolling around too! Also, thanks for mentioning plenty of other games that had worlds that were alive and interactive - i've now got plenty more games to go out and play on :)
 
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