Johnnie Baldwin

Updated on August 22nd, 2021 by Ritwik Mitra: When the topic of open-world games is brought up, most people think of games that take hundreds of hours to complete. After all, the very concept of open-world gaming has been attached to lengthy titles for the longest time; however that isn't necessarily the case. In fact, there are several games that adopt the open-world formula, but craft titles that serve as short and concise experiences. Keeping this in mind, here are some of the shortest open-world video games ever m

Horror games are a great way to show off new technology, allowing for features like ray tracing to really shine, so it's no surprise that Microsoft took advantage of that during the Inside Xbox event. Microsoft has already announced it will be holding monthly Xbox Series X streams over the summer as part of its Xbox 20/20 initiative, and Sony is yet to properly reveal the PlayStation 5 to the world, meaning that with or without E3 2020, there's going to be plenty of next-gen news on the horizon, and more horror games to be revea

The Amazing Spider-Man 2 barely counts as an open-world game. Though players are technically free to explore a portion of New York City as the wall-crawler, missions are all linear and repetitive, and the whole thing wraps up somewhere after the six-hour mark, and that's taking into account some seriously boring padded sequences and the atrocious Peter Parker investigation segme

After the success of P.T. inspired psychological thriller Layers of Fear in 2016, horror game extraordinaire Bloober Team followed it up with the cyberpunk-themed psychological thriller, Observer for PC, PS4, Xbox One , and Nintendo Switch earlier this year. It's next game, Observer: System Redux is effectively a next-generation port, taking the original game and updating it with enhanced visuals and gameplay, as well as brand new story content . Observer: System Redux is coming to PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X in the fourth quarter of 2

When I say this game aspires to be Paper Mario , I'm not talking about a few little touches here and there. From the second you load up Bug Fables, you will know that this is a Paper Mario game in practically every way except the name. Each character is a flat 2D model with big fat black outlines walking around a 3D world. The art style looks simplistic, as if it was drawn by a crayon-wielding kindergarten class, yet it's bursting with life and personality. Even the music evokes the soundtracks of Nintendo's games, with songs that reminded me of Final Fantasy games, Donkey Kong Country , Earthbound , and of course, the Paper Mario ser

In between battles, your party of three will travel to various locations that will require some platforming and puzzle-solving to obtain the next artifact. Each character has a special ability that can be used to get past hazards and giant gaps. Vi's "Beemerang" can be thrown to activate switches and cranks as well as gather items that are out of reach. Kabbu can use his horn to move objects and cut through grass. Leif can use his ice magic to freeze water and enemies so they can be used as platforms. Figuring out which abilities need to be combined to traverse Bugaria's harsh landscape was never very challenging, but it still managed to be a fun part of the g

This will especially be the case if you're a fan of the first Paper Mario game or its sequel Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door . Bug Fables does everything in its power to be a spiritual successor to those games, and it comes insanely close to being a complete succ

This all raises quite a few ways that the morality system for Fable could change , but the key factor will be making it less black and white. Villains portrayed simply as those that needlessly slaughter citizens isn't an engaging way to portray a character anymore, even if those actions are "villainous." Instead, it's important that Fable introduces some level of ambiguity for decisions to the next game, and shows players the weight of their acti

That being said, it's a necessary change for a modern title. Ideally, there will be a balance between the old system and the creation of the new one, though, with no game confirmed so far, it's difficult to say what exactly that will look like. Fans may get a decent idea if the game is announced at Xbox's July event, though they'll just have to wait and find

Xbox has shown that a freedom-driven, open-world experience can be accomplished with its first-party Adventure Game weapons Sea of Thieves from developer Rare (another UK-based studio like Playground Games, by the way). While Sea of Thieves had its own ups and downs, Rare successfully reinvented the game. Again, not that a next-gen Fable should copy Sea of Thieves , but hopefully learnings (and maybe even technology) from that game could be shared between Xbox's studios to influence Fable in a way that gives players that sense of freedom and helps the game achieve the grand RPG path that was originally envisioned with Project