Open World Game: The Open World Game | a Review
originally published on 05/11/2022;
Hello everyone, I am the openly worldly G.E.M.Simov, a game-ish goon, here to tell you about the joke game called: “Open World Game: The Open World Game”.
Simple review details - I rank games on an out of 10 basis, granting up to 3 points in 3 categories, as well as a last, single point from my own self, depending on my experience with it.
Gameplay
This game is a top-down ARPG. It’s actually like Skyrim, if you put in some effort, imagining the vistas and all the sights, as well as all the Non-Player Characters and… Well, it’s actually a lot more like a more recent Assassin’s Creed or Far Cry or Ghosts of Tsushima game. You’ve got a very cool story - more on that later - told to you through a very specific set of means - more on that later - and you’ve got a mountain of things to do while exploring the world.
It is EXACTLY like those aforementioned games. You’ve got a big map, you navigate the world by pressing the WASD keys, or the Arrow Keys, you can play with a controller (very cool). You can press the Escape key to access the menu, which contains everything you really need. It features all the bars (that fill up the more things you collect), shows you your level and the progress you’ve made on your way to the next level, shows you your skills, and even your achievements - what you have and have not unlocked.
It’s very handy, but it’s not actually that important, because there’s little gameplay related to it. The gameplay, however, is found on the map. There, you’ve got a plethora of different things to do. There are Exclamation Points, which have you press a series of buttons (Arrow Keys) in succession.
You could do Question Marks, which have you press a series of buttons (the Arrow Keys) in succession. You could do Hearts, which require of you to press a number of buttons (the Arrow Keys) in the right order (shown to you on the screen). You could do the Eyes, which require that you press the Arrow Keys in succession.
Dear reader, you are catching on, right? As mentioned, this is a parody game, but it happens to do the thing it is parodying quite well. The movement is very smooth, even if it feels as though it is a tad too slow, and then the only aspect of the game that is actually in the game, and that is the main focus of the game, is done quite well.
THIS is the feeling, the intent, that should be getting put into games that see something as an issue and supposedly move in to fix it. Imagine one of those idle games that rile against grinding so much - they fix the grinding by making it happen by itself, but there still IS grinding. If the grinding was NOT a factor, then the issue of grinding would have been fixed. In this game, the issue of samey gameplay that doesn’t really lead anywhere (Assassin’s Creed: Odyssey; Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla; FarCry 4; FarCry 5; FarCry 6; FarCry 7[?], any AAA open world game after Skyrim) is solved by removing it.
There is no wasting of time, there is nothing at all, there’s only the checklist. Get all the checkmarks. It’s laser focused, and that makes it entertaining on an entirely factual level, disregarding the meta implications of it. It does not matter that this is a parody game, what matters is that the act of going around and collecting the collectibles is actually FUN. I want to do that. I think it’s cool, and I enjoy doing it, and, somehow, this game takes a concept that’s almost always poorly executed and makes it work NIGH FLAWLESSLY.
How? I can’t tell, because it’s monstrously simple. I suppose it’s owed up to the fact that humans have this hunter-gatherer brain disease, and we love collecting random garbage, as though we were magpies, but it makes me feel good, so I’ll keep doing it.
Best part of this game might be the fact that it takes you around an hour and 10 minutes to get EVERYTHING. Still, though, it is a parody and it is lacking, so I can’t, in good conscience, give it the highest grade. 2/3
Presentation
This game is a top-down meme of an experience. Everything the Player sees is a map, the Player Character (who is an arrow) and all the objective markers. That’s literally it. It’s simple and concise.
In the music department, the game is lacking… There is some music, but it isn’t anything exceptional. In the sound department, the game is also lacking. Sure, it is satisfying, it is decent, but it’s not something superb. It’s just okay. There’s a different tune whenever a different arrow key is pressed for the ‘minigame’ of it, and the pitch of the tunes is different for different objectives, but that’s that. Nothing too special, though the map, itself, is quite nice. 2/3
Story
We come to a surprise upset. Here I am, thinking that the game was really good off of its gameplay, and I thought that there would be no story - after all, that’s almost how AAA games treat story. Turns out, however, that there was story. A lot of it, as every single collectible comes with its own journal entry, and some of those can be quite lengthy.
Naturally, it is all a big joke, satirizing the genre, making fun of the common tropes - all that jazz, but it’s interesting. How will the funny be implemented here? It was not something outstanding, but it was entertaining and interesting enough to nudge me towards reading all the Journal entries. Some didn’t need to be read, but others were quite amusing to flip through. 2/3
Legendary Point
Does this game get the legendary point, so craved and wanted by all and none at the same time? YES, of course, it does get the legendary point. I already said it in the Gameplay part of the review, but somehow I really enjoyed playing the game, collecting the things… And I think we need more critique to be presented, more outcry, more complaints to be leveled in the face of the regurgitated games we’re getting.
This one might be old, but it is good. We need more like it, and we need the critique to become so unbearably poignant that we can’t even play the joke games! 1/1
Conclusion
7/10. This is a great game, when it comes to Open World RPGs. It’s ACTUALLY good when put up against games of that genre. Play it if you’re a fan of said games, or play it, regardless. It’s a good bit of fun for an hour.
I tuck it under my belt, another shining achievement that I proudly display. If only there were more like it…