>>42461728>>moving the goalpostI'm not moving the goalpost. The Wild Area is bad by open world standards for the past, at least, 20 years. Open world is still bad, non-existent game design however. The majority of playtime in any open world game is running through needlessly immense environments, be they fields, towns, whatever. The rest of that time is spent doing mundane quests in said environments. While people here were jerking off in awe over Castelia and Luminose cities and thinking of how glorious full scale 3D versions would be, all I felt was pain (them being divided up like mad by loading screens didn't help). For rpgs 2D >>>>> 3D and thats a fact. RPGs used to have level design, actual labyrinths, towns that actually existed and weren't but a mere mirage (hello Turrfield), and so on. The topdown view alone was perfect for creating uncertain twists and turns and the illusion of non-linearity. The Wild Area may be tiny by open world standards but the trademarks of shit are all there. Its empty yet they want you to spend a ton of time there (can't complete the dex without it, its the postgame zone, raids, berries, watts, TRs). The daily weather system reinforces how much they want you to be there for pokemon catching purposes. They even put a daycare in it. Yes, you pass through it only twice throughout the main story but even not exploring it and going from point A to point B is still a crawl. And if you intend for the game to have staying power then you'll be doing raids out the ass which entails spending loads of time running around through each and every zone to hit up the daily login bonu... I mean daily raid dens, then each of the new ones that pop up after you've cleared that set. An entire game setup like this would be an absolute travesty.
