IGN's top 10 open world games! Elden Ring is..

https://www.ign.com/articles/the-10-best-open-world-games

Number 5. Wow, IGN still has Breath of the Wild at number 1 despite Elden Ring's release!

Your thoughts, SW? What are your top 10 open world games? I'm a bit surprised Miles Morales on here.

Excellent list of games there and would probably be pretty close to mine. Breath of the Wild would be my number one as well. Would probably have Elden Ring up higher though, probably number 2. The only ones that I haven’t played from that list yet are Horizon Forbidden West and Miles Morales.

Not surprising...Belden ring isn't on the same level. It's very much copy pasta open world

What the hell is this list? ER is just a better BOTW in every way, so if BOTW is first, ER is actually first. RDR2 has a good main story, but that's all it really has, and that's nowhere near enough for an open world game. TW3 has the worst combat system of any open world games and the exploration is just bland. lol gta5. GTA being in front of ER is funny.

Elden Ring is just one big Souls game lol.

bit soon to be putting it in a list like that IMO. needs to percolate for a while.

I always liked ign, now this made me remember why. They are a very wise review site and one of the most credible and respectable.

My order from that list:

1. BotW
2. Elden Ring
3. Skyrim

Played Witcher 3, didn't like it. Don't care about the rest.

And that's a negative? What are the other games? BOTW is the emptiest open world game. The Switch can't handle more than 10 trees on screen.

Fitting... the open world in BotW is one of the most interactive sandboxes in gaming. Also the biggest map I have seen.

You can see where developers since have been influenced by BotW in designing their open worlds.

@SolidGame_basic: we agree on this fact. BotW >>> dark souls 4 aka Belden ring, copy pasta open world with massive bugs and performance issues

Elden ring is botw on steroids and in ultra difficulty mode. Loved both games but ER is the king right now imo.

I thought Softwenzen said that Elden Ring was the best open world game ever.

But according to IGN, the same source that takes points away for having too much water in a game, it's not even in the top 4.

Lol at GTA V and RDR2. These games play like ass.

For me it is Skyrim, Dragon's Dogma, Prey and Elden Ring. No order needed.

BOTW is more difficult than Elden Ring if you put it on master mode.

Celebrating empty worlds now? Interesting.

Helluva Recency Bias.

Ultima 7 is a game that made better use of its open world than all of these games minus BotW. And Miles Morales over the first one? Horizon forbidden west over GoT? Where is Minecraft?

And does Mount and Blade Warband count?

I wouldn't classify Mount and Blade Warband as open world, for whatever that's worth.

I think the bigger crime is ranking Witcher 3 above New Vegas. The Witcher series is probably one of the more overrated ones as of recent, and New Vegas is arguably the best Fallout game ever made. Forget that Elden Ring is just a better game than BoTW in every way, just having Witcher that high is insulting.

But it's IGN so who cares.

@Maroxad: Yeah, no on mount and blade, it was only open world on the over map. But once you went to battle it was open field. Love that game.

Good list here, although BotW is ranked a little low. BotW should be cloud 9, then rest ground level.

What are these takes?

If I knew nothing of ER and somebody described it like that, I'd imagine a game rich with interplaying systems, heavy on interaction, huge emphasis on traversal mobility, and plenty of gameplay elements beyond explore place and kill things.

ER is none of that, in many ways these games are diametrically opposed in their goals and execution. Which is fine, not a snub against ER, BotW isn't what I'd want from Big Souls.

Both games cut the player loose from the jump, but that's about it. If anything, when ER doesn't feel like a Souls game I find it loosely reminiscent of Morrowind.

I don't have a problem with this list, although I'd ditch Skyrim for Morrowind or even Gothic 3.

Call me crazy, but having recently started Cyberpunk 2077 following its 1.5 patch, I'd honestly consider putting it on that list. Did not expect to love it as much as I have.

I've got to disagree with each of these points.

The Witcher 1 was an instant classic when it came out, getting instant praise even before the Enhanced Edition fixed it. At a time when the biggest RPGs were Bioware's brain-dead one-choice RPGs ("are you the blue character or the red character?"), The Witcher showed you could have a rich, mature, subtle storyline with excellent choices and consequences. The Witcher 2 took all of that and added better combat and top-notch production values. Then The Witcher 3 somehow transposed all of that into a massive open-world RPG, at a time when the biggest open-world RPGs were barely functional potatoes like Skyrim.

New Vegas was great, but it was hampered by sharing a lot of DNA with the worst mainline game in the series, Fallout 3. For every bit of clever writing and world-building, there was an equal amount of mediocre production values and middling gameplay. The roleplaying options also took a huge nosedive compared to Fallout 2 - although it was still a great game.

I'll withhold my judgement of Elden Ring until I play it, although I doubt it will be as dynamic and interactive as BOTW, and I doubt it will be as challenging as BOTW's Master mode.

Ditto.

On the first point, no, not at all. ER is a scaled up Souls game. Way static by comparison.

Challenge though? 😂

Master mode makes the first few hrs of BotW more interesting than normal, but quickly tapers off. About 5 hrs in it didn't feel all too different from a normal run. Was way disappointing.

ER is significantly more challenging from the get go.

BUT IGN

Metal gear solid 5 sucked, wouldnt even be on my top 50

Cant talk about Spiderman:MM but the open world in the original Spiderman was rubbish

@hardwenzen: At the end of the day you can't spell ignorant without IGN, and I have evidence to back up my claims.

I agree with this Pokemon Go enjoyer.

Elden Ring is a better game in nearly every category over Breath of the Wild. I'd debate anyone on that

@hardwenzen: I can't say I've ever downloaded Pokemon Go.

@Fairmonkey: not really. Elden Ring has no traversal, no puzzles, not much as far as quests, no cool environmental effects, physics, collecting. It's just one big Souls game.

@SolidGame_basic: Let's compare Breath of the Wild to previous Zelda games. Breath has a worse story, no memorable story moments, worse characters, worse dungeons, worse enemy variety, not nearly as memorable music, no musical instrument to use, no cool transformations like in child/adult in Ocarina, three masks in Majora, or wolf link in Twilight, no cool items to find like the hookshot or lens of truth for example, and worse weapon durability. Breath of the Wild is also in my opinion too big with too much empty space. I would have greatly preferred a world half the size but filled with more content. Every Shrine in Breath has the same boring elevator music and bland art style. All you get for beating them is a boring health or stamina upgrade. So yea Breath of the Wild isn't a 10/10 and it's overrated as hell and I've been a lifelong zelda fan.

Elden Ring has better technical graphics, frame rate, environment design, enemy and boss art design, enemy variety, combat, weapon durability, gameplay depth and mechanics, replayability, and better rewards than Breath of the Wild

Elden Ring has horse that can double jump, fly high in a gust of wind, and fast travel so that's good enough traversal for me

No puzzles. Yea Zelda wins there but every shrine has same music and art style and rewards were weak. Figuring out how to beat bosses in Elden Ring is a bit of a puzzle in a way also

Quests: I honestly don't remember any memorable quests from zelda to be honest

Environment is fine in Elden Ring. Google the Raya Lucaria Academy and tell me that is not one of the best looking areas you have seen in a game

Collecting is more rewarding in Elden Ring. Instead of a crappy health or stamina upgrade i find a sword that shoots fire or the ability to throw lightening and stuff

MGS V really IGN? it has one of the worst blandest open worlds ever created.

@Fairmonkey: Bro, Elden Ring has average user scores in the 6's. Get that blind fanboy shat out of here. BotW is leagues above Elden Ring, even fans agree, BotW is one of the greatest games of all time. Elden Ring is nowhere near the best Souls game. You have to hit a certain bar to even get in discussion with BotW. And trust me, crap user review averages like Elden Ring has isnt even close to BotW's bar.

@hardwenzen: Red Dead Redemption 2 has a good story and that's it? Did you play the game? Hunting, playing dominoes, poker, solving mysteries about serial killers, racing, not to mention the fact that eating and drinking actually meant something, etc. There was so much to do in the game that I literally got lost in it. We get it, you love Elden Ring but some people prefer other games over it and that's cool lol

Pokemon Nap i mean🤮

You're talking to someone who played the damn thing for 300 plus hours of it. I know VERY well how the game is structured. There are some fun little side quests, but there isn't many of them and they're very short. You're mostly roaming beautiful scenery and collect 1230943982349802 consumables for you and your horse. Such a vast open world, but there's nothing interesting for you to collect. RDR2 needed to be an rpg for the world exploration to be fun and engaging. And i liked the game, but gameplay wise it ain't got crap on ER.

I don't know if I'd call Elden Ring the best open world game of all time or not, but in my opinion it's certainly better than the games listed above it. I guess The Witcher 3 is the closest to me personally. I would put Elden Ring, Morrowind, Oblivion, The Witcher 3, A link to the past (yes it's technically open world), survival games like Ark/Atlas/Conan Exiles, Kingdom Come Deliverance, various MMO's, various RPG's including turn based as well, a couple looter shooters, a couple open world action games like Assassins Creed (only a couple though), games like Mount and Blade, various procedurally generated open worlds, etc. above most the games on this list. I wouldn't put 1,4,7, and possibly 8, 9, and 10 on a top 20 list.. That said, opinions and all that.

@hardwenzen: I'm not comparing it to ER. I'm just saying that it definitely had more content than just the main story. It also deserves it's place on this list. I'd replace MGS5 with Ghosts of Tsushima, though.

No doubt that Elden Ring is amazing, it's just not an amazing open world game. Yes, it's non-linear nature is great, gameplay is great, design is great, but if you compare it to what other open world games offer, it's very narrow.

I get why people love the Witcher but I personally would give is a solid B-. Gameplay is ho-hum, and it suffers from too much dialogue crap like BioWare games (which you've unironically used as a comparison). I simply don't think there is anything that it REALLY excels at. It's just good at a lot of things and it unfortunately isn't one of those 'greater than the sum of it's part' scenarios.

I won't criticize people for liking FO2 more than New Vegas though. They are fairly close and made by the same team. I personally just love the Mohave and setting of NV more, especially given the dynamic nature of the world with reputation and factions. If I put NV head to head with TW3, NV comes out on top each time (dated graphics and all).

As for BoTW it simply won't be a challenge like Elden Ring. But it doesn't have to in order for people to enjoy it, I get that. But BoTW just doesn't have very rewarding dungeons. Items, weapons, clothes, all pale in comparison to the rewards structure of Elden Ring given the builds and play styles available. At the end of the day Elden Ring has a much more compelling core gameplay kernel which drives all of it's world activities to be higher quality than BoTW.

Of course it deserves a place on the list, but no way in hell does it deserve to be in front of ER.

@SolidGame_basic:

Spiderman ps4 is 100× better than Miles Morales. And any list that has the monstrosity that is Phantom Pain is a list not worth taking seriously.

Not a bad top 4 tbh. Id swap GTA5 and RDR2 around though.

@pelvist: Agreed. Red Dead Redemption 2 honestly puts GTA V to shame imo. Now the online that's another story, though.

Far cry 2 is still best open world game.