Greg Lobanov

small game design thing I've been learning: giving the player a ton of things to do and making them figure out how to progress sucks. good "open" design still shows a clear objective, and then also lots of other fun/intruiging things to do that distract from the critical path

it feels like giving the players lots of stuff to play with directionlessly will let them appreciate all the elements at their own pace, but usually it does the opposite. it's frustrating cuz they don't know what they're supposed to do and that can be where the game loses them

i know a few people who bounced off BotW for exactly this reason and it's a shame

I felt like botw does this really well! (that's what inspired me to think about this). super-visible map towers from far away and constant map markers to the next story objective... ignoring those is such an intentional, fun choice to get to make (for me anyways)