Open World Games have the possibility of keeping gamers engaged for many hours longer than linear game experiences. While linear stories simply take the time that is needed to complete them having a more open ended structure allows you to explore and take your time with the environment, especially when it comes to completing side objectives.
A huge problem that a lot of Open World Games have however is having meaningful side quests instead of simply filler or collect-a-thon based missions. I personally despise collection missions as I don’t like scouring an area to find one or two things without having a meaningful story or reward at the end of it. Thus a huge problem is created: you want your players to have a lot to do in this massive world that you created but you don’t want them to just do meaningless tasks like kill three of a certain kind of enemy. This balance needs to be taken into consideration when making side quests, or at least an interesting story or motive needs to be included so that you feel like there is an actual purpose to what you are doing and not that you’re simply killing time to increase an XP bar.
That’s all for now, and as always. It’s not just a game, It’s a Life.